History of Thanksgiving

It is easy to pass right over Thanksgiving today. Christmas music is already on the radio and the stores have had their Christmas displays out since October. If we do think about Thanksgiving our thoughts are usually consumed with details for family gatherings, turkeys, green bean casseroles and football. But Thanksgiving was originally designed as a time to stop all activity and think about God and express our thankfulness for all His provision.

The First Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was first celebrated in 1621 in Massachusetts as a harvest feast thanking God for his care and provision. English Pilgrims left Plymouth, England on September 6, 1620 for the New World seeking freedom. After two months at sea, they landed in what is now Massachusetts in November 1620.

Sadly, unprepared for the brutal and unforgiving environment they faced, half the settlers died before winter’s end due to starvation and disease. However, by persevering in prayer and with the help of Native Americans, they planted crops and reaped a harvest to carry them through the second winter in the New World.

Although their hearts were still heavy from the losses suffered the previous winter, there were at least three areas for which they felt particularly grateful to God.

1. With the arrival of spring, the sickness that had immobilized the community and taken many of them in death had lifted. 

2. With the arrival of spring, God providentially sent to them an English-speaking Native American, Squanto, who became their interpreter and guide, helping them establish friendly relations with Massosoit, chief of the Wampanoag, the nearest and most powerful tribe in the region. In March 1621, they had signed an agreement of peace and mutual aid with Massosoit, which resulted in both peoples moving freely back and forth in friendship and trade.

3. Through hard work and Squanto’s advice about farming and fishing, they experienced abundant harvests during the summer and fall of 1621.

The first Thanksgiving included English Pilgrims and Wampanoag Indians. Not only did they enjoy meals together with thankful hearts, but they engaged in games, foot races and wrestling matches. It was such an enjoyable time that the one Day of Thanksgiving was extended for three full days. The Indians brought deer that they had hunted and prepared, and the Pilgrims provided fowl which probably included turkeys.

The Nationalizing of Thanksgiving

The early days of Thanksgiving were observed at various times in different places as deemed appropriate and necessary by the colonists. As the colonists began to form themselves into a nation, these days of Thanksgiving began to be nationalized and made part of the national calendar.

The Continental Congress met between 1774 and 1789 and issued several calls for days of humiliation, prayer and thanksgiving. The first one was to be observed on November 28, 1782. The proclamation reads in part:

“It being the indispensable duty of all nations, not only to offer up their supplications to Almighty God, the giver of all good, for His gracious assistance in times of distress, but also in a solemn and public manner, to give Him praise for His goodness in general, and especially for great and signal interpositions of His Providence in their behalf.”

Shortly after being sworn in as president, George Washington issued a proclamation designating November 26, 1789 as a Day of Thanksgiving wherein all citizens should offer gratitude to God for His protection, care and many blessings. It was the first Thanksgiving Day designated by the new national government of the United States. The proclamation reads in part:

“Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor, and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me ‘to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.’

What is clear from these early national proclamations is that the pilgrim’s original intention of directing all thanks and praise to God was upheld by our nation’s earliest leaders. Thanksgiving is intended to be a day of prayer and gratitude to God as our great provider and we want to focus on Him and how great He is on this holiday.

We would love to invite you to Praise, Pie and Gratitude on the night before Thanksgiving as a way in which our church remembers that Thanksgiving is about our amazing God and his provision in our lives. We will come together that night for a time of exalting Him and thanking Him because all good gifts come from our God. Please join us at 7:00pm on Wednesday, November 27 in Prior Lake Campus Worship Center.

Colossians 2:6–7: “as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”