“THANKSGIVING EVE ”
Saint Luke 17: 11-19
The Eve of a Day of General Thanksgiving: 22 November Anno Domini 2023
Fr Jay Watson, SSP
We are a sad, pitiable, and loathsome people. We are selfish, ignorant, clueless, greedy, lustful, and just horrible people. I mean, do we not confess that we are sinners? And if we sin daily does that not clearly indicate that—of our old fallen natures—we are despicable.
Not all of you are equally spoiled. Some of you are physically worse off than others. Some of you are older than the rest gathered here—and thus you bear more the ravages of age. Not everyone has the same level of income, savings, and material goods that are desired. Yes. But most of us are ungrateful brats far too much of the time.
In the Old Testament times of the Hebrews/Moses, the faithful were constantly presenting to God, at the Tabernacle, “thanksgiving” offerings. These were animals to be sacrificed—blood and death and burning flesh. Physical, solid, and real!
In the Psalms, King David (and others) begin also to publicly offer up songs and words and prayers, and chants, of thanksgiving. The Lutheran Hymnal # 313—a communion hymn—“O Lord, we praise Thee, bless Thee, and adore Thee, in thanksgiving bow before Thee.” Esaias and Jeremias, equally, have passages where God’s people give thanks to The Lord; for He is good, and His mercy endureth forever. You believe that don’t you?
You do, but mostly, only when things are going well—by your own subjective definition and standards. You know better. You know the Law.
Even that wonderful Apostle of Justification speaks law to you: “be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made know unto God” [Phps. 4.6], and “rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving” [Col. 2.7]
There should be guilt produced in all of us because we are ungrateful and unthankful by our words and actions and thoughts toward our Creator/Redeemer/King/Lord and God. That is good. Guilt is the first step which leads to contrition…sorrow and repentance; and then turning. Oh, The Holy Ghost is good. When we are bad, He is still The Lord and Giver of Life. He shows us by The Word that we need, we must be thankful. He empowers us and constrains us to be truly thankful in the inner man—the Justified Saint!
In past sermons you have had Luther’s explanation of the 1st Article of The Creed spoken unto you. This was to remind you of all the things your heavenly Father has bestowed upon you. Again, not all of you have wife or husband; children. Some of you may not have the “clothing, shoes, meat, drink, and house” that you think you need—and maybe DO really need. Many do not have the eyes, ears, and ‘senses’ that would be beneficial to the tasks at hand which all Saints desire to abound in (good works). So yes, you do know why you should give thanks if you have all that the Reformer tells you God has given you. You know the Psalter and our meal prayer: “the eyes of all wait upon Thee, O Lord, and Thou givest them their meat in due season; Thou openest Thine hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.”
We know too that we can be, by God’s Grace, thankful even for the so-called bad things and situations that come upon us. Our want can supply the opportunity for some other Saint’s generosity and love to flower. Our pain, and our bearing up under it with hope and trust in ultimate deliverance through Christ, can witness The Faith to the unbeliever attending us. Our lack of “stuff” of mammon (which is why we fast and abstain during Lent…sometimes Advent) focuses us on the one thing needful—Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
Yes, even on Thanksgiving it all comes back not to us, not to our navel-gazing, but to Christ and His Redemption of us on the bloody tree.
The Gospel, the true Good News, is that God loves you, that The Lord loves and cherishes you even though you are a poor, miserable, and yes, un-thankful sinner. The Evangel trumpets into your sullen ears, the thankfulness That Jesus has for you—not because you deserve anything, but because He is merciful—“Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God” [Heb. 12.2].
And because it all comes back to our Lord’s Body and Blood given and shed at Calvary on the Crucifix, it also comes back to The Sacrament of The Altar.
Though the words thanks, thankfulness, thankful, and thanksgiving occur dozens and dozens and dozens of times in Scripture, the most important times is when your Lord Christ Jesus is about to feed you as He first fed others. First with His feeding of the 5,000 and then 4,000, but thereafter, until He comes again in Glory, the feeding of all His sheep, His Church catholic: “…and when He had given THANKS, He brake it and gave it to His disciples,” and “…when He had supped, and when He had given Thanks, He gave it to them,” saying “Take, eat, This is My Body; “Drink ye all of it; this…is My Blood.”
To be sure, He was thanking The Father for the food and drink, for the occasion to have His Last Supper with His own, before the Crucifixion. But more so, Christ was thankful that He could be The Savior and That His saving Body and Blood could be given to His beloved friends for their strength and preservation unto life everlasting.
This Holy Sacrament is also called The Eucharist. This comes from the New Testament Greek word Eucharista—which means: Thanksgiving.
You give thanksgiving this night for receiving your Lord’s Body and Blood. He gives thanksgiving for all of you coming to the Altar that He has the joy of forgiving, feeding, and fortifying you.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of The Holy Ghost
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