Remembering. Bringing to mind. Reminiscing. Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is remembering and as a Christian “thanksgiving” is remembering what God has done for you. It is remembering what He has said to you. It is recalling His promises yet to be fulfilled as well as recounting those which He has already fulfilled. It is bringing to mind once more the times when you have been granted and gifted even more than what you asked for, desired, or didn’t even know that you needed or would be good for you until you received it from God’s righteous right hand.
The whole life of a Christian is one that is centered around the activity of recounting, remembering and doing so in Thanksgiving. Why would you trust God or have faith in Him except that God has already given you His gifts of forgiveness of sins, of life, breath, and everything good and by faith you remember? Why would you pray to the Lord for help, for blessing, for yourself or anyone else except that He has already given it you before. You as a believer are called to remember this, and in this remembrance and thanksgiving for what has already been given to you, you may trust the promise to pray and hope for God’s ongoing guidance strength, and giving you what is best for your present and future good.
Therefore, the theme for every day but especially for a National day of Thanksgiving should be one of remembrance. Remembrance of the “what” and the “why” you can give thanks for. Remembrance too is the theme within the readings appointed for today.
In Deuteronomy, Moses tells the Israelites to “remember” many things. “Remember the whole commandment given. Remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness. Remember how He humbled, tested, taught, fed, and provided. Remember how your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years. Remember His commandments and His promise to bring you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing. Remember as you eat and are full to bless the Lord from whom the blessings come.”
Paul speaking to the Philippians, encourages them to “not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” How are they able to do this? Why can they believe that God will hear and answer their prayer so that their anxiety may be replaced with God’s peace? By remembering. “What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.” By recalling and meditating on the good things that God has done and promised. By focusing on the good around us and meditating on that rather than what the world is telling us that we lack. Instead of focusing only on the negative and the unhappy or our inborn sinful sense of “unfairness” and victimhood though God has given us more than we deserve, we are to recount and think about whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise.” In this way we are encouraged to trust, to hope, to have peace by the forgiveness of our sins.
Even in our Gospel lesson, the thanksgiving of the Samaritan former leper came from his “remembering”. He remembered; he remembered how just a moment before he had been sick, outcast, a man with a permanent death sentence, then he wasn’t. He was now healthy, able to be socially restored, a man with hope and a future life. And in this remembrance, he remembered who was the source of his healing. How could he remember and not give thanks? How could he not come running back in great joy, no matter how far the distance to the place of his Savior to speak his words of gratitude in the confession of his faith.
Dear friends in Christ, this is what faith is. This is what faith does. It is not only in the receiving, but it is in the reacting. Faith takes what has been given and immediately turns to the one from whom it has received and responds, not with a “oh is that all?” or “give me more more more!” Faith “returns thanks”. It responds in humble gratitude. Because faith also remembers what once was. Faith remembers that you and I do not deserve forgiveness of our sin. Faith remembers that sin is miserable and puts us in a hopeless death sentence. Sin makes us anxious because sin knows that it deserves nothing but punishment and hard times. Anxiety struggles with trust and so never finds peace. Faith remembers how that feels, remembers how that felt. Faith knows the change now granted by God’s grace. It knows, acknowledges, and glories in this grace as it remembers.
For faith recalls the proclamation of what has happened for it. That God loved the world. He loved and loves you and me. And in “remembrance” of that love and His promises, God has sent of Himself, His Son, to take what we deserve and He did not. He took on human flesh to toil in our temptations, our sin plagued life, while keeping the Law in its entirety so that in perfect innocence He would also take the punishment that we deserved, the righteous wrath of God. He died in agony so that we would receive life, and by life, I don’t mean an extra moment or year or more. No He came so that all humanity would not have just been wiped out from the earth and His sacrifice makes it so that the life that is promised is eternal life. A life of perfect flesh and soul living forever in the presence of our God and Savior free from the troubles, hardships, hungers, and dangers that we deserve and so often experience in part here on earth. The fullness of this promise is yet to come, but we have reason to hope because this promise has already been given to us even if only in part. He brings forgiveness of sins and by it, faith, life, and salvation in Holy baptism. He renews it in Holy Absolution, and confirms it and comforts our minds, bodies, and spirits by the meal of Thanksgiving which the Eucharist/the Sacrament of the Altar wherein Jesus comes to us with His crucified and risen body and blood to eat and drink in joyful thanksgiving.
So we gather here and remember and give thanks today and throughout our lives for this most important life giving gift of Jesus Christ our redeemer. And yes, we recall, recount, and give thanks tomorrow on the national day of thanksgiving for all the good that He has done that we are aware of from our youth until today, and bless and praise Him even for what protections and grace He has given that we are not aware. Let us give thanks before and after each meal, when we wake up and before we go to bed, thinking of all that he did that day and every day. He who gives us everything for the life of our body, for the salvation and upbuilding of our faith unto eternal life is indeed greatly to be praised, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen.
Pr. Aaron Kangas