2024 is a year we won’t forget. Everyone remembers where they were on July 13 when an assassin’s bullet came within millimeters of murdering Donald Trump. The slight gust of wind, turn of the head, and rushed shot by Thomas Crooks amounted to a miraculous near miss leaving blood streaming down President Trump’s face. Trump pumped his fist and shouted “Fight, fight, fight,” creating an iconic moment that symbolizes his warlike journey back to the presidency.

On November 5, the nation and world braced for another tightly contested election with days of counting ballots and widespread fraud. But that didn’t happen. 2020 didn’t repeat itself. State after state turned red in a Trump wave that resulted in an electoral college landslide. A peaceful, dominant election victory propelled him back into the White House.

After years of “deep state” attacks, fbi weaponization, bogus lawfare and bitter affliction under Joe Biden, the country seems to be healing. America is no longer sliding into irrelevance: It is becoming resurgent. The nation is undergoing a miraculous change of direction.

These are once-in-a-lifetime events. These should be life-altering events. They are dramatic and profound miracles from God.

Millions watched these miracles unfold before their eyes, and millions more watched footage after the fact. God wanted these miracles recorded and remembered. Why?

2024 is the year God saved America through mighty miracles.

This should not be a typical Thanksgiving. We will gather with family and friends, watch football games, and enjoy a plentiful feast. But this day affords a special opportunity to express thankfulness, gratitude and praise for God’s nation-saving miracles.

That is the heart and core of why Thanksgiving exists: It gives us time to reflect and thank God for saving America time and time again. It is about contemplating this divine legacy as an individual, a family and a nation. These miracles convey a wonderful message of hope for America’s future if we will listen and take action.

America is the republic of miracles. There were countless times divine intervention saved the fledgling revolutionaries from destruction at the hand of the mighty British juggernaut.

George Washington, an eyewitness to many of these miracles, knew the country needed to remember their history with God if it was to endure. He declared the first “day of public thanksgiving and prayer” in a proclamation on Oct. 3, 1783, writing that “it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor.”

Thanksgiving was a day to revel in the glorious miracles, power and wisdom of God. Washington continued:

That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks—for his kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation—for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war … and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions ….

This spirit of thanksgiving was continued eight decades later by President Abraham Lincoln, who was an eyewitness to God’s nation-saving miracles during the Civil War.

In the summer of 1863, the Civil War was a disaster for the North. Despite having overwhelming superiority in manpower, supplies and industry, the Union generals could not win a decisive victory over the Confederate army led by Gen. Robert E. Lee.

What was President Lincoln’s reaction? In a proclamation on March 30, 1863, he called for a day for “national prayer and humiliation.” His message read:

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity; we have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us …. It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the offended power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

But the war did not immediately turn. After the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863, President Lincoln knew one more defeat could cause the collapse of the Union and leave the United States of America permanently split. He dropped to his knees and prayed fervently for God to give the North a victory.

Only two months later, God answered that prayer at the small town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It was not any strategic brilliance that won the battle, but a series of divinely ordered mistakes by General Lee and perfectly timed movements by Union Gen. George Meade. Upon hearing news of the victory, President Lincoln thanked God for answering his prayer and used his authority to proclaim God’s greatness.

In his Oct. 3, 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation, President Lincoln counted all the blessings Americans enjoyed and declared:

No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people. I do, therefore, invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States … to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.

We gather on this day to praise our beneficent Father for His mercy, good gifts and nation-saving miracles. Just like Washington and Lincoln, you have been an eyewitness to God’s miracles.

Just as God saved America during the Revolutionary War and at Gettysburg, God saved America by guiding the assassin’s bullet on July 13 and the epic Trump wave on November 5. Our founding fathers set aside a day to let these miracles change our lives and our thinking.

Has being an eyewitness to God saving Trump’s life changed your life? Did the bitter affliction cause you to cry out to God like President Lincoln? Have we humbled ourselves and thanked God after watching Him bring Trump back into the White House?

We have forgotten God, and He has revealed His divine power and love through miracles! God saved us so we have more time to change our lives.

Thanksgiving is rooted in a biblical way of life: Praising and thanking God helps us become more like God. Notice these scriptures:

That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of all thy wondrous works.
—Psalm 26:7

Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
—Psalm 107:8

Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
—Philippians 4:6

This is just a small sampling of the spirit of Thanksgiving woven throughout the Bible.

Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry recently completed a book entitled The Psalms of David and the Psalter of Tara. It teaches us how to recapture Thanksgiving, how to react to God’s miracles, and how to talk to God in prayer. At the center of it is how we praise and thank God.

“This book will help you come to know God,” writes Mr. Flurry. He continues:

You will gain deeper appreciation for God’s power, His love, His devotion to human beings, His long-term, strategic thinking and steadfastness.

This book will also show you how to better worship this almighty, loving God. …

You will gain an inspiring vision of a blueprint of the culture God is about to establish worldwide in the soon-coming Millennium, and how that culture is rooted in godly virtues … of humility, repentance, faith, trust in God, thanksgiving and gratitude, and passionate praise—ardent love, intensely expressed.

Use Thanksgiving as a springboard for individual and national change. Take some time on this day to talk with your family about being an eyewitness to God’s miracles. Discuss these scriptures and capture the spirit of Washington and Lincoln in your observance of this day. Read The Psalms of David and the Psalter of Tara and seize the moment.