Thanksgiving is a holiday tradition that dates back hundreds of years. Some say it is just a day of celebration and attempt to remove the religious significance from this great American Holiday -- while historical records show it was a time to give thanks to God.
When we think of that first Thanksgiving, most of us think about the pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock on Dec. 11, 1620, and the Indians, and the three-day celebration of feasting in 1621. They saw everything as a gift from God.
Even sorrowful things were allowed that perfected their character.
These were amazing Christians of great faith and outstanding examples for us.
Our nation today faces real and present dangers. Our citizenry faces challenges we've not faced in decades and it's more important than ever to understand how the power of praise and gratitude to God can be our pathway to victory.
Millions of Americans are doing what they can to keep the true meaning of Thanksgiving alive.
On this day of Thanksgiving, we too need to be thankful people. We can rejoice that God is with us... He is faithful... His word is true... and He has kept his promises.
Jack & Nineva Salley, Mesa
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Dale Whiting posted at 8:06 am on Wed, Nov 24, 2010.
Jack & Nineva,
I hope you are correct but fear that you are not. My concern is not so much whether or not "God is with us" but whether we are with Him. I doubt not that He is faithful, that his Word is true, and that He keeps His promises. But I do question whether we are true and faithful to Him such that He is bound to keep the promises made with us. It's a two way street, you know.
And while I do agree that the 1621 Pilgrims of Massachusetts were thankful for their preservation, largely at the hands of some of God's Great Children, the natives who appear in their own ways to have been close to Him, I also recall that by 1671, the discendants of these immigrants had largely wiped out or totally subjugated those who saved their ancesters. Get my point? We are totally inconsistent with ourselves and our history.
Paul tells us that "Charity never faileth." [I Corr. 13] But it did fail the natives who welcomed us ashore. So this Thanksgiving Day, let's memember whose bounty graced the tables of Plymouth in the Fall of 1621!
Accuracy posted at 9:59 am on Wed, Nov 24, 2010.
Dale Whiting…….. Your sermon seems to focuses on God's kind of love from the verses written by Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:08 – “Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.”
Or Love Never Fails.
“Proclamation of Thanksgiving” by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863: “I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”
Have a “Happy Thanksgiving!”