As a kid perhaps you learned a poem which begins with the words, “In fourteen hundred ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” It commemorates the year Christopher Columbus reached the shores of America.
Born in Italy in 1451, Christopher Columbus became a sailor in his teens and actually survived a shipwreck. In his day Europeans understood the world was round, but the Pacific Ocean was still unknown. Thus map makers and sailors believed that by crossing the Atlantic Ocean they could reach the Far East. Columbus dreamed of reaching the riches of the East Indies. Although he believed the earth was round, he had no idea about how big the planet actually is. That discovery would happen a few years later when Ferdinand Magellan and his sailors crossed the Pacific Ocean and then his navigator, Juan Sebastian, finished the first circumnavigation around the world.
Columbus landed in the new world (actually the Bahamas) on October 12, 1492. Many believed him to be the first European to explore the Americans. However, today we know the Vikings established colonies in Newfoundland as early as the 10th century. In 1493, Columbus returned to Spain, the country that sponsored his trip. He claimed to have reached mainland China and brought back gold, spices and Indian captives. Later he made several more Atlantic crossings before his death in 1506.
Columbus Day is a federal holiday commemorating the landing of Christopher Columbus in the Americas and all federal offices are closed. However, not all states grant it as a day off from work. Originally observed on October 12, today it’s observed on the second Monday of October. The first Columbus Day celebration took place in New York in 1792, to commemorate the 300th anniversary. The Columbus Obelisk in Baltimore was erected in that year. A hundred years later, President Benjamin Harrison issued a proclamation to mark the 400th anniversary of Columbus’ voyage. But it was not until 1937 that Columbus Day became an official national holiday under President Franklin Roosevelt.
Although this holiday has been celebrated for many years in the United States, as well as other countries of the Americas, some controversy exists. In recent decades, there has been a growing movement to cancel Columbus Day and replace it with Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Native Americans and other groups have protested the celebration claiming the invasion of Europeans resulted in the colonization of the Americas, genocide and the slave trade. Plus Columbus was not the first to discover America.
Like Columbus, Christians around the world are looking for a new world. As the apostle Peter wrote centuries ago in 2 Peter 3:13, “we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.” Jesus has promised each of us a new home. He said, “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” John 14:1-3
So as this nation celebrates Columbus Day, keep in mind that the best is yet to come—a new earth that will never fade away—a new home where no tear will be shed and there will be no more death. Let’s celebrate Columbus Day with a focus on heaven and an earth made new.
