Why I am Thankful!

Do you believe that America had a destiny when we first broke away from England?  Was there a purpose  that stretched beyond the desire for religious freedom? 

A purpose far reaching and benevolent, a place that has led to a place we now call home, where you have certain Inalienable (cannot be bought, sold) rights…..that include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

I do, I don’t believe it was coincidence that led to our beginning. 

Behind History is the compassionate hand of God, God had, God has, a plan for every life and every nation! Peter Marshal once said:  Our freedom does not mean that we can do whatever we please, but to please do what is right! 

This week Americans are reminded to be Thankful, it is the right thing to do!

The first Thanksgiving Day at Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Wampanoag Indians were the people who taught the Pilgrims how to cultivate the land.  The Pilgrim leader, Governor William Bradford, had organized the first Thanksgiving feast in 1621. He out of gratitude invited the Wampanoag Indians to the feast. 

The first Thanksgiving celebration lasted three days.  Mashed potatoes, pumpkin pies, and cranberries were not foods present on the first Thanksgiving's feast table. 

Instead there was... lobster, rabbit, chicken, fish, squashes, beans, chestnuts, hickory nuts, onions, leeks, dried fruits, maple syrup and honey, radishes, cabbage, carrots, eggs, and goat cheese are thought to have made up the first Thanksgiving feast. 

The pilgrims didn't use forks; they ate with spoons, knives, and their fingers!

Today, we might banish them to the kids table for such conduct ;)

I learned this week that the first recorded thanksgiving took place in Virginia more than 11 years earlier, and it wasn't a feast.

The winter of 1610 at Jamestown had reduced a group of 409 settlers to 60. The survivors prayed for help, without knowing when or how it might come. When help arrived, in the form of a ship filled with food and supplies from England, a prayer meeting was held to give thanks to God. Today in the Word, July, 1990, p. 22.

As we all make our Thanksgiving plans this week, to ride the ribbon of America's highways to see familiar faces and places I am reminded of the timeliest, expression of provision in history!

Isaiah writes of The Lord Jesus Christ “The Suffering Servant”

Who has believed what he has heard from us?
    And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
2 For he grew up before him like a young plant,
    and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
    and no beauty that we should desire him.
3 He was despised and rejected by men;
    a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief
and as one from whom men hide their faces
    he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he has borne our griefs
    and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
    smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
    and with his wounds we are healed.
6 All we like sheep have gone astray;
    we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.  (Isaiah 53:1-6). ESV

Our Lords origin  is referred to as …a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. One writer stated: 

*Like a shrub in arid soil, the conditions of His earthy life will be unfavorable. Consider the family, locality and history of the Lord Jesus Christ. He came from nobodies, who lived nowhere, but He saves the world! * Joel Gregory

I am thinking today of His Agony He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. (Isaiah 53:3).

You have been snubbed, so have I.  People who willfully divert their eyes from ours. It might have been in a relationship that had soured or a rude encounter with a salesman or waiter, but you know what it is to have someone who should acknowledge you, simply refuse to. In our experience, that may lead to a breakup, or a determination to not return to a certain business and give them yet another opportunity to discard us.

We have been snubbed, and we have snubbed others.  A homeless person at an on ramp tries to make eye contact, and we look away thinking the whole time, why is this light so long?

If you have ever felt an ounce of rejection or neglect our Suffering Savior felt a ton of it!

He came to his own people, and even they rejected him.  (John 1:11).NLT

He however did the one thing that allows us to know God! He offers during this Thanksgiving season the reason to be truly thankful! He is not looking away from you; He is looking at you, and for you!

Martin Luther once had a friend who couldn’t accept the fact that he was forgiven. He kept trying to make atonement for his sins to be righteous. Luther wrote him these words: “Learn to know Christ and Him crucified. Learn to sing to Him and say, ‘Lord Jesus, You are my righteousness. You took on you what was mine; you set on me what was yours. You became what you were not that I might become what I was not.”

Such an expression of love prompts forgiven hearts to be thankful every second of our existence!

On the cross Jesus accomplished only what He could!

 *The sins, of the world were compressed upon the Lord Jesus Christ, in that time. All of the sin of the world was distilled upon Jesus. He didn’t just take my sin; He took OUR sin—the sin of the world. All of the adultery; the blaspheming; the rape; the murder; the hatred; the immorality—it was all upon the Lord Jesus. And, it was on Jesus, in a sense, for all eternity. Jesus suffered an eternity of Hell upon that cross. Hebrew scholars say Isaiah 53 uses an extensive plural when speaking of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ, It’s like saying “He died a thousand deaths”. Only Jesus died billions of deaths! *Adrian Rogers

He is why I am Thankful!