Thanksgiving - November 24, 2016

Saying Grace

I don’t know if anyone has ever done a study, but I imagine that a higher percentage of people and families say grace over their meal on Thanksgiving than on any other day.  In fact, I expect that quite a few people say grace only on Thanksgiving and not at any other time or occasion.

If you think about it, it’s actually kind of a funny phrase: to say grace.  If you asked a ten year old to say grace, wouldn’t the natural response be “grace?”  What the phrase means, of course, is to say “a” grace.  And a grace is a prayer.  A prayer of thanksgiving or praise.  A prayer invoking God’s blessing or grace.

Incidentally, the dictionary definition describes a grace as a short prayer, something to remember at the Thanksgiving table.

As I was browsing information on graces I came across one that said:  May God’s grace hover at our table this day.  Hover.  I like that tangible, visible image of God’s grace or blessing as something we can see.

Because, although we ask God to bless, to lend his grace, we don’t really need to summon or conjure God’s grace.  It is already with us.

What we are doing when we say grace is making ourselves aware, opening ourselves to the action of God’s grace, tuning our ears to hear and our eyes to see God’s blessing.  The action or change that we pray for is not in God, but in us.  We are not saying:  Hey, God, I know you weren’t going to come to our Thanksgiving dinner, but now since we’ve said grace, we know you’ll change your mind and show up.  Rather, we are saying:  Change us, transform our hearts to see your grace with us, that we may live more faithfully and more gratefully.

It’s too bad that we say grace so infrequently.  Think how gloriously we might be changed if we said grace at more meals, or even at other times in our lives.  If we could open ourselves to see God’s grace hovering over us, enfolding us, in other daily activities as well as eating.

I have a book that is an anthology of prayers (The Oxford Book of Prayer, ed. Appleton).  It contains a group of prayers written by Chinese Christian women and men.  I don’t know anything about the origin or history of the prayers.  But they are written to accompany the tasks of daily life.

A prayer, a grace when opening a door:

A pray thee, Lord to open the door of my heart to receive thee within my heart.

Help me to see your blessing and grace with me as I open a door.

On pruning a tree:

I pray thee, Lord, to purge me and take away my selfishness and sinful thoughts, that I may bring forth more fruits of the Spirit.

A grace while posting a letter:

I pray thee, Lord to add to me faith upon faith, that I may always have communication with thee.

When planting, or sowing seed:

I pray thee, Lord, to sow the good seed of virtue in my heart, letting it grow by day and night and bring forth a hundredfold.

When drawing water, or, as we would say, turning on the tap:

I pray thee, Lord, to give living water to quench my thirst, and wash away the stains from my heart.

A prayer when boiling water for tea:

I pray thee, Lord, to send down spiritual fire to burn away the coldness of my heart and that I may always be hot-hearted in serving thee.

Think about saying grace more often.  Praying for the awareness of God’s grace and blessing with us and giving thanks in all of the activities throughout our daily lives.

Thanksgiving Day

Le Jour de l’Action de Grace

Thanksgiving. Thanks. Giving. Giving thanks.

As the name implies, from its earliest celebrations this day in this country has been about GIVING thanks, the action of giving thanks.

It is a good time to pause and count our blessings, to bring to mind the things we are thankful for. But that’s not the stopping point. This holiday is about giving thanks. At a minimum that means giving voice to our thanksgivings. Saying thank you to God, to defenders of liberty, to family members, to those have given us the things we’re thankful for.

But this year Mary Schmich of the Tribune has given me another insight into this holiday. In a recent article she notes the Spanish and French names for this “quintessentially American holiday:”

El dia de acción de gracias. Le jour de l’action de grace. 

Our English composite, smushed together, word “thanksgiving” doesn’t exist in Spanish or French. Thanksgiving becomes acción de gracias or l’action de grace. The day of action of thanks. Or the day of action of grace.

Today is a day to undertake graceful actions. To do things that are grace-filled.

How do we do that?

Maybe one way to start is to begin in those places where we are thankful. And then act upon that thankfulness. Share, nurture, celebrate those things we are thankful for. Many of the meals and gatherings of this day will indeed be grace-filled. Although for many people family gatherings can be fraught. Focus on thankfulness. Seek and share grace. Grace is in these gatherings. Name it; share it.

