We are Survivors this Thanksgiving

What a year this has been.

I first heard the term COVID in January – some far off distant disease that was puzzling the medical experts of China. For the briefest moment I believed it might stay there. Then there was the outbreak in Washington state, and I knew, I just knew it was a matter of time before it would affect my life too.

I don’t remember where my boys were, but I was alone enough in my living room to hold out my hands and pray through my tears, surrendering my family to God. 

Lord Jesus, please. Whatever happens, spare my family. 

And He gave me peace we’d all be standing when this was over. 

I know it sounds dramatic, but to someone who has spent some serious time in self-reflection these last several months, realizing that I’ve probably held some kind of illness-related anxiety my entire adult life, this assurance is the only thing that has kept me moving forward.

Nothing changed in the immediate. Our world kept spinning, moving, us doing all the normal things. And then in March everything stopped, and everything changed, and here we are celebrating a very different kind of Thanksgiving.

One that probably resembles the first more than any other I’ve lived. 

The Pilgrims that landed at Plymouth in 1620, weary and malnourished, would lose half of their company to illness within two to three months time. They only harvested in abundance that fall because of the kindness of an Indian who taught those who remained how to survive a new normal in their New World.

When Governor Bradford invited local Indians to a Thanksgiving feast, I imagine they met with less gaiety than I’ve pictured before, and more somber gratitude that they were still standing, bellies filled, houses snug. I picture them holding grief and sadness for all they’d lost, in equal measure with determination, knowing the difficulty of the winter that lay ahead.

It was survivors who gathered that first Thanksgiving, and survivors who celebrate today.

We have collectively lost so much this year – some of us more than others. Nothing is what it was, and yet here we are, hearts beating and lungs breathing to the sunrise of another day, holding equal parts grief and sadness for all we’ve lost, with determination for all we still have left to survive this coming winter. 

Today our family is celebrating Thanksgiving in quarantine just the five of us. After months of anxiety and isolation we caught COVID and by God’s grace we are still here, just like He promised me we would be. I come to this year’s Thanksgiving table limping, weary, and worn. Mourning all that we’ve lost and with profound gratitude for all that we still have. 

God is still in control. 

He still holds my future and my family in His hands. 

He still walks beside me each and every day. 

He is still enough – no matter what the days and weeks ahead will bring. 

And I will still bless Him.

I know this Thanksgiving is not what we hoped it would be.

I know we are all desperate for the normal we lost, but I am praying that we do not miss the gift of opportunity that is before us. The chance to grow our faith against all hope in “the God who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did” (Romans 4:17) – and to learn to really trust Him.