Thanksgiving 2010

Thanksgiving art by Ethan

We say, ‘be thankful’ or ‘I am thankful.’

We ask our children ‘what are you thankful for?’

The question few people ask is, ‘WHO am I thankful to?’

I teach in public schools where this question is taboo. In this month of November we wrote poems, essays, lists and drew pictures of all the things we were thankful for without ever mentioning WHO exactly we were thanking. This is disconcerting to me.

Well, at the least, you would expect that schools teach students about Thanksgiving with historical accuracy. Sure, except you would have to search textbooks and children’s books on Thanksgiving with copyright dates that precede 1960 (or so) to find any references to God.

In 1621 the pilgrims did not celebrate bounty, they celebrated God’s provision. In 1863 Abraham Lincoln did not declare Thanksgiving a national day of ‘thankfulness.’ Abraham Lincoln proclaimed it, in his own words, “as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent father who [dwells] in the heavens.” Omitting God’s name from the historical account of this holiday is historically inaccurate.

This Thanksgiving, I am reminding my children that we are thankful to God.

This week I cannot shake the passage of Joshua chapter 4 from my mind, where God instructs the Israelites to take up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan River. The key to being thankful is remembering. The stones were to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever of God’s power and goodness. As we thank God, may we remember all of His great works.

This Thanksgiving, while we count our blessings, let's begin our list by saying, “TO GOD, I am thankful for…”