The year 2020 has been long and challenging. Amidst the global pandemic, the US election cycle, and many other challenges, the Saints of the Lord Jesus Christ have taken the opportunity to dig deep into our common Christian confession and let that confession come to our society like baby’s breath amid decay.
At the core of Christian confession is the truth that God is our sovereign and benevolent creator. He has fashioned us in His likeness and given all that we need to fellowship with Him. Fellowship with God was ruptured by sin. At the core of sin is pride. It was Augustine who said, “Pride is the beginning of sin. And what is pride but the craving for undue exaltation? And this is undue exaltation - when the soul abandons Him to whom it ought to cleave as its end, and becomes a kind of end to itself.” (City of God)
Recent days have highlighted Augustine's last point; we are prone to cleave to ourselves. Even in our great need for aid, many have not turned towards God but have retreated deeper and darker into themselves.
Scripture confronts humanity's twisted sensibilities towards forgetfulness of God’s goodness with a call for thankfulness. Psalm 100 says,
A Psalm for giving thanks.
Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth!
Serve the LORD with gladness!
Come into his presence with singing!
Know that the LORD, he is God!
It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
and his courts with praise!
Give thanks to him; bless his name!
For the LORD is good;
his steadfast love endures forever,
and his faithfulness to all generations. (ESV)
In the midst of a year that has put our entire world's brokenness on display unlike many times before in recent memory, Christian confession comes at this time at the end of the year and reminds us to be thankful. The thankfulness we hold forth to the world is not simply a thankfulness for all his good in the midst of the dark days but hope for a brighter and better day coming, a better day guaranteed by the resurrection of the Son of God. As Schweitzer reminds us, “Jesus was called to throw himself on the wheel of history, so that, even though it crushed him, it might start to turn in the opposite direction.” NT Wright often adds that Jesus’ walking from the tomb was the beginning of the new creation in the midst of the old one. We come with that same expectation during a global pandemic, in a confused culture, with a word of thanksgiving and in that thankfulness, hope.
Not so many years ago, a faithful religious group known as Puritans were fashionable called Pilgrims in a brave new world called America. They understood Psalm 100. They understood that as Christians, they had every reason to be thankful.
Thankfulness not merely for today but for tomorrow and every other day guaranteed by our resurrected, ascended, and soon coming again, Lord.
May we understand what those Puritan Pilgrims understood, that true thankfulness comes by letting the peace of Christ rule in our hearts.
Remember, as you listen to cultural commentary through headlines, news programs, or even television, as you listen to many who will attempt to call for thankfulness without God, remember your reason for thankfulness is Jesus. On Thanksgiving Day, Christian confession takes the high ground and lets the light we have been given shine like a city on a hill.
GK Chesterton, in all his wit and mastery, reminds us, Unbelievers could make an alternative to Christmas, but they could not make a substitute for Thanksgiving Day. “For half of them are pessimists who say they have nothing to be thankful for; and the other half are atheists who have nobody to thank." We are not like those without hope; indeed, we are thankful, and we yearn to be more so.