Thanksgiving Sunday, November 21, 2021
Introduction
The first verse of today’s reading mentions a form of the word “blessed” three times. Even the most surface of reading reveals this as the crux to the entire pericope.
What follows then is a litany of God’s blessings that come at you like a set of Russian nesting dolls—you uncover one blessing, only to find another.
Depending on your exegesis of this text you can find 20 or more different blessings to which the Apostle Paul is expounding upon. Some of the obvious ones include…
God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world (v. 4).
God destined us for adoption as his children (v. 5).
In Jesus we have redemption through his blood (v. 7).
In Jesus we have … the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace (v. 7).
In Christ we have also obtained an inheritance (v. 11).
In him you also … were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit (v. 13).
And like I said, these are just a few.
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Paul is counting his blessings and counting our blessings is a practice that has been encouraged for generations to help us have not only the perspective that God is always good and always blessing God’s children, but also so that in the midst of hard and trying times we know there are blessings to see and embrace, and of course be thankful for.
And then in the counting of our blessings, hopefully, we see the absurdity of such an effort—that counting our blessings makes about as much sense as trying to count grains of sand at the beach or the number of hairs on our head. It’s impossible!
But, counting and keeping track is what we humans do. We count everything, right?
The dollars in our bank account. The mileage on our cars. The number of items on our to-do list. The hours worked compared to the hours we don’t work. The number of emails and texts we get. The minutes we exercise (or don’t exercise), calories, pounds, days, weeks, months, years… What don’t we count?
And technology has gotten to such that it counts things for us. My smart watch reminds me of those lack of exercise minutes. My phone shows me the number of minutes (or hours) I spend each day on Facebook, Twitter, Google, texting, and on the phone talking. It tracks it all, and then shows a daily average for each—which can be rather jarring.
But my phone doesn’t track how much time I spend counting my blessings. And it certainly doesn’t count my blessings.
Which means we have to do it ourselves, right?
And we should certainly count our blessing because most of what we do count doesn’t often lead to joy, happiness, and thanksgiving. But we can find joy, happiness, and thanksgiving by counting our blessings.
So I propose, like the Apostle Paul, we count our blessings. And there is perhaps no better time to start then at the beginning of the Holiday Season.
With Thanksgiving leading the charge into the cornucopia of blessings that abound in our lives, let us count our blessings so we are led to joy and happiness, and so we are certain to give thanks for all of our blessings.
We can call it “Thanks-Blessings.”
Move 1
This reading from Ephesians is apropos for this Thanksgiving Sunday where we intentionally consider and celebrate all we have to be thankful for—all of which are, of course, blessings.
We’ve already noted some of the big blessings the Apostle Paul identifies—and following his lead is good. But it is also good to unpack and drill down a bit further into the word itself— “blessing.”
So let’s do so grammatically, because that’ll be fun, right?
Grammatically “blessing” can be both a noun and a verb.
Used as a noun, we might say: “She is such a blessing.” “He said a blessing before dinner.” “We have received so many blessings.”
But the word “blessing” is also be a verb, conveying action. “The pastor blessed the couple on their wedding day.” Or as the case may be, “The pastor did NOT bless the congregation with a SHORT sermon.”
Verse 3 actually show us the use of the word blessing as both verb and noun“ God… who has blessed (verb) us in Christ with every spiritual blessing (noun).”
A blessing can be both received (noun) or bestowed (verb). We can receive a blessing (noun), and we can bless others (verb).
Yes, I know this is a sixth grade English lesson—ok it was the sixth grade for me, but more like third grade for y’all—but hang with me because the simplicity of this is where we find the profound.
Simply speaking, a blessing received is a prayer for God’s goodness to be experienced. And a blessing given is the same.
In the Old Testament, blessings typically refer to: material possessions, children, good crops, good health and long life. Abraham had many descendants. Jacob had many sons. Solomon was blessed with wisdom—and because wisdom was what he asked of God, God also blessed him with incredible wealth and power. On and on in the Old Testament we see these type of noun blessings.
In the New Testament, however, blessings generally refer to the spiritual.
Our text for today is an example, but there are other well-known passages too—the Beatitudes from Jesus perhaps the most well-known.
In the Beatitudes, traditional notions of what it means to be blessed are turned upside down. Before Jesus and the Beatitudes, scribes and Pharisees taught and interpreted the scriptures to show: The rich were blessed; those who were in mourning had been cursed or punished for their sins; the strong and mighty (not the meek and mild) are blessed; you are blessed if you have plenty to eat and drink.
But Jesus said: The poor were blessed; those in mourning were blessed with comforted; the meek would inherit the earth; and those who “hunger and thirst after righteousness” are truly blessed.
And here in Ephesians are more spiritual blessings: We’ve been “chosen”; we are divine children; our sins and transgressions have been forgiven.
All of these blessings are reason to give thanks to God for those noun blessings.
But we don’t want to stop our “Thanks-Blessings” with just the persons, places, or things. We need— as Jesus and Paul and others show time and time again— we need to verb these blessings.
