Thanksgiving: The Root of the Tradition, the Secret to Successful Christian Living
By Michael Tummillo
Originally Broadcast Nov 2001
The fourth Thursday in November is called Thanksgiving Day in the USA. Whether you live here or not, are you going through a tough time this Thanksgiving? Aside from all the international unrest, are you finding it hard to find anything to be thankful about in the midst of your own life? If so, maybe this message will minister to you.
Did you know it wasn’t until the American Civil War (1861-1865) that Congress officially recognized Thanksgiving Day? Even though it all began over 200 years earlier in the Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts, 1621. The Separatists (it was much later when they became known as “Pilgrims”), who founded Plymouth Colony in 1620, ignored most holidays. In fact, they recognized only three: the weekly Sabbath, the Day of Humiliation and Fasting, and the Day of Thanksgiving and Praise. The latter two were not set on the calendar but were proclaimed in response to God’s perceived favor or disfavor. Colonial life was so tied to the harvest cycle that fasting days were most often called in the spring, when there wasn’t much to eat anyway. Feast days often accompanied the autumn harvest. Both observances occurred on weekdays, usually the day of special sermons (known as Lecture Day), which was on a Thursday in Plymouth Colony.
Their first dreadful winter in Massachusetts had killed about half the members of the colony. But new hope arose in the summer of 1621. The settlers expected a good corn harvest, despite poor crops of peas, wheat, and barley. Thus, in early autumn, governor William Bradford arranged a harvest festival to give thanks to God for the progress the colony had made.
The festival lasted three days. The surviving Separatists, numbering about 50, feasted with 90 members of the Wampanoag Indians who brought gifts of food as a goodwill gesture. It was not an “official” day of thanksgiving. In the only surviving firsthand account of the meal, Edward Winslow described it this way: “Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which time, among other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed upon our governor, and upon the captain, and others. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.”
The very first Thanksgiving observance in America, two years earlier, was entirely religious and didn’t involve anything remotely resembling a feast. Sorry, it wasn’t the Pilgrims either. On Dec. 4, 1619, a group of 38 English settlers arrived at Berkeley Plantation, on the James River near what is now Charles City, Virginia. The group’s charter required that the day of arrival be observed yearly as a day of thanksgiving to God. Captain John Woodleaf held the service of thanksgiving. Here is the section of the Charter of Berkley Plantation which specifies the thanksgiving service: “Wee ordained that the day of our ships arrival at the place assigned for plantacon on the land of Virginia shall be yearly and perpetually keept holy as a day of thanksgiving to Almighty god.” In accordance with this 1619 charter, the colonists most likely held service in 1620 and 1621. The colony was wiped out in 1622. Thanksgiving was a private event, limited to the Berkeley settlement.
For those who see Thanksgiving as being more of a religious holiday, where the Separatists, or Pilgrims, were concerned, it wasn’t intended to be such, though Separatist leader, William Bradford wrote in his diary that their voyage across the ocean was motivated by “a great hope for advancing the kingdom of Christ.” Hunting, contests of skill and strength, and entertainment generally have no place in religious observances. However, these were a part of the long tradition of pagan harvest festivals, with which the Separatists would have been very familiar. In their native England, days of feasting and leisure commonly followed the harvest. Earlier such harvest festivals include ancient Greek Thesmophoria, ancient Roman Cerealia, and the Jewish Sukkot.
Not to imply that the 1621 feast had more in common with pagan festivals than with their first Christian Thanksgiving, which they observed in 1623 to celebrate the now infamous crop-saving rainfall, after apparently skipping the occasion in 1622. From the Separatist perspective, everything fell within the bounds of faith. EVERYTHING. As Leland Ryken wrote in “Worldly Saints: The Puritans As They Really Were”: “Puritanism was impelled by the insight that all of life is God’s. The Puritans lived simultaneously in two worlds–the invisible spiritual world and the physical world of earthly existence. For the Puritans, both worlds were equally real, and there was no cleavage of life into sacred and secular. All of life was sacred.”
In simple English, whether you go to church on Thanksgiving or not, the day can be seasoned with what Puritan Richard Baxter called “a drop of glory.” For that matter, EVERY day can be seasoned in this way. As Paul and King David put it, “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it” (Psalm 24:1, 1 Cor.10:26).
After their first few traditional celebrations of Thanksgiving, the custom of such a day soon spread to other colonies, becoming a time of celebrating the harvest. In 1777, the Continental Congress proclaimed a national day of Thanksgiving after the American Revolution victory at the Battle of Saratoga, an important battle which proved to the world that America could stand toe-to-toe with England, who had the greatest army in the world at that time. Notice it was a holiday motivated by armed conflict. Twelve years later, George Washington proclaimed another national day of Thanksgiving in honor of the ratification of the Constitution and requested that the Congress finally establish it as an annual event. They declined. So, it would be another 100 years, after the nation’s bloody Civil War, before President Abraham Lincoln would proclaim that the last Thursday in November would become Thanksgiving Day. That was 1865, the year the Civil War ended. Surprisingly, it took another 40 years, the early 1900s, before the tradition really caught on. See, Lincoln’s official Thanksgiving was sanctioned in order to bolster the Union’s morale. Southerners boycotted the new holiday, seeing it as an attempt to impose Northern customs on their conquered land.
Today, Thanksgiving is an annual Rockwellian event filled with football, feasting, and family that causes over 35 million Americans to “head home” for their family feasts. But that’s not the historical picture of this idealistic holiday. From its inception, it has more often been associated with adversity, bloody, and difficult times. Before a day of Thanksgiving ever existed in a place called the United States, the Apostle Paul, writing from a prison cell and probably knowing that he would soon be killed, wrote to the Philippians, “I give thanks to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”
Out of great suffering have come many glorious expressions of gratitude such as Paul’s over the centuries. One wonders, what motivates Christians to give thanks at all when a more reasonable response would seem to be bitterness and murmuring? Well, does not a new baby enter the world only after a time of travail and transition? Does not an expectant couple prepare a baby’s room, and isn’t the infant showered with gifts, before he or she ever arrives? We celebrate the good things to come, in faith that the good things WILL come.
In the wake of the recent terrorist attacks, the Afghan war, the anthrax scare, the economic turmoil, and the flight 587 crash, in keeping with American tradition, we have all the more reason to celebrate Thanksgiving. Let’s give thanks, EXPECTING new life to come as a result of the turmoil that surrounds us today.
American or not, Thanksgiving - giving thanks - in the midst of dark and troubled times, if nothing else, is in keeping with the way of the cross …the CHRISTIAN tradition. Give thanks at ALL times - even in the midst of your own trying situation.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pastor Michael is founder of t.e.a.m. ministries (team1min@aol.com). His eMail broadcasts, known as “Your Town for Jesus” (SEARCH it!) are reaching tens of thousands WEEKLY. He ministers by way of email and Instant Message, too. Write him at team1min@aol.com if you’d like to SUBSCRIBE to receive his messages directly.
Michael’s mission is to bring Discipleship and Encouragement to the Body of Christ. Michael is the author of numerous booklets on a variey of subjects that will interest the thinking Christian. Since 1999, he has written and broadcast hundreds of inspirational articles and a dozen booklets, all designed to accelerate the process of spiritual development in God’s people.
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