On my way to my favorite coffee shop this morning I turned on the heat and the radio in my Jeep. It’s been cold and they say the Thanksgiving weekend may bring some snow. Snow for Thanksgiving. We will be praying our travelers in. Tomorrow Holly flies to Washington State for Thanksgiving with Jesse. Others are hurrying home. She can’t wait to leave Granville Cottage for Thanksgiving and fly to the West Coast.
People come and go from the coffee shop this morning in hats, and furry collars, cheeks red with cold. I’m warming myself with breakfast oats, steaming coffee and the London Philharmonic Christmas music. The sky is lightening and the traffic is picking up. I’m thinking about a funeral later today, folk in the hospital, some administrative responsibilities and preparations for the Thanksgiving Eve service and study for Sunday’s launch of my Christmas Series and Christmas communion. If you live close I hope you will attend our Christmas services in person. It you don’t you can catch the sermon podcast.
Deep Trouble in the Soul of our Nation
by Ken Pierpont
Last week I heard a fellow talking about a business idea—a restaurant concept. The restaurant would serve only Thanksgiving leftovers. Cold turkey, cold mashed potatoes and gravy, cold stuffing. Each patron would have his own recliner, a little microwave to warm his food, and a TV to watch football. They would hire a family to sit over in the corner and argue politics. The restaurant chain would be called “Thanks Again.”
Every year about the time the trees are bare and the wind is cold Thanksgiving comes to Michigan again. Thanksgiving in America is blessed time of year. The holiday nicely shortens the third work-week of November. It’s a family time. It’s a mellow, simple holiday that comes and goes quietly and doesn’t require a second mortgage. Even if the Lions didn’t always play every year, Thanksgiving would still be a great idea. If you don’t love leftovers and football I’m glad to remind you that Thanksgiving is much deeper than that. It is a holiday that can reach down deep into your soul if you let it.
Thanksgiving is a Day when those who know and love God have a chance to stop and humbly and quietly acknowledge Him. It was originally conceived not as a slick on-ramp for the materialistic mayhem of holiday shopping, but a season of quiet national humility, when devout men and women acknowledge God and his goodness.
Today we are living in a nation, though that is willfully forgetting God. We are electing to office leaders who are writing laws that defy the laws of God. They are legalizing immorality and normalizing murder in our name. They are doing their best to write God out of American History. They ignore the Bible, distort its meaning, or selectively interpret it to justify their willful defiance of God.
Referring to the prohibition against immorality in Romans, our own President said that he prefers the Sermon on the Mount to what he called “An obscure passage in Romans.” That the leader of the free world has come to consider Romans an obscure passage is evidence of deep trouble in the soul of our nation.
All around us the enemies of God refuse to acknowledge Him. There are many who are not satisfied to see churches pushed to the inconsequential margins of culture. They will not be satisfied until they tax us or legislate us completely out of existence. Some of the most powerful leaders in America are working steadily toward that end. refuse to serve Him. They refuse to worship Him. They refuse to glorify Him. They refuse to even thank Him. What you see in America today is clearly described in Romans 1; “Though they knew God they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him…” Refusal to thank God darkens your heart. “Their foolish hearts are darkened…”
That is why, now more than ever, we must keep Thanksgiving alive in our hearts and homes and churches. May it never be said of us, “…their hearts were darkened because they refused to thank God.”
Ken Pierpont
Granville Cottage
Riverview, Michigan
Nobember 30, 2013
So True!
Pastor,
It was very reassuring to me to read this article in which you point out exactly what is going on in our nation. Our leaders have a goal in mind and we are watching the bible unfold before our very eyes. As a member of Evangel, I have long prayed that our ‘leader’ would speak to these very events from the pulpit. We are a country founded on Godly principals and faith. The great men who wrote our constitution never backed off from their beliefs and stood bold and firm. The people of this nation need to hear this in our nation’s churches. Some pastor’s do, but most don’t. They need to hear how these times in our history are real and prophecy is being fulfilled. There is no denying it. None of us knows the day or the hour of Jesus’ return but the bible tells us to watch for the signs and wait on Him. There is an urgency in our nation and its’ people need to realize this and kneel before the Lord God Almighty in repentance and accept Him before it becomes ‘too’ late. Prayerfully, I urge you to insert in your sermons the same message as you wrote here today.
Love in Christ,
Diane