prayer of gratitude for america
Written by Lynette Kittle
Bible reading:
“Praise the Lord, proclaim his name, and let the nations know what he has done.” – Psalm 105:1
Listen or read below:
Sadly, many Americans have never heard the truth of how God faithfully led Christians who were eager to serve God openly, leave their country and everything, and risk their lives to journey to the New World.
In The Pilgrim Chronicles, historian Rod Gragg explains how the Pilgrims began in England around 1606 as a group of Christian separatists who sought to worship Jesus in the pure gospel, based on their beliefs and understanding of the Geneva Bible.
However, holding meetings outside Anglican churches was illegal and prohibited, and the pilgrims faced severe persecution. The flight to Holland around 1609 was short-lived, as the Pilgrims began to seek new life options as their children were influenced to follow secular Dutch ways in Holland.
After hearing of the settlement at Jamestown, the Pilgrims borrowed money and set out to ask King James for permission to sail the Mayflower. Having received the right to travel across the Atlantic, they were given the opportunity to sail to the New World, where they hoped to find a permanent home where they could worship Jesus openly and peacefully.
Today, America is a testament to what God did in America through the faith of the Pilgrims. The foundations of our nation were laid by the Pilgrims on Biblical truth, and America’s Founders guided our nation and government to be based on God’s principles. These Bible truths have given us the right to worship God freely and without reservation.
Prayer and fasting played a major role in establishing American freedom, and the first Americans practiced James 4:10, “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you” on a national level.
Before the formal founding of the United States, historical documents record how a National Thanksgiving Day was observed in which colonists were asked to express their gratitude to God for His protection of their troops.
In 1789, President George Washington issued the United States’ first official Thanksgiving Proclamation, calling on all Americans to express gratitude to God for the end of the war and the successful ratification of the Constitution.
President Washington said, “It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to submit to His will, to be grateful for His blessings, and to humbly implore His protection and favor.”
Following Washington’s example, Presidents John Adams and James Madison also established national Thanksgiving Days during their terms as presidents.
During the Civil War, one woman’s persistent campaign for Thanksgiving officially became a national holiday. In 1827, Sarah Josepha Hale, a magazine editor and author of the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Lamb,” began a campaign to establish a Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. “Thanksgiving is a day when we pledge our faith in a Christian God, recognizing God as the dispenser of blessings,” Hale, a widow and mother of five, wrote.
After thirty-six years of relentlessly pursuing this through the publication of editorials and personally asking newspaper editors, ministers, governors, and presidents to take a day off, President Abraham Lincoln granted her request on October 3, 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, by declaring the last Thursday in November a national day of thanksgiving.
Let’s pray:
Dear father,
We lift up our voices to praise and thank you for America. We are here today because of your hand in leading pilgrims to the New World.
Dear Lord, thank You for founding America on divine principles, dedicated to following Your ways, and committed to giving us the religious freedom to worship You freely.
This Thanksgiving Day, remind Americans how Christians were led by You to sail and settle in this land for Your glory.
Strengthen and restore America’s godly foundations and traditions, and lead our leaders back to your word and truth as they make laws, make judicial decisions, and govern their people.
We thank you for the salvation you have freely given us through Jesus Christ, a gift from you and not something we could have earned by our own efforts.
In the name of Jesus,
Amen.
Share your thoughts on today’s devotion in the Daily Prayer discussion in the Crosswalk Forum.
Photo credit: ©Getty Images/Drazen Zigic
Lynette Kittle is married and has four daughters. She enjoys writing about faith, marriage, parenting, relationships, and life. Her work has been published in Focus on the Family, Decision, Today’s Christian Woman, kirkcameron.com, Ungrind.org, StartMarriageRight.com, and elsewhere. She holds a master’s degree in communications from Regent University and is an associate producer at Soul Check TV.
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