In other words, the patriot-citizenry was growing numb to the cause.  George Washington's Continental Army was not winning, and the people were dispirited.  The troops were wintering without shoes and provisions.  It had become known as the Winter of the Red Snow.  And civilian support was waning.  Thomas Paine wrote that when the going gets tough, the tough get going.  He discouraged fair weather fans:  "The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country,"

And he recognized that freedom is not free:  "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value."

Finally, Paine raises the comparison of the Revolution with Heaven:  "Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods."

A Christian Crisis
​I have no doubt that a quick, capsulized version of the Gospel numbs and disenfranchises the public.  This world, our society, has become fair weather fans of God, reducing Him to Sunday morning, too busy to involve Him in their Sunday or Wednesday evenings, spreading Him thin by focusing on themselves during vain and ignorant worship, stressing the importance of the feelings on the surface and not understanding that:

• He deserves to be esteemed in good and bad times.  But God is not the Revolution.  Whereas fair weather fans only support their teams when they are winning, many people only seek God when they are challenged by tragedy or illness.  In Matthew 6, Jesus begins to give the prescription for anxiety and worry:  He tells people that worry about things like food and clothing.  He says, "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you."  Seek first:  that means seek His kingdom and His righteousness before you are tempted to worry about hardships; seek Him in fair weather if you want Him to help you through the storm.
• Freedom in Christ is not free; quite the opposite, it is costly, not only taking the life of Christ, but requiring our lives, as well.  It is a heavy and expensive investment, requiring more from us than a prayer of faith, more than the act of baptism - requiring instead submission to God's will, an investment of our lives, and sharp focus on Heaven.  John 3:16f:  “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.  For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

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1 Peter 3:18:  "For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit."

Matthew 10:34-37:  “Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.  For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.  He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.  He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it."

Conclusion
"​Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods."  Do you?  The price tag on Heaven - you might say, the price tag on your salvation, for they are in the same - is more than any of us can ever pay.  Perhaps you skated past the Gospel a long time ago and quickly set it aside.  Perhaps someone said it would be easy, that you could simply ask Jesus into your heart and He'll be there forever, but if our dedication is not there, if we do not continuously submit to His will, and obey His word, reaching out to Him always, then we may have misunderstood what He tells His disciples in Matthew 16:24-27, "“If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.  For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.  For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?  For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and will then repay every man according to his deeds.

The second session with Professor Taylor went quite well.  That is to say that it went well even when our scholar's computer shut down unexpectedly and we were left with Mr. Hoggatt to keep the ship afloat. I'm happy to report that the ship didn't take on water at all.  I was very pleased with my ability to fill the time with meaningful content until he was able to reboot everything and rejoin the meeting.

Participants came up with more and more questions for the second and third sessions, but I was still prepared with a few of my own to keep things moving and meaningful.  They aren't all related to one another directly, but for the third session, we were dealing with "the rest" of colonial history, so I didn't expect it to be as organized or concise as previous sessions.  Here are my questions:

​One of the goals and challenges of the question/answer sessions is to keep things as chronological as possible and remain focused on the history at hand rather than using a shotgun approach.  I've had to manage this with a little planning of my own, but with spontaneity as well.  When participants in the seminar have their own questions, I need to be able to sort them out on the fly and discern whether to ask them immediately or postpone them for a day or two.  For someone who doesn't enjoy virtual meetings (or talking on the telephone, or ordering in a drive-through), this poses a bit of a challenge.  Still, I think I did a decent job of keeping things moving.  I've seen these things drag on with a lot of dead time and ums and uhs from the presenters, but we were able to maintain momentum throughout.  I suppose I should be pleased with that.

Here are the prepared questions I used in yesterday's Q&A with Dr. Taylor:

• There is a monument to Samuel de Champlain in Ticonderoga, New York.  On it, Champlain is named by many titles:  soldier, mariner, explorer, mapmaker, artist, writer, naturalist, humanist (friend of Algonquin), visionary, and leader.
• By this account, Champlain sounds pretty incredible.  Is this an example of whitewashed and therefore romanticized history?  Talk to us about the real Samuel de Champlain.  What about this is true and what is possibly embellished?
• ​Was alcohol as detrimental to the indigenous peoples as is often stereotypically characterized?  Did it affect some groups more than others?
• Were they using the King James Version of the Bible in Jamestown while the Puritans were still using the Geneva Bible?  How might the religious differences alone affect contrasting lifestyles in Jamestowne and Plimouth?  Whereas people in England were predominantly Anglican/Protestant, was there conflict caused by the differences in people’s religion now that they were an ocean removed?
• Once again, we have to constantly acknowledge that history is ugly.  Would you point to a particular event as the ugliest portion of colonial history in the Americas?
• Are there questions you would like to have been asked that apply to this session?​

This week, I am facilitating my first national teacher seminar for the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History in New York City.  Yesterday, I was charged with moderating a one-hour question/answer session with two-time Pulitzer Prize recipient Dr. Alan Taylor, author of multiple books on American history, including the recommended American Colonies:  The Settling of North America.

