Thanksgiving: the Forgotten Holiday

1) Has Thanksgiving become a forgotten holiday? If so, what are some reasons why?

a) It’s between two of the biggest “holidays” of the year – Halloween and Christmas. Halloween is the second-most commercially successful holiday behind Christmas. In a recent online survey Halloween is a family favorite ranking second only to Christmas. Radio stations start playing 24 hour Christmas music the day after Halloween. Christmas shopping season traditionally began the day after Thanksgiving. Now, some big stores are pushing for it to begin the day after Halloween. On the weekend before Veteran’s Day, Santa Claus was in Southpark mall taking pictures with children.

b) Many people consider it a “blah” holiday. Not a whole lot of fanfare or rituals associated with Thanksgiving - no memorable songs (God Rest Ye Merry Pilgrims or Hark the Herald Turkeys Sing); no presents to open on Thanksgiving Day; no giant turkey visiting homes leaving candy and turkey eggs; no Thanksgiving merchandise; no fireworks; no frills associated with Thanksgiving that get people excited about celebrating the holiday unless you like to eat a lot of turkey and watch parades (who is normally at the end of the parade- Santa Clause!) and football games.

c) Gratitude problem – The only thing a person really has to do on Thanksgiving is say “thank you” to God. That’s how the holiday started. In my opinion, there are three true “holy days” (that is what holiday means – holy day) on the calendar. Christmas – celebrate Christ’s birth; Easter – celebrate Christ’s resurrection from the dead; Thanksgiving – a special day to thank God for all He has done for you and our nation during the past year. Thanksgiving has its origins in the early days of our nation. The pilgrims set aside a day to thank God for seeing them through a very harsh period of time – famine, disease, death of loved ones. They wanted to thank God for their new friends, the Indians, who showed them how to survive in this new world. They did not take their survival/God’s blessings for granted. I question whether that spirit of Thanksgiving still exists today. I wonder if we are more like the nine men we’ll be talking about in today’s lesson.

Background –

Samaritans – The Assyrian empire conquered the Northern Kingdom of Israel also called Samaria. The Assyrians scattered thousands of people from the North Kingdom throughout their empire. Forcibly removed them from their homes and exiled them to strange lands hundreds of miles away. The Assyrians then forced other people groups in their empire to settle in the Northern Kingdom. People of different races and religions. Overtime, the remaining Israelites intermarried with these other people groups. Their descendants would become known in Jesus’ day as Samaritans. The Samaritans were greatly looked down upon by their relatives to the south the Jews. The Jews held a strong racial and religious prejudice against the Samaritans. The Jews perceived Samaritans as “half-breeds”. They were genetically and religiously impure/unclean. A Jew did not step foot on Samaritan soil for fear they would become “unclean”. They would walk miles around Samaritan territory to get to where they were going. A Jew did not associate or socialize with a Samaritan. The Jews and Samaritans had a similar relationship as whites and blacks in the United Stated during the days of segregation.

Leprosy – a generic name given to a skin disorder that was common in Biblical days. Leprosy produced sores and eruptions on the skin. The skin turned a snow white color. Left untreated, leprosy can be progressive, causing permanent damage to the skin, nerves, limbs and eyes. A person with leprosy can feel no pain in the area affected because the nerves are dead. A person who contracted leprosy was immediately ostracized from the community for fear of spreading diseases, not just leprosy. Consequently, there was a strong social stigma associated with being a leper. The only people lepers could socialize with were other lepers. These “leper colonies” as they were known would go around the countryside begging for food and money.

Read Luke 17:11-19

1) Where was Jesus travelling? Along the border between Samaria and Galilee.

2) Who did Jesus come across during this journey? Ten lepers

3) What did they want Jesus to do? Show mercy towards them by healing them of their leprosy.

4) What did Jesus tell them to do? Go show themselves to the priest. According to scripture (Leviticus 14), a person with leprosy had to be examined by a priest to determine if he is cleansed or not.

5) As the ten were going to see the priest, what happened? They were healed. The leprosy was gone. Their skin was a normal color. They could actual feel again.

6) What did one of the ten do after he realized he was healed? He went back to see Jesus praising God the whole way. For what purpose? To give thanks to Jesus for healing him.

7) In the last sentence of verse 16, what does Luke point out about this former leper? He is a Samaritan. Why does Luke say this? To explain what Jesus says about this former leper in verse 18.

8) How would you describe Jesus’ response to the actions of the former leper? Amazement perhaps. Why does Jesus exhibit this response? By pointing out that this man who came back to thank Jesus for healing him was a foreigner/a Samaritan, what was Jesus implying about the nationality of the other nine? They were probably Jews. People of Jesus’ race. Yet His own people failed to return to thank Him for healing them.

9) Why was the Samaritan so grateful to Jesus for healing him? Put yourself in his shoes for a moment. Feel the physical and emotional suffering this man endured. You are a leper. Your skin is basically rotting off your bones. You have open sores. You can’t feel anything. There is an awful stench coming from your body. You are ostracized from your family, friends, and normal community. You can’t touch your wife and children. Even if you could, you could not feel them. When you do come into contact with healthy people, you have to shout “Unclean! Unclean!” so that they know not to come near you. When they do recognize you as a leper they run away in fear from you. The only people you can socialize with are other lepers. But, you are not just a leper. You are a Samaritan leper. If the other nine lepers you associated with were Jews, how did they treat you? Not well. They probably stole whatever alms you received or shared with you the last morsel of moldy bread. In effect, you are an outcast among outcasts. But that all changed on the day Jesus healed you. You are healthy once more. You will no longer be treated as a pariah. You can go home to your family. Moreover, it was a Jew who showed compassion for you … a Jew who healed you. That has to make some impression on you. Out of the Samaritan’s joy, poured praises of thanksgiving for the one who changed his life. In return, Jesus, a Jew, commended him, a Samaritan, for his faith. Wow!

10) Why did the other nine not return to Jesus? We don’t really know. In my opinion, the nine were so ecstatic over what happened to them that they simply forgot to thank the One who made it possible. Before we throw rocks at them for being so ungrateful, how many people today … how many of us are guilty of doing the same?

11) In today’s culture with whom does our nation identify most when it comes to celebrating Thanksgiving - expressing thanks to God – the one Samaritan or the nine ex-lepers? You can deduce my conclusion from the title of this lesson and what I shared at the beginning of this lesson. This Thanksgiving be like the Samaritan and not the nine. Do not take God’s blessing for granted.

President Abraham Lincoln's November 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation

The year that is drawing toward its close has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added which are of so extraordinary a nature that they can not fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God.

In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere, except in the theater of military conflict, while that theater has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.

Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship; the ax has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well as the iron and coal as of our precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battlefield, and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the imposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the divine purpose, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity, and union.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this 3d day of October, A. D. 1863, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.