Tomorrow morning, many of us will turn on our televisions and watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. We’ll watch the floats and the marching bands and the giant balloons. Studies show that most of us won’t actually watch the whole parade – but we’ll see large parts. Because watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade is a tradition – it’s what we do on Thanksgiving.
Later many of us will watch a football game. First we’ll see the Detroit Lions lose to a better team, and then we’ll watch the Dallas Cowboys lose to a better team. Watching Detroit and Dallas football games is also a tradition for many of us – it’s what we do on Thanksgiving.
Between the parade and the football games we will eat. Collectively as a nation we will eat record amounts of turkey and dressing and potatoes and green bean casserole and cranberries and pumpkin pie. Most of us will eat far more than we should be eating, and after we pull ourselves away from the table, we’ll complain about how bloated we are feeling. Some of us – and I include myself here – will be so stuffed that we will blame the tryptophan in the turkey for making us fall asleep doing those football games. Because eating a big turkey dinner is a tradition for us – it’s what we do on Thanksgiving.
Some of us will stay home to celebrate Thanksgiving, but many of us will get in the car and travel to family gatherings. We may see people whom we seldom – if ever – see at any other time of the year. We will remark about how much the kids have grown and how old we seem to have gotten since last Thanksgiving. We say that we should get together more often, even if we know that we won’t. And when we get in the car to head home, we’ll talk about how nice it was to reconnect with all of those friends and family members. That’s another tradition for us – it’s what we do on Thanksgiving.
Now if you’ve been paying close attention you may have noticed that I have left something out of our list of Thanksgiving traditions. Did you pick up on that? What I left out is this: giving thanks. The original purpose of Thanksgiving Day was to give thanks to God for all of the blessings that He showers on us. Now admittedly, many families will pause for a prayer of thanks before their Thanksgiving meal. But often it is not much more than “Thanks, God,” and now let’s eat. For many people, it’s not an occasion of true thanksgiving, of actually giving thanks. And there’s a big, a huge, a monumental difference between saying “thanks” and actually “giving thanks.”
If tonight’s Gospel lesson from Luke chapter 17 sounds more than a little familiar to you, it’s not just because the story of the 10 lepers is one that many of us learned a long time ago in Sunday School. Actually, these same verses served as our Gospel lesson just over six weeks ago, on Sunday October 10. It isn’t very often that our lectionary repeats the same readings – especially repeats them so closely together. But this is one of those occasions. And while we use a three-year cycle of lessons so that we can, over time, cover larger parts of the Gospels, this reading from Luke 17 is the only reading assigned for the observance of Thanksgiving in this or any year. If you were here last year on Thanksgiving Eve you heard these same words – and if you are here again next year on Thanksgiving Eve, you will again hear these same words.
I’d like to re-read a portion of the Gospel lesson, focusing just on verses 15 and 16: “Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks.” When we focused on this same Gospel text last month we looked at how the Jewish people focused on the Law rather than God’s Gospel, and we saw how God’s mercy extended not just to His chosen people, the Children of Israel – but to all people, including the gentile Samaritans. But tonight we’re going to focus on just a few short words: “and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks.” The Samaritan didn’t just run back and say “Oh, by the way, thanks, Jesus.” No, he fell on his face at Jesus feet – he prostrated himself, he threw his body on the ground in the ancient posture of worship – and gave thanks.
The original Greek verb used here by St. Luke is εὐχαριστέω, a word that has deep and far-reaching meanings. Yes, it means to give thanks. But let’s face it – we often say “thanks” more as a formality than something we stop to think about. When someone holds the door open for you, you say “thanks.” When an usher hands you a bulletin as you enter the Sanctuary, you say “thanks.” Most of us tend to be polite people, and when someone extends some type of courtesy to us, we say “thanks.”
The concept of giving thanks takes in a lot more territory. The Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament – a kind of very large and very expensive dictionary of the ancient Greek language – gives three definitions for εὐχαριστέω. The first definition is “to show that one is under obligation.” When you are under obligation to someone, it is clear that someone has done something extraordinarily good for you, and you are obligated – you are required, really – to acknowledge that good deed by expressing your appreciation. This tends to become Law rather than Gospel – you think of it as something that you absolutely have to do to make that person happy or to satisfy some type of requirement.
But the second definition of εὐχαριστέω takes us from Law to Gospel, for here it is defined as the act of expressing appreciation for benefits or blessings. It’s not something that you are required to do – it just something that you do. You realize that you have been blessed, and you give thanks. It’s not just some words when someone holds the door open for you – it’s a thought process and a realization that you want to give thanks for blessings that you don’t deserve but yet have received. No one has been required to shower those blessings on you – but you still receive them. And when you receive them, you just can’t help but be thankful for them.
The third lexicon definition of εὐχαριστέω is one I’ll bet will surprise you. The third definition of εὐχαριστέω is to pray. That’s right – pray. To give thanks through prayer. To give thanks to God who is the source, who is the giver, of every blessing that we enjoy. Everything, absolutely everything that we have is a blessing from God. We cook the meal, but God gives the food to us. We go to the grocery store and purchase the food we will eat tomorrow, but God gives that food to us. God gives us good weather to grow the crops and to grow the turkeys and He gives us people and processors who package and prepare those raw crops and large birds into something we can eat and He gives us the income to buy gas for the trip to the store and pay for those groceries and He gives us gas and electricity to prepare our meals and travel to be with family members. Everything about Thanksgiving Day – everything about every day of our lives – is a blessing from God. We deserve not a single one of those blessings, and yet, He gives them to us. Not because God is somehow required to give us these things – but because in His boundless love, He chooses to give them to us.
The verb εὐχαριστέω is derived from the same root as the noun εὐχαριστια, and εὐχαριστια is the source of our English word Eucharist. The word Eucharist is another name for the Lord’s Supper. So εὐχαριστέω and εὐχαριστια and Eucharist all lead us to the Lord’s Supper, the Holy Communion where we receive Christ’s own body and blood, given as a gift to all believers for the forgiveness of sins. When we give thanks tomorrow for the many blessings given to us by our Lord, this truly is the greatest of all: the forgiveness of sins. Without the forgiveness of our sins, none of the other blessings that we will enjoy tomorrow or on any other day would have any meaning or value. A belly stuffed with turkey and dressing and pumpkin pie won’t get you into heaven. But the forgiveness of sins for all who believe in Jesus as their Savior will – and does – most certainly get you there.
When you sit down to enjoy Thanksgiving tomorrow, pause – for just a moment – to consider the many blessings that God has given to you and will continue to you. Blessings of everything we need to sustain our life as well as those that just make our life more enjoyable. Blessings of food, family and fellowship. And then pause – for just a bit longer – to do more than just say “thank you” to God. Pause to truly and genuinely “give thanks” for every blessing that we have. Give thanks for having been brought to faith. Give thanks for having been made God’s own precious child. Give thanks for all of the material blessings you have been given. And give thanks that God sent His own precious Son to suffer and die and rise from the dead so that your sins could be forgiven. May this truly become your Thanksgiving tradition today – and in every day of your life.
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