(Did I just turn the word “verb” into an adjective? Not sure. See, I told you, as a student I was always behind.)
Move 2
So let’s drill down into “blessing” as a verb.
“To bless” is the verb form of the word. Followers of Jesus try to live in a way that blesses others.
As the Apostle Paul says in our text we have received “every spiritual blessing,” so now we try to bless others— our lives are blessings in action.
And really, this is not a hard effort for us. Any of us would be more than willing to do whatever we can to bless others. Spouse, partner, parents, children, nieces, nephews, family, friends—we’re glad to bless them—we want to verb bless them.
People in need—we’re working on that verb blessing all the time through the giving of noun blessings. Bulldog Bags, Freedom House, sending kids to camp, the Christmas In-Gathering Outreach program, on and on—verb blessing through noun blessings.
And here is the power of verb blessings. Those who live lives of verb blessings—they see and experience the joy and happiness, the holy and sacred, that abounds in life.
Move 3
The Apostle Paul was a man of faith in action, and because he was he had some incredible adventures that included shipwrecks, floggings, imprisonment, false accusations, the misunderstanding of colleagues, and illness. But always Paul regarded himself as blessed.
He wasn’t blessed on some days and not on others—but every day he received God’s blessings—nouns.
And in response he lived out his calling to bless others—verb.
And this awareness of the providence of God certainly came from his upbringing and education as a Jew—who read what we know as the Old Testament.
Rabbi Jennifer Singer emphasizes such when she states, “Judaism is chock-full of blessings. We’ve got blessings for heads of state, Torah scholars, even ugly people. Blessings over sunsets, meteors, rainbows, reunions, and bad news. Blessings for bread and baked goods and fruit and vegetables, all different. A blessed person perceives blessings when others are oblivious. In turn, a blessed person blesses everything.”
Rabbi Singer then explains how the Talmud—which is a compilation of ancient Jewish teachings that are to be studied more so than just read—recommends “reciting 100 blessings each day… one every 10 minutes of our waking lives. The faithful person should be constantly aware of the world around us, and should respond through gratitude, thanksgiving, and prayer.”
This is a suggested religious practice—drawn out from the Old Testament that Paul would have read and studied.
A spiritual practice of thinking often about the blessings around us; being constantly aware of them AND the world around them; and then live in response to those blessings and awareness’s with gratitude, thanksgiving, and prayer.
Or maybe, for short, we live in response to our Thanks-Blessings.
Conclusion
The Apostle Paul rattled off a rather lengthy list of blessings in our text for today.
So what if we challenged ourselves to do the same—starting this week as the holiday season kicks-off with Thanksgiving, leading the charge into this holy and sacred time—and we too begin to count our blessings?
No, we won’t ever be able to stop because our blessings are like grains of sand at the beach or the hairs on our head. But that’s the point, right? Because by counting our blessings, by practicing “Thanks-blessings” every day, we stop counting all that doesn’t bring joy and happiness, which then leads us to finding the holy and sacred—the abundance of noun blessings from God around us— which then leads us to verb bless others.
And that is a spiritual practice that blesses us, to find blessings, that inspire us to bless others, through our blessings, all by the blessing and blessings of God.
(I may have been a slow student, but I eventually caught up.)
So may you have a happy and blessed Thanksgiving—made even happier and more blessed through your spiritual practice of “Thanks-blessings.” Amen.
Pastoral Prayer, November 21, 2021; Thanksgiving Sunday
Holy God, the witnesses in your sacred word tell of your abundant and boundless generosity.
You give your word and call the worlds into being; You give your sovereign rule to emancipate the oppressed; You give your commanding fidelity to form your own people; You give your life for the life of the world—broken bread that feeds, poured out wine that binds and heals.
Again and again, You give…we receive…and we are thankful.
Thankful we have any sense of your mysterious presence; thankful you give us life and ask simply that we live abundantly and fully into your calling to be extensions of your love and blessings in this world
Even so, we know, instead of loving recklessly and blessing wastefully, we live hedging our bets, and on the safe side. But we do give thanks, O God.
Yes, thanksgiving willed, but not so readily lived; thanksgiving held back by old wounds turned to powerful resentment; thanksgiving slowed by early fears that become vague anxiety, thanksgiving restrained by self-sufficiency in a can-do arrogance, blocked by amnesia unable to recall blessings that have already, and still abound.
Help us remember we are your beloved and blessed children; we live in your beloved and blessed world; we are alive and can experience the blessings that abound, and we can share abundantly by helping to bring your healing and love, to the corners and streets and spaces in which we live and move and have our very being.
Create innocent spaces for us this day, this week, this season, and beyond—for the thanksgiving we intend, and for all the blessings we have received.
Make it that in our thankfulness of blessings received, we will give, we will tell, we will act, we will share. Bless us O Lord, in such a way that through our Thanksgiving for you abundant and boundless blessings we share them with all.
May you hear now the prayers of our hearts as we offer them in this time of Holy Silence.
All this we pray in the name of the blessed one who comes in the name of the Lord, Jesus the Christ, who taught us to pray, saying, “Our…”