Hugh Odneal
Jefferson City
Dear Editor:
Thanksgiving is a wonderful time of the year. For the pilgrims, it was looking back at how they had been blessed in the past. Some, perhaps most, will ask how they had been blessed or even if they were blessed. If we look at it one way they had most of their possessions, some had lost members of their families, most had been sick and yet they were thankful. To look at it another way, they were free to live and worship as God had instructed. They had left behind the oppression of a government that forbids this. They also came as missionaries for God.
Even before stepping ashore, they drew up an agreement, the Mayflower Compact, for how they could live and prosper. They treated each other as equals in unity, they even treated a native equal in a court of law against their own. They considered each other as God does, as described in the Bible in Galatians 3:28. This is what our country was founded on, but yes, they compromised with slavery. See that is the problem when we read into the Bible what we want it to say instead of reading out what God says.
This is also the problem with most opinions and agenda they leave God out completely or relegate Him to a position of debate. Joshua said in Joshua 24:15, and I agree, "But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD." Also Acts 5:9 and Acts 11:1-18. In John 14:6 "Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."
So this day, I choose to be thankful for the freedom to worship in a country that has protected this freedom and men and women have died protecting this for all Americans and even going to other countries to help them have the same freedoms. Thirty days from Thanksgiving I and fellow Christians will celebrate the birth of our Savior and then, God willing, 82 days from then we will celebrate the victory of our Savior, Jesus Christ, over sin and death. Yes, we in America have much to the thankful for and it is easy to be distracted by the evil of the world.