Independence Day
It was during a homeschool history session this Fall that my children and I talked about the American Revolution. We tacked up on our timeline that’s situated with a long string of yarn on the wall, alongside and in succession of the Vikings first visit to North America, Jamestown and Plymouth Rock, etc., our cardstock colored pencil cutout that represented the signing of the Declaration of Independence with colorful pushpins. We read several stories and supplements but as a mother and their homeschool teacher something struck me that I hadn't really thought about before.
I’m old enough to have watch the film strips in school. I had text books too. What I saw as a child was simply “history”. Those random people, strangely dressed ghosts without passion or personality plastered in my social studies books, tacked to the wall in classrooms very much like our timeline for our homeschool curriculum were distant figures for me growing up. What struck me is that these people were just like people now; full of life and all the choices that come with it.
For once it occurred to me that the individuals that not only wrote and signed that very special and superbly crafted, eloquently composed document but “little people” who adjusted their whole lives in order to fight for it are nothing short of amazing.
That may strike you as a little sad that I had never really thought of that before. I think as I grew up in public schools maybe other kids grasped completely the patriotism that comes from knowing the story of our country’s roots but I was left until adulthood simply understanding places, times and dates; sometimes names.
It never really occurred to me that they were real people, not far off ungraspable figures of heroism. They had a favorite food. Feelings. Some were morning people, some were not; some had gentle manners and others hot tempers. These people, the colonists that founded and fought for our country in its infanthood were from varying backgrounds and demographics not all unlike today.
A striking difference, though is the choices they had to make. Our country, being so young, was probably full of a people divided. Some people still had relatives in the country we were fighting, not ancestors but fathers, uncles, sisters. I believe some people had to see the great and mighty England and by default chose the side of the established, well-armed and organized foe.
Decisions had to be made, real ones. These were choices to stand up and fight for freedom despite your connections or at times, your family; sometimes against terrible odds.
We have the blessing of hindsight. We see our founders and our young army and all the battles fought and lost and then the war won. At the time that hindsight didn’t exist.
The fact that we are such a great country, and perhaps also the reason why so much of the “moral fiber” of this era seems to be either deteriorating or at times nonexistent, is because it started with choice. Our forefathers chose to stand up for what was right and good and to break away from oppression. We now have the freedom, the science, the relative prosperity as Americans to choose; to decide on the fate of some things that should never be put in our hands.
I’m so grateful to be an American and I am immensely proud to say that a lot of my ancestors were living, breathing and fighting in and for this country long before it was actually a country all its own. That is something sacred. It’s something to protect, defend and stand up for.
I see us in modern society fighting for the dumbest, most meaningless things. We are a perverse generation and we are so very confused.
I have a lot of fight in me. I learned long ago though that there are only somethings that are worth using that fight on.
We have the freedom to choose who we are, what we are in some cases, where we go, how successful we can be, where we work, how we play, what we say. I watch the news, scroll through social media feeds and occasionally read the hatefulness that exists outside my protective little bubble I’ve made for myself.
I know this is starting to sound a bit like rambling but the point I’m trying to make is that we’ve become this defunct society, trampling the very sacred foundation of freedom that this country was built on.
Just because I’m a citizen of a free democracy doesn’t mean I need to dismiss what God has taught us. Our forefathers did not dismiss it. That is part of what makes their actions and decisions so very sacred and special.
You may not be founding a country in your lifetime, and you certainly don’t have the benefit of reading your story in a book as if it has been studied by historians. You do get to live though and you have choices to make. Don’t take that for granted. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Are you going to be part of some downward spiral of our country that starts with the immorality and depravity of this era? Or are you going the choose to fight, for something good, and right? I know I want to be part of the latter.
As we light up our BBQ’s I like to remember that it’s not all about the freedom, it’s very much about the fight.
