On November 23, almost all Americans will celebrate the holiday of Thanksgiving. But in our current “culture,” how many, one wonders, can truly appreciate why they should be thankful? How many know and can be passionately thankful for the gifts that have been bestowed upon us? And how many have studied and pondered the principles and outlook that created the United States, which made the opportunities of today possible?

People all over the world are children of God, and they are our brothers and sisters within God’s creation. We as a people desire the best for all human beings. But we must also recognize that what was set into motion with the voyage of the Pilgrims to Plymouth in 1620 changed history. It created a New Hope for Mankind. It was the beginning of freeing all of humanity from millennia of oligarchical rule. And it established a new social reality which proclaimed that human beings are not beasts of burden, but that the divine spark of reason and agápé lies within every human soul—and that the governing of society should reflect that truth. From this recognition of Man’s true nature sprang the American Republic and hope for suffering millions throughout the world.

Given the crisis of today—both within the United States and worldwide—it would behoove all of us to reflect and give thanks to God for those who crossed the Atlantic in 1620 and made possible what became the United States. It is also of critical importance to recognize that the principles and intentions which guided the Pilgrim Brethren are wholly incompatible with the Satanic impulses which govern the actions of today’s global elite. If we are to defeat the current oligarchical enemies of humanity, a closer look at the heroes and heroines of 1620—what they believed in and what they fought for—is in order.

An Act of Courage

In 1619 there was only one English colony in North America, that of Jamestown, and it is important to recognize that Jamestown, like the British colonies in the West Indies, as well as the French, Spanish, and Portuguese colonies in the Americas were commercial colonies, controlled by “trading companies” in London, Madrid, and Paris, and were created for the purpose of extracting wealth and turning a profit for the investors. As such, overwhelmingly, the inhabitants of these colonies were unmarried adult men.

The Pilgrim’s mission was something else entirely. The Plymouth colonists were families, and among the 102 passengers who set sail on the Mayflower were 22 women of child-bearing age and more than 30 children. These were not employees of a London-based corporation, but free men and women determined to throw off oligarchical rule, to establish an entirely new type of society. Their sacrifice was enormous. During the first winter of 1620-1621 half of the colonists died from disease and famine. Yet in October of 1621 they organized, with their Native American friends, a celebration to give thanks to God for sustaining their colony through the worst days of crisis. Although it is not generally known today, at that first American Thanksgiving, natives from the Wampanoag tribe outnumbered the Pilgrim settlers 2 to 1.

The Pilgrim Fathers & John Robinson’s Message

The two primary leaders of the Pilgrims were William Brewster, who would become the Elder of the Church at Plymouth until his death in 1644, and John Robinson who led the Pilgrim church in the Netherlands from 1608 to 1625. Both were great men, but it was Robinson who provided the philosophical and spiritual motivation which led to the decision to emigrate to America.

Robinson wrote numerous essays and sermons, many of which still exist and can be read today. What is startling in Robinson’s writings is the complete absence of the Old Testament “fire and brimstone” conception of a wrathful God. Instead, Robinson returns, again and again, to the notion of Christian Love, agápé, as the quality which is the basis for a human society, and which is most pleasing in God’s eyes. From this, Robinson develops the idea—which later profoundly influenced Cotton Mather and through him Benjamin Franklin—that the purpose of one’s life on Earth is “To Do Good.” He addresses this subject of “doing good” directly in his sermon “Of Created Goodness”:

• “First, we must do good in obedience to God’s commandments, and in honor of his name, and gospel; and must ever have that end in our eye, as archers have their mark.
• “Secondly, that we do it at all times, as we have opportunity; ‘sowing our seed in the morning, and in the evening not holding our hand. . .’
• “Thirdly, we must do good readily, and whilst we have opportunity; ‘not saying to our neighbor, Go, and come again tomorrow, and we will do it. . .’
• “Fourthly, according to our ability; knowing, that as our receivings are from God, greater or less, so must our accounts be, for good doing. It is true, that God looks to the heart of the doer, and measures the work by the will. . .
• “Fifthly, we must have respect to men’s present wants; and not only consider, what we can best spare, but withal, what they stand most need of; as having learned of our Lord and Master, in his Gospel, that our duty is to ‘feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick,’ as their need is. . .
• “Sixthly, ‘we must do good to all,’ knowing, that wheresoever a man is, there is a place for a good turn. . . To good men we must do good because they do deserve it; to strangers, because they may deserve it, and do stand in need of it; to all men, because God deserves it at our hands, for them; to our friends, because we owe it them; and to our enemies to heap coals of fire upon their heads—the coals of charity to thaw, and soften their hardness. . .”

This admonition of “Doing Good to All” was to become Benjamin Franklin’s yardstick for his life’s work.

Washington and Lincoln

The creation of the “most American of Holidays” is largely due to our two greatest Presidents. Although there had been numerous “days of fasting and thanksgiving” observed in the colonies prior to and during the Revolutionary War, it was on October 3, 1789, that George Washington issued the proclamation that created the first Thanksgiving Day designated by the national government of the United States of America. This was done, explicitly, to celebrate the recent adoption of the U.S. Constitution which created the American Republic. Washington says:

“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.”

On Oct. 3, 1863, 74 years to the day after Washington’s proclamation, Abraham Lincoln released his Proclamation, designating the fourth Thursday of November a national day of Thanksgiving. This came in the midst of the horrors of the Civil War but toward the end of a year which had witnessed the Union victories at Vicksburg and Gettysburg, as well as the issuance of Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln said:

“The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. . . .

“It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”

Today

So what do we have to be thankful for today? First, our Republic still stands. We are thankful to those who created it and defended it over the span of scores of years. Second, more and more individuals of courage, led by Donald Trump, are stepping forward every day to join the battle to restore our nation to its original intention. We are thankful for them. Third, parents are standing up to defend their children and provide a future for them. We are thankful for them. Fourth, great advances in science and technology, such as the November 18th test flight of SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy rocket system, hold the promise of a glorious future for generations yet unborn. We are thankful for those who made this possible. Fifth, God’s gift of creative reason and agápé still reside—as the most powerful human potential—within the hearts and minds of our citizenry. For this we are eternally thankful.

That’s a lot to be thankful for, and it should embolden us to win the battles ahead.