<![CDATA[holidays]]>

Never Let Them Steal Your Joy

December 2, 2022 by Jerry Wilson Leave a Comment

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I’ve long been fond of the saying, “When the house is on fire, the first priority shouldn’t be arguing over who struck the match.” This goes a long way toward explaining why I have yet to make it very far in politics, my present position at this website notwithstanding. Should a situation arise requiring attention, give it the necessary attention. Even as there is seldom time to do something right yet always time to do it over, there is invariably time afterward to analyze how things went wrong. Fix it first.

This is especially true when it comes to people, be it yourself or someone else. The broken heart does not need a lecture on actions and consequences. A man or woman duped and dumped has, in most all cases save where they have been sufficiently gaslit by their former, a firm grasp on what went down. They’ve learned the lesson. They need friends providing comfort and love, friends who they, in turn, will comfort and love when things go sour in their lives.

These things are never more true than during the holidays when the amplified silence of voices no longer present screams even louder than we do during the 950^th time today we’re being subjected to Wham or Mariah Carey. Oftentimes the silence is the loved one who’s moved on from this life to eternity, hopefully with Christ. However, there are times when the absent one or ones are quite alive and dwelling on this planet, the separation being one of love at best unreturned and usually openly rejected.

Fellowship is vital in such seasons. We are called to simultaneously carry our cross and carry one another’s burdens. Christians make terrible lone wolves. Broken hearts need some time alone, but they also need time with others to be reminded they are never alone. Our hearts need reassurance that love, when offered, is not always rebuffed.

We who are believers know Jesus loves us. Still, there are times in most believer’s lives when we wonder if He stepped out for a smoke break when, in anguish, we’re angrily crying out to Him and the only discernible answer is the still, small voice saying, “Leave a number and We’ll get back to you.” In our head, we’re aware this isn’t the case. But, when your heart is hurting, theologically accurate logic does not always rule the roost.

Hopefully, prayerfully, the broken heart will find solace in the Savior. There are no quick fixes, no robots available to provide companionship when what once was is no more. There is also no room for platitudes or use for the relationship edition of what James called out regarding feeding the poor, in which one wishes the lonely well before they dash off to their own little lives built on little happy nests of husbands and wives. It’s not that the relationship-rooted are incapable of helping the lonely dancer, but genuine sensitivity is mandatory.

Remember, happiness is joy’s flighty cousin, prone to appearing and disappearing at a moment’s notice. The world will try to steal your joy, be it through the forcible reminders throughout this season that you’re supposed to be tripping the light fantastic when in reality you can’t so much as get the tree lights untangled, or through the insinuation that if your life isn’t an in-person Hallmark Christmas movie, there is something seriously wrong with you. As David wrote, weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning. Celebrate Christ’s birth without apology or compromise. Give and take comfort in one another. We have the honor of helping each other. Seize the opportunity.

I put together this week’s Cephas Hour with the above in mind, selecting songs that speak to heart and soul. You can listen at the link below. Also, please note the artist’s names each contain a link to their website or page. Please, if the songs bless you, actively thank the artists by buying a download or CD. Thanks.

Progressives Try to Ruin Thanksgiving Because Everyone Should Be as Miserable as They Are

November 23, 2022 by Jeff Charles Leave a Comment

I’m often fond of pointing out how progressives ruin everything. They have ruined comedy, movies, our institutions, and pretty much everything else they get their hands on. Thanksgiving is no different. This year, leftists are continuing a tradition called “Truthsgiving” that they invented a few years ago as part of their anti-Thanksgiving movement.

Axios reported:

“Thankstaking,” the Native American-influenced alternative to Thanksgiving, has become more noticeable in the U.S. amid a racial reckoning.
Why it matters: Indigenous tribes in recent years have been asserting their sovereignty around water rights, criminal justice and political representation. Thanksgiving, where Indigenous people are the center of a national myth, is also a target.

“Indigenous activists, scholars and artists are using the hashtag #thankstaking in November to bring attention to land theft, removal and the exclusion of Native American history in schools,” according to the report.

The movement’s website explains that “Truthsgiving is an ideology that must be enacted through truth telling and mutual aid to discourage colonized ideas about the thanksgiving mythology – not a name switch so we can keep doing the same thing.”

It further notes that the “holiday” is “about telling and doing the truth” so that “we can stop dangerous stereotypes and whitewashed history from continuing to harm Indigenous lands and Peoples, as well as Black, Latinx, Asian-Americans and all oppressed folks.”

Truthsgiving is one of several ways people have pushed anti-Thanksgiving sentiments since the 1970s, when they established the National Day of Mourning. “Native Americans say the Thanksgiving myth glosses over the decades of horrific violence imposed on Indigenous tribes after a three-day feast between Pilgrims and the Wampanoags,” according to Axios.

Thanksgiving was originally established to celebrate the three-day feast between the pilgrims and Wampanoags that took place in 1621. President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed the holiday during the Civil War to “heal the wounds of the nation.”

But some have found the modern-day commemoration to be offensive with its depictions of Native Americans. Axios pointed out that “[s]chools introduced the Thanksgiving story to children without discussing the violence that followed, and often encouraged students to make cut-out, paper Indigenous headdresses.”

“Thanksgiving is nothing but government propaganda,” said Crystal Echo Hawk, founder and executive director of the Indigenous advocacy group IllumiNative.

Almost nobody denies the atrocities that were inflicted on Native Americans hundreds of years ago. These acts continued for centuries after the first Europeans discovered America. It is also not inappropriate to discuss this history and how it figured into the nation’s history.

However, it is also not wrong to celebrate a holiday that has come to mean so much to the American people. Most view it as a time to reconnect with friends and family and to focus on that for which they are grateful.

What the Truthsgiving folks fail to realize is that people can acknowledge both. Contrary to what they seem to imply, there are plenty of times in which people can focus on America’s history – the good, the bad, and the ugly. To suggest that we should do away with one of its most cherished traditions is absurd and unnecessary. But, as I said at the beginning, progressives ruin everything, which is why most do not take them seriously.