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Gramster Rant: The Real Story Behind Thanksgiving
It's Thanksgiving week, and that means it's time to talk about all the revisionist history out there. There's been so much that we've had to swallow over the years, and it's just awful. So let's go with Sergeant Friday on this one: just the facts, ma'am.
There's a lot of blame and finger-pointing out there. Hate your whiteness. White privilege, whatever that is. Let's talk about the people who came here from Europe and see how privileged they really were. It was a difficult time, it's an amazing story, and God was present through the whole thing.
The First Lie: Colonizers Looking for Industry
One of the first lies they tell us is that settlers came here to colonize and build industry. There was no industry here. Who were they selling anything to?
The separatists were a group of religious people, and this goes all the way back to King Henry VIII in the 1500s. Yeah, that guy. Hank was not right in the head. He had a lot of wives, and when he wanted an annulment from Anne Boleyn and the church wouldn't give him one, he had the bright idea of making the king head over the church. Hence the Church of England.
As Christians practiced their faith in opposition to what the king wanted, religious persecution went on for quite a while. It would be good for all of us to look into that type of persecution considering we don't face anything near like that here. It's hard for us to even look across the ocean to our Nigerian brothers and sisters right now who are suffering. People suffer all over the globe for the kingdom, and we have really not much on these shores. There's reason for that, and there's thanksgiving that needs to happen for it.
The separatists were the people within the church who said, "No, we cannot stand for this. We're going to move on." Other people were like, "Well, let's just go along to get along." The separatists left because they were being harassed, thrown in jail, hit with heavy fines by the Church of England under King Henry VIII. You can imagine how brutal it really got. Just look at who King Henry VIII really was.
Just remember—King Henry VIII beheaded two of his wives. So there's that. What could possibly go wrong, right?
Leadership matters. Leadership that is redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ is different than leadership of people who play religious games.
They Didn't Come Straight Here
A lot of people think the separatists just came to the United States. No, they went to other places first—primarily the Netherlands, because the boat trip was shorter.
Eventually they looked toward America because it had no government where you had to ask permission. It wasn't ruled by anybody at all. They could just go there. There was no king to answer to. There was an element of freedom—they could come and just be here.
Why would they choose to face the unknown wilderness? They were under persecution from the Church of England, or they could face fighting with violent American Indian tribes while trying to make friends with the friendly ones. Why would they choose one over the other?
Because their faith in Christ was that important. They would rather face the unknown, face the hardships, than be told they could not worship Christ in the way that they felt the Bible really told them to.
Historical documents show they felt led by the Holy Spirit to come and create a nation where Jesus Christ could be proclaimed. They tried to live out their Christian faith as much as they could. In their Christian faith, they even tried communal-type work, almost like a socialist thing, and it didn't work out because the incentives weren't there and there was too much death. They suffered a lot to found this nation. But they were called by God to found it on the idea that they were looking for Jesus Christ to come on these shores.
If you go to the rotunda of the Capitol building, you'll see the painting of the pilgrims with a Bible open right in the center of the whole gathering. But we as a nation want to kind of ignore that.
Revisionist historians want to take the reality of that faith journey out of our history books. That's to our detriment because then we don't really understand what happened.
The Cost of the Journey
These settlers did not just get on a plane and arrive in eight hours. This was weeks and months on a boat. Not sanitary. Not healthy. Between 1616 and 1619, the vast majority making the journey died. Some handwritten diaries estimate nearly 90% didn't make it across the ocean—and that's before their first year in the new land.
All jokes aside, what kind of world do you have to escape from where you're willing to take a 10% chance of making it across the ocean? And when you get there, you have to be healthy enough to plant a crop. And not only that—there's no going back. This was permanent. The rest of their natural-born lives committed to this.
Sickness and starvation plagued those early settlers.
Here's another distinction: these weren't refugees or immigrants. They were settlers. Big difference. Settlers come with a purpose. They weren't overthrowing a government—there was no government. No king to answer to. They could just land on the shores and be there and it was fine.
The Native American Indians were nomadic, moving with the seasons and depending on where food was. They didn't have land ownership per se. The settlers weren't coming and claiming what belonged to someone else. They really weren't. They were just trying to eke out an existence where they could no longer be under the religious persecution of the Church of England.
Big Ed's Diary: What Actually Happened
You really need to know the name Edward Winslow. Look him up. In 1621, he kept a record of what happened because he was one of the leaders of the first colony.
They'd been here a couple years. After years of really devastating hardship, with maybe not even quite 50 American settlers left, here's what Big Ed wrote:
"And God be praised, we had a good increase. Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors."
