The Story of Thanksgiving (modified)

I actually posted this on a different blog so I figured I would put this here. Thanksgiving is tomorrow here in the USA. The Pilgrims came to the USA from Europe as you all (probably) know. The journey that met them was even tougher. They escaped for religious freedom, as they desired to pray and worship as they wanted to, not what the King felt was good. The King was one way and the Ocean to the New World was the highway. After a few shorter journeys, the Pilgrims took the latter. The settlers in the new world were not prepared to live in the New World because they could not farm the land properly. Along came members of the Wompanoag Indian tribe alliance member Squanto showed them how to grow food properly. The result at the harvest time was that there was plenty of food for the long winter.

Why is that significant? How could a member of the Wompanoan tribal alliance communicate with the new settlers? He had been captured and brought to England as a youth by George Weymouth in 1605 (to prove he did go to the New World). Squanto returned in 1612 with Captain John Smith. A few years later, one of Smith's former officers tried to sell him into slavery, even though Smith let him go. The Pilgrims settled on where his former village was. He taught them how to cultivate the land and acted as an ambassador (of sorts) between the Pilgrims and the surrounding tribes. Nearly sold into slavery again, he managed to return to England and live there a few more years, learning more English during that time. 1619, he returned to his native region and had contact with the Pilgrims a few years later (this reminds me of the Biblical character Joseph).

As the video will show, the first Thanksgiving was celebrated with a feast and giving God thanks for His provision. On December 26, 1941 (almost 3 weeks after the Pearl Harbor attack), President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Day of Thanksgiving into law. Since 1942, Thanksgiving has been celebrated on the last Thursday in November. The foods served for the modern Thanksgiving dinner is reflected in part by that first feast.

Thanksgiving, from a historical point:






Fun food videos:




This is a MUST for Thanksgiving:


Turducken (a TURkey, stuffed with a DUCK, stuffed with a chicKEN). This is unique to the southern US and is actually a yearly dish. You can kill three birds with one stone:

God's first commandments (?)

Let me start by saying I have no formal training in the Bible or Biblical related subjects. I am not a Pastor or teacher and don't see myself as one any time soon. This is my opinion and mine alone (at least I believe it is). One part criticism and one part theory/opinion. I am not saying that this is what God says but I only do it based on two things. The context He speaks in and His nature (what He did in other contexts). The 10 Commandments are the blueprint for what modern (criminal and civil) laws are based off of. For the longest time, I thought that to be true but then something hit me. I’m not trying to denounce the 10 Commandments (because you can’t keep them anyway at least as they were intended). In fact, far from that at all. Over a period of days while reading Genesis, something came to me (strangely enough after reading Revelations). This is how I think God intended things to be. Fellowship with Him with no pain, death, sorrow- none of it. My thinking is based off of different teaching I’ve heard over time (along with those on God’s nature). I also base it off of reading the Bible as a piece of literature (yep all the English classes I took may have done some good). Don’t ask me to get into the Hebrew, Greek or so on because that is WELL outside my knowledge base.

This is only a thought. What you see below is what I think are the first commandments God gave to man. Personally, I think that these were the only commandments He ever wanted to give mankind. This is what God said to Adam and Eve (from Genesis 2 and 3). To me, it seems pretty straight forward. As I looked at the story further, it made more sense. The one little act caused God to cut off this incredible paradise He had created for his creation. He also had to send his only Son to the world to die the most barbaric death for that time. Why? No other way to save mankind as God saw it. Do you think these are doable? I hope I edited the “thous” to "you" to make this more readable. Who speaks King's English anyway. I don't. I'm an American. Anyway, here it goes.

1. “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful"
2. "and multiply"
3. "and replenish the earth.” I think the be fruitful and multiply parts are the act of creating human life and intimacy between the Adam and Eve (hint-hint). Replenish I think was seems to show things once the children is born and how they should carry forward.
4. “and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” In other words, Adam and Eve were supposed to oversee the earth. The entire creation was given to them by God. Look up the words subdue and dominion to get a better picture.
5. “God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.” Translation. I see this as authority that God made mankind superior to other living things. Adam and Eve were in God’s image. It follows number four. I think this could show partnership with God as well (though not being equal with him). Adam thought up a name, that’s what it was called. I actually heard a sermon on this years back so that's what comes to mind here.
6. “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” Again, pretty self-explanatory if you think about what the words imply (especially the last part if you think about it). I think the first part of this was directed for the children of Adam and Eve (again, just my opinion and is something I am unsure of). At this point, Adam and Eve were it. An early marriage blueprint.
7. “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou may freely eat.” Imagine going into a forest or orchard. Imagine that you can eat any fruit that you see. I have seen enough orchards and these are not small pieces of property. More provision.
8. “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, do not eat of it: for in the day that thou eat thereof thou shalt surely die.” The first “do not/thou shall not” is given here. This was intended to be a warning once they ate the fruit, their lives will not be the same. They had a free will to eat of the tree but God gave them the right to decide for themselves. God wanted to give Adam and Eve free decisions to act within the boundaries He set for them. The serpent (Satan) tells the first lie in human history, hence becoming the "father of all lies" by doing this. The result was that Eve ate the fruit, gave some to Adam, which he ate as well. The rest was all down hill from there. The death was not physical but the spiritual, once perfect state they once knew. All glory given up for one piece of fruit.

