The Miracle Of The First Thanksgiving: Squanto

The Miracle of the First Thanksgiving: Squanto

Scripture: Matthew 25:40, Psalms 100

It is common to compile wish lists at Christmas and draw up a list of resolutions for the New Year. There is another list we may consider, a Thanksgiving Day list. Let me read a part of the list that several homemakers compiled. They wrote that they were especially thankful:

1. "For children who put away their things and clean up after themselves. They are such a joy, you hate to see them go home to their parents.

2. "For automatic dishwashers because they make leaving the kitchen before the family comes for their after-dinner snacks more likely.

3. "For Smoke alarms because they let you know when the turkey’s done.

4. "For teenagers, they give parents a chance to learn a second language.

5. "For husbands who attack small repair jobs around the house because they usually make them big enough to call in the professionals.

Your list will not be the same as theirs, but I believe we would find more to be thankful for than our material possessions. Like you, I am sure, my list would include life's major things, health, family, friends, and the nation we live in. Even more than that, I am thankful for my salvation, our church family, and the mercy that God showers upon us each day.

What did the first Americans, that small handful from the Mayflower who started the custom of setting aside a day of Thanksgiving to Almighty God, have to be thankful for? They had started from scratch in the wilderness of North America in 1620. They had only primitive, quickly erected log homes, little food and it was severe winter. They had no means of transportation but their legs. The first winter, one-half of them died from the cold and starvation.

Then a miracle occurred. Squanto walked into their lives. Squanto was an American Indian born on January 1, 1585, near Plymouth, Massachusetts. Captain George Weymouth who was exploring New England for the Plymouth Company abducted Squanto and some other Indians in 1605. Weymouth took Squanto and other Indians back to England to show the Company owners what they were like. Squanto returned to New England in 1614 with an expedition led by Captain John Smith. On his way back to Pawtuxet, Englishman Thomas Hunt, one of Smith's lieutenants, abducted Squanto. Hunt sold American fish, corn, and captured natives in Spain. There, Hunt sold Squanto and several other Native Americans into slavery for £20 apiece.

However, some local friars who opposed what Hunt was doing purchased the American Indians, including Squanto, to instruct them in the Christian faith. Squanto convinced the friars to let him try to return home. In 1617, the friars arranged for Squanto to go to London, where he worked for a shipbuilder for a few years. To get to New England, Squanto tried to take part in an expedition to that part of the North American east coast. At last, in 1619 Squanto returned to his homeland aboard John Smith’s ship, having joined an exploratory expedition along the New England coast as an interpreter. Squanto soon discovered that his tribe as well as a majority of coastal New England tribes died in an epidemic the year before. Squanto had spent 14 years learning to speak English, Spanish, and the Bible.

Squanto decided to live where his old village had been. Then, in the winter of 1620 - 1621, Squanto heard of Plymouth Colony. He went there and on March 22, 1621, just before spring planting season, Squanto walked into the town and in English said, "I am Squanto." Squanto taught the pilgrims how to grow American crops, dig clams, oysters, fish, and catch other seafood. Squanto also made peace between the nearby Indians, the ones who celebrated that first Thanksgiving with the colonists. It was from the abundance and Squanto teaching and the colonist labor with which all celebrated the first Thanksgiving.

Both Squanto and the Pilgrims considered this a miracle, a miracle like Joseph in the Bible. Remember in the Book of Genesis Joseph, the 11th of Jacob's and Rachel's 12 sons, came to be sold into slavery by his jealous brothers and rose to become the second most powerful man in Egypt next to Pharaoh. When famine struck Egypt, Jacob (Joseph's father) and Joseph's brothers went to Egypt. Joseph saved his family from starvation and Pharaoh gave them his best land, the land of Goshen, for their land. God performed that same miracle for the colony through Squanto.

Thanksgiving Day is a distinctive American holiday. It does not commemorate a battle or anyone’s birthday or anniversary. It is simply a day to express our nations thanks to God. In 1789, George Washington made this public proclamation, "By the President of the United States of America. A proclamation: 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.' 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."