So often we like to complain about things, but, man, we’ve got it good.
I read recently that if the world was represented by 100 people, 53 of them would live on less than $2 a day. Some of you spend more on coffee in a day than that. We’re a rich nation. Maybe you don’t see yourself as having much, but compared to the majority of people in this world, you’ve got it good.
And not only in wealth, but in the peace and freedom our country enjoys. You read every day accounts of violence and oppression in many lands, yet here we’ve got it good. We live in relative peace. You don’t go to bed at night fearing a terrorist attack. We live in great freedom. You don’t worry over breakfast that the government’s going to come in and take over your land, your house, your bank account, your healthcare – oh, wait a minute. Better not go there now.
The point is this: God has blessed us tremendously – individually and nationally. But, oh, how I fear for this nation because we have forgotten God. As the Lord spoke through the prophet Hosea: “Yet I have been the Lord your God since the land of Egypt; and you were not to know any god except Me, for there is no savior besides Me. I cared for you in the wilderness, in the land of drought. As they had their pasture, they became satisfied, and being satisfied, their heart became proud; therefore they forgot Me” (Hosea 13:4-6).
I challenge you to read Hosea or Jeremiah or any of the prophets and see if God doesn’t have the same word for the people in our generation as He did for rebellious Israel!
What will we do? Will we continue to follow our own stubborn, proud, perverted ways and face increasing measures of His righteous judgment? Or will we return to the Lord our God as He still – for now – invites us to do?
Lest we forget the kindness and grace of God toward us, I want to let the words of George Washington remind us to give thanks to the Lord. The following is the text of President Washington’s Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1789:
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."
Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be. That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks, for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation, for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his providence, which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war, for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed, for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted, for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.
And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions, to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually, to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed, to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shown kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord. To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and Us, and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.
Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
Go: Washington
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