Thanksgiving
as a national holiday comes and goes. And for many people that’s all
there is to it. However, believers are exhorted in the Bible to be
thankful not just on the holiday but throughout the believer’s life.
Many
have been taught that the first Thanksgiving was held by the Pilgrims
soon after the Mayflower anchored at Plymouth. Texans, however, claim
that the first Thanksgiving in America was proclaimed in Palo Duro
Canyon by Juan De Cadilla for his troops in 1541, seventy years before
the Pilgrims arrived. So, there is some question as to when the national
holiday began.
Scripture
does not tell us anything as to when the first day of Thanksgiving was
given. However, it tells us often and plainly that believers are to be
thankful at all times. In fact, Thanksgiving was on again and off again
until a widow named Sarah Hale who had five children and a millinery
shop. Sarah authored a number of magazines. In 1846 she launched a
crusade to establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday.
Here
are a select three out of many Scripture passages that tell us to be
thankful always. Psalm 92:1 says, “It is good to give thanks to the
Lord. In Psalm 95:2 we read, “Let us come before His presences with
thanksgiving.” And in 2 Thessalonians 1:3 we read, “We ought always to
give thanks to God.”
