Thanksgiving

Introduce Myself and the Topic

Hello everyone. A couple of weeks ago Brother Porter called me up and asked if I could speak today.

Immediately after the call, I told my wife I was asked to speak and that I was given the topic of gratitude, as it would be just after Thanksgiving. Rachael replied, “That will be easy for you! You are married to me!”

Although it is true I am very grateful to be married to Rachael, it remains to be seen if that translates into being able to speak well on the subject. I really have just a few thoughts that came back to me again and again as I pondered gratitude and thanksgiving. My hope is I can share a message that the Spirit can edify all of us through.

I feel like with my current calling people may think I’m only an occasional church-goer. And with the rolling in of new families, allow me to give a very brief introduction first.

• My name is David Mitchell.
• I first really encountered my wife, Rachael, in Middle School, in Sterling, Virginia. We were friends through high school, and I suppose we really became an “item” right at the very end of our Senior year.
• We have now been married over 25 years. We lived in Sterling, VA as newlyweds, moved to West Virginia, then to Alabama, and then back to Virginia just over 10 years ago. We have six children.
• Jacob is in his last year at Virginia Tech studying Aerospace Engineering and is recently engaged.
• Carter is attending Mary Washington, studying Historic Preservation.
• Owen is attending Germanna Community College, still finding himself, but is thinking of becoming a history or geopgraphy teacher.
• Henry is a Freshman in High School.
• Bennett is in 4th grade.
• Josie is 4 and starts Kindergarten next year.

A Diversity of Thanksgiving Throughout Cultures Across the World

Cultures throughout the world celebrate various forms of celebrations focused on gratitude. Most, but not at all, are related to the harvest. But not only are these celebrations expressing gratitude for a bounteous harvest, they often also focus on worship and remembering.

• In India, Pongal (paang-gaal) is a celebration of the rice harvest. It includes ceremonial acts of worship of making offerings to various gods for their role in the bounty. It is a time family and community come together to reflect on the prosperity of the last year.
• In Korea, Chuseok (chew-sock) is a time families return to their ancestral homes. It is a time to remember and honor their ancestors, but also a time to get with family and friends to spread happiness and togetherness.

There are festivals from China to Ghana, and from Malaysia to Germany, and everywhere in between, where different cultures have found their own unique ways to remember and celebrate their blessings.

In America, many of the traditions of our Thanksgiving come from the 19th century. Sarah Hale, from New Hampshire, began in 1846 to spread the tradition of Thanksgiving, from a mostly New England celebration to a national one. Abraham Lincoln finally rewarded her efforts in 1863, establishing Thanksgiving as a national holiday.

The Pilgrims celebrated their first harvest in the New Word in October 1621. It included 90 Wampanoag Native Americans and 53 Pilgrims. That first harvest represented the possibility for survival. It also represented strangers helping visitors to a new land. The coming together of two different communities and cultures.

One other harvest holiday I must talk about is Sukkot (sue-coat). This is the Jewish holiday, also known as the Feast of Tabernacles. This feast is mandated in Leviticus to occur after the harvest, from a Sabbath to the next Sabbath. Part of the mandate is to live in temporary outdoor structures as a remembrance of the Israelites in the wilderness. These structures are called a “sukkah”, which is basically a tent. As a time of gathering, this feast coincides with some very important historical events, including the dedication of King Solomon’s temple. Although there is no explicit link, the final address King Benjamin gave his people in The Book of Mormon also has a lot of the markings of the Feast of Tabernacles.

A holiday to express thanks for our blessings, for our harvest, for our rescue, and to remember the past year, and to remember those who came before us is a global and nearly universal phenomenon.

The Very First Giving of Thanks

I began to wonder, what was the very first expression of gratitude? I immediately thought of Eve. In fact, I believe it was both Adam and Eve together. This happened after they were kicked out of the Garden of Eden, a paradise with no death or suffering.

We learn in Moses, chapter 5, that after their expulsion, Adam was commanded to offer sacrifices. Then an angel appeared and asked Adam, “Why dost thou offer sacrifices unto the Lord?” Adam said he did not know, and then the angel taught “This thing is a similitude of the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father.” After this experience, Adam received the Holy Ghost, and testified of the Son of God and his mission to redeem us and save us from the Fall.

Then Adam expressed gratitude and said, “Blessed be the name of God, for because of my transgression my eyes are opened, and in this life I shall have joy, and again in the flesh I shall see God.”

When Eve heard all these things, the scriptures say she was “glad”, and she says, “Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.”

And it doesn’t stop there. “Adam and Eve blessed the name of God, and they made all things known unto their sons and their daughters.”

I think we can learn a couple things from this.

