Christ Animated

Friends old Friends new Blend gold and blue Weave beautiful threads from hearts to heads Lead to old and new insteads

I am ____ alone. I am ____ afraid. I am ____ distressed. I am ____ despairing.  I am ____ loved. I am ____ safe. I am ____ at peace. I am ____ hopeful. The only thing I must choose is which word to place in the blanks Not or  Truly. (C) B. Campbell 08.26.20

The power company meter reader nodded at the teenager seated on the carport door steps then stepped around to the back of the brick house. He paused at the gate of the backyard fence and studied the two canines enclosed therein with the meter he needed to check. Going back to the carport, he asked the boy, "Do your dogs bite?" The boy looked surprised and answered, "No." So the meter man let himself into the backyard, checked the meter and ran back out, slamming the gate behind him as the barking furry duo snipped at his heels. Annoyed, he called to the teen, "I thought you said your dogs don't bite!" "They don't," he said. "Those aren't my dogs." It wasn't even his house. It was mine, and my friend Tony was waiting for me to get home one summer afternoon in the mid-1980s. My dogs didn't bother anyone, but they liked to make noise at people they didn't know. Any cat that came in the fence was fair game, however. ...

I’m very happy to report that I have had some sleep this week. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always feel like it. It’s really hard for me to fall asleep when I want or need to do just that. I’ve had this problem for as long as I can recall. Last night I said something at dinner about being very tired and needing to go to bed as soon as I had my work done. My daughter asked, “Can you turn off your brain so you can fall asleep?” “No,” I said. “But I’m going to try to not interact and just watch and listen to the videos, music and conversations that will continue in my head until I pass out.” The constant flow of such mental media comes unfiltered from only God knows where — surely an amalgamation of things I picked up on throughout the day without realizing it, things I’ve read, videos I’ve watched, conversations I’ve overheard or participated in, random memories and whatever extraterrestrial implant I may have between the folds in my gray matter — and continues absolutely non-stop. When I’m...

For some reason this morning, I could easily picture myself standing in line during elementary school, all of us with our backs toward cubby holes of instruments and music books, facing the classroom of chairs and the teacher’s desk at the far end. The lucky few were handed tiny metal triangles or kazoos to add creative clinks and buzzes to the ensuing cacophany. The rest of us had to sing. The joy of music class lasted less than an hour at a time, and I don’t think it was even once per week. Maybe it was. But at least we learned some great songs. We learned songs about the struggles of a tiny spider just trying to make it up a gutter downspout during the pouring rain; or about a twinkling little star that we wondered what it was … um, it was a star. Then we sang about the possible joys of adulthood in learning that our beloved had left us while we slept, only to love another. Having stolen my only sunshine, she would live to “regret it all some day.” Charming. But the s...

Kellye is the untiring leader of the weekly children's messages on Sunday mornings at our church. Others help occasionally, but this elementary school teacher is the main one, I guess you'd say. Just about every Sunday, whether it's Kellye or another leader, the children say things that I find hilarious, even if not everyone else does. This morning's topic was thanking God for our country, since it's the weekend prior to Independence Day. Kellye: I love birthdays, don't you? Kids: Yes!!!! Kellye: What do you put on a birthday cake? Kid A: Ice cream! Kellye: Well, yes, but what else do you put on a cake? Kid B: Candles! Kellye: That's right. See the fireworks on the screen? Those are like America's candles. Kid C: Wha---? Kellye: Is that sky in the picture bright or dark? Kids: Dark! Kellye: So where is the light coming from? Kids: From the fireworks! Kellye: As followers of Jesus, where does our light come from? Kid A...

Today as we waited in a checkout line in Walmart, along with quite a few other people, a middle-aged man barged through the lines with his buggy (that's a shopping cart for any non-Southerners) to a previously-unopened register while a manager opened the register and began to check him out while another manager stood nearby. He yelled at the managers and told them he wasn't going to do their job for them by checking himself out at the self-check registers and that he was busy and had places to be! He just wanted to get his stuff and check out and go! I'm sorry … don't the rest of us waiting patiently in line want to do that also? No one knew who the guy was. He was not “important” except in his own mind. I don't know how self-centered you have to be to act like the entire world is there simply for you and to make you happy, but this guy lived there. Except he wasn't. Happy, that is. He was angry, stressed and … well, a jerk. A little girl around a...