It’s Independence Day weekend in America. It’s iced tea and watermelon time. It’s fireworks and firecracker time. It’s time for sparklers and sweet tea. It’s time for lemonade and lightening bugs and bandstands with bunting. It’s a good weekend for long talks in lawn chairs on porches and under shade trees. It’s time for strolling […]
Lost and Confused
Lois’ homeplace is just a few miles from the vast Daniel Boone National Forest. Even for young, healthy, able-bodied hikers and climbers it can be a dangerous place. Last week a man hiking a path that I have hiked before was attacked and nearly killed by a Black Bear in the Red River George. In […]
Danger on Route 2
Route 2 is one of Michigan’s most scenic highways. It runs west of St. Ignace in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula along the north shore of Lake Michigan. The scenery is broken periodically when the stunning, vast blue of the great freshwater ocean bursts into view south of the highway. Travis Brown would be 24 this summer, […]
Learning from John McPhee and Sebastian Junger
Last night as evening fell