HAPPY THANKS-LIVING

An American Tale

Most Americans know the story, but in case you were absent that day in American History class or you fell asleep during your child’s elementary school Thanksgiving play, here are the CliffsNotes®:

In the fall of 1621, British colonists from the “old world” gathered with the native inhabitants of the new one in what would become Plymouth, Massachusetts, to celebrate their first successful harvest after a devastating, and deadly, Massachusetts winter.

As of this writing, we are four-hundred-three years removed from this inaugural feast. And while this historical event was never officially referred to as “Thanksgiving” until after America’s founding, a few American presidents, starting with George Washington, recognized the importance of setting aside a day to offer thanks for the blessings we enjoy as Americans.

One could even argue the purpose behind the creation of a national “Thanksgiving” holiday was to weave an attitude of gratitude into the very fabric of American culture.

Four centuries later, Americans still honor this thanksgiving tradition by gathering together with family and friends on the last Thursday of November, and give thanks to God for the blessings he has poured onto their families and their country over the previous year.

Either that, or we get together at the end of November to stuff ourselves like a Thanksgiving turkey, drink our weight in beer, and watch football until the tryptophan* punts our brains into a meleagris**-fueled coma.

Whatever your particular Thanksgiving ritual, I believe I’m pretty safe in stating the obvious. Culturally speaking, the holiday originally dedicated to showing our collective gratitude for our blessings appears to have de-evolved into little more than the starter’s pistol to the real American holiday celebration that begins as soon as the clock strikes midnight on the day after Thanksgiving:

Now, before anyone gets their knickers in a twist, this isn’t an anti-consumerism rant. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say there’s absolutely nothing wrong with a little old-fashioned shopping around the holidays. But speaking as a boomer that can remember the days when standing in line outside the local Wal-Mart wasn’t the primary reason for the holiday season, the cultural shift in prioritizing “getting” over “gratitude” hasn’t done American society any favors. 

In short, American culture could definitely use a remedial course in actual thanksgiving on pretty much every level of social interaction.

When pondering the Biblical account of mankind’s creation found in Genesis, I’ve often wished God had installed a set of bio-mechanical gauges that clearly displayed our emotional and psychological levels. I mean, wouldn’t it be great if we all came from the factory with ”happy” and “sad” gauges? And wouldn’t it be incredibly helpful to check someone’s “frustration” or “anger” gauges before sharing our opinions with the guy pushing his full grocery cart through the “express” checkout line?

Based on a quick scan of my fellow Americans on social media and the “journalists” on America’s 24-hour news channels, I don’t think it’s a stretch for me to say on a scale of one to ten (“one” being the Earth’s core and “ten” being Mt. Everest), America’s cultural “gratitude” gauge is registering in negative integers. Now, I know social media is not the same thing as reality. However, I do see social media as a cultural barometer that is pretty flawless at revealing pressure points in American society.

Based on that barometer, there’s been a societal storm slowly-but-surely brewing for the last decade (or more) that is not going to end well if our culture doesn’t return to a healthier equilibrium. In my humble opinion, one human characteristic that needs to return to cultural prominence is the same characteristic those allegedly backwards-thinking religious zealots openly displayed way back in 1621: gratitude.

It probably won’t come as a shock to anyone to learn gratitude is a foundational characteristic of Christianity. In fact, one of the most clearly written verses of scripture in the entire Bible is centered around thanksgiving:

“In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” - 1 Thessalonians 5:18 (NKJV)

Try to imagine the type of culture we would have in America if this simple concept of gratitude had been embedded into our national identity over the last two centuries. Heck, try to imagine what Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok would be like if a daily dose of gratitude was a part of the American social diet. 

Now, I’m under no illusion that teaching generations of Americans to live in a state of perpetual gratitude will produce a trouble-free utopia. After all, every living human on the planet arrives with a totally self-centered operating system burned onto their little baby hard drives. While the original version of that selfish programming is designed to keep the infant alive (feed me, change me, let me sleep, etc), as the child grows into a fully functioning human, the challenge for most parents comes with our efforts in ‘reprogramming’ the child’s selfish human natures.

I know there is a growing segment of humans who will dispute this ‘selfish human nature’ claim. Of course most of the people who would argue against this statement are young people who haven’t experienced the joys of parenting a child yet. But if anyone needs proof of the inherent selfishness of human beings, here is a simple exercise for you:

Simply lock yourself in a toy-filled room with two, and we recommend only two for the sake of your sanity, two-year-old human toddlers.

Every parent worthy of that title knows the outcome of this exercise. Parents also know they do not have to teach their precious children concepts like “lying”, “cheating”, and “fighting with their friend/sibling over the same toy in a toy-filled room”. What every parent on the planet does have to teach their children are concepts like “sharing”, “waiting your turn”, “kindness”, and, of course “gratitude”. Y’know, things that do not come naturally to human beings, generally speaking.

