Happy Thanksgiving Day

I've been a little out of the e-mail loop lately. Five weeks ago I started working on a Masters at Liberty Online University. It's an eight-week concentrated term and I'm taking two classes which have just about eaten up all my time. The reading alone is about to kill me, but I'm glad to say with only three weeks to go I've got a 98% in Old Testament and 95% in New Testament. There will be a break for Christmas and after the New Year I'll try it again. This week I've got all of my written assignments already done and only have left about eight more chapters of reading, so I'm taking today off.

I started celebrating last night with a great American tradition; a John Wayne movie. Unfortunately it was midnight before I popped the dvd into the player, and Rio Bravo is a full two hours, and since I can't watch the Duke without seeing every scene, every time I dozed off I had to rewind to catch what I missed, so it was 3 a.m. before I got to bed. This morning I am thankful for my 20 ounce John Wayne coffee mug and a bag of Nairobi Java House coffee beans to get me jump started. Lhey is already in the kitchen cooking the green beans and a ham, and after awhile we're going out to my mother's for dinner.

Of all our holidays Thanksgiving is the most uniquely American. You know the story, how the Pilgrims came and survived the first harsh winter where half of them died, and then when the harvest came in the next fall in 1621, they stopped for a three day celebration to give thanks to a benevolent Savior, Jesus Christ, who had provided for them a new home in the New World. One of George Washington's first acts as our first president was to declare a Day of Thanksgiving, and then in 1863, in the middle of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving an official holiday.

Today I'm grateful for the history that gave us Thanksgiving. I'm thankful for the patriots who gave their lives to secure our history and make us a free people, and I'm thankful for our servicemen and women who are in harm's way today protecting our liberty.

I'm thankful for my family, for my beautiful wife who is still with us after her health struggles over the last year and a half, for our two handsome sons and a lovely adopted daughter. I'm thankful for our house that will be paid off, Lord willing, in another year. I'm thankful for this computer to write and all the things God has provided for us in the last year. I'm thankful for good roads, running water and reliable electricity, things we seldom had in Kenya.

At this moment I'm thankful for three robins perched on the fence outside the window where I am writing. I'm thankful for the little things like these birds that God provides to remind us He is always there. I'm thankful for all the red, orange, and yellow leaves and the gorgeous splash of color they gave us before falling off the trees, and the knowledge that in the spring they will bud and grow back green and full of life. I'm grateful that it's not a reminder of some zen circle of life, but of the resurrection to eternal life that one day will come for all those whose faith is in Jesus Christ.

I'm thankful that Obama won the election. Hear me out. I supported Romney once he won the nomination, but he was not my first choice and I was never fully confident or satisfied with him. He was gentlemanly and presidential, but he wasn't bright enough or tough enough to get in the trenches and hold BHO's feet to the fire over Benghazi or anything else. He may have been good for the economy, but if he wouldn't stand up to BHO in a debate, how do we know he would have stood up to anybody in a crisis? Maybe that's not fair, but here's what I think:

If Romney would have won, Obama would have left Washington and never been held accountable for anything. It would always have been Bush's fault. He would have lost because of racism. The liberal media would have whined for the next four years about Republicans stealing the election. The problem is we've come to the point in America where the anti-Christian blame America first crowd has tipped the scales. The anti-God party in power is determined to lead this country to a position where just like the ancient Jews in the Book of Judges, "Every man did what was right in his own eyes." (Judges 21:25).

I believe that is where we are in America today. When the Jews of old turned their backs on God He sent an oppressor who made things so bad that it finally drove the people to their knees. I was reminded of this in our devotions last night before we put Ethan to bed. Ethan is sharp in his four year old way. Last night he prayed, "Jesus, rescue us from Obama."

I wrote before that God won't have to do anything to judge America. If we reelect BHO we'll bring the judgment on ourselves. There are some people who, of course, will never wake up from their blind worship of this false messiah, but there are others who, when they don't get the cell phones they were promised, when they can no longer afford to buy gas or pay rent, when so many people get on food stamps and prices go so high that they can't even buy food with the stamps, may finally get the picture. Then, when God has humbled the nation and driven us to our knees, maybe people will cry out to God for help, and maybe He will have mercy and restore America to its former greatness.

There is no way of knowing for sure what God's short term intentions for the country are. We know from the Bible His long term plan, and it may be that we are closer to the long term plan being fulfilled than we realize. In the meantime all we can do is "occupy till He comes," be faithful in our own lives and witness, oppose ungodliness and stand up for righteousness, and try to win as many people as we can to Christ while there is time.

And don't worry about Obama's legacy. The conservative movement, even though it is struggling to gain traction with RINO and establishment Republicans, is not dead. Benghazi is not going away. The next four years for Obama is going to be one coverup after another to hide the truth of his disastrous and traitorous leadership. His legacy is going to be the worst economy, the worst foreign policy, and the least transparent and the most corrupt administration in American history.

I am thankful for the privilege of being born an American, to have served in the Armed Forces, to have lived and breathed free. And I am grateful for the freedom in my heart that comes from knowing Christ as my Savior. I hope you know Him too.

Happy Thanksgiving.