They had a tremendous harvest after being here a couple years. The hunters killed enough fowl in one day to serve the company almost a week. Then comes this great phrase: "We exercised our arms." They were shooting. Having fun. Pew pew pew. That phrase needs to come back—the next time the guys get together for a shoot, it should really be called "the exercise of arms." Very classy.
Here's what's important as Big Ed is writing this in 1621. It is well known the suffering that has taken place to try to come and settle this land. A lot of the early settlers in the Christian space wanted to share the vast land with just a handful of different folks, different tribal groups including Native Americans. For our young people to be taught that these nasty white privileged people stormed the shores and just took over, slaughtering people—that is so far from the actual historical record found in documents like Big Ed's written letter, which can be verified as being authentic.
It's like Winslow read that criticism because his diary entry goes on to say:
"Many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest, King Massasoit, with some 90 men whom for three days we entertained and feasted. And they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor and upon the captain and others."
Do the math. About 50 white settlers remained after years of devastation. Twice as many Indians show up—and there didn't seem to be fear. They did nothing but celebrate and feast and play games. The Indians brought more food. This was a wonderful thing.
Winslow concludes:
"And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty."
They got along. Everybody was getting along. There was plenty for everybody. He literally says because they suffered so greatly in the past and now they are so far from the want they experienced in their journey and landing—they wanted to share it with everybody around them. That's pretty amazing.
The Two Years That Followed
That initial celebration was kind of the first Thanksgiving, but it was impromptu—not formal or anything. The following two years brought devastating drought. Want, want, want. Need, need. They'd gone from want to plenty, and two years later back to want—things were scarce.
But then unexpectedly they had really good rain and were in plenty again. During those difficult years, they were planning ahead. They were saying, "Hey, when we're through this, we're doing this again. We are going to have a feast and we are going to celebrate and we are going to give thanks to God."
This is when Thanksgiving started becoming more formal. They planned ahead. They knew what they wanted to do. Sometimes those dark, turbulent things we go through ultimately bring us to those places of being thankful.
The Complexity of Human Nature
The settlers and the Indians got along. There was plenty of room. There was plenty of everything. Over the first two to three decades, they found harmony and joy in each other.
Sure, there would be some rogue tribal Indians who rose up and attacked settlers. There were settlers who fought back. But here's what both the Native Americans and the pilgrim settlers had in common: they were sinful human beings in a fallen condition.
As the colonies grew, documented evidence shows some of the white colonists treated some Native Americans very harshly. And there's plenty of evidence that some Native American tribes treated some settlements very, very harshly.
As everybody pushes and shoves, it becomes "you shouldn't celebrate Thanksgiving because of this" and "Indians shouldn't celebrate because of that." On and on until we realize there's one solution. And it seems like there's a huge Native American population and an even larger settler population that surrendered their lives to Christ and lived in harmony with their brothers and sisters.
Because this nation was settled—and Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation—we don't just celebrate Thanksgiving this Thursday. We celebrate a day of thanksgiving and repentance. That's the original document.
Indian tribes brutally fought one another. That's been since the dawn of time. Sinful people were fighting sinful people. Then you have the Revolutionary War where white people are fighting white people. This is what we do because we're humans. We have this natural fallen bent. You can't draw ethnic lines and label one good and one bad.
That's one of the major problems with American culture today—and you might even call European culture, Western culture, the same—this narrative that all white men are bad. It's racist. Legislation has been put through, especially in the Biden administration, that is absolutely discriminatory toward white men, and nobody says anything. We just keep going along with it.
The Only Solution
The solution is always the same. It's not going to be corporate. It's not going to be tribal. It's not going to be national. It's personal.
The solution will always be recognizing your sin and finding a solution because you're going to have to stand perfect in front of a holy God. How are you going to do that?
When those individual transformations happen, that ethic starts and it literally changes society around you. Go back 60 years in America. The Judeo-Christian ethic still permeated all of society in a beneficial way—including for the atheist, including for the heretic. They still benefited from a society under the covering of a Judeo-Christian ethic.
As that's been dissolved and removed, we now have absolute chaos. "Sticks and stones may break my bones" used to be the theme. Now words are considered violence, especially from a white man.
Stay in those history books. Read what's really true. Don't let revisionist history change your mind.
Salvaged by God Deep Dive: Thanksgiving in All Circumstances
What would cause people who've been through such devastation to be so bent on having these moments of thankfulness and celebration? Of course, they were a little more somber back then than what we think of today. They wore buckles on their hats—that'll somber you. But what would cause that thankfulness?
The settlers read God's word faithfully and voraciously. That means they did it a lot, with intentionality.
The Key Passage
First Thessalonians 5:16-18 says:
"Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."
Joni Eareckson Tada quotes this passage and makes an important distinction. She says, "Don't give thanks for all circumstances. Give thanks in all circumstances." She does not thank God that she's in a wheelchair every day. But she thanks God she has a wheelchair she can roll out into the sunshine in.
