Being from the northeast I love autumn.  It is the season of year when nature becomes an artist and paints the countryside in a beautiful symphony of colors. It is a perfect time of year to celebrate our abundant harvest and to observe Thanksgiving Day.  This time of year brings back some many fond memories of playing in the falling leaves, and spending   Thanksgiving Day with grandma and grandpa.  Every Thanksgiving Day my family and I would go to Grandma’s house.  Imagine mom and dad and all 6 kids piled into the car.  We kids would sing: (we changed some of the words)

“Over the river, and through the wood, to grandmother’s house we go!  The horse knows the way, to carry the sleigh, through the white and drifted snow.

Over the river, and through the wood, to Grandmother’s house away!  We will stop to buy apple cider, for this is Thanksgiving Day.”

Oh yes, we had to stop at the cider mill; Thanksgiving wasn’t complete without the fresh apple cider.  All the kids would get out of the car and watch the making of fresh cider.  I can still see the mill and smell the fresh fragrance of the apples.  We would also buy some fresh apple to take to grandma.

Grandma’s house was warm and cozy.  She had been cooking and baking all day so the house was full of wonderful aromas.  She was such a good cook. 

The house was small so Thanksgiving dinner was always served in the basement. Grandpa had decorated the entire basement streamers, ribbons and lights and grandma had set a beautiful table.  To child it looked magical.   There was plenty of food served with all the trimmings; it was delicious.  If we wanted desert Grandma insisted that we clear our plates, almost lick them sparklingly clean.  The deserts were the best part of the meal so we did just as grandma asked.   After dinner grandpa took a nap and we grandchildren would run around the basement and create a little havoc.  Grandma and grandpa had a little storage room down in the basement.   We would like to go rummaging through it to see what we could find.  We know that grandma and grandpa always shopped early for Christmas.

This was a wonderful time.  I looked forward to it every year.  The best part, Grandma and Grandpa would also send us home with “bags of goodies” to enjoy the rest of the week.  Unfortunately I had to share them with all my brothers and sister.   Grandma and grandpa are gone now, but the memories of Thanksgivings past linger.

I like retelling that story - it makes me think about how well God treated my family and me.    Today I realize that God continues to treat me well even when I am not treating him well.

That childhood story also makes me think, about how I do not really appreciate what I have or act like I know where it has come from.  It serves as a kind of reminder to me - like that reminder in today's Old Testament reading.

There is Moses, after telling the people of Israel how they will prosper in the promised land that they are about to enter, how, after so many years of slavery and then of wandering in the wilderness, they will eat their fill, and have fine houses and large herds, and that their silver and gold will multiply,

then he says:

“Do not say to yourself, ‘my power and the might of my own hand have gained me this wealth.’  ‘But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, and as he swearing to you today.’”

Sounds like he is talking to us, doesn’t it?

Chapter eight of Deuteronomy speaks so well to each one of us.  It speaks of what we all know somewhere in our hearts, but often we seem to forget in our actions and our attitudes.

It speaks of how everything we have is a gift from God, a gift worked upon by our hands; and a gift enhanced by our own strength, but nonetheless a gift, for God gives us the hands we need, and God gives us the strength we have.

We need to remember this at all times - it would make our lives so much easier, and it would bless everyone around us, and it would bless God…it would bless God.

Now, I want you to think for a moment, if you could be granted one wish that will come true right now - what would that be? 

There would probably be as many as different answers as there are people here, some would be very interesting responses. But how many of you would ask the following:

“I wish that I could be given an even greater ability to appreciate all that I already have."

What do you think would happen if each one of us suddenly became a more thankful person?  If all of us suddenly became more appreciative people?

I don't know what you are thinking about, but I know for sure that when I was younger my mother would have been really pleased; and now that I am older - well I know that my wife, Mildred, would be very happy if I expressed my appreciation a little bit more than I do - I know that because she tells me so.

All of us like to be appreciated, all of us like to be thanked, and all of us, I believe, like to see those we love live thankful lives, appreciative lives.

This morning as we think with prayerful minds - as we thank God in our worship service for the harvest and the abundance we are all sharing and enjoying, I ask you - as I ask myself - where is your sense of thankfulness? 

Listen carefully to a couple of Bible verses:

I Thessalonians, chapter five, verse eighteen says:
"Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."

and in Ephesians, chapter five, where Paul is telling new Christians how they should live, it says:
"Give thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ."

We are Christians, we need to live thankful lives, and that is where thanks-living comes in.

The lessons for us:

Give thanks in all circumstances
Give thanks for everything.
Give thanks at all times.

If we do this we go one step beyond the Deuteronomy scripture by remembering God and thanking God for all the wealth that we enjoy in this our promised land.

We go one step beyond remembering God and obeying his commands because he has given us fine houses and filled our bellies.

Like the grateful leper, we go one step beyond thanking God, for healing through Jesus.

This is truly - "Thanks-Living" - and it is demanding lifestyle-but it is a rewarding one.

God calls us not only to a day of thanksgiving, as he has called his people from the time of Moses, He calls us to a life of thanks-living.

The difference between thanksgiving and thanks-living is between giving thanks on one day and living thanks always.  Thanksgiving is a wonderful day but it is a terminal event.  Thanks-living is a way of life.

Like Abraham and Sarah, we discover we have been blessed to be a blessing. Our continual thankfulness for our blessings will turn into a lifetime of living thanks, of living the blessings and sharing the blessings because we know in the deepest parts of our hearts that God is the giver of it all.

Here is the best part: giving thanks blesses the person who is thanked and it transforms the person who gives thanks.   Let me repeat that: it blesses the person who is thanked and it transforms the person who gives thanks.

It works the same way everywhere, with everyone, even with God.

And guess what?  When we forget to thank - things get harder; we become bitter, discouraged or we grow arrogant and self-satisfied.

God wants us to celebrate his love.  God wants us to give thanks in everything.   Why?   Because it will bless us and because it will bless the world he has made.

As the psalmist declares - "It is good to give thanks to the LORD, to sing praises to his name"

It's good because it is right that we should feast and thank God for what he has given us, it is right to celebrate and to share our bounty, it's good to express appreciation and to rejoice over the goodness of God.

When we give thanks, we are reminded of all the good things and all the good people that we have been given or gifted.   We remember that we have been blessed.

This is where thanks-living comes into the picture.  We begin to "live thanks" when we open our lives up to God and give God the first place.

As we do this - as we humble ourselves before God and admit that he is the source of good things, our blessings increases, our joy becomes fuller, and we find ourselves in an attitude and state of grace.

Happy thanks-living.   Amen

Sermon delived by Bill Price, Lay Leader on November 20, 2005.