TIME TO SING SOME THANK YOU NOTES

Happy Thanksgiving to all y'all.

Well, the very fact that I'm writing this when I'd normally be cooking or eating tells you something different is going on. Yup. A few days ago a nasty cold caught up with me. Tested: no COVID nor the other two kinds of flu bugs on the test guage. So that's something I'm thankful for today. But I couldn't get up the energy to shop, cook, bake while trying to fight this bug. So, in a couple of hours, Maggie's picking me up and taking me to their home for Thanksgiving dinner.

Times change. Maggie drives now and I go along for the ride. Poco called yesterday to ask me for recipes so she could copy Thanksgiving dinner at my house. She said, "Momo, it's my favorite meal every year!" Well, it's hard to hand over recipes that are only in my head. Did you ever try to describe making gravy to a Grand? It's more work than making the gravy. But it reminded me to ask myself, "What am I not passing along that really matters?"

Well, Maggie called to report that the turkey took longer to thaw than anticipated, so we'll eat a little later. But that's better than the time Mama baked the turkey with all the giblets still giftwrapped inside the cavity of the turkey. Daddy discovered it at carving time. Or the time I was so nervous I'd overcook the bird, it was lethally undercooked. So while vegetables waited with the cranberry sauce, the turkey stayed in the oven until that little gizmo popped up. But just to be sure I shoved it back into the oven. Better to serve dry than raw turkey. After fifty plus years of baking turkeys, I've finally mastered the timing. Like a lot of life, just when you catch on, it's time for someone else to take over.

But, if all we do today is talk turkey, we've missed the true focus of the day. It's neither food nor football, though I like both a lot. Nor is it getting a jump on Black Friday sales. It's about giving thanks. And that's a lot harder for some, than making gravy. It ranks right up there with being told to sit down and write a thank you note to someone. And sometimes it was for something you really didn't want but, Mama said, "Write!" So I wrote.

Then again, many of the Psalms are thank you notes. They are praise songs to God, thank you notes sent to the God "from whom all blessings flow." And speaking of songs, even though I felt too sick to go, I know they sang Now thank we all our God, last Sunday at church. I especially love that hymn, now that I know the story behind it. You can Google it, or keep reading.

This hymn was written by a Lutheran minister, Martin Rinkart, in Eilenberg, Germany around 1637. This was when the thrifty Years War was devastating Europe, but especially Germany. In that country they were also experiencing a famine and a plague. Remember what it was like during the recent pandemic? Imagine these other disasters happening, as well. And no vaccines!

In various sources I read, it said that during 1637, the plague killed 8,000 people, including Rinkart's wife. He, alone, buried 4,480 during that year, 40-50 a day. Imagine the weight of so much sorrow. Yet two miracles,(my word, not from the sources) Rev.Rinkart never got sick. And the 2nd miracle, to me, is in the depths of his personal despair, he wrote NOW, Thank We All Our God. Yes, I wrote NOW in full caps on purpose. It's in the middle of life's muddles, not when we finally see a way out, we are to give thanks. Why? It's easy to lose ourselves in what's happening and forget that God is with us. God didn't cause it. But God can make something good come from it. Like this hymn, that is second only to Martin Luther's, A Mighty Fortress is Our God, among favorite hymns in Germany.

And with this context, NOW picture the following Thanksgiving scene in 1637. Martin Rinkart, somehow found time and thankfulness to write this hymn, but not for the church. He wrote it for his two young motherless children. They sang it before meal time and at bed time. Eventually it found its way into the hymnal.

With that in mind, I hope you'll hunt the lyrics, then tell the story to your family and friends at some time when you're together. Then sing the hymn with great gratitude. We have so much for which to give thanks to God. And to and for each other. The Apostle Paul had plenty to be unthankful for. But he and Silas sang thank you notes in prison to God. And in 1Thessalonians 5:18 urged us who choose to follow Jesus, to do the tough stuff, like Martin Rinkhart did. "Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."

So, lets rejoice and sing some thank you notes to God. I'll start us off, but I won't sing. I might get coughing, barking like a seal. I don't want to spread anything but goodwill.

Now thank we all our God with heart and hands and voices

Who wondrous things hath done, in whom his world rejoices

Who from our Mother's arms hath blessed us on our way

With countless gifts of love and still is ours today.

For sure, there is so much more I hope to pass on to my Grands, than how to make gravy for Thanksgiving dinner.

You, too?