‘Cornbread’s Rich Uncle’ & Skipping Thanksgiving
Dear church,
The next two months rank among the favorite times of year for many of us. We come off the Halloween holiday and we are headed towards New Year’s Day with two months of what feels like a lot of celebrating…and most of our celebrating this time of year is for Christmas.
Some twenty years ago, John Grisham penned a comedy novel entitled Skipping Christmas. The premise of the novel is this: Luther and Nora Krank attempt to avoid the frenzy of everything that comes with a traditionally celebrated Christmas. Their daughter has left on a Peace Corps assignment to Peru, and they are dealing with the separation anxiety that comes along with the significant family change. So, to escape the emotions that come with Christmas they attempt to skip Christmas to deal with their newfound anxiety. You know the story, don’t you? The novel was adapted for the film Christmas with the Kranks. We know how the movie ends, too don’t we? The idea of skipping Christmas is too much to handle as their daughter returns early from her Peace Corps assignment and surprises them as she and her new fiancé fly home on Christmas Eve. At that point, skipping Christmas seems like a really silly proposal.
As we sit here on the precipice of the holiday season let me present a simple challenge to you in the spirit of John Grisham’s novel: Don’t skip Thanksgiving.
Don’t get me wrong – I know we’ll celebrate Thanksgiving in a variety of ways.
There will be a myriad of foods available on the day of Thanksgiving. In fact, let’s just talk about Thanksgiving foods, shall we? It is one of my favorite meals of the year! Personally, I’ve always loved to make the sides – homemade dressing, homemade cranberry sauce, and cornbread so delicious its official name as my friends and family know it is ‘Cornbread’s Rich Uncle’. This year I’m also going to try smoking my turkey for a dinner our small group is hosting.
For sure we’ll be celebrating Thanksgiving with food. There might be football games on in the background on the big screen followed by a game of football in the yard. There might be board games and maybe a holiday movie to cap the night off (Christmas in Connecticut, Holiday Inn, and Elf are three of my favorites). There will be the day after Thanksgiving with leftovers (I love leftovers!) and perhaps some shopping for socks at Fred Meyer’s (totally a thing to do in Douglas County, right?). Again, I know we’ll celebrate Thanksgiving in a variety of ways. My challenge to you is to not just celebrate Thanksgiving – make sure you don’t skip Thanksgiving. Don’t skip the opportunity to give thanks. Don’t skip the opportunity to be thankful.
Don’t skip the opportunity to practice thanksgiving with your spouse together.
When was the last time that you and your spouse sat down together and listed things you’re grateful for? Maybe you can make it a game of sorts and try to come up with 50 or 100 things you’re grateful for without repeating one while you alternate turns?
Don’t skip the opportunity to teach your kids what thanksgiving looks like and what it means.
Maybe you can create a ‘Thanksgiving Jar’ where each member of the family jots down one thing they are grateful for on a slip of paper every day and put it in the ‘Thanksgiving Jar.’ Then in December, you can read a few each night leading up to Christmas.
Don’t skip the opportunity to be grateful for salvation.
Take some time and read some of the Scriptures that describe the beauty of salvation: Colossians 2, Ephesians 1 & 2, Romans 5 & 6. Read these as a family. Discuss them with your family: How did God demonstrate His love for us? Where should our faith be rooted? What is the impact of God’s love in our lives? Find these chapters on the Bible App and listen to them throughout the day. Meditate on these Scriptures.
Don’t skip the opportunity to think about what Jesus did on the cross for us.
Read the Gospels. Make a list of everything Jesus said and what He did. Think through how Jesus endured so much. Meditate on how Jesus could pay a price for our sins that we couldn’t pay to receive the gift of eternal life that we could never earn on our own.
Don’t skip the opportunity to show gratitude for the friendships and relationships in your life.
Reach out to your friends and let them know how grateful you are for them. Write them a handwritten note and express your love and gratitude for the gift of their friendship. What would it look like for you to show them your gratitude?
If we aren’t intentional about giving thanks, we’ll find ourselves taking things for granted and giving place to discontentment. When our discontentment is not addressed in our lives, it can give way to bitterness in our lives.
It'll happen fast. It always does. Before we know it Thanksgiving will be in the past and we'll be in full-Christmas mode and all of its glitz while facing the eve of a New Year. This year let’s pause to position ourselves in a posture of gratitude as we enter the season. For the second consecutive year we will host a Gratitude Sunday on Sunday, November 20th. We're thrilled to welcome Phil Roberts as our guest speaker for this year’s Gratitude Sunday. He is the Assistant to the President for Seminary Development at the Emmanuel Christian Seminary (Milligan College). Phil is a tremendous speaker, and we are excited to host him on this incredibly special Sunday. The goal of this Sunday is to inspire you to pause and not rush as we give you spiritual applications and practical ideas on how to cultivate thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is not just a holiday nor is it a single day; it’s a word that denotes action. It means we should do more than just celebrate Thanksgiving. It means that we practice the act of thanksgiving. So, in the rush to celebrate the holidays, let’s not skip Thanksgiving.
I love you, church.
Pastor Daniel
(In upcoming issues of ‘Dear church’ we’ll talk about all that’s ahead of us this holiday season, the second most repeated command in Scripture, five questions I ask when I read my Bible, how I study for a message, and what a week looks like in the life of your pastor)
