Something to Be Thankful For

Some time in the past few months a turkey laid down his life for my benefit. A thoughtful farmer planted some sweet potatoes with me in mind. Cranberries were harvested from a bog, bread was cut into little cubes and allowed to dry out to be mixed with seasoning for dressing or stuffing, if you prefer. All of these items will be carefully prepared by loving hands and then the call to the table will come.

Amidst a rush of scrambling feet, legs, arms and elbows, seats will be taken. The leader of the gathering of family and friends will lovingly, yet firmly, ask the participants to join hands, or bow their heads together for the giving of thanks.

The prayer will be sincere. It will include thanks for family, friends, jobs, health and all of the provisions for which we can rejoice and show gratitude. The longer the prayer, the more fidgety the crowd will become. Thoughts of the food getting cold will trespass into the mind. Perhaps others will be strategically planning how to get the best cut of moist breast meat and mom's outrageously good stuffing, before it is decimated by the guaranteed food frenzy that will follow the conclusion of the prayer.

Finally the Amen is pronounced, echoed by an enthusiastic chorus. Moms and Dads fix plates for toddlers. The children are dismissed to the kids table. It dawns on an awkward teenage member of the family that there will be no room at the "big" table and she will be relegated to eating with a bunch of younger cousins. You'll never experience a teenager eat and asked to be dismissed so quickly. The family pet parks itself underneath the table partly to avoid the ear pulling from the toddlers but knowing instinctively it will get an orb of people food previously forbidden.

Laughter penetrates the air as previous Thanksgiving memories are shared. One of the toddler nephews manages to get a pea stuck in his nose. Not to be outdone, a younger niece discovers that turkey gravy makes an excellent hair gel. Then panic ensues! A member of the family is in distress. The mandatory Heimlich maneuver is administered to Uncle Joe, who always seems to laugh too hard with his mouth full. After the initial scare, the feeding orgy continues.

Eventually the plates are filled, then emptied and some are filled again. It gets quieter by the moment. Partially because of contented palettes and stomachs but also because of the increased levels of tryptophan taking its toll. Family members begin to roll out of their seats and head toward the couches. The volume level of the television set is turned up so that football junkies can experience the game as if they were there live. The decibel level grows as other conversations compete. The mood will be determined by the score of the game. If the home team is winning, it will be a great holiday. If they lose, it will merely be a good one.

Somewhere along the line, at one time or another, most of the people gathered in the house will slip away for a few moments. Some mentally, some physically, but most will enter into a short period of reflection, which looks remarkably like a nap. They will gather all of the sounds, sights and smells and synthesize them into a warm memory clip to be filed away for future years. Those few quiet moments, individual and hardly every collective, will be the reason for the holiday. For a few moments, everyone will get along. All past hurts will be set aside. Hope for a better tomorrow will linger in the mind and heart. There will be a sense that things are good, and can continue that way.

During that moment, a contented sigh and a whisper of thanks will be directed to the one who births hope in our hearts. The Great Reconciler will appear by faith. And thanksgiving is in order.

"Father, I pray that this holiday will be filled with fun, family and faith. That all of my readers will be filled with your joy. That peace will reign in their hearts. That praise and thanksgiving will flow freely from their lips. Grant them forgiveness as a gift as they give it and receive it. And may they all take a moment to look toward heaven from which our richest blessings come, and give you thanks for all they have, and all you are. For the glory of your son. Amen."

From our home to yours, have a Happy Thanksgiving.

We Still Support Our Troops

This post is a little late since Veterans' Day was over a week ago, but I thought I'd put it out there anyway.

There is good news on the war front. At this point in time it looks like there will be a gradual drawdown of troops in Iraq. This doesn't really have much to do with the election as the success of the mission has been determined by the superiority of our men and women in uniform and the great leadership they have by officers in the field and strategy room. Afghanistan will continue to present its own challenges, but I think we can be confident of eventually prevailing.

While this has been an unpopular war, there has been a huge difference between Iraq and Viet Nam. In the Viet Nam war our soldiers were singled out for criticism and called horrendous names. There seemed to be no difference attached to the fact that they were mostly soldiers drafted into the service and were not to be blamed for being sent out. The soldiers in Iraq are 100% volunteer. You would think that volunteering for an unpopular war would garner criticism but the American people seem to instinctively understand that for the most part the mission to Iraq has a noble component to it.