​Needless to say, this was an intimidating task.  The expectation was that I could hold my own in a virtual presentation with nearly 90 participants from across the United States - a group mostly consisting of middle, junior high, and high school history instructors, with just a few elementary teachers peppered in.  While the participants were invited to ask their own questions during the session, only a handful were asked, so in that event, I had prepared some questions to fill the hour:

The highlight of a ride on the Dollywood Express is the thought of being pulled along by a very capable engine.  This is no miniature, amusement park atrocity; it is a genuine coal-powered steam engine, built and commissioned originally for use in Europe during the Second World War.
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There is no outlaw holdup during the short ride.  There is no comedy script to entertain guests.  Dollywood simply relies on the nostalgia and the relaxation of a guest to entertain.

I enjoy a bit of nostalgia.  I don't just mean history.  I mean I like to look at old items and imagine life the way it was in what some like to call the good ol' days.  I think we all know those days were no better than the present. Whether we're looking at revisionist history or some kind of romanticized version of it, we ought to recognize both that we have it better in many ways than those folks in the past AND that advancements occur at an alarming rate.

Dolly Parton's childhood is said to have been quite a bit different from her life today, and yet there are parts of us that would love to return to that period of time in the 1940s and 50s.  In many ways those were simpler times, but obviously, they were also harder times.

What we really grope for might be the better morals, or perhaps a time when less publicity was granted to the offended and the offensive.  Maybe we're looking for a time when the media was more credible or when people weren't afraid of hard labor.

All of that comes in a display of Dolly Parton's childhood house at Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.  The too-small log cabin in the park is a re-creation of the real one which still stands in its original location.  The contents here are reported to be mostly original "family treasures".  Imagine the bustle of this tiny building with Dolly and her 10 brothers and sisters running about. 

​Still want to go back to a "simpler" time?

That fits, since the anchor attraction in the area is an extreme, wooden, launched rollercoaster named Lightning Rod.  If you're familiar with Outlaw Run at Silver Dollar City, you may see similarities with this ride. s with this ride.

​The restraint system is familiar, with shoulder guards holding passengers in on the inversions and turns and including ankle restraints.  Lightning Rod is probably the most extreme ride I have experienced.  Not far into the ride, on this ride - one of the fastest wooden coasters in the world - I was ready for it to be over.  No such luck since this is also a relatively long ride.  Thankfully, it was one of the last coasters we would ride on that day.

This was a day of rides with the kids for us, but my favorite thing to do in a theme park is appreciate the theme. This area had oil cans and, outside of a little drive-you-own-car attraction, there was even a used car lot.  It's all effective in immersing guests with the theme.

This bumblebee was fun to watch while waiting for other members of our family to get concessions at Dollywood.  It was captivating to watch it flutter from bloom to bloom, shoving its face deep within each flower and then back out to visit another and another.  Sometimes we are too busy looking for the next rollercoaster, and we miss an opportunity to appreciate the little things that prove the intricate design of nature.

When we visited Silver Dollar City, last week, I couldn't help but be distracted by some of the music being played:  Ghostbusters, Rick Astley, Michael Jackson, and Mission:  Impossible.  Plainly stated, there is no excuse for that.  While Dollywood can get away with putting a chalk artist with a wreath of flowers in her hair on the sidewalk, this doesn't fit on the streets of SDC.  With a little creativity, the theme at SDC could be easily kept.

About the chalk artist, by the way, without the family, I would have taken more time to watch her work.  I appreciated the talent of reproducing these masterpieces, and I would have liked to have observing the talent in progress.  I wonder, now, at how it might feel to work so hard on a piece of art only to have it ruined when the rains come.

While we're on the subject, I would have likes to have spent more time seeing some of the other artisans at work - the glass blowers, the blacksmith, and the like, as well as the musicians and shows.