Traditions

All throughout world history, mankind has been known to practice traditions. Traditions can be a great thing, because they can help people to remember their heritage. They can remind people where they came from, which will lead people to better know who they are. However, there are many instances in history when tradition has not been so beneficial to mankind. 

For a very long time (about 900 A.D. – 1930 A.D.) in China, upper-class Chinese women used to carry out a practice called “foot-binding.” Basically, when a girl was still young, her toes were folded underneath her feet and bound there, then squeezed into very small shoes. A woman’s feet would stay bound that way for the rest of her life. It was very hard for a woman to put pressure on her feet after they were bound, so a woman with bound feet had a really hard time walking, moving around, and really doing any labor that required standing up or moving. It caused a lot of pain for the woman throughout her life, and often a lot of bleeding from her feet. Chinese peasant women didn’t practice feet binding because they had to work standing on their feet with their families to earn a living. Feet-binding was only practiced in families that were wealthy enough to live off of the income of only men. Over time, this tradition largely became a status symbol. If a woman had bound feet, then people knew that there was wealth attached to her name.

X-Ray comparison of a regular foot and a bound foot

As you can observe, there are a lot of pointless elements to this tradition. Nobody really knows how it was started; some people think that women began doing it because it was attractive to men. One legend goes that there was a ballerina who bound her feet to dance in front of the emperor, and many other women began binding their feet because they wanted to be like the ballerina. How the tradition started isn’t really relevant though; the question we should be asking is: why was it continued? Why would Chinese women continue to bind their feet even though it was very painful and restrictive? It may have been a symbol of status, but couldn’t upper-class women just find a different symbol to represent their wealth? The Chinese women were caught in a loop. They continued with foolish traditions only because the generations before them had. They were stuck in a constant state of blindness.

Today in modern American culture, we practice many traditions, and we have many practices that could be recognized as status symbols. A lot of the traditions we have are related to holidays. For example, we light fireworks off on July 4th, we have a feast on Thanksgiving, we give presents on Christmas, we go to stores on Black Friday, we dress up on Halloween, we give valentines on Valentines Day, etc., etc., there are many, many more. Some of these traditions are important to remembering our culture, but some are just really dumb. Take Black Friday, for example. It’s a celebration of material things. People spend hundreds; even thousands of dollars in just one day, all because things are “on sale” or because everybody else is spending their day shopping. It’s embarrassing that we have to have as much law enforcement as we do at the store on Black Friday because people care more about objects than about other people.

Money. Isn’t that what it’s all about in America? Everything we do is for money. It’s like a game: whoever has the most money and can retire the fastest wins the game of life! We have a wide variety of status symbols in our culture. Having a nicer car, or a college degree, or a bigger house shows other people that you are somehow at a higher level than they are, because you have more money than they do. Obviously, poverty is much worse in other parts of the world. But why can’t everybody just treat each other like brothers and sisters? Why do we have to treat other people like lesser beings just because they’re different or because they have less money than us? In my mind, a reputation of integrity is worth more than every paper dollar in America.

What happened to this?

American culture today, though it still possesses significant elements, is foundationally flawed. Therefore, it must be revolutionized. Our traditions do not make us better people. They do not help us to remember our true heritage. Instead, they tear us down and cause us to forget God. True American heritage is Christianity. You can choose to be offended by that statement, but evidence shows that it’s true. I’m not saying that you have to be Christian to be a true American, but I do believe that you have to stand by and live basic Christian principles which are found in ninety-five percent of non-Christian denominations. That is American culture. The Pilgrims sailed the Atlantic Ocean so that they could worship God in the way they believed was right. Our founding fathers called upon God to deliver them from British bondage. They studied and lived by Christian principles and based the systems of our government upon those principles. That is our heritage and the basis of our true culture.

So the question is: why don’t our traditions help us to remember our heritage? Even the traditions that brought people closer to God when they were started are flawed today. For example, Christmas is supposed to be a time to give gifts and show love to other people, and to celebrate what Christ has given to us. Today, we teach the next generation that how much you receive from others is more important than how much you can give. Thanksgiving started out as a day to give thanks to God and to remember all that he has given us, but today it’s just gluttony and NFL worship.

Let us cease to practice foolish traditions of our fathers and instead do things that will help us to remember who we really are and where we came from. That is what traditions should do.

Wake Up America!!!

  Every true American knows that without God, we would be nothing. That may be a very bold statement, but to me, that is the definition of a true American. This nation was founded on principles of Christianity taken straight out of the Bible. The whole reason that the Pilgrims and the Puritans came to America was so that they could worship God. It’s been proven that the number one resource the founders used to create our founding documents, including the Constitution, was the Bible. The very first freedom that is mentioned in the Bill of Rights is the freedom to worship God. There was no way America could have won the Revolutionary War without God, and if you disagree with that statement, you have more studying to do on the Revolutionary War. God’s hand has guided this nation throughout all of our history, and the success that America has had up to this point is proof of that. The role that our nation plays in the world today is proof of that.

            However, I don’t think that very many of us truly realize the entirety of the role that God has played and still does play in American freedom. In Old Testament times, God made a covenant with Israel. It was a national covenant, and it applied to the whole land, not just a certain person. Israel was the Promised Land. The Israelites were God’s chosen people, and God covenanted that He would preserve and prosper them if they would but keep His commandments. The prophets pled and pled with the Israelites all throughout the Bible to keep their side of the covenant. Christ was even sent to the land to bring salvation to all mankind, but in the end, the nation rejected and crucified Him.

America is God's chosen land. This is
the land of the free.

            Today, America carries that covenant. America is the Promised Land, and God has guided it and preserved it because of the faithful people that have turned to Him. The covenant was re-established in America when this nation was being founded and established. This is the land where anyone can worship God in the way that they choose. This is a land of freedom, and freedom has been God’s plan from the beginning. Throughout our history as a nation, we have been faithful to God. However, there have been times in our history when we haven’t kept our side of the covenant.

            In the early/mid nineteenth century, slavery abounded in America. We were denying freedom to groups of God’s children, not only African-Americans, but many religious parties and certain other groups of people. The Constitution didn’t properly protect the freedoms of everyone, because the Bill of Rights didn’t give the Federal Government enough power to properly protect everyone’s freedoms. Action had to be taken to stop this, or God would send his punishments upon the nation.

            Unfortunately, the nation did not decide to change, and the punishments were sent. A very bloody Civil War happened, and so many people suffered. That’s when the nation finally decided to turn to God. Abraham Lincoln went through a conversion process and kept the nation together by turning it to God. By instituting the thirteenth and fourteenth amendments, Lincoln abolished slavery in America and gave the Federal Government the power that it needed to keep freedom in America.

            This nation is in a covenant with God. That covenant still exists today, and we are breaking our side. We are becoming lazy and reliant, and we are putting other Gods before the God who delivered this nation so many times. Our freedoms are being taken away daily, and many of us are doing nothing to stop it. Unless we change quickly, punishment will come upon this nation, and freedom will have to be restored manually. It’s our choice: we can turn to God as a nation, or we will have to endure His wrath.

Most Americans in this country today would agree that they are free, but they are ignorant because they do not see that they are being more and more tightly wrapped in the chains of bondage as each day passes. It is the job of every educated American to wake America up to our awful situation. Join me. Let us wake up America!