Thanksgiving, 2013

Count Your Blessings, Hymn

When upon life’s billows you are tempest-tossed,
When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,
Count your many blessings, name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done.

- Johnson Oatman, Jr.

This writer and world traveler has shared many events in articles, particularly about holidays in foreign countries. Thanksgiving is a very particularly-American celebration. In my lifetime, it has been overshadowed by the paganism of Halloween and the excesses of Christmas.

I was in Khartoum, Sudan, Africa. I remember it as if it were yesterday, being at the largest hotel in the city, right on the banks of the Nile. Of course every Muslim country is dreary and colorless-- you never see a flower (God's beauty). The housing, clothing, exteriors and interiors of buildings, is very drab. In fact, I do not believe, that in all the Muslim countries I have visited in my life, that I ever saw someone smile or laugh.

There were several other Americans in the hotel on Thanksgiving. Evidently, they wanted to impress us Americans by serving us a Thanksgiving meal. We Americans were all sitting together at one table, in one dining room, when they brought in some birds of some type, which they had prepared. The legs were sitting straight up, pointed at the ceiling,  and the outsides were parched. Of course I had no appetite for this food-- in fact, in most foreign countries, I would eat around the fringes of everything in an attempt to discern what I was eating. I lost much weight in my travels.

As I have stated many times, you are Christian, with everything that Christianity entails-- daily thankfulness. You are American, with everything that that entails. Not I am an American or I am a Christian.

The apostle Paul tells us about thankfulness in his letter to Colossia:

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Colossians 3:15-17

We live in a profane world, in a broken culture-- in entropy, slipping and sliding towards chaos. The most difficult question I have ever been asked, in a long life of interaction with both believers and nonbelievers, is, "If God is love, why all the suffering in the world-- poverty, disability, war, criminal activity?" Particularly, the question is, "Why do good people suffer-- especially innocent children?" And we could just as easily ask, "Why did God not spare his own Son from flogging and crucifixion?", or "Why did God allow slavery-- the most inhuman activity in world history?" Think of the slave breakers, the inhuman activity in the hearts of some humans, to be able to beat a slave daily, until they were in absolute submission-- much like the mule skinner, beating a mule or horse into absolute submission. We must allow-- in our thinking, in our psyche-- harsh truth, the fact that God allows Satan, not only to tempt us, but to abuse us. Never forget, God is boss. He is in charge, and Satan can only go as far as He lets him. 

For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.

Hebrews 4:15

In this season of Thanksgiving, we should be so thankful that life is more than temptation and abuse, warfare and criminal conduct. I can still see my grandmother getting out her glasses, from a case, on which was the name, "Dr. Edward Bizzel." I knew Dr. Bizzel, and the joy he had given my grandmother through glasses, with which she could read her Bible. But, what made her more elated than her joy at being able to read her Bible, was having her own grandson be able to write her prescription. From that day, she never stopped talking about her glasses, prescribed by her oldest doctor-grandson.  At this time, we can be thankful that we are producers, not moochers. My grandmothers were thankful that they never had a child or grandchild who ended up in jail or depended on Welfare.

On one of my last visits to one aunt, who was totally crippled by arthritis, and unable to get around or do anything, she talked about her childhood, drawing water in a bucket from a well, to wash clothes. She said, "The trials of my childhood, those of my parents and grandparents, seem so trivial when, with Thanksgiving, I realize that every one of my nieces and nephews have graduated from college, have good jobs, and are responsible and productive citizens. But most of all, that they know Jesus Christ as their savior, and every one-- without exception-- are living lives that make me very proud."

Thanksgiving is more than overeating, spending at "super centers," and waiting in line to get a special deal. African American people, and even slaves, were once described as, "The happiest people on the face of the Earth." The happiest people on the face of the Earth, should be those who have productive lives-- lives of encouragement. Mark Twain said, "Politeness costs so little." One who is thankful, long-suffering, and encouraging to others, is a testimony to Thanksgiving.