That perspective comes from the Holy Spirit-infused new life of a Christian believer who has accepted the substitutionary death of Jesus on the cross. Now they have new life. They are redeemed. Even though they still wobble around and bump their heads here on earth, they are redeemed. One day they'll stand in front of a holy God as if they're perfect and never sinned.
Who Are You Thanking?
Thanksgiving to God is what our life is about. It really, really is.
The atheist says "thank you"—but thank who? Who are you thanking? If you're lost in the desert and suddenly stumble upon an oasis, you're going to feel thankful. You're going to feel those feelings. Who are you thankful to? The oasis? The universe? "I'm made up of star stuff"?
Remember Carl Sagan? He comes on with this very serious documentary: "We know through science we're made up of star stuff." Happy day. But "In the beginning, God"—that's just too outrageous? Can't sit with the professors if you believe that.
Thinking themselves wise, they became fools. That kind of sums it up.
Our Natural Bent
We have this natural bent to just want to divide one another, be angry with one another. Titus 3:3-7 talks about how we were hating one another. That's what we lived for—conflict. But then when the love of Christ appeared, that changed everything. And it's not because of anything we've done. There's no righteousness we conjure up on our own.
Look through all the atrocities and tragedy to find what God did. God brought peace and fellowship and harmony and sharing. Part of the way He does that is through going through tremendous times of want and need—and then being so overjoyed that you just want to share it with everybody around you.
Sometimes the dark, turbulent things we go through ultimately bring us to places of being thankful.
A lot of that's been forgotten over the years, and that's too bad.
Forgotten Thanksgiving Dishes
Things change over time, and some Thanksgiving dishes that were once hugely popular have mercifully faded away.
Creamed Onions
Pearl onions cooked in cream sauce. The ultimate dad dish. It sounds kind of okay—like a creamy French onion soup with cheese and beef broth. But without all that good stuff, it's just onions and cream heated up. Yum yum. Bet it makes you sleep good though.
There's a reason it fell out of favor. Would it be worth trying on an off Tuesday with really good sandwiches? Maybe. But not on Thanksgiving when everything else is so good and clearly part of the journey.
Oyster Stuffing
Out on the East Coast where seafood was plentiful, they'd cram that stuffing full of oysters. One way to choke them down. Or just say no.
For Christmas, some families made oyster stew all the time—that was a big thing in the '60s and '70s with the older crowd, very traditional. But the problem is it looked like mice that drowned in the milk. The visual alone... you can never unsee that.
Savory Jello Salad
Sweet jello salad with fruit and marshmallows is still around. How jello salad fell out of favor in America is hard to understand—it's been such a staple. It used to be that at a potluck, having a jello salad was just standard.
But they used to make a savory version with cabbage, ham, tuna, or olives suspended in unflavored gelatin. Just no.
Turkey Aspic
Instead of making lovely leftover sandwiches and hot dishes, they'd take the turkey and vegetable leftovers, submerge them in unflavored gelatin, and slice it up cold. They'd layer it so when you sliced into it, it looked like a layer cake made of jello and meat and stuffing and vegetables.
Gelatin is very good for you—you should have some in your diet—but we know why this one disappeared. The first wave of dysentery probably put it on the shelf.
Vinegar Pie
This took off during the Great Depression because fruit was in very short supply. A custard-like filling made from butter, flour, and vinegar. The vinegar gave it a little tang to make it more dessert-like. ("A little tang" is really putting lipstick on a pig—that's like when the dentist says "you're going to feel a little pressure.")
A guy on YouTube made these depression-era recipes that sounded absolutely horrible—physics should tell us they wouldn't work. But he'd eat them and say, "Wow, that's really good." How they figured it out with just what they had is remarkable.
Hot Dr. Pepper
All the rage in the 1950s. Heated Dr. Pepper with lime or other fruit added. You can see housewives of the 50s saying, "Oh yeah, let's do that." Pop a hot Dr. Pepper. It didn't last, and probably shouldn't come back.
The Verdict
Are any of these dishes missed? Not really. We're good with what we've got.
You want mashed potatoes and gravy on Thanksgiving, not scalloped potatoes. Do you want to use beef gravy out of a jar? No. You want to make turkey gravy from the bird that goes on the mashed potatoes, the stuffing, the white and dark meat. That's just what you want to do.
Thanksgiving Trivia
Q: Early NYC Thanksgiving parades didn't have balloons. What did they have instead?
A: Live animals—bears, elephants, monkeys—courtesy of Central Park Zoo. Whether PETA got involved eventually or what, eventually the balloons replaced them. Felix the Cat was the very first balloon.
