Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1872-12-06
THANKSGIVING SERMON.
Preached at the Union Service, held
in the Congregational Church.
Thanksgiving Day, Nov.
2Sth, 1872.
BY REV. GEO. NJ. PRESTON.

Thanksgiving LAY, NOV.
28th. 1872.
BY REV. GEO. NJ. PRESTON.
Therefore shall ye lay up these my
words in your heart and in your soul,
and bind them for a sign upon your
hand, that they may be as frontlets be-
tween your eyes And ye shall teach
them your children, speaking of them
when thou sittest in thine house, and
when thou walkcst by the way, when
thou iicst down, and when thou risest up.
'And thou shalt write them upon the
door posts Of thine house, and upon thy
gates; that your days may be multiplied,
and the days Of your children, in the
fathers to give them as the days OF
heaven upon the earth "-DEUT Nj: 1S
-21.
Without formally stating the con-
ncction between the sacred words
Just read and what / may say on
this occasion, l will at once an
nounce my theme: orr Coumtsy'$
Debt to the Future.
1t is usual on Thanksgiving days
to recount the favors Of the past,
and to interpret even the untoward
events of our history, in the light OF
that mercy "which endureth torev-
cr." The successes and failures,
the fortunes and misfortunes, the
friends we have gained and the dear
ones we have lost, all that has made
us joyful and all that has made us
sad, we look at in the light of "the
sanctuary of God," and find in the
midst of them all abundant occasion
for thankfulness to that Heavenly
Father, without whose notice emo
sparrow can fall to the ground,' -
and who has counted "every hair of
our heads"
But to-day propose to point to
your gaze the great expanding .tu-
tire. What do we, as nation, owe
to that future? What does each
church, each family, each individu-
al owe to it? What does any Or
ganization, or any one, in his par
ticular calling, owe to it?
1t is natural for us to-day to look
over the whole past Of our national
history, and to give force to the dis
cussion of our theme, we need just
to glance at the now nearly compile
ted century of our national inde-
pendence.
How can we know what is the
debt, of which we have spoken, un-
til we know the value received, for
which we owe it?
Our wide domain, stretching frcm
sea to sea and from tho ice-bound
regions of the North to the tropics
of the South, with it's massive for
ests, its fertile plains, its noble
mountains, its extensive lakes and
rivers, all so related to each other
as to offer us in their manifest and
still hidden resources, the subsist-
amco Of D people which can be more
numerous than any other nation up
on the earth; our free government,
and now, as the result Of the bloody
revolutions of the past, u govern
ment in which every man is free,
the power of the people welded by
the people and for tho people; our
educational institutions, opening to
every learner the avenues to practi-
cal kr owledge and wisdom; our re
ligion, which acknowledges One
Divine Master and all as brethren;
and our history, though in some OF
its periods recording the march OF
armies and describing the scenes OF
bloodshed, yet recounting, in every
step, the progress of some noble
idea; all these, as We turn the leaves
of the past, cause us, to-day, to open
our hearts to the noblest express
sions of gratitude to the great God
of nations.
And we should not forget the
contents Of the last pages of our his
tory, whose leaves are just wet, and
whose type has not been set up for
the permanent record. To-day, as
last year, we behold a city rising
from its ashes, and now multitudes
Of men, and even beasts, recovering
from disease (though one of these
escaped calamities is threatening
this community. We have also
passed through, and that peaceably,
our quadrennial revolution, and all
acquiesce most gracefully in the
we'll secured results.
But what shall we render, as a
nation, to Him who is "from ever.
lasting to everlasting" the God OF
the past and the future, for all
these benefits to us?
One return we can make, and il
seems to me the grand duty of the
present and the future, to insure to
our children and remotely to all
men, what we now possess, and the
benefit of what we have enjoyed, is
to educate the people of our land,
and ultimately the world of man.
kind, or at least, in this latter re.
spect, to do what is o,~ particular
duty.
;Maiorql ciauffgtio,' is, ! believe,
our present and future task.
We have planted a Repuiic, lei
us now train it for it's future pre-em.
lnence. Much as we talk of educa.
ton, we are to-day an uneducated
people. We have our schools and
colleges and professional semina.
ries, to be sure; we have the pulpit
and the nrcss: we have orr science