Deuteronomy Chapter 16, beginning in verse 9, gives instructions regarding the Feast of Weeks. It is also called the feast of the harvest. It was a celebration of God’s gracious provision of the harvest. It was to be a joyous celebration. And not a little polite clapping either. The celebration was also to last for a week. That is serious rejoicing. I like to think of Thanksgiving in our country as a similar celebration. We do not do it for a week, but its purpose is similar and its results are the same. The Israelites took a whole week to celebrate the goodness of God, and I suspect they did not have to worry about whether the cranberry sauce came from a can with ridges in it. They celebrated God’s abundance with singing, dancing, shared meals, community, and story telling. It was not a day marked by turkey-induced naps in front of a football game, but by the recognition that God was not merely a Provider. God was their Provision.
The Feast of Weeks required farmers and families to physically go to the place God would choose and rejoice there. It was not a “celebrate from home” holiday. It was a pilgrimage. There is something about stepping out of the routine and going somewhere special to celebrate that transforms the experience. God wanted Israel to physically go into His presence and celebrate. Of course, today, most of us have a hard time getting the family to agree on where the Thanksgiving dinner will be held, let alone traveling a hundred miles by foot to celebrate a harvest. And it is humorous to imagine that ancient Israel did not debate the proper temperature for pumpkin pie or whether sweet potatoes need marshmallows on top. They knew the harvest did not come from their cleverness. It came from the hand of God.
Charles Spurgeon said, “When we bless God for mercies we prolong them, and when we bless Him for miseries we usually end them. Praise is the honey of life, which a devout heart sucks from every bloom of providence and grace. We may as well be dead as be without praise; it is the crown of life.” I love that phrase. “Praise is the honey of life.” You can almost taste it when he says it. Israel took seven days to taste that honey. They savored God’s goodness and thanked Him publicly for it. When Thanksgiving comes around, I often think Israel had the right idea. Maybe our problem is not that Thanksgiving is a holiday. Maybe our problem is that Thanksgiving is just a day.