The more I think about it the more I wonder… Why do Americans only celebrate one day of “thanksgiving” per year?
Are we not “thankful” the other 364 days of the year?
Do we not have more than one day’s worth of “thanks” to give the Creator for the blessings He’s bestowed upon us?
Are we in it only for the turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie and cranberries?
Are we in it only for the four day long weekend and all the great football games on TV?
Is it because we lack manners that we don’t give thanks to our Maker more often?
Or is it (and I suspect this is the root cause)we EXPECT to be blessed materially, financially, physically, mentally, academically, spiritually, etc., because we DESERVE it by virtue of being Americans living in the twenty-first century?
I hate to break the news to you, but NO ONE deserves to be blessed because of where or when they were born.
The Pilgrims had it rough. More than half of them died during the first winter after they landed on these shores. If anyone “deserved” a break from a life of grueling hardship and sudden death, I’d say it was these poor souls.
But they didn’t expect a break. They didn’t expect to be blessed because of who they were and where they were. But, in the end, they were blessed. They survived.
And they gave thanks to God for being able to draw breath for another day and for the help their Native American friends gave them in teaching them how to fish and plant corn.
Looking back at that moment in time, shouldn’t we feel a bit ashamed of ourselves for crowding shopping malls to buy things we don’t necessarily need after a day of stuffing our stomachs with an overabundance of food our waistlines don’t necessarily want?
Here’s a radical idea: Let’s replace our current “Turkey Day” with a national day of prayer and fasting. Most of us could go without food for twenty-four hours and suffer few ill effects. In fact, our physicians and fitness trainers may just love us all the more for it.
Instead of watching football or hitting the early Christmas sales at the mall, perhaps we could all spend some time with our family and friends… sharing with each of them how thankful we are for them being in our lives. (Including the non-communicative teens. We can express our thanks that at least we see them on occasion, even though they rarely confide in us anymore.)
If you get the chance to help out at a homeless shelter or soup kitchen this holiday season, consider yourself lucky. Consider yourself blessed. You are learning a valuable lesson firsthand—what it’s like for the vast majority of the world who experiences an empty stomach more often than not.
Let those images of hungry folk stay with you for a while. They will remind you to give thanks year ‘round because you have a home and a turkey of your own.
2 comments:
yeah, compared to other people, we're very lucky..
First Thanksgiving (from the History Channel)
In 1621 the Plymouth colonists and the Wampanoag Indians shared an
autumn harvest feast which is now known as the first Thanksgiving.
While cooking methods and table etiquette have changed as the holiday
has evolved, the meal is still consumed today with the same spirit of
celebration and overindulgence.
What Was Actually on the Menu?
What foods topped the table at the first harvest feast? Historians
aren't completely certain about the full bounty, but it's safe to say
the pilgrims weren't gobbling up pumpkin pie or playing with their
mashed potatoes. Following is a list of the foods that were available
to the colonists at the time of the 1621 feast. However, the only two
items that historians know for sure were on the menu are venison and
wild fowl, which are mentioned in primary sources. The most detailed
description of the "First Thanksgiving" comes from Edward Winslow
from A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, in 1621:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling,
that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had
gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much
fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week.
At which time, among other recreations, we exercised our arms, many
of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest
king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we
entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer,
which they brought to the plantation and bestowed upon our governor,
and upon the captain, and others. And although it be not always so
plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God,
we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers
of our plenty.
Did you know that lobster, seal and swans were on the Pilgrims' menu?
Seventeenth Century Table Manners:
The pilgrims didn't use forks; they ate with spoons, knives, and
their fingers. They wiped their hands on large cloth napkins which
they also used to pick up hot morsels of food. Salt would have been
on the table at the harvest feast, and people would have sprinkled it
on their food. Pepper, however, was something that they used for
cooking but wasn't available on the table.
In the seventeenth century, a person's social standing determined
what he or she ate. The best food was placed next to the most
important people. People didn't tend to sample everything that was on
the table (as we do today), they just ate what was closest to them.
Serving in the seventeenth century was very different from serving
today. People weren't served their meals individually. Foods were
served onto the table and then people took the food from the table
and ate it. All the servers had to do was move the food from the
place where it was cooked onto the table.
Pilgrims didn't eat in courses as we do today. All of the different
types of foods were placed on the table at the same time and people
ate in any order they chose. Sometimes there were two courses, but
each of them would contain both meat dishes, puddings, and sweets.
More Meat, Less Vegetables
Our modern Thanksgiving repast is centered around the turkey, but
that certainly wasn't the case at the pilgrims's feasts. Their meals
included many different meats. Vegetable dishes, one of the main
components of our modern celebration, didn't really play a large part
in the feast mentality of the seventeenth century. Depending on the
time of year, many vegetables weren't available to the colonists.
The pilgrims probably didn't have pies or anything sweet at the
harvest feast. They had brought some sugar with them on the Mayflower
but by the time of the feast, the supply had dwindled. Also, they
didn't have an oven so pies and cakes and breads were not possible at
all. The food that was eaten at the harvest feast would have seemed
fatty by 1990's standards, but it was probably more healthy for the
pilgrims than it would be for people today. The colonists were more
active and needed more protein. Heart attack was the least of their
worries. They were more concerned about the plague and pox.
Surprisingly Spicy Cooking
People tend to think of English food at bland, but, in fact, the
pilgrims used many spices, including cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg,
pepper, and dried fruit, in sauces for meats. In the seventeenth
century, cooks did not use proportions or talk about teaspoons and
tablespoons. Instead, they just improvised. The best way to cook
things in the seventeenth century was to roast them. Among the
pilgrims, someone was assigned to sit for hours at a time and turn
the spit to make sure the meat was evenly done.
Since the pilgrims and Wampanoag Indians had no refrigeration in the
seventeenth century, they tended to dry a lot of their foods to
preserve them. They dried Indian corn, hams, fish, and herbs.
Dinner for Breakfast: Pilgrim Meals:
The biggest meal of the day for the colonists was eaten at noon and
it was called noonmeat or dinner. The housewives would spend part of
their morning cooking that meal. Supper was a smaller meal that they
had at the end of the day. Breakfast tended to be leftovers from the
previous day's noonmeat.
In a pilgrim household, the adults sat down to eat and the children
and servants waited on them. The foods that the colonists and
Wampanoag Indians ate were very similar, but their eating patterns
were different. While the colonists had set eating patterns--
breakfast, dinner, and supper--the Wampanoags tended to eat when they
were hungry and to have pots cooking throughout the day.
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