| Author | Message | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 3257 Registered: 7-2007 |
Happy Thanksgiving  And the reason I'm saying Happy Hanukkah is because it started last night! It's REALLY rare that Hanukkah starts this early! (Oh and Hanukkah is the feast of Dedication and the Festival of Lights. Jesus actually celebrated that day. Adventists claim that Jesus started the "investigative judgment" in 1844, but actually the sole verse - Daniel 8:14 - that they claim prophecies the "investigative judgment", was fulfilled when the temple was re-dedicated and the oil which was supposed to last only one day lasted for eight days, when they could get new oil made!) | ||
| Mjcmcook Registered user Username: Mjcmcook Post Number: 1296 Registered: 2-2011  |
Thank-you, Asurprise! ~mj~ | ||
| Philharris Registered user Username: Philharris Post Number: 2966 Registered: 5-2007  |
First, I would like to affirm Asurprise’s point because there certainly is an amazing direct parallel between Hanukkah and our Thanksgiving celebration. Both center on the miraculous survival of a nation with modern Israel’s reemergence as a sovereign nation and survival since 1948. For us in the United States Abraham Lincoln establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday of thanksgiving following the victory at Gettysburg. Up 'tell then it was not certain the Union would survive the Civil War. What bothers me most is that we, as a people, tend to forget all that we should be thankful for and act like a bunch of idiots on ‘Black Friday’. In our thanklessness we not only forget to be thankful we are focusing on much that has nothing to do with upcoming Christmas and the birth of our Savior. PS The very first thanksgiving dinner was held in Jamestown, Virginia many years before the survivors who came over in the Mayflower. Fearless Phil | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 14668 Registered: 12-2003  |
Phil, I agree with your assessment of our thanklessness-driven consumerism. It's ironic, isn't it, that so much craziness happens the day after we purport to be thankful. I was struck, on the day after Thanksgiving, when Richard led us in psalms and hymns for our annual FAF Thanksgiving Leftovers and communion evening, that in Psalm 50 it says God desires our sacrifice of thanksgiving. There a reason both testaments are filled with cmmands to give thanks to God. A thankful heart is a submitted heart. When we can thank God for His faithfulness and constancy and provision even when circumstances are hard, we can experience true Sabbath rest because we're leaning on our true Father instead of on our own management of our lives. This is a "place" to which God keeps bringing me. I have to trust Him...and I can't manage my outcomes. He is faithful! Colleen | ||
| Butterfly_poette Registered user Username: Butterfly_poette Post Number: 371 Registered: 5-2011  |
I never knew Hanukkah could come so early. It is true, the Massachusetts pilgrims of 1620 weren't all that special. They were not the first colonists to go to Massachusetts, nor were they really much of Pilgrims. They already fled to the Netherlands, and were upset at their kids becoming Dutch. Also, many of the Mayflower passengers weren't Puritans like the Pilgrims we know. There were a number of passengers dubbed "Strangers" by the Pilgrims. | ||
| Butterfly_poette Registered user Username: Butterfly_poette Post Number: 372 Registered: 5-2011 |
The Strangers decided to go to the New World for various reasons. It is interesting that the Mayflower was supposed to go to Virginia, yet a storm blew them up north. The ship almost blew up because the Billington boys set fire to some pieces of rope near some barrels of gunpowder. Thankfully the boys were stopped. God did have His hand on the Pilgrims. Even though their fate was harsh, I do think God did want the Thanksgiving holiday to be a tradition later on. The Pilgrims were a prime example of people who wanted to live up to their faith. |
