The following are some reflections from Homiletics regarding Thanksgiving. Thought I would copy this for your reading.
Things proven to change the course of Thanksgiving:
1. During the middle of the meal, turn to Mom and say, “See, Mom, I told you they wouldn’t notice that the turkey was four months past its expiration date. You were worried for nothing.”
2. When everyone goes around to say what they are thankful for, say, “I’m thankful I didn’t get caught” and refuse to say anything more.
3. Load your plate up high, then take it to the kitchen, toss it all in the blender, and take your “shake” back to the table. Announce that it’s the new Thanksgiving Weight Loss Shake.
4. Prepare a several-hour-long speech to give when asked about your thankfulness. If necessary, insist that no one leave or eat until you have finished the speech.
The first settlers in America landed in December of 1620 in Massachusetts, and within one month 10 out of the 17 fathers and husbands who were on that ship, the Mayflower, died. Within a couple months only four of the mothers and wives were alive out of the first 17 couples. And by Easter almost half of the pilgrims had died. They landed in the middle of winter without provisions, without shelter and that took a toll. It took a huge toll and yet in 1621 they celebrated and they gave thanks to God. It was amazingly difficult, amazingly difficult those first years.
On another continent about 25 years later there was a Lutheran pastor named Martin Rinkart. He lived in Eilenberg in Saxony and it was during the siege of the Thirty Years War. Eilenberg was a walled city that was surrounded by Swedes and there were 800 homes were burned, and the people within suffered from the plague, from starvation, and it got to the point where the pastors within that town, within that village were burying 12 people a day. Pretty soon the pastors themselves started to die and Martin Rinckart was the only pastor left. He was conducting 50 funerals a day, can you imagine? Fifty funerals a day. He buried over 5,000 people that year, including his own wife. When the war ended a year later in 1648 he sat down, and listen to the words that he penned:
Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done, in whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.
This was a man who knew horrors beyond all we can think and imagine, getting on his knees and leading people in praise and thanks to our God.
—Deb Kielsmeier, “Thanksgiving,” November 25, 2004, Christ Presbyterian Church Web Site, christpresbyterian.com.
The shelves of the Christian bookstores are full of books arguing over worship styles and methods (churches have been destroyed over these things), and as I have had a chance to peruse these many volumes of drivel I have found one thing lacking in their pages — namely, God. For all the hubbub about traditional vs. contemporary — evangelistic vs. covenantal — liturgical vs. low-church, the one thing that no one seems to care about is the ONE they’re supposed to be worshiping in the first place. They substitute personal preference for God.
The NT is surprisingly indifferent to worship as far as outward ritual goes. We don’t have a worship manual per se. My Bible lacks musical arrangements with harmonies and guidance on what type of instruments should be played. What we find — I think to our amazement — is a focus on an inward experience of the heart as we praise God and receive his Word.
—Brian Thomas, “Make a joyful noise to the Lord,” November 7, 2004, Kaleo Fellowship Web Site, kaleochurch.com.
In his book, The Grand Essentials, Ben Patterson ... tells of a time when the great Jewish rabbi, Abraham Heschel was confronted with a complaint from his congregation:
“Some of the members of the synagogue told him that the liturgy did not express what they felt. Would he please change it? Heschel wisely told them that it was not for the liturgy to express what they felt, it was for them to learn to feel what the liturgy expressed. As Jews they were to learn the drama and say it and ‘play’ it over and over again until it captured their imagination and they assimilated it into the deepest places in their hearts. Then, and only then, would it be possible for them to live their own individual dramas.”
Heschel said: “Praise precedes faith. First we sing, then we believe.”
—Daniel D. Meyer, “A disciplined joy: What should I bring to worship,” September 28, 1997, Christ Church Web Site, cc-ob.org.
Jesus had a plan for John [Ungureanu]. He travels into Romania twice a year for 6-8 weeks each trip and in the name of Jesus goes into the villages of the poorest of the poor. He finds families in need and meets that need as best he can — all in the name of Jesus.
One large family suffered the loss of the mother at a young age. The entire village felt badly for the situation. In the name of Jesus John carted in a refrigerator and made sure it would be filled up through the winter. As word spread about this amazing gesture many have come to faith in Jesus in that village. When John came across a blind woman in her 80s, he saw that her house was falling down. So, in the name of Jesus John had that home rebuilt and provided for her through the winter. The next time he returned she had turned her life over to Jesus and wanted to be baptized.
On each trip John is able to touch from 150 to 200 families with the love of Jesus, meeting their needs with no strings attached.
—Tim Timmons, “Jesus seen walking around in the villages of Romania and India,” ASSIST News Service, August 23, 2004, across.co.nz.
But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.
—Vincent van Gogh.
“In worship,” writes Kathleen Norris in Amazing Grace, “we let loose with music, and the words of hymns, the psalms, canticles and prayers. We cast the Word of God out into the world, into each human heart, where, to paraphrase the prophet Isaiah, it needs to go to fulfill God’s purpose. Isaiah uses the metaphor of rain to convey this — rain that disappears into the ground for a time, so that we can’t see it working. And then, it bears abundantly.”
Jesus is cool; Christians are not.
According to Dan Kimball, in his book, The Emerging Church, California college students think Jesus is cool but Christians are messed up, dogmatic, closed-minded, the wicked ones. See page 80.
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