I read a story about this boy. His name was Johnny, and he called his dog Uncle Joe. They asked him why he called his dog Uncle Joe. He said, because he's just like my Uncle Joe. He growls at everything and wants to fight everybody, just like my Uncle Joe. So that's not the kind of Christian I want to be. Some people go through life standing at the complaint counter. Don't let that be you. Amen. There's plenty of things to complain about, but there's more things to thank God for. That's right. Thanksgiving is a very American holiday. During the Revolutionary War, the United States Continental Congress set aside a day for Thanksgiving and praise for the victory at Saratoga in 1777, marking the first time all American colonies took part in such an event. The following year at Valley Forge, George Washington declared a special day of Thanksgiving, later as the young nation's first president. He accepted a petition from Congress declaring Thursday, November 26, 1789 as Thanksgiving Day in the United States. There are many more quotes. I don't know of any other nations that have Thanksgiving. There might be, but I don't know of any. Well, I'm glad we do and we have reason to as Americans, especially as Christians. So I trust you have a wonderful week. Invite your attention to Psalm 100, please. Psalm 100, familiar passage, already been read a couple times today, part of it. But I want to share with you as quickly as I can about the first Thanksgiving. There is an intentional effort today to erase our Christian heritage. It's called cancel culture. It's a movement, includes tens of thousands of people that want to take God out of American history, want to take Christians out of American history. Nowadays, if you went to a university, they would tell you that the main problem in America is the Christian men. But I think we need to take another look at our history. And I want to share with you a page or so out of our American history, hoping to be a help to you. If anybody ought to know Christian American history, it ought to be Christian Americans. It ought to be you. And we'll be as brief as we can. Psalm 100. Let's stand, please. if you're willing and you're able. Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the Lord, he is God. It is he that hath made us and not we ourselves. We are his people and the sheep of his pastor. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Be thankful unto him and bless his name. For the Lord is good, his mercy is everlasting, and his truth endeareth to all generations. We want to pray, J.R., happy birthday, and would you pray for us? Amen. Amen. You may be seated. Thank you. Thank you for the good prayer. Speaking on the subject for the glory of God. For the glory of God. The pilgrims said they came here for the glory of God. and for the advancement of the Christian faith. So permit me to give you a lot of details about the pilgrims who came to Plymouth Rock and founded our nation. The question was asked many years ago, what's the difference between North America and South America? Why is North America so prosperous, so blessed, so civilized and South America is not? And someone said very succinctly, well, the Spaniards came to South America for gold, and the Pilgrims came to North America for God. And that explains the difference. So all these centuries later, there's still strong evidence of that fact. I was talking to a Baptist historian one time. I said, why didn't Columbus go south and not north? He said, well, he was looking for rare exotic birds. And I forget their name, but anyway, the Catholic religion went with him. So it's amazing, isn't it, that North America could be like South America, very, I don't have to explain to you how it's like in Venezuela and other socialist, communist, backward Roman Catholic countries, Brazil and so forth. So history, excuse me, history is his story. And if you keep that in mind, then you'll understand history. So let's talk about the pilgrims. The reason they were called pilgrims, it meant that they had left the Church of England because of all the abuses, and the Church of England never was right. King Henry started it. I think because he wanted to get married the eighth time and the Pope didn't want him to. So that's how it started. But anyway, it became so bad that people began leaving the Church of England and they called them pilgrims. And the people who stayed in it were called the Puritans. So that's the difference between the pilgrims and the Puritans. But it's a great story. and the pilgrims went first of all to Holland. They were looking for religious freedom. They went to Holland in the year 1609. One hundred and twenty-five pilgrims left England and went to Holland seeking religious freedom. And they stayed there for twelve years, but the people of Holland were rubbing off and influencing their children, and the pilgrims didn't like that, and they said, we got to go somewhere else. They'd heard about America, and so they decided to leave Holland and to go to America. And they also heard about all those Indians in America, and they said, we'll go on a missions trip, and we'll start all over, and we'll keep our children away from all bad influences. and we'll start a whole new nation. They'd heard about Jamestown that had been founded just a few years previously in Virginia. And they wanted to do missions work among the Indians. So a third of the congregation decided to make the trip under their assistant pastor, William Brewster. They believed that it was God's will for them to go. So on September the 6th, 1620, the Mayflower with 102 passengers headed this way on their epic journey. 