Unfortunately, American culture is currently calibrated to reward people for fully embracing their narcissistic human natures.

If you need any further proof of the inherent selfishness of mankind, just watch the news or spend a little time on social media. The number of people complaining about the horrors of American social mechanisms like capitalism, democracy, or freedom of speech is staggering. America’s narcissistic culture has produced several generations of humans who are unable to see the irony in their complaining about capitalism on a $1000 smartphone, after buying an $8.00 cup of coffee, while wearing $150 sneakers.

You see, the absence of gratitude can, and often does, produce entitled, ungrateful whiners and complainers who are incapable of recognizing the blessings literally staring them in the face. 

So, thanks to social media and 24-hour news coverage, the need for an attitude of gratitude to become a foundational characteristic of American culture has never been more obvious or more necessary. We need a societal recalibration that focuses on the instructions given in 1 Thessalonians 5:18; to learn how to be grateful in “all things”.

That two-word phrase, “all things”, is a little sticky. A lot of bible readers get stuck on what “all things” actually means. After all, I think we can all agree that every circumstance in the human experience does not call for an outpouring of gratitude. I could create a very long list of scenarios that make giving thanks an impossible task.  But, it should be noted that God is not asking us to give thanks for inherently evil situations. Instead, what God is instructing us to do is to adopt a perpetually grateful perspective and attitude, in spite of potentially evil situations.

Yeah, this is difficult. But we have no less than Jesus Christ himself to give us an example of what this attitude of gratitude looks like. Paul gives us a beautiful rendition of this divine example of gratitude in the face of evil in his description of Christ’s “last supper”:

“For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is my body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’” - 1 Corinthians 11:23-24 (NKJV)

There is a LOT to unpack here. Paul makes sure we understand this scene is taking place “on the same night in which He was betrayed”. For those of us who have experienced betrayal from a family member or a friend, we know how deep that pain goes and how impossible it is to “give thanks” for that pain. But, Jesus doesn’t give thanks for the betrayal. He is giving thanks for the meal; specifically, the bread.

This bread isn’t just any old piece of bread. Paul’s description includes Jesus’ commentary on the symbolic meaning of the bread; “...this is my body which is broken for you…” Jesus’ final meal on the night of his execution wasn’t a smorgasbord of his favorite culinary delights. It was the passover meal; unleavened bread and kosher wine. Anybody who has ever experienced the official Jewish passover meal can tell you, it’s the polar opposite of a culinary delight. 

Jesus’ words takes the reader all the way back to the book of Exodus when the passover was originally instituted (Exodus 12:1-20). The “unleavened bread” (bread made without any leavening agents) is a flat, bland-tasting matzo bread traditionally used in the Passover feast since the time of Israel’s departure from Egypt. The symbolic meaning behind this bread represents the sinless sacrifice that Jesus Christ is about to selflessly give. More specifically, the bread represented his physical body that would be horrifically “broken” by Roman scourges, a crown of thorns, and the most tortuous form of public execution ever devised by the human race.

And in the face of all this suffering and torment, Paul describes Jesus taking a moment to “give thanks” for the physical representation of that suffering and torment. In other words, Christ is thanking the Father for the symbol of the unimaginable torture, pain, and death he will be suffering in a few hours. Is it any wonder why Isaiah refers to the messiah as “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”? (Isaiah 53:3)

This example is what God means when he says “In everything give thanks”. It means living in an attitude of consistent, habitual, and perpetual gratitude. To experience the benefits of an attitude of gratitude, we have to be willing to do things that do not come naturally to us. Things like “yielding”, “surrendering”, and “obeying”; y’know, like the Son of God did when he allowed his own creation to beat, torture, and execute him for the “sin” of claiming to be the Son of God. 

So, if Jesus can “give thanks” in the face of all of that, I think we can learn to be thankful in traffic, while working on broken appliances, or during any of life’s little aggravations. 

Just imagine what kind of country we would have if the majority of our fellow Americans realized their ‘pursuit of happiness’ would be far more successful if we could learn how to be thankful, not just on the last Thursday in November, but every day of our very blessed lives. 

Just that one adjustment could recalibrate American culture and transform Thanksgiving into an always beneficial 'thanks-living'.

#justathought 

~ PappaMurf

FOOTNOTES:

* TRYPTOPHAN / noun / - an amino acid which is a constituent of most proteins. It is an essential nutrient in the diet of vertebrates

** MELEAGRIS /noun/ - the type genus of Meleagrididae comprising the wild and domestic turkeys