I saw some grace-filled action earlier this morning. At my neighbor’s across the street, extended family is gathering, undoubtedly to share a feast later today. But this morning, some of them were out raking leaves, including a boy who must be about five, wielding a full-sized rake. With energy, joy and grace. A task that might seem onerous, filled with grace because it was shared, part of the blessing of family.

Start in the places of thanksgiving. If you are thankful for the beauty of creation. Get out in it. Take a grace-filled walk.

At last night’s interfaith community Thanksgiving service, Pastor Claude King asked us to imagine our perfect Thanksgiving. What is your image of a perfect Thanksgiving? What needs to happen for that to be a reality? In your life? In our community? In the world?

Whatever it is that needs to happen… do it. Those will be actions of grace.

Thanksgiving. A day for grace-filled actions.

Thanksgiving Day

An Attitude of Dependence

Thanksgiving is a feel-good holiday. For most people, at least, it is about good times, family, and good food.

A clergy mentor of mine once told me that on holidays like this the only roll of the homily is to evoke that good mood. To evoke feelings of warmth, gratitude and the aroma of roasting turkey. Actually, at the time he was mostly talking about Christmas and Easter. And I generally agree with him. However tempting or important it may seem to a preacher, Christmas and Easter are not the times to rage against secular culture or to launch into a complex theological treatise on the nature of the incarnation or the resurrection.

But I just can’t do it on Thanksgiving. I just can’t preach a sermon that is evocative of a warm feast and nothing more. Any of you who come regularly to these services know that I really struggle with preaching Thanksgiving. The traditions of Thanksgiving are wonderful, but when we try to bring the holiday into the church, it gets very complicated. Fraught with all sorts of theological pitfalls.

One is a sort of spiritual smugness. A well-intentioned effort to be grateful that ends up focusing on the special gifts that have been given just to us. Spiritual smugness. Please be careful. It is one thing not to take for granted the gifts we have been given, however they have come to us. It is a good thing not to take for granted the special gifts we have been given. It is a very different thing to thank God for privilege and plenty that other people have been denied. Please think twice about thanking God for privilege and plenty that other people have been denied.

As I was stewing over this yet again this year, I remembered one of my favorite prayers in the Prayer Book. It wasn’t in the 1928 book; it’s one of the great additions to the current book. In seminary we called it the Charlie Price General Thanksgiving. Charlie Price had input in quite a bit of the current book. He wrote this prayer; it’s in the back with the extra thanksgivings. He was on the faculty at Virginia Seminary when I was there. (I’m thankful for having known and learned from Charlie).

The thanksgiving includes this line: "We thank you also for those disappointments and failures that lead us to acknowledge our dependence upon you alone."

Every part of that sentence is important. We thank you. We give thanks. Not just for stuff we have, but for disappointments and failures. We give thanks for disappointments and failures. But not just because they are good for us. And not for all disappointments and failures. We give thanks for those particular disappointments and failures that lead us to acknowledge, to recognize, what is already true. That we are dependent upon God. God alone.

Disappointment and failure are not the only way to come to an acknowledgment of our dependence on God, but they do seem to be particularly effective.

So for Thanksgiving this year, to modify a popular cliché, I’m trying to cultivate, not an attitude of gratitude, but an attitude of dependence. An attitude of dependence upon God. To be mindful, aware of my dependence upon God for all that really matters.

And it’s a wonderful place to be. To be aware of dependence on God is a wonderful place to be. Not because it’s “character building” to be put in my place. Not because it’s some sort of spiritual “consolation prize” in times of personal failure. To rest and trust in God to provide what I truly need, maybe not everything I want, but to depend upon God to provide what I truly need is a wonderful attitude to live with.

I am reminded, too, of a line from one of my favorite hymns: “I came to Jesus as I was, so weary worn and sad; I found in him a resting place and he has made me glad.” He has made me glad. Even if you’re not weary worn and sad, resting in Jesus is a place of comfort, of gladness.

Dependence upon God means acknowledging that my happiness or success or fulfillment is not dependent upon the things or even the people of this world, but upon the love and presence of God with me. It is to find a place of surpassing comfort, peace and gladness. To acknowledge dependence on God alone eliminates the fear of loss. It eliminates anxiety about failure in the endeavors of the world. It is a place to rest in joy and hope.

This Thanksgiving, join with me in trying to cultivate an attitude of dependence. Dependence upon God alone.

