Harvest Thanksgiving

Don’t Forget to Say Thank You

Readings: Deuteronomy 26:1-11; Psalm 65; 2 Corinthians 9:6-15; Luke 17:11-19
As children, whenever we went to a party at a friend's house, the last thing my mother always said to us was the reminder, "Don't forget to say thank you!" I remember, as well, the painstaking care with which I wrote notes after Christmas to aunts and uncles saying thank you. I am the first to admit, that since I had very practical relatives, I did not always feel grateful for the socks or the hat and mittens, but what mother said went. I sat down the day after Christmas or my birthday, and dutifully wrote a note expressing my sheer and utter gratitude for the lovely gift.

In this electronic age, writing thank you notes is a lost art. I feel fortunate on the occasions when I receive a message on Facebook that at least the gift has been received. It would seem that gratitude has become a radical response. I say this in the sense that it seems to be unconventional, surprising, perhaps even shocking to write a thank you note. We seem to have the sense that saying thank you to God is important, but why? God does not have a need to hear us say thank you. The fact that is so often overlooked is that we ourselves have a need to say thank you. Gratitude is important to our wellbeing.
The power to appreciate and be grateful is a gift from God. Thankfulness is not something that one can put on. It is something that wells up in us. I suspect it has little to do with how much we have, and everything to do with our ability to allow God’s grace to permeate our lives. “Give us thankful hearts” is certainly a good and realistic prayer, not only at Harvest Thanksgiving, but the whole year round.

For the people of Israel giving thanks was about remembering the good things that God had provided. It is very much a part of Jewish faith to do that kind of remembering. They recognized that God wants us never to forget that it is not by our power and our strength that we exist as servants of God, but by the grace extended to the least among us. The passage read this morning begins by remembering the past, not with a sense of nostalgia and longing for the good old days, but with a view to correcting the present and looking to the future. They are not to take things for granted; they are to remember that what they have belongs to God. They are reminded that as God journeyed with them through the wilderness times, so God is with them in their time of prosperity.

For Paul it was also about remembering God’s bounty. He reminds the Corinthians about their need to give as God gives. It is his stewardship sermon. “God provides abundantly,” he tells them, “so that you will have enough not only for yourselves, but also to share with others who are in need.” He is not talking about having enough resources to be self-sufficient, to be independent, to get rich, but enough resources to be able to help one another.
In the Gospel. it is about having a sense of gratitude for all that God has provided. It describes an encounter between Jesus and a group of ten lepers who sought healing from him. Instead of healing them on the spot, he sent them to show themselves to the priests. That was the requirement before they could return to society. They did as Jesus told them to do. They scurried off to show themselves to the priest. As they went in obedience to Jesus they discovered that they had been cured. One of the lepers, a Samaritan, a foreigner, gave praise to God for his cure and returned to thank Jesus. He received more than a cure. He became whole. It is not that the other nine lacked faith. They were all healed. Yet their faith remained incomplete, because it did not result in gratitude.

What can make us truly grateful? Such a question always brings to mind a certain episode of “Frasier”. He and his brother Niles are in the café as usual. Niles says to him, “Are you happy!”

Frasier turns the question back to Niles, “Why do you ask?

Niles responds. “It’s just that I saw an orphan receive a pair of cheap shoes. And there was such an expression of gratitude on his face. He was so happy. Why was he so happy? Here I am wearing a pair of $400.00 shoes. I look at them and wonder if I even really like them. Do you like them? They have tassels. I don’t really like tassels. What do you think?” And Frasier spends the rest of the show trying to decide what it is that makes him happy.

Like Niles we wonder sometimes how people who lack the luxurious lifestyle that we take for granted can be happy. How can they be close? How can children living in misery in Haiti or Peru or Zaire ever laugh? How can they play and sing when we can’t with all that we have? How can they play and sing and hold hands, and fall down on the ground and rejoice? But they can.
Surely the most effective thing we can do is to give thanks. Do we really believe that prayer has anything to do with what happens in the world? Do we pray for the leaders of our country really expecting that something powerful could happen? Do we see the signs around us of God's presence in our lives? Do we care for this world in a way that expresses our gratitude?

We hear over and over again that climate change is real, that it is having a dramatic effect on our world. We see it in our weather patterns. Unprecedented violent storms like the ice storm last winter! Weather systems that linger on for long periods of time! Drought in parts of the world, flooding in others! We see documentaries showing picture of open water in the Arctic, and of animals and birds that are in decline. There are predictions about climatic change and the probability that Canada will face more floods, droughts and tornadoes with the increasing levels of ozone in the atmosphere. The most perplexing part of it is that no one wants to take responsibility for the changes that are occurring. My suspicion is that change will come about because each one of us begins to take seriously our obligation to God and to this wonderful creation. We have an obligation to be thankful for God’s bounty.

Our Christian story is about remembering to give thanks. We come together as community. We break bread. We share together. We ask ourselves how we too can share fresh bread with others. At the heart of what we do at worship together, bread and wine are taken and blessed. They are the fruit of the earth. God's promises have again been fulfilled. Seed time and harvest go on producing food for us.

The bread and wine are products of our hands. People make that bread and produce that wine. In bringing food and drink as an offering to God we are enacting the deepest facts of human experience. We are acknowledging our dependence upon the Creator and Sustainer of all things. We trust and thank God for all that we have.

As we celebrate the harvest, can we make certain that what we have is not a hindrance to our relationship with God and with one another? Can we lift thankful hearts to a loving God who cares for each of us, and provides for our needs? Can we learn to share our bounty, and in that sharing find the happiness that God would have us know?

May we be moved beyond the gratitude of satisfaction to the risk of generosity! Amen
 
thank for it.