In 1863 President Lincoln proclaimed the final Thursday of November each year to be observed nationwide as an official day of Thanksgiving. Before 1863, Thanksgiving was celebrated and had been since colonial days, but the date varied from state to state.

It is interesting that President Lincoln made this proclamation during a time of intense conflict in the nation over the issues of slavery, state rights, etc. In other words, there was a great divide in the culture.

Most of us have extended family that we interact with but must tread lightly because there are issues of disagreement. Two big holidays bring families together: Thanksgiving and Christmas. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is still the busiest travel day in the year as people are struggling to get “over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house.”

Most of us will stuff our personal opinions long enough to observe, and sometimes enjoy, time together with people we are supposed to love.

We need Thanksgiving to be more than a brief interlude between Halloween and the frenzied shopping of the Christmas season.

Thanksgiving needs to be a day of pause and reflection personally and corporately. Most of us are safer and doing better financially than we were four or five years ago. Thanksgiving shifts our focus from what we want to what we have, and, if we are honest in assessing our situation, we must declare that the bounty we enjoy is not from our hands, but is from the hands of a magnificent and gracious Almighty God.

In 1863, there was hatred. It was brother against brother, family against family, and the differences resulted in a tragic Civil War with the differences still simmering today. Let’s not go that way again. We can come together. There is more that binds us than what divides us.

Let us begin this Thanksgiving season to truly “Count Our Blessings” and move toward the unity this great Union deserves.