Thanksgiving

Grateful For How God Made Me

I’m seeing “30 days of thanks,” “30 days of thanksgiving” everywhere this year. They are programs encouraging people to identify one thing they are thankful for every day over the course of 30 days. It seems everyone is doing “30 days of thanksgiving.” At least everyone on Facebook…

But we don’t need computer games, of course, to prod us to count our blessings. This season invites thankfulness, encourages us to count our blessings, to be grateful. Gratitude is a very good thing. And certainly each one of us has way more than 30 things to be grateful for.

Some of you may remember that last year I created a scheme with five stages of thanksgiving. Gratitude was stage two, one up from clueless entitlement. Stage three was donor appreciation— being grateful that someone has given us what we have. Stages four and five involve us making a response. Expressing our thanksgiving to the donor and finally sharing with others what we’ve been given.

But back to gratitude. These 30 day projects are good. We need to count our blessings. It occurs to me that we probably cycle through stages 2 through 5 over and over again. But we need to start with gratitude.

Reading what people have posted on Facebook, it’s mostly what you’d expect. People are thankful for family, the beauty of nature, freedom, friendship, the Thanksgiving feast or a favorite food. We all have much to be grateful for. I want to take that sort of list and stretch it just a bit.

One. In addition to gratitude for the abundance of the Thanksgiving table… In addition to gratitude for all of the people who planted and tended and transported that food to our tables…. In addition to gratitude for fertile soil and refreshing rains that nurture the growth of the food that sustains us… in addition to gratitude for these things, I’m grateful that God created us with senses of taste and smell. God created us with a capacity to enjoy food, beyond just eating it. I’m grateful for all of our senses, but Thanksgiving evokes taste and smell in particular. Smells and tastes that bring us joy; that nurture our souls as well as our bodies. And because we have the capacity to taste and see and smell, we also have the promise our senses may bring us new tastes, new joys yet ahead.

Two. In addition to gratitude for the blessings of the particular family members and friends who are a part of my life, I am grateful that God created us with the capacity and the yearning for friendship and love. God created us with a desire and an ability to form relationships. Relationships that enable us to be more than we could ever be on our own. And it is this capacity for relationships that enables to know God with us in our lives.

Three. In addition to gratitude for all of God’s creation, I am grateful for the spark of creativity that is within us all. Within us because we have been created in the image of the creator God. We can create. Creativity is a part of who we all are. This means we can be co-creators with God. New music, new art, new technical wonders are yet to be created.

Four. In addition to gratitude for the freedoms I enjoy in particular as a citizen of this country, I am grateful that God created human beings with a passion for justice and freedom. We are free because God created human beings with a passion for justice and freedom. And because God created us with a passion for justice and freedom this ensures that gratitude for freedom will not stop with us today in this country. In the future other peoples will come to have occasion to be thankful for new freedom and justice.

This Thanksgiving, I am grateful for all God has given me, but perhaps more profoundly, I am grateful for how God has created all of us. I am grateful that we have been created with the capacity for joy and wonder and the yearning to nurture our souls. And I’m grateful that we have been created in such a way as we have reason and cause to hope. To hope for new joys and wonders, to hope for richer relationships and an ever deepening faith. To hope for justice and peace and the coming of God’s kingdom.

Thanksgiving

Five Stages of Thankfulness 

At least in the era of modern psychology, it seems like everything is described in “stages.” There are the well-known five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. The psychologist Erik Erikson described human life as unfolding in stages of psychosocial development. They have fairly prosaic names like adolescence or middle adulthood. I was a bit interested to read that the defining conflict for middle adulthood, my current stage, is the conflict between generativity and stagnation.

If you google development stage theories, you’ll find listing of lots of other stages… stages of moral development, stages of spiritual development. There seems to be a development stage theory for everything in life.

 I am not an expert, but I think it’s accurate to say that all of these development stage theories are progressive. Human beings are perceived to progress, in order, from less mature or developed stages towards stages of greater maturity and sophistication. I imagine sometimes we get stuck or even backtrack a bit, but overall it’s a good thing to progress to higher and higher stages.

In this spirit of development stage theories, today I propose the five stages of thankfulness. It may be that some psychologist has written a dissertation on this or maybe there are a whole host of books on it, but I’m not aware of them. So these are my own, unscientifically constructed… Kristin’s five stages of thankfulness.

