I hope everyone has a blessed Thanksgiving day with their family and friends.

Thanksgiving day is a holiday and feast day meant to to thank God for our blessings through the year and to celebrate our harvest. Even in these difficult economic times in our nation most of us can find many things to be thankful for.

First and foremost, Christians should be thankful for our salvation. No matter what happens to us on this earth we should know that we were given the promise of eternal life in a place of unspeakable joy. As I get older one thing becomes more apparent to me every day. It is more likely than not that I will be with the Lord in twenty years whether the Rapture happens in that time period or not. There is one thing that is certain in this world. Some of us Christians will be with the Lord before the Rapture. 😯

Longevity is usually desired by the healthy but even life on earth can be a burden to bare for those of age that are not living in good health. So we Christians can even be thankful for death of this temporal body, for to be absent from the body means we will be present with the Lord. We can show are own thankfulness for our salvation by sharing it with someone who is lost.

As Christians in America we can be thankful that we were born in a blessed nation. The vast majority of Christians on earth have quite a different experience than Americans. They have many hardships and persecutions that most Christians in America never experienced. But, keep in mind that material blessings of the world and even our freedoms can become a stumbling stone in our walk of faith if we allow them to be. Like Paul we should be content in whatever state we find ourselves in. For whatever we go through in our body of flesh for the cause of Christ does not compare to the blessings that we will receive in Christ for eternity.

We can be thankful for our health and we can demonstrate our thanks by ministering to the sick among us.

We can be thankful for our family and friends by showing love towards them and where necessary showing unmerited forgiveness for past offensives against us.

We should be thankful if we have enough food and adequate shelter. Many in the world go hungry and are homeless or live in tents and makeshift sheds. We show are thanks to God for our own abundance when we help the poor.

We should remember the downtrodden victims of this evil world system on this day of thanks. If it were not for the grace of God or the mercy of someone else many of us would fare no better than they. Maybe we can show thanks this year by helping someone else that needs a helping hand.

So on this day of thanksgiving when we celebrate our blessings with a feast, let us at least give thanks to the One whom all thanksgiving is due, and also remember the second great commandment.

Mt 22:35  Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,
36  Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37  Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38  This is the first and great commandment.
39  And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.