First Fruits

Introduction

Thanksgiving is upon us. Tonight we celebrate this holiday as a church family. Tonight we not only thank God we are here but we are thankful for everyone here with us. We are thankful for many things and this is the season of thankfulness. While we know we are to be thankful every day, this is the season when thankfulness is elevated or put above other demands of our attention.

God also established a time of the year when his chosen people should also have a season of thankfulness. In some ways, they were given a pattern to help them remember the ways in which God had carried them through the past year and their past lives outside of God’s favor.

Tonight, lets focus on remembering the ways in which we too could learn to be thankful in this season of Thanksgiving.

Deuteronomic Law

In some ways, you might be tempted to ask, why would God need to establish laws that commanded the people bring offerings of first fruit? Aren’t the people grateful they were brought forth out of Egypt, through the wilderness, and now live in the fruitful land of plenty? Sadly no, it would not take too many generations to pass between arriving in the promised land and forgetting where God had brought them from.

The law was meant to establish worship patterns so that when they saw those first fruits of the season, the first fruits of the bountiful land they now enjoyed, they would remember the promise of God to Abraham to become God’s people in the land of milk and honey. They would also remember how God rescued his people from Egypt, the land of slavery and oppression.

While things were good, it is easy to forget why they are good. It is easy when things are going smoothly to forget the years in which they have not gone smoothly. Over and over God even warned them through leaders and prophets, to follow the commands of God, over and over they would forget God and chase after false gods and forget who they were and how they got into the promised land.

They needed a reminder to be thankful and remember it was God who promised and it was God alone who delivered them into this fruitful land. The offering of the first fruits was tied to remembering their past and how God had been faithful in bringing them into the fruitful land they were enjoying. The first fruits or the first of the results of their labor in the land would be dedicated to God, returning back to God, the first fruit of the blessing of being God’s children living in the land of milk and honey.

Modern First Fruits

I wonder today what they would be like. Given lots of people are not farmers, first fruits may seem strange or antiquated. We work a job, that pays us money so their is no food to return to God as a sign of our thankfulness.

Yet, we still enjoy the fruits of our labors. We still enjoy God’s blessing on our labors and the fruitfulness God has brought about. What might it look like if we thanked God for the jobs we have? The ways in which God has provided for our basic needs the past year? The ways in which God has taken care of other people’s needs? There are many ways in which we could look at God’s fruitfulness in this place. We are able to celebrate this meal together. We are raising funds for children in need of meeting those basic needs such as food. We are able to be part of this mission work financially as well as using our hands to put the meals together.

What if we took a particular day of the week or what about every time you got paid, you remembered God and you gave thanks to God as soon as you received it or when that week begins, thank God for the opportunities and blessings that have come from last week.

While I could turn this into a tithing sermon, I want to look at it differently for today. The response of our thankfulness is the offering. The first fruit offering the Israelites gave was the token offering of being faithful not just in giving to God this first fruit, but being confident in God’s ability to continue sustaining you. First fruit is the first with faith telling you, more is coming to sustain you. You will not miss the first fruit. You will not waste away or starve, or be financially devastated when you offer the first part to God.

Today let us place our faith in God. We place our faith in God to provide what we need, our daily bread. This is what we need and this is what God is faithful to provide. As we prepare our hearts and minds and bellies for the feast we are about to receive, let us give thanks to God for the blessings and fruitfulness of the land where this feast has come from. Let us give thanks for our neighbors who worked hard in gathering all the ingredients and preparing all this food we find in this feast. Let us give thanks to God that love has poured forth into our lives through this gathering of community that today celebrates God’s fruitfulness in our lives.