ONE. Stage one I call clueless. Clueless at least in the thankfulness department. Characterized by a sense of entitlement. What I have is mine. I deserve it. I have it. It’s mine.

TWO. Stage two is gratitude. I am grateful for what I have. It is conceivable that I might not have it. Perhaps I am aware of others who don’t have what I have and I am grateful. It seems to me that this stage is the primary focus of the thanksgiving holiday. To remind us to be grateful for what we have, to not take things for granted. Awakening gratitude is an important task. And, on the whole, I think most of us do pretty well. We are grateful.

THREE. Stage three takes gratitude one step further to what I call donor appreciation. Not only am I grateful for what I have, I am aware that someone gave me what I have and I am grateful to that donor. For example, not only am I grateful for the opportunities and freedoms I enjoy in this country, I am grateful to the wise and courageous founding fathers, who, in order to form a more perfect union, established this government and I grateful to soldiers and judges and citizens who preserve it. As Christians, aware of life’s blessings, we name God at this stage. We thank God for bestowing blessings upon us.

From clueless entitlement to an awareness of gratitude to thanksgiving for those who gifted us with good. Progress in the stages of thankfulness. It’s easy to stop at this point. But I have two more important stages of thankfulness. They both involve a response. A response from us.

FOUR. Stage four is giving thanks, expressing thanksgiving, returning thanks. Not just being thankful that you have a kind grandmother who gave you a really fabulous birthday present, but writing her a thank you note. Taking the time, the effort, the initiative to say thank you. Express thanksgiving. Offer prayer and praise to God in thanksgiving. Give voice to our thankfulness.

FIVE. Stage five is sharing. Sharing out of gratitude for what you have. And if you have anything to be thankful for, you have something to share. Not just giving out of a sense of obligation or responsibility or to meet a need, not that there’s anything wrong with that. But I’m thinking of sharing just for the sake of sharing. Because we can. Because we’re grateful. Because it’s a joyous way to participate in God’s own limitless generosity. Sharing seems to be the most spiritually mature, sophisticated stage of thankfulness. The stage that brings us closest to God. What are you thankful for? Warmth, love, creativity, friends, freedom, material abundance? All of these can be shared. Shared just out of joyful thankfulness that bubbles up and out into the world. Sharing as an expression of thankfulness.

Five stages of thankfulness. Stage one, a clueless absence, really, of thankfulness. Then gratitude, then an awareness of the donors and protectors of our gifts. And finally, our response. Expressing thanks, and ultimately, without reservation, in thanksgiving, sharing what we have been given with others.

May you know and share God’s blessings this Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving

Give Thanks for Giving

South Suburban Ministerial Association

Community Interfaith Thanksgiving Service

It may surprise you to hear me say that, as a preacher, I find Thanksgiving extremely challenging. It might seem like it should be a slam dunk. As a person of faith, giving thanks… giving thanks to God is one of my primary activities. Preaching on thanksgiving should be a simple pleasure.

But I find it very challenging to preach on this particular holiday. One of the challenges is unique to me as an Episcopalian. As we celebrate Thanksgiving as a national holiday here in America, part of our focus is on a historical event—the arrival of the Mayflower in 1620, the safe landing of the Pilgrims, and their spirited escape from religious persecution by the government and Church of England. The Episcopal Church in America is a direct descendent of the Church of England. The pilgrims were fleeing us.

In many ways the contemporary American Episcopal Church is a very far cry from the Church of England in the 17th century, but as contemporary Episcopalians we cherish much of what we inherited from that church. I give thanks for religious freedom, but I cannot demonize those from whom the Pilgrims fled. This business of claiming history as our own story is complicated… We might all do well to be reminded of that.

It is also challenging for me, and perhaps for you, to avoid a certain spiritual smugness as we undertake the task of counting our blessings at Thanksgiving time. It is good to be mindful of our blessings and to name them as blessings. But despite our very best and sincere efforts, it seems almost impossible not to end up thanking God that we happen to be on the right side of a world in which the distributive justice that I believe God yearns for is not realized. As we express our gratitude to God for all that we have been given, we do so in the shadow of those less fortunate. And I’m not talking about the 99% or the 1% in this country. Statistics are mushy, but I’m talking about the 15% who live below the poverty level in this country or the 25% of the world’s population that lives on less than a dollar and a quarter a day. I cannot thank God for data that indicate that the inequality of private consumption is growing exponentially.

