Church of the Holy City

The Foreigner’s Praise

The Foreigner’s Praise
Rev. Dr. David J. Fekete
October 10, 2010
Thanksgiving Sunday

Leviticus 23:33-36, 39-43 Luke 17:11-19 Psalm 118

Our New testament story is so typical of how things can be with us. When we are in distress, we call out to God. Then, when things are going well, we can forget all we have to be thankful to God for. And once again, the New testament author shows the spirit of true thankfulness through the foreign and despised Samaritans. Ten lepers appeal to Jesus to be cured. He sends them to the priests and they are cured. Only the Samaritan alone comes back to thank Jesus and praise God. I have talked about how the Samaritans were viewed by the Israelites before, but some brief review may help us to understand the story better.
The Samaritans were foreigners who settled in northern Israel after Assyria had conquered it. They were largely of Assyrian origin. Their scriptures were not the ones used by the Israelites in Judah. And they constructed their own temple on Mount Gerizim, as a rival to the one in Jerusalem. So the Jews in Judah, the Jews that Jesus lived among, saw the Samaritans as heretics, and even enemies. But true worship of God transcends place and sect. Jesus tells the Samaritan woman at the well, “A time is coming when you will worship the Father neighbor on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. . . . A time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth” (John 4:21, 23). And it is a heretical foreigner–a Samaritan–who shows us all the spirit of thankfulness.
Our reading from Leviticus concerns one of the three great agricultural festivals. They are Passover, the Festival of the First Fruits of the Land, and The Feast of Tabernacles, also translated as the Feast of Booths. We heard about the Feast of Tabernacles. It was celebrated in the autumn when all the crops had been harvested and gathered in. And in a society that depended upon the year’s harvest for its very survival, it is only natural that the autumn harvest festival would also be one of thankfulness for the year’s crops.
So we have two themes of thanksgiving from our Bible stories. One is thanksgiving for bounty–the Old Testament story. And the other a theme of thanksgiving for deliverance from distress and for healing–the New Testament story. Both these stories are ours.
Let’s begin by considering thanksgiving for bounty. We all have so much to be grateful that we cannot enumerate everything. Sure we gripe about not having enough. Sure we struggle to make ends meet from pay check to pay check. I struggle and gripe. But dwelling on what we don’t have only gets in the way of our peace. Instead, we can look at all the things we do have. When we do that, we will find that our cup truly flows over. Last year I bought a new car, which added a rather high car payment to my monthly expenses. What shall I look at? Shall I complain each month about the car payment? Or shall I be grateful each time I’m driving my car that I now have reliable transportation? Each time I find myself in that car, I am buying peace of mind and confidence with that car payment. We can even get more basic than that. I have a roof over my head. My apartment meets all my needs. I am dry when it rains. I am warm inside when it is cold outside. I have room for my bed, and in addition I have room for my electric piano and my bookcases. I have food. I have enough food and good food to keep me healthy. And my health gives me the ability to fulfill my uses in this world. I have clothes. I have all the clothes I need. I have shorts and t-shirts for the summer. I have long pants and long-sleeved shirts for the autumn. I have warm jackets for the winter. I even have enough money for an occasional trip to the ski-hill in the winter to cheer me up in Edmonton’s cold, dark winters. I have the love of a dear friend whom I love back with all my heart. We have here a healthy and loving faith community. We have a place where Swedenborg’s inspired theology can be proclaimed and heard. We have a place where people can explore spirituality as God is leading them without condemnation or judgement. We have a place where people care for one another and friendships blossom. And we can get even more basic than this. There are some sombre lines from Walt Whitman that I’ve always liked. He writes, “It seems to me that everything in the light and air ought to be happy;/Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave, let him know he has enough” (“The Sleepers,” 79-80). What I am talking about is called a “gratitude list.” It is a list of all the things we have to be grateful for. A mind filled with gratitude is happy. It is fitting that we take one day out of the year to think about all we have to be thankful for. For it is too easy to forget as the year passes by, and we find ourselves worrying about what we don’t have. We can carry the spirit of Thanksgiving into the year that follows. We can give thanks for the blessings we all have. We will find life more blessed and happy when we dwell on all our many blessings.
On a spiritual level, we can give thanks to God for His continual work of salvation. Through all the challenges and trials we experience in life, God is with us. God is ceaselessly lifting us upward toward him. God is ceaselessly lifting us upward into heavenly joy. God is ceaselessly elevating us out of worldly and selfish loves and into spiritual and Godly joys.
This is both an active and a passive process. Sometimes we feel deep anguish and pain, and we cry out to God for help and deliverance. We cry out of our misery like the lepers cried out to Jesus. I think you all know that poem about the footprints in the sand. A man is walking on the beach and there are two sets of footprints. His own, and those of Jesus who is walking next to him. It happens that the man falls into deep despair and finds only one set of footprints on the beach. He cries out to Jesus where were you then? Jesus responds, “Those footprints were mine; I was carrying you.” God is with us in our moments of trial and despair. God hears our prayers, and answers. Inevitably, our trials come to some resolution. We may find ourselves in a new frame of mind. We may find ourselves on a new spiritual plateau. Rarely do we ever come back to the same place we were before our trials. And this new spiritual place may be God’s answer and healing that we cried out for. But our life eventually levels out; our distress eases. Our life then should be a constant prayer of thanksgiving. But is it? Do we remember to give thanks to God for His deliverance? Whom are we like–the Samaritan, or the other nine lepers? I have been describing God’s help as an active process so far–when we cry out for God’s help and we find deliverance.
But there is also a passive process to God’s salvation. Sometimes we go about our lives for a long while with no serious challenges or trials. We go to work; we live out our family life; we visit with friends. And yet, all the while, God is working in the background. We look back over the years, and we see how different we are from the person we were in the past. In fact, this is one reason why the Buddhists say there is no self at all. When we wonder when the change occurred, we can’t say; we can’t put our finger on when the change happened. But happen it did. Through all the events in our life in the world, God was working on our soul. God was lifting us upward. Lifting us so subtly and so gently that we weren’t even aware of His work. It was as if we were carried along in the powerful current of Providence, as in a river.
Both of these processes are the workings of God’s Divine love. It is out of love that God is continually bringing us toward Himself. Every lover wants to be close to his or her beloved. And God is love itself. So it is only natural that God would want to be close to us. It is only natural that God would want to bring us close to Him. And for God’s love, we can give thanks with our whole heart. As we thank God, we are returning the love He lavishes on us. We can return God’s love by being loving in our own lives. Jesus tells us, “If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love . . . This is my command: Love each other” (John 15:10, 17). Obeying Jesus’ commands; loving each other; these are the ways to truly show gratitude and thankfulness to God. As we enjoy the Thanksgiving feast and the love of family and friends, let us keep in mind that Thanksgiving Day is both a spiritual holiday, and an earthly holiday. Let us remember to give thanks to God for our bounty and for God’s help and deliverance. Then, Thanksgiving Day will be on earth as it is in heaven.