November 21, 2024
Thanksgiving Sunday
It’s hard to believe that the “holiday season” is almost upon us, in spite of the fact that retail America has been selling Christmas merchandise for weeks already. My favorite holiday of this season has always been Thanksgiving, because it reminds us to take time and remember all our blessings in this
life. To my mind, so many of our holidays have become about getting something – romantic gifts at Valentines, candy at Halloween, and everything else on the list at Christmas. I love Thanksgiving because it’s always been about being grateful for ALL God’s bountiful, undeserved, and too often
overlooked blessings.
After surviving a few near-death experiences in my first two decades of life, I was inspired to give the response “I’m thankful” when people ask how I’m doing – whether friends, colleagues, or strangers on the street. It is amazing how many people pause and remark on the sentiment – we are so often
consumed with what is distressing or discouraging us, and a grateful heart can lift us above all of it so powerfully!
For that reason, Henry Smith’s simple yet profound 1978 praise chorus “Give Thanks” seemed the perfect Call to Worship for our Thanksgiving Worship, and we invite you to sing along with the choir on the repeat of this well-known chorus. This text reminds us to give thanks in all things – no matter what may be going wrong today – because we still have the blessings of life, health, family, friends, faith, and the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God!
The choir’s Thanksgiving Anthem has roots in Texas, even though it was composed by one of England’s finest current choral composers, John Rutter.“For the Beauty of the Earth” was written by Rutter for Rosemary Heffley and the Texas Choral Directors Association during her term as its President from 1979-81. Rosemary was a prodigiously talented, loving and much-loved choral conductor who inspired passion for choral music in thousands of youth in the Metroplex and founded the Mesquite Civic Chorus and Children’s Chorus of Greater Dallas.
The well-known text by Folliott S. Pierpoint is given a lively setting by Rutter that is a fun challenge for choir and accompanist alike. One of my favorite lines is “for the love which from our birth over and around us lies: Lord of all, to thee we raise this our joyful hymn of praise.” May we all believe claim that all-surrounding love on those days when it seems hard to be thankful! The entire text can be found in our hymnal at Hymn #92, and I invite you to prayerfully read this poetic recitation of just a few of the things for which we should offer grateful praise to the Giver of All good things!
So today I give thanks for each of you, and the radically welcoming place that Grace Church is because of your loving and joyous spirits! And I give thanks for our beautiful choir members that help to enable our praising each Sunday – may we all be strengthened as we join our voices in joyful hymns of thankful praise!
With Great Thanksgiving,
Kenton