Moving on… I do try to at least limit my Thanksgiving sermon rants…. But to name one final challenge for the Thanksgiving preacher. How can I possibly say anything tonight that you don’t already know?

Actually, I think it often is the preacher’s task to tell us things we already know… to give words to things that God has spoken into our hearts… to celebrate out loud the inner truths of life as God’s beloved people.

So let me tell you something I hope you already know. Let me tell you about the joy, and the blessing—of giving. The joy and blessing that are part of the experience of giving.

And I remind you tonight to give thanks for giving. To give thanks for the opportunities and the experiences of giving. I’m not just encouraging you to give, although I certainly do that. I’m encouraging you to give thanks for the opportunities and the experiences of giving.

There are many reasons to give of ourselves. We give back as a grateful response for what we’ve been given. We also give out of a sense of moral responsibility to care for one another. Those are values that many people might share.

Or we give just because it’s a joy and a blessing to give. Not out of a sense of obligation or as a specific response of gratitude at holiday time. Those are great, but giving just because we can is a source of joy and blessing. That’s the truth that God whispers into our hearts. That’s the experience of God’s faithful people. Faithful giving. Faithful giving brings us close to God. Giving, just for the sake of giving, is a way to share in God’s own life, to “partner” with God in God’s work. That’s an indescribably exciting and joyous experience.

So give. Your ideas, your creativity. And feel God’s creative spark kindle within you. Give your time. Give within your families. Give within your neighborhoods and your faith communities. Give your labor and know the sure guidance and unflagging zeal of God working with you. Give your laughter and your hopes. Give within the broader communities of the south suburbs. Give your music and your money. Give around the world; share with God in God’s own limitless compassion and generous love.

Faithful giving is a blessing. The opportunities and the acts of giving are something to be thankful for. So this Thanksgiving, let us give thanks for giving.

Thanksgiving Day

The Beauty of Holiness

It may surprise you to hear that preaching on Thanksgiving poses great risks for the preacher. Theological disaster lurks at every point. It is like sailing along the most hazardous and rocky of coastlines.

A big part of the challenge arises when we try to bring what is really a civic holiday into the church. Theologically speaking, our thanksgivings go awry. A recent blog linked on the Christian Century website listed many of the horrendous theologies that underlie much of our Thanksgiving preaching and piety.

But I will spare you the rant. I know that is not why you are here—to hear me rave against inappropriate Thanksgiving theology.

I do try, in my own prayers on this day, to focus less on counting my blessings, like a child counting presents under the Christmas tree to make sure there are “enough” or more than his brother has… (oops, I wasn’t going to rant.) I try to focus more on praying that God will transform me. I pray that God will transform me into a more grateful person. That God will give me a grateful heart for the benefits and blessings I do enjoy.

This year, in particular, I pray that I will remember to be grateful for the opportunity to worship. Not for the political freedom to gather for worship. That is a civic benefit we enjoy in this country, and one I think we should cherish and work to ensure that all people may enjoy that benefit.

But regardless of political time or place, human beings are created in such a way that we have the desire and capacity for worship. That’s really pretty remarkable and wonderful. Like remembering. Or creating. Worship is a part of our human potential. And I am grateful to have been created by God with the potential for worship, to be wired with the desire and capacity for worship.

The psalmist says, “I thank you that I am wondrously made.” Part of being wondrously made is being wired for worship.

Evelyn Underhill defines worship as: “The adoring acknowledgment of all that lies beyond us—the glory that fills heaven and earth. It is the response that conscious beings make to their Creator.” We have the capacity and the desire to adore the glory of God. Thank God that God has given us hearts to know and love him.

The psalmist also says, “Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.” The beauty of holiness surrounds us all. Regardless of the circumstances of our lives. Regardless. The beauty of holiness surrounds us all. And we have been given the ability to see it and a way to respond. It is a great blessing to be able to worship, to have a means of responding to the beauty of holiness in our lives.

Worship in this sense is more than coming together in corporate worship, although that is a powerful blessing. Worship is losing ourselves in the presence of God. Joining that “mystic sweet communion” that the hymn describes. It is to live praise. To celebrate the beauty of holiness.

It is a wonderful thing to be created with the desire and capacity for worship. For that, I thank God.