Message: Where Gratitude Dwells / Deuteronomy 26:1-11 & Philippians 4:4-9

The colours of autumn are all around us. Trees have shed their green, now dressed in yellow, red, and brown. The sunlight is soft, and the cool wind stirs the fallen leaves. Geese fly south, leaving their cries behind. At Long Sault Parkway, people enjoy their last camping trips or ride bicycles along the bright and sparkling water. The air feels just right, not too hot and not too cold. In the fields and orchards, farmers are busy gathering the fruit of a year’s hard work.

This season reminds us that life unfolds through transitions filled with beauty. It reveals the harvest of the earth and the blessings that fill our lives. It invites us to pause and reflect on the true abundance that sustains us.

For this reason, people around the world celebrate this season with gratitude in many different ways. For example, in Korea, Thanksgiving, called Chuseok, was celebrated just last week. People gather around one table to share food, stories, and laughter. They give thanks for the fruit of the earth, the people they love, and those who have helped them along the way. The traditions, foods, and customs may be different, but the heart of every harvest festival remains the same: gratitude. It is not about judging success or failure. It is not about who has done better or worse. It is about remembering, rejoicing, and giving thanks together.

Indigenous botanist and writer Robin Wall Kimmerer says that gratitude is one of the most important teachings in Native wisdom. She explains that the practice of giving thanks leads to emotional, spiritual, and material abundance. In the book Traditional Ecological Knowledge (2018), she emphasizes that cultures of gratitude lead to cultures of reciprocity, writing, “Gratitude is most powerful as a response to the earth because it provides an opening to reciprocity, to the act of giving back.” 

Kimmerer also teaches that ceremonies of gratitude are significant because they renew the relationship between the land and the people. When we give thanks, we remember that everything we have is a gift. Gratitude opens our hearts to care for others and for the world around us. It helps us focus our intention, attention, and action on the well-being of creation, which also embraces the spiritual dimension of life.

This insight helps us understand today’s first Scripture reading from Deuteronomy. When the Hebrew people entered the promised land, God gave them the Law as a gift to guide and shape their new life together. Among those teachings was a beautiful ceremony of thanksgiving. When the harvest was gathered, the people brought their first fruits to God and came together in worship. During this ritual, they remembered how their ancestors had wandered as strangers before finally finding a home. They recalled how God had freed them from slavery in Egypt. They celebrated the fruit of their labour and rejoiced in the blessing of living as one community.

Their offerings were shared with the Levites and aliens, those who did not have their own land. The Levites were fewer in number than the other tribes, so they were not given a portion of land. In ancient times, a large population was often seen as a sign of strength and power, while the Levites were considered too weak to defend their own land. But God did not forget them. Instead, God gave them a special role in religious service and allowed them to receive support from the offerings of others. God also commanded the people to care for the strangers among them, because they themselves had once been strangers before settling in the promised land.

The offerings were practices of gratitude and reciprocity. By sharing what they had, the people learned not to be trapped by greed or fear. They discovered that true freedom is not found in having more, but in sharing what they had with others. Every third year, they were also instructed to give a tithe to support those who were poor or vulnerable. This tithe was a kind of tax in the Law that made sure everyone in the community was cared for. It reflected God’s vision of justice and mercy for all people.

But in the time of Jesus and Paul, things had changed. Under the Roman Empire, taxes were no longer used to care for the poor. They were used to fund wars and to support the luxury of a few powerful rulers. Many people had to pay as much as forty percent of their income in taxes, which only made the rich richer. Land was no longer shared equally because it had been taken by the colonizers. The poor suffered, and the weak were pushed aside. To survive, people had to compete with one another and prove their worth.

In this situation, Paul wrote his letter to the believers in Philippi, saying, “Rejoice in the Lord always.” He reminded them that the source of true joy is found in prayer with thanksgiving. This keeps us from forgetting who we truly are, even in difficult times. It helps us see clearly what is essential in life and what is not.

Paul did not write these words because he was rich or comfortable. When he sent this letter, he was in prison. He often relied on the support of fellow believers, suffered from chronic illness, and faced oppression both politically and religiously. Yet he wrote, “I have learned to be content with whatever I have. I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty” (4:11-12).

To be content does not mean ignoring pain or pretending that everything is fine. It means learning to recognize what truly matters. Paul saw his life as a gift to be shared. Like Jesus, who gave himself for others, he sought to share the good news of Christ wherever he could. Prayer with thanksgiving fueled his life and ministry, giving strength and purpose to all he did.

Gratitude is like a light that shows us the blessings around us. In the dark of night, we can see only silhouettes. But when the sun rises, everything shows its own colours. In the same way, when there is light within us, the world becomes full of beauty. If we see the world in darkness, it feels like an endless hell. But if we see it in light, the world is still a place worth living in. True happiness begins with the light of gratitude. It comes from learning to enjoy each season of life and to find something good in every one of them.

Today, as we gather for Thanksgiving Sunday, we take a moment to give thanks to those who make our lives possible. The first recorded Thanksgiving in Canada was in 1578, when English explorer Martin Frobisher gave thanks for surviving a difficult voyage. But even that celebration was only possible because of the help and knowledge of the Indigenous peoples of this land. From the very beginning, Thanksgiving in Canada has been a story of shared life and mutual care.

None of us lives alone. We need parents and families, neighbours and friends. We rely on farmers, teachers, caregivers, police officers, soldiers, and the beauty of creation itself: the earth, the sky, the rivers, and the trees. Gratitude opens our eyes to this web of connection.

So, let us light the candle of gratitude in our hearts. Let us remember that where gratitude dwells, joy dwells. Where gratitude dwells, sharing dwells. Where gratitude dwells, reciprocity dwells. Where gratitude dwells, justice dwells. Where gratitude dwells, hope dwells. Where gratitude dwells, peace dwells. And where gratitude dwells, God dwells.

May our hearts become a dwelling place for gratitude, so that we live each day with open hands and joyful hearts.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Rev. Min Hwang