Hello, thank you so much for joining me on this wonderful day. Thanksgiving.

Before we start the post, I want to remind you, we will be taking communion together at the end

if you have not yet prepared some juice or wine and bread, cracker, whatever you have available.

You may want to pause the recording and prepare that now.

The title of today's post is A Thanksgiving Proclamation and Prayer.

The holiday we Americans call Thanksgiving was first celebrated by the pilgrims after their first harvest in 1621.

History says it was attended by 90 Native Americans and 53 pilgrims.

The gathering lasted three days. In 1789, our first president, George Washington,

issued a national proclamation of, quote,

public,

public, thanksgiving, and prayer, acknowledging with grateful hearts the many

signal favors of Almighty God, end quote.

Abraham Lincoln issued another proclamation in 1863 and made it a national holiday.

He referred to it as, quote, a day of praise to our beneficent father who dwelleth in the heavens, end quote.

So much for the myth of separating God from America's government.

Excuse me.

Washington's and Lincoln's proclamations are brilliant

and can be found at the end of today's post.

I won't read them. The verbiage is a bit different than ours today

can be somewhat challenging. The following is a proclamation and prayer for us to offer together

today. Please agree with me as I read it.

Heavenly Father, we in the United States pause today to acknowledge your gracious and omnipotent hand.

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