1. I am not sure if we are able to fully feel gratitude until we have suffered. Adam and Eve didn’t express gratitude for a Savior until they had fallen, and understood their need to be saved. A farmer who toils through the Spring and Summer will have much greater joy with an abundant harvest than those of us who shop at a grocery store.
2. Are we truly grateful if we do not express it and make it known? Perhaps God can feel a grateful heart, but how else will those you love know you are grateful to them unless you tell them?

A Form of Worship

In thinking about the traditions of different cultures around giving thanks, and thinking about Adam offering sacrifices, and when he learned the significance of it he immediately expressed gratitude, I conclude that Gratitude is a form of worship.

I have often asked myself what it means to me to worship. We worship through prayer. We worship through music. But perhaps at the essence of worship is gratitude. Just as Adam and Eve realized the great blessing a Savior is, we also each need that same realization. I think of that realization as what the scriptures call a “broken heart and contrite spirit.”

I think of ingratitude as anti-worship. Being ungrateful is to deny the work and effort of others. When we don’t feel gratitude towards God and Jesus Christ, in a sense we are saying we don’t need them.

I have learned a few lessons about expressing gratitude to God in the past, that I must admit I can be better at.

1. One that I’ve heard from a few different sources over the years is to give regular prayers of gratitude. Don’t ask for anything, just list your blessings. I’ve heard some say to try for 30 minutes. In my experiences trying that, first I’ve done the obvious. Then there is a pause. And then, a flood of thoughts come. In the quiet and in the pondering I’ve seen how things connect. Things I was oblvious to I suddenly realized I should be grateful for. Deep and meaningful blessings come to mind, beyond the usual ones we immediately list when asked to give a prayer.
2. A second lesson I learned from my wife. She once told me she thinks of 3 things to be grateful for specific to that day. This is another way to get beyond our usual menu we pick from. I think the same principle could be applied to a daily journal. If we all made such a journal, what a testimony of a living God that still performs miracles would that be!

Audacious Gratitude

I want to conclude with a story of two sisters, Betsie and Corrie, taking gratitude to a whole other level.

It begins on a morning in June of 1944, with these sisters, Dutch Christians, reading from 1 Thessalonians, Chapter 5, verses 14-18:

14 Now we exhort you, brethren, ^awarn them that are ^bunruly, ^ccomfort the ^dfeebleminded, ^esupport the ^fweak, be patient toward all men.

15 See that none ^arender ^bevil for evil unto any ^cman; but ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves, and to all men.

16 ^aRejoice evermore.

17 ^aPray without ceasing.

18 In every thing give ^athanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

By the time Corrie and Betsie went to bed that night they were in a German Concentration camp, arrested for helping Jews escape.  Their sleeping quarters were crammed full, bunk heads 3 high without any room to sit up, and only space enough for one to walk by at a time.  The matted straw reeked of urine and mold.  As Corrie laid down trying not to vomit from the stench, she felt something bite her leg.  Then another bite, then another.  Hitting her head as she jumped out of bed she exclaimed “fleas!”  Desperate,  she told Betsie she wasn’t going to be able to do this.  Both women were in their 50s.

Betsie had a sudden thought.  The answer to get through this was found in what they studied that morning in Thessalonians.  Betsie said, we are together.  And Corrie agreed she was thankful for that.  Betsie said, we were were able to sneak our Bible in here.  Again Corrie agreed she was thankful.  Then Betsie said, we should also be thankful for the fleas.  Corrie didn’t see how to be possible for that, but Betsie insisted that the verse reads, “In EVERY thing give thanks.”

Betsie and Corrie would read aloud from their Bible  every night.  Soon they had listeners.  Then enough wanted to hear that they would hold two makeshift “services” every night for the women who shared their pit of despair.  But in that pit, the two sisters and their Bible gave others hope.

They lived in constant fear of being caught and of the ensuing consequences.  Then one day Corrie discovered the means of God protecting them.  She heard guards arguing about who would go into their dorm to deal with something, with them all refusing to enter out of fear of getting fleas.

Conclusion

I want to conclude with my testimony of the power of gratitude.  I am grateful to Jesus Christ who saves me from my daily fall.  I am grateful for the plan Our Heavenly Father made for us, so that we can share Eternal Life with Him.  I am grateful to this Earth so that we can gain the mortal experiences we need.  I am grateful for the beauty of this Earth, for the bounty it gives us.  I know this mortal life is also hard.  We all have our own “fleas” in their various forms.  We should learn how to be grateful for those too.  I challenge myself, and if you are willing, I ask you to share the challenge, of finding meaningful ways to express more gratitude in our lives.

I say these things….

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