Why am I so worked up?

Unfortunately it seems that the holidays and family functions are often a mixture of joy and pain. This Thanksgiving was no different.

For the past few months, my parents and I have been coexisting in the same environment and interacting now and then. The reality is that there are a few unspoken tensions, some of which have been resolved, and some which have not. In writing all of this, I know that I too am with fault and have likely been particularly sensitive, which doesn't help my emotion behind all of this.

So, during our rushed Thanksgiving dinner, I mentioned the Lexicon I was making for my World Religion class, a glossary of the important terms from each major religious tradition. It's been a great class for growing in understanding and learning much about others. It hasn't changed what I believe, but it has changed how I relate to others and how I think of others in various religious traditions. I've read novels, listened to songs and stories, read some of their sacred texts, and discussed in detail the questions being asked by each. I've learned a lot and also realized that I have much to learn.

My mom is highly involved in an interfaith council and both of my parents view themselves as highly open, liberal Christians. Like myself, they highly value other cultures and learning, but they also would argue that all roads lead to god. I would not. While I enjoy learning and better understanding and while I love learning and better appreciating other religious and cultural traditions, I think that there is one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ. I know this sounds exclusive and narrow, on one hand it is and on another it is not. I believe it is a path open to all who will believe and bow a knee to Christ. I also know that not all people will do this and that many follow other paths that are to either reach God or some universal all through sacrifice, good deeds, and ritual. While there are very good people who follow other religious traditions, I would argue that they don't reach to God. I can't reach God either unless I go through Christ and that is no work of my own.

And, yes, I do think it is right to be in discussion with others, to seek to understand. And yet a follower of Christ cannot deny that they desire all to come to know Him. If they did, they would be unloving. Yet this is the point at which most people take offense. And yet Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Mormons, and others would do the same. But that wouldn't be seen as narrow and offensive, it would be seen as being open-minded and culturally open. This is why I am frustrated. My dad wants me to acknowledge the Bible to be on par with other sacred texts and Christ to be ONE of the ways to God. My mom wants to merely talk about differences but to merely explore others' beliefs and yet not hold firmly to Christianity's core beliefs. That is not open, unbiased discussion. Not at all. Yet that is what I am told to do, leave my beliefs at the door, and embrace all. On one hand, I wholeheartedly agree and, on the other hand, I cannot. I do want to embrace all and I do want to learn and listen and understand. I don't want to bulldoze others over, I want to love and serve and pray and share my beliefs as they do. I will pray that they would come to Christ, but if they don't I won't shun or act unrightly toward them. That is why this bothers me. Have I acted unrightly toward people in the past of other beliefs? Am I unloving and one who bulldozes over others? No, I don't think I generally am. At times I may and, hopefully, I then generally ask for forgiveness. I am clearly emotional and upset and hurt. I want my example and attitude to be that of Christ in Philippians. Oh, I pray that it would be more and more like that. And I do pray that people would be changed by seeing Christ in me. Oh how I pray that would be true. I pray that people would not stumble as a result of my testimony, verbal or in action, but instead be confronted with the truth and love of Christ alone.

Both Thanksgiving and today, I realize that this is likely HIGHLY emotional for me and likely not so emotional for them. Their faith is not an essential part of everything they do. It is connected, but it isn't one of the first things they would say that characterizes their life. For me, it is. If I am not a good representation of Christ, that is tragic. Yes, God will and can change me, but it is the reputation and reflection of my God and Savior and King, that is marred by my sin, a reputation and a reflection that I long to be crystal clear to those on-looking. He is my all. He is my life. He is my Lord. I want all I do and say and am to glorify Him and reflect Him. That is why this is so personal. It's not really about me being right or wrong; it's about Him.

Having said all this, I do love and think the world of my parents. I'm grateful to have time with them, I just wish it weren't a mix of joy and pain.

thanksgiving in the us

It's been six years since I've celebrated a Thanksgiving in the US. That added with NOT cooking for 50+ people and added with it just being me and the parents and added with having beaucoup work to get done this "break" made for a fairly uneventful, strange thanksgiving day. I was thankful to have some great friends with whom to spend dinner and was glad that my parents and I sat around the table together for a meal. But weird to say the least.

Yes, it caused me to pause briefly and to give thanks for what I have and how God has provided for me again and again this year. As my friend said tonight, "we've never truly been without."

It was fun to meet some fun turkish people which somehow strangely seemed appropriate on turkey day. It was nice and fairly uneventful. It made me a bit nostalgic about great thanksgivings past and friends and family whom I miss. Happy Thanksgiving!

"Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, his love endures forever..." Psalms

p.s. Highlights on the menu were some incredible goat cheeses, one with honey drizzled on top with a sage leaf, and the other covered with blueberries and slightly sweet. Yum!

Thanksgiving & Abraham Lincoln's Proclamation in 1863

Proclamation of Thanksgiving
Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863

This is the proclamation which set the precedent for America's national day of Thanksgiving. During his administration, President Lincoln issued many orders like this. For example, on November 28, 1861, he ordered government departments closed for a local day of thanksgiving.

Sarah Josepha Hale, a prominent magazine editor, wrote a letter to Lincoln on 28, 1863, urging him to have the "day of our annual Thanksgiving made a National and fixed Union Festival." She wrote, "You may have observed that, for some years past, there has been an increasing interest felt in our land to have the Thanksgiving held on the same day, in all the States; it now needs National recognition and authoritive fixation, only, to become permanently, an American custom and institution." The document below sets apart the last Thursday of November "as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise."

According to an April 1, 1864, letter from John Nicolay, one of President Lincoln's secretaries, this document was written by Secretary of State William Seward, and the original was in his handwriting. On October 3, 1863, fellow Cabinet member Gideon Welles recorded in his diary that he complimented Seward on his work. A year later the manuscript was sold to benefit Union troops.

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. 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, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, 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. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

While this is a bit late coming, these words of Lincoln are powerful and thought-provoking as much in 2010 as they were in 1863. Happy belated Thanksgiving! I'm thankful that we have a day set aside to step back and to remember all the things and people for which we are thankful and also Him who has made us and all these things and people.

Note: George Washington also has a famous Thanksgiving speech, which can be read here on a friend's blog.

Psalm 136:26
"O give thanks to the God of heaven, for his steadfast love endures forever."

Psalm 30
"I will extol you, O Lord, for you lifted me out of the depths, and did not let my enemies gloat over me. O Lord my God, I cried to you for help, and you healed me. O Lord, you brought up my soul up from the grave; you spared me from going down into the pit.

Sing to the Lord, you saints of his (all who follow him); praise his holy name. For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may last for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.

When I felt secure, I said, ‘I will never be shaken.’ O Lord, when you favored me, you made my mountain stand firm; but when you hid your face, I was dismayed.

To you, O Lord, I cried; and to the Lord I cried for mercy; ‘What gain is there in my destruction, in my going down into the pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it proclaim your faithfulness? Hear, O Lord, and be merciful to me; O Lord, be my help.’

You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing to you and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give you thanks forever."