Q: Thanks to Princeton and Yale in 1876, what began its journey into Thanksgiving tradition?
A: Football. At the time, baseball was hugely popular—America's sport. Princeton and Yale played the very first football game on Thanksgiving Day to a pretty sparse crowd. Not many people showed up. The game looked a lot more like rugby back then, and it's evolved quite a bit and continues to evolve today.
The NFL formed in 1920 and began hosting as many as six Thanksgiving Day matches to promote the still-evolving and less-popular sport. In the Super Bowl era, two teams have always played on Thanksgiving in their home stadiums: the Detroit Lions (kicking off at 11:30 Central) and the Dallas Cowboys (around 3:15). For the last 10-12 years, they've added a Sunday night game as well.
Q: Female turkeys don't do this. What is it?
A: Gobble. Only the males gobble. All the men are just yak yak yak, and the females just sit and roll their eyes. Maybe that's why they're food.
Q: On average, how many seeds does a pumpkin have: 500, 1,000, or 5,000?
A: About 5,000. Doesn't feel like that many when you're digging out a pumpkin, but that's the fact. The smaller, younger pumpkins actually have more seeds than older ones—as they grow and mature, some of them kind of go away. It's true—as anything gets older, it dies a little inside.
Q: True or false—Early Thanksgiving dishes likely involved eel, seal, and swan.
A: True. The eel and swan are believable, but seal? They were on the coast. Seals were easy to catch with a lot of meat for what you were getting.
Swan was a favorite—they'd make swan pie. They'd skin the swan, take the meat, make this lovely pie dish, and then they would take the skinned swan with its feathers and everything, kind of re-stuff it, and drape it over the pie for presentation. If you Google swan pie, you'll see pictures. It used to be a thing. Most bird is good—duck, turkey, chicken. Eventually swans got too pretty and people didn't want to kill them anymore.
Q: The day after Thanksgiving is the busiest day of the year for what profession?
A: Plumbers. Not for the reason you might think. It's because people are cooking up a storm, often in kitchens that aren't even theirs—they're just helping. Meat, potato skins, and grease go down the garbage disposal, and the phones start ringing.
Roto-Rooter advises being very careful this Thanksgiving about what goes down that disposal.
Final Thoughts
One of the things Paul tells us in the Word of God is to be a praying person with thanksgiving. Go to the Lord in thanksgiving. Just like that verse says—you don't have to be thankful for everything, but in your circumstances, look for the positive. Look for the fact that you're still breathing.
It used to be you'd get up Monday morning thinking, "I can't believe it's Monday again and I have to go to work." You've got to turn that to "Thank the Lord I have a job that's going to pay the bills and feed my family." You've got energy today. You're struggling—it's Monday and you wish it wasn't—but you're going to turn that around. The turnaround is having thanksgiving and joy in your heart.
A Day Set Aside
This Thursday is the day Americans have set aside for feasting. There are times of fasting and times of feasting. When you have contentment with godliness as great gain, there's nothing better than to be at a feast that's prepared for you.
Yeah, it's turkey day with football. But it's really thanksgiving in our hearts that the Lord saved us. That while we were sinners, He loved us so much that He came and died for us. There is an option for forgiveness, and that is worth thanking God through thick and thin.
Thanksgiving and Repentance
About Abraham Lincoln's proclamation: it established a day of thanksgiving and repentance. The Bible says in keeping with repentance, His mercies are renewed daily.
When we have a thankful heart and take one day a year to feast out of the goodness of what God has given us—that's when we look to the heavens with a joyful, thankful heart for what He's done.
When atheists have Thanksgiving, who are they giving thanks to? They turn it into turkey day and football day. That's fine—people can do whatever they want. But believers make Thanksgiving that one day a year where we really look to the heavens with a thankful heart. And in keeping with repentance, we serve the Lord.
The Pilgrims Were Heroes
Don't be part of the group being deceived into thinking these pilgrims were awful, mean, white privileged jerks who came over and stomped on everybody. They weren't. They were literally Christian heroes who came to build a new society that could be free.
The pilgrims lived for more than 150 years before they started drafting the Constitution and forming the colonies. From 1611 to 1776—that's a long time of that boat going back and forth from Europe. They wanted a free society that would allow people to find God on their own terms while promoting the New Testament—promoting Jesus Christ as the way, the truth, and the life.
This country, more than any other in all of human history, has shared the gospel worldwide. It's because these men and women decided that their lives of serving Jesus and settling a new land was more important than anything else.
The Native Americans who reached out to those early settlers, helped them survive and thrive, taught them things, and befriended them—they deserve honor too. You can't just draw a line and say good side, bad side. These were human beings.
Hopefully this gives you stuff to laugh at, chuckle at, think about, and something to talk about over the holidays other than politics.
Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.