Just this week, I asked Google, “What time is Thanksgiving Dinner?” I had to ask because my family’s tradition was … you eat when it’s ready. Maybe it was just my hungry childhood inpatience, but it seemed like we were always waiting on something or someone: a miscalculation in turkey cook time, that member of the family hadn’t arrived yet … again, etc. So, I had no recollection of a traditional time to eat the festive meal.
According to one article turned up by Google, the most popular time for Thanksgiving Dinner is 3:00 pm. It’s okay to argue … because your family tradition should have been the gold-standard for the rest of the world. Why not at noon or 6:30 pm? The article provided a list of plausible reasons. I quote …
- An earlier meal creates a more relaxed celebration, plus there’s plenty of time to digest before going to bed.
- An earlier dinner accommodates traveling guests and lets them return home at a reasonable hour.
- Football! Dinners are scheduled to coincide with the end of the early afternoon game, or to begin well in advance of the late afternoon game
- The Historical Answer: “Dinner” was once the main meal of the day, served around one or two in the afternoon, while “supper” was a much lighter meal, or even just a snack, eaten around sundown.
- Bonus: Sue remembers their mealtime being tied to watching the Thanksgiving Day Parade together as a family.
Like I said … I mostly remember waiting. And when we finally set down? Mom would put the whole affair on hold until we each listed something for which we were thankful. This was acute torture … not to mention how hard it is to talk with all that preparatory saliva. But my mom was right, there should always be time to slow down and offer thanks. Thankfulness is mentioned 133 times in the Bible and that number would increase greatly if you included synonyms. Slow down and take time to be thankful … at 3:00 pm this Thursday … or any other time, every day of the year.
So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. Colossians 2:6-7
