As we come to the end of the church year, it is appropriate that we look back on the year that has passed with thanksgiving. God has certainly poured out blessings on us this year, bringing new faces, new lives, and new opportunities to Parish, along with this beautiful building where we are now able to worship. Accordingly, many of the elements in this morning’s service encourage gratitude towards our Lord. We open and close with the hymn Let All Things Now Living, which asks all of creation to raise songs of adoration and thanks to the Creator. Readings from the psalms call us to “offer to [Him] the sacrifice of thanksgiving” and to “give thanks to the Lord with [our] whole heart” (Psalm 116:17; Psalm 111:1). We respond by singing the psalms, declaring our intent to come through His gates with thanks and to “thank the Lord, for He is good” (In All The Land Rejoice—Psalm 100; O Thank The Lord, For He Is Good—Psalm 118). Several hymns refer to us as a “thankful people,” and describe our hearts as both filled and dissolved with thankfulness (Come, Ye Thankful People, Come; My Heart Is Filled With Thankfulness; Alas! And Did My Savior Bleed). We are sent out with a “grateful song,” in which we confess God’s providence towards our ancestors in the past and our hope that He will continue to be “ruler, guardian, guide, and stay” in our land for the days to come. I pray for all of us this morning that, even in the midst of our “toilsome ways,” we can find refreshment in the posture of gratefulness.
—Henry C. Haffner