Our soldiers exemplify what it is to be an American in unique ways to how other soldiers are trained. They learn obedience with responsibility for their actions. They train in their craft of war with the objective to defend rather than to conquer. They conduct themselves as professionals knowing that they represent the honor and ideals of our country. This has been noted by others in the Alliance. Here is an excerpt:

. . . a post by a French OMLT (Operational Mentoring Liaison Teams) infantryman working with our troops there. A couple of brief excerpts:

Heavily built, fed at the earliest age with Gatorade, proteins and creatine - they are all heads and shoulders taller than us and their muscles remind us of Rambo. Our frames are amusingly skinny to them - we are wimps, even the strongest of us - and because of that they often mistake us for Afghans. [....]

Each man knows he can count on the support of a whole people who provides them through the mail all that an American could miss in such a remote front-line location : books, chewing gums, razorblades, Gatorade, toothpaste etc. in such way that every man is aware of how much the American people backs him in his difficult mission. And that is a first shock to our preconceptions : the American soldier is no individualist. The team, the group, the combat team are the focus of all his attention.

And they are impressive warriors ! We have not come across bad ones, as strange at it may seem to you when you know how critical French people can be. Even if some of them are a bit on the heavy side, all of them provide us everyday with lessons in infantry know-how. Beyond the wearing of a combat kit that never seem to discomfort them (helmet strap, helmet, combat goggles, rifles etc.) the long hours of watch at the outpost never seem to annoy them in the slightest. On the one square meter wooden tower above the perimeter wall they stand the five consecutive hours in full battle rattle and night vision goggles on top, their sight unmoving in the directions of likely danger. No distractions, no pauses, they are like statues nights and days. At night, all movements are performed in the dark - only a handful of subdued red lights indicate the occasional presence of a soldier on the move. Same with the vehicles whose lights are covered - everything happens in pitch dark even filling the fuel tanks with the Japy pump.

Even the French recognize how great an Armed Forces we have. :) I am proud of our servicemen and women. I am thankful that they are standing guard so that people like me can sleep at night in freedom. I am grateful that they will defend our rights against any and all enemies. But most of all, I am in their debt as a fellow veteran. The camaraderie we feel from one generation to the next can't be expressed in words. I continue to fight alongside them in virtual reality. Once a GI always a GI.

Although over 140,000 of them will spend Thanksgiving and Christmas away from home and hearth, our prayers should continue to be with them as we long for the day of their return.

Hat tip to American Thinker

Hallelujah! The Elections are Over!

I try not to post much that is political on this blog. It's too easy to make enemies when you discuss politics. I do have a few things to say about this past election. I'll try to keep it short and sweet. As usual, I invite your comments,

• In my estimation, the campaign season is too long. This one for president has been non-stop for two years.
• Way too much money is spent on trying to get elected. The presidential candidates raised and spent almost $1 billion (that's a one with nine zeroes after it!) It is not a big stretch to say that often the candidate with the most money wins locally or nationallly.
  
• This election had the clearest distinction between the two front-runners in a long time. Often it's hard to tell one candidate from another regardless of party. But in this case the candidates were polar opposites on just about any and every issue.
  
• I think early voting stinks. With the exception of absentee ballots for people who are overseas on assignment or shut-in because of health, I think early voting skews the process. What were to happen if a candidate were to fall ill and die? What if we find out that a candidate has really shady connections? What if a person who casts a ballot early dies? (That last one is a gimme, because we all know that dead people vote all the time. :)
• Campaign signs and bumper stickers are a great way to divide a community and alienate potential friends. I can see trying to convince family members and close friends to vote for the candidate of your choice, but it gets downright ugly when it spills out onto lawns and bumpers.
• Debates should be debates, not commercials or rote recitations of talking points. I was seriously disappointed with the debates this time around. I felt like I was watching a ninety minute commercial.
  
• Talking heads are full of themselves. There was very little reporting and a whole lot of opinionated commentary. It was difficult to get the real scoop on candidates because investigative reporting was pretty much non-existent. Unless you count Obama's missing flag pin and Palin's Gucci purse, you didn't learn a whole lot about the candidates.
• We still live in the greatest country in history and on our planet. On January 20th we will have a change of leadership. There will be no tanks in the streets and no bloodshed. The American people will still have the opportunity to write their Congressional Representatives and Senators. We can give money to candidates we believe espouse our best interests and then enter a ballot booth and cast votes. I'd rather live here than anywhere else.
  

Now that it is over, let's get about the business of trying to make our country better. Pray for our new President. Get involved on a grassroots level. And most importantly, remember the priority of enhancing the influence of God's kingdom through prayer and evangelism. It's our country's only real hope and will truly effect the change that is needed.