65 days on the Mayflower, confined to a very damp and dark gun deck, no bigger than a tennis court, tossed to and fro for nine weeks, and eating cold food. During a certain fierce storm, they thought they were going to sink. The main beam broke and they had not brought anything to support this beam. But fortunately, The pastor said, I brought a printing press. And he said, there's a great iron screw in this printing press, and I'll let you use it to support the beam. And when we reach land, I want it back so I can print Bibles in the new land. So the reason they made it is the preacher wanted to print Bibles. Hallelujah. Man, I like that. I can't tell you how much I like that. So there would not be an America that hadn't been for a desire to print Bibles and that great iron screw. There's a whole lot more. I'm just going to hit a few highlights. It's all truly amazing what happened, especially when I talk about the Indians here in just a few minutes. But on November the 9th, the land came into view, and they fell down on their knees and praised God. And they were coming, of course, to a wilderness, no houses, no towns, just a wilderness to tame, to explore. And they set together a government called the Mayflower Compact, which was the first time in the history of the world that free men came together to form a government. their own government, and it said in the Mayflower Compact, they'd come for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith. Now, that would gag them at the Democrat National Convention, but that's the truth, isn't it? I'm just telling you the truth. Study it yourself. But that's why they came. They were not a bunch of atheists. They were not a bunch of liberals, socialist. And what you are is your business. You just vote like a Christian, okay? Is that right? I think that's right. But anyway, they came for Jesus. They came to advance the gospel. And a few days later, 99 of them came ashore at Plymouth Rock, but Many of them would die in the next few months because they had arrived there late, no time to plant a harvest that year, and it was a bitter winter, and hardly 50 of them were still alive three months later. Half of them died, but they pressed on. An amazing thing about the Pilgrims is they decided before they left, we will not get discouraged. No matter what happens, no matter how many of us die, to the weather, starvation, disease, Indians. They said, we are not, I like this. They said, we're Christians. We're not like everybody else. We can take things that other people can't take. By the grace of God, they said. They said, we are not as other men. And he said, we'll take whatever happens with no complaint. And they said, we'll take it cheerfully and we will not be discouraged. I like that, don't you? We will not be discouraged. Christmas day, 1620, they started to build their hospital, called the common house. They buried their dead at night. They were afraid of the Indians, but they found out there was no reason to be afraid of the Indians. They were not hostile. In fact, on March the 16th, the next spring, Chief Samoset of the Algonquins walked right into their village and said, welcome. in English and told them that where they were had been the reservation, not a reservation, that's probably the wrong word, had been the home of the Patuxet tribe that had been wiped out by disease four years earlier. And so they had nothing to fear. The Algonquins were friendly. And the Wapanoags, 40 miles away, the closest tribe, they were also friendly. So that was a fear that they had, that there was no reason to be afraid. So Samaset said that another chief, the Wapanoag chief, wanted to meet them as well and establish peace with them and their colony. and that was Massasoit, the Wampanoag chief. It was really too good to be true, wasn't it? Afraid of all these Indians, and the Indians only wanted peace, and the ones that didn't want peace, the most feared tribe in all of New England, they were all gone. Every one of them had died, except one, and he had been abducted. Now listen to this. He had been kidnapped by the British. Squanto was his name. And he served nine years in England and learned English, escaped, came back to America, tried to find his tribe, the Patuxix, they were all gone. But he walked in the camp one day speaking perfect English. And they said, how in the world did you learn that? And he said, I lived nine years in England. God let all that happen so I could learn English, so I could come back here and teach y'all how to plant, how to plant pumpkins and corn and use fish head as fertilized, how to hunt deer, catch eel, You reckon God had anything to do with all that? It just looked like God put the whole thing together, protected, provided, sent Squanto right there, everything, and he got saved, and he was the first convert to