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A Blessed Thanksgiving Holiday to You
Autumn is such a beautiful time of the year particularly in the Northern Hemisphere. It is a time of the great harvests of the fruits of the earth. It is a time filled with brilliant fall colors that are literally radiant when illuminated by a brilliant blue sky. And it is a time of harvesting bundles of fruits and vegetables, and making vast preparations for the holidays.
In less than a week we celebrate our Thanksgiving Day Holiday. Can’t you just smell the apple pies, squash and pumpkin dishes, roasted turkeys, mashed potatoes, gravies, cranberry sauces? We get busy baking delicious foods. Depending on your particular ethnic backgrounds you can add even more of your own special dishes… spicing up the list even further.
This is a special time to unify and to gather around the table with our family and friends and intentionally say "thank-you" for each other, for the fruits of the earth that have been prepared in such a special way, and especially to thank God, our ultimate Creator, for all that we have. In this way, I have always viewed the family table as a sacred space.
Our Churches with their Communion rails and altars are sacred spaces also. We gather together in unity to give thanks to our God for the many blessings in our lives. Through Christ we are continuously given new life as we break bread together and give thanks.
We are called to bring the essence of this to our Thanksgiving tables so they can become a sacred space filled with God’s presence, God’s agape love. They can be a space filled with the harvest of another type of fruit, the fruits of the Spirit. And God calls us to harvest and prepare this fruit. Remember these fruits are growing within each and every one of us. God planted the seeds in all of us. We are called to nurture them and help them grow in one another to full fruition, and then to f harvest and share them among one another and with those in need.
With the harvesting and continual preparation of these spiritual fruits: love, joy, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self control; we are able to bring to our sacred tables the poor, the lonely, the destitute, the forgotten elderly, the sick, and even the stranger.
In 2nd Corinthians 9:6-15 and in Matthew’s Gospel, 25:35-40 we are reminded that we are called to give with joy and without being repaid….. Generosity….. We are called to bring to our tables the poor, the lame, the crippled, and the blind. Not just the physically poor, lame or crippled and blind, but also those spiritually impaired. We are called to unify and to break bread together in a way that says "Yes, the Kingdom of God is here and now." God’s Kingdom in the form of Jesus’ way, truth and life.
There are so many examples of this. There is the elderly person who is crippled physically and possibly mentally from a stroke and left in a nursing home day after day. Their spirit can become crippled too. Instead of love, joy, patience, and gentleness, they begin to exude anger, sorrow, impatience and gruffness. Is there a place for them at the Thanksgiving table?
Another example would be how we often hear the term "they’re the black sheep of the family". The one no one wants to invite to the table. I imagine most of us know of someone who is not welcome to the family thanksgiving table. And yet, God calls everyone to God’s table. God wants everyone to be fed by the fruits of the earth and the fruits of the spirit.
In other words, if they are not able to come to one family table, can’t they be welcome at another’s? Like mine or yours? I think what God is saying to us is that there are plenty of tables and fruit to go around.
Sometimes we are so hurt ourselves that we are not able to extend an invitation to the very person in our lives who needs to be invited. We may be so broken that we cannot do it this year. So we are called to work on our brokenness by turning to God for healing grace and for the nurturing and growth of our own spirits. In the meantime, perhaps we are able to invite to our own Thanksgiving table; our own Thanksgiving banquet; someone else with the hope and prayer that the one we cannot call this year, will be called by someone else.
God calls us to unity and to break bread together in generosity despite our own brokenness. To offer what we have to the marginalized without the expectation to be somehow repaid or recognized for our generosity. We are called to reach out and invite the other to our banquet out of genuine love, generosity, and faithfulness… out of the fruits of the spirit that are being harvested in us.
Let’s allow the rich sunshine, the rich healing grace of God into our own lives such that the fruits of the spirit are harvested and prepared in us just as much as we harvest and prepare the fruits of the earth for our special Thanksgiving Day holiday. Let’s reach out and invite someone to our banquet this year that is hurting. Let the healing grace of God work through us as friends, parents, siblings, children, spouses, and strangers as we extend, in generosity, an invitation.
Let us break bread together recognizing the need to give to one another an inclusive spiritual love and nurturing at all of our sacred tables, at all of our banquets, following the example of the essence of what it means to come to God’s table.
Wishing you a blessed Thanksgiving celebration. May we all break bread together in God’s name, sharing the fruits of the earth and the fruits of the Spirit. Let us give thanks for each and everyone one of us in God’s name, Amen.
Pastor Sandra 