The Practice Beyond the Holiday
Rev. Erik Swanson
November 23, 2025
You can watch the entire sermon here.
As Thanksgiving approaches, I find myself thinking not just about food and plans, but about the deeper abundance in my spirit. In the midst of cooking, traveling, resting, and gathering, I want to hold onto the truth that this day has two overlapping but distinct layers.
Thanksgiving – A Spiritual Invitation
On one level, it is a spiritual invitation — a real reminder to be grateful for this one precious life, for the people who fill it, and for the countless gifts I usually take for granted. I know how easily stress, troubling news, harsh words, or my own heavy feelings can pull me away from gratitude. Yet the practice of gratitude is central to a grounded and healthy spiritual life.
Thanksgiving – The National Holiday
The other layer is the national holiday, with its traditions — vacation time, travel, football, family rituals, and even the President pardoning a turkey. This layer also carries a complicated history, one that calls for accountability, truth-telling, and healing. As I move toward Thursday, I hope to hold these layers together in a constructive tension, reflecting deeply enough to arrive at a more grounded place.
Don’t Underestimate The Power Of Gratitude
I’ve realized that both our culture and the wider church often underestimate the true power of gratitude. We say “thank you” frequently enough, but we rarely move into the deeper well from which real gratitude arises. One thing I appreciate about our Grateful Gatherings is the reminder that gratitude is more than a polite word — it is a whole-person response. It engages my body, mind, and spirit, helping me recognize the abundance God has entrusted to me. When I think of moments when I’ve offered someone a genuine, heartfelt thank-you, I remember the way something opens inside me — how it creates space, wonder, and a sense of connection. There is real benefit when I allow that depth to shape my daily life.
Gratitude Reorients Our Hearts
True gratitude also shifts my attention beyond myself. Scripture’s call to give thanks is not because God needs it, but because I do. Gratitude reorients my heart, connects me to others, and reminds me of my place in the larger circle of life. I didn’t create this world, build the roads I travel, or grow the food I eat. Despite a culture that glorifies individualism, I am deeply connected to and dependent on countless people and systems. Gratitude helps me remember this truth. It keeps me from imagining I am in control of everything and opens me to the preciousness of life.
Remembering And Telling The Whole Story
Some in our community keep gratitude journals, and I’ve seen how this practice can steady the heart during difficult times. Gratitude doesn’t ask me to deny pain or pretend everything is fine; it simply invites me to notice the small blessings I encounter each day. I truly believe that if the early settlers had practiced this kind of gratitude, our history with Indigenous peoples would have unfolded with far less violence and far more mutual respect.
This brings me back to Thanksgiving as a national story — a story that, for many Indigenous communities, is a day of mourning. The sanitized version many of us learned ignores the suffering that followed first contact. If I am going to celebrate Thanksgiving, I feel called to tell the whole story, to learn more, and to honor the people whose land was taken.
Hold Thanksgiving Honestly
As these two meanings of Thursday overlap, I want to hold them both honestly. I don’t need to be comfortable to be truthful. Gratitude is a practice that helps me live fully, honor complexity, and recognize the deep blessings of this one precious life. May that practice continue to grow in me and all of us — today and always. Amen.