Christianity in North America. He was a godsend. He was a Joseph, as it were, to them. He taught them how to stalk game, how to refine maple syrup, and many other things that were so useful and led to their bountiful harvest that year. The Mayflower headed back to England in April, but not one pilgrim was on board. They'd come too far to turn back. They'd made up their minds they'd come here to begin a nation, and thank God they did. And there was a wedding on May the 12th, first wedding in Plymouth Colony. Then the summer flew by and harvest came in and there was a great bountiful harvest. And the governor said, let's have a Thanksgiving festival. Let's have three days of Thanksgiving in Plymouth Colony. Feasting, rejoicing, 100 Indians were invited. They ate deer and fowl and praised God. for all you've done. The first American Thanksgiving, Plymouth Colony, 1621. I guarantee you, what I've said in the last 10 minutes, you'll never hear that on television. You won't see that in the library books, unless it's a Christian book, but that's our history. That's how we started. When they came on shore, they had a 12 foot wooden cross. They planted it in the soil. They joined hands around it and dedicated North America to the Lord. And they said, we claim this land for the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. That's how we started a distinctively Christian beginning. More ships would come, more trials, more blessings. They faced it all with courage. I wanna give you, before I close, some words of Governor Bradford. He was their governor for many years. And he said, what's happened here at Plymouth is one candle lighting a thousand other candles. He said, it's a small beginning, but God can do great things with small beginnings. He said, as one candle may light a thousand, the light here kindled has shown unto many. Let the name of Jehovah have all the praise, said Governor William Bradford. If you were to go to his tombstone, there's something written on there to you. And it says this, it says, oh, do not give up what your forefathers with much difficulty have secured for you. They saw ahead, they saw you and me. Everything they did, the price they paid was for the sake of religious freedom and the spread of the gospel. They did it for you and for me. So that's the first Thanksgiving. You know, I remember one time being in school and they said, the first Thanksgiving, was the pilgrims giving thanks to the Indians. That's not so. That's not so. That's a lie. No, they gave thanks to God who brought them here and all the things that I've just mentioned. The pilgrims, if you were kin to a pilgrim for many generations, that was a big deal. You know, if your last name was Alden or some of the other pilgrim names. And I like what Will Rogers said. He was Indian, you know, and somebody told him that their family came over on the Mayflower. And he said, that's nothing my people meant to boat. So it's a glorious history. Even as late as 1892, the United States Supreme Court said, this is a Christian nation. Read the document of every colony, the 13 colonies, every one of them openly saying, we are Christian, emphatically Christian. A hundreds of quotes all over the courthouses. If you went to the United States Supreme Court tomorrow, there's six different places you'd see the 10 commandments. Amen. What we need to do is catch up with our founding fathers. Amen. And have a real Thanksgiving and thank God for what he's done. Did you know less than 1% of all people have ever got to be Americans? We're blessed. with such a distinctively. There's no other nation in the history of the world except Israel. That even compares to the Christian history that we've had. And that didn't just start yesterday. Folks, you can read a book that's 200 years old. And even way back then, we were leading the nations of the world. Francis Asbury, the circuit rider, said America will be known for her Christianity, amen. That's a good thing to be known for, isn't it? Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. So I just wanted to take us back a few minutes, remind us where we came from. A preacher said the names of the pilgrims are held in everlasting remembrance. So may ours. Our Christian testimony can continue to do good long after our earthly labors ended and our prayers that may, they may be left to the generations to come as a rich inheritance to be answered in such time and manner as God's wisdom determines. Amen. I like that. And if we had time, we could go further and talk about the Baptists, but that'll be another message. And John Clark, the oldest Baptist church in America in Rhode Island, first place there was ever complete religious freedom in the history of the world. That's why they're the oldest Jewish synagogue in America is there, because it was finally a place where people could practice their religion without being tortured. That's right, because this book teaches freedom of conscience. God made us all free moral agents, and guess who gets to choose whether you get saved or not? You. Guess who decides whether you live the Christian life or not? Not the government, not the denomination. No, you get to decide. That's what this book teaches, and that's what we stand upon. Amen.