If I tried to do this in the actual Hebrew, it will look something like this (note: I used Google translate to create this but you get the picture):
ואת אלוהים בירך אותם אלוהים ויאמר להם פרו ורבו

ו לחדש את כדור הארץ

ולהכניע אותו: ויש לך שליטה על הדגים של הים, ועל עוף של באוויר, מעל כל דבר חי שזז על פני האדמה.

אלוהים יצר כל חיית השדה, וכל עוף של האוויר; והביא אותם אל אדם כדי לראות מה הוא היה קורא להם: ואת בכלל אדם בשם כל יצור חי, זה היה שם ממנו.

לכן יהיה אדם לעזוב את אביו ואת אמו, ולא תחול לבקע אל אשתו: והם יהיו לבשר אחד.

של כל עץ של הגן אתה יכול לאכול חופשי. ואת יהוה אלוהים ציווה האיש לאמר, כל עץ של הגן אתה יכול לאכול חופשי.

אבל העץ של הידע של תעשה טוב ורע, אתה לא לאכול אותו: במשך היום כי אתה לאכול ממנו ונתתה בוודאי למות.

Or Greek (in part):
Και ο Θεός τους ευλόγησε, και ο Θεός είπε εις αυτούς, να είναι καρποφόρες και να πολλαπλασιάζεται
ανασύσταση και η γη
και να υποτάξει: και να έχει κυριαρχία πάνω από τα ψάρια της θάλασσας, και πάνω από τα όρνιθες του αέρα, και πάνω από κάθε ζωντανό πράγμα που κινείται επάνω στη γη.

I only did this to clear my head. As I said before, these are my thoughts and mine alone. It's just something that I found curious and considered pondering.

Rich Mullins: 1955-1997

I did a entry about Jimi Hendrix on the day 28th year of his passing. The following day one decade and a half later, the music world lost a man who brilliance too many never heard first hand but may be familiar with his music. His name was Rich Mullins. He was a part of early days of what became Contempory Christian Music (CCM), trying to add a more modern touch versus "traditional" Christian music. The first time I heard him, my playlist was far from what he was playing (I should say WAY FAR). Anyway, I got home one night while in college (doing what typical college students do) and I turn on the TV. I notice the music playing was pretty soft (a good thing in the wee hours of the morning) and I noticed something different. I then heard the singer with his opening verse- "the other side of the world, isn't so far away." You might expect that the video was shot on some soundstage someplace, right? Wrong. Here's the kicker. The guy was singing in a garbage dump somewhere in Central America. That man was Rich Mullins, singing "The Other Side of the World." For the first time in my life, I was actually seeing how God's love was in action (in a way I had not seen before). Think about this. Who would go to a place like that to shoot a video? In other words, guitarist Adrian Belew's quote that a lot of today's music is "fashionable crap dressed as artistry" would not apply here. With Rich Mullins, what you saw is what you got.

I can recall going to Cornerstone, a music festival located in Bushnell, Illinois, back in the early 1990's (I believe it was 1993) where I actually got to meet this guy. I had met some musicians in CCM and those who weren't years prior. Some were very nice and actually appreciated that you came to see them. Others??? How can I put this as kindly as possible? Let's say they believed their own press a bit too much. Rich Mullins was doing a seminar, just speaking about his music, his life and things going on with him personally. He was not a big man in stature at all. Afterwards, I told him how I appreciated his music and he was very gracious to say the least. After the seminar ended, he took more time with people. As I heard his interviews, it never seemed like he cared about being famous at all. In fact, it was almost like he was making fun of fame. I'm curious what he would think about American Idol? His life ended on September 19, 1997, about 2 hours from where I live (less than one month from his 42nd birthday). I was on my way home from work when the news came on the radio. I was in total shock. He was struck and killed after being thrown from his jeep and hit by a tractor trailer (he was not wearing a seatbelt from what I understand). I decided to wait until now to do this because I wanted to do this right. I found this quote that summed up who this man was (as I see it): "One day it won't make any difference how many albums I sold, but I will give account of my life to God. What I think He'll be most pleased with is to see that we truly lived, that we were the person he created us to be." I'm not trying to be some death magnet, but I felt it would be good to remember someone as this.

Below are some of his songs I liked. I chose 5 but I could have easily added more. Enjoy:

This is one of his earliest videos. This was also on the same record as "The Other Side of the World", which I mentioned earlier.


This is a song I'm pretty partial to.


This song was made popular by Amy Grant. Many people don't know is that Mullins actually wrote the song. I like his version better (no disrespect to Amy Grant).


Him speaking on a few things. The guy playing the bass (or at the start of the video, sitting behind him in the brown shirt) is a guy I knew years back (nice guy). We attended the same church years ago:


His song that has been covered by many (which overlaps the prior video):


This video was recorded not long before his passing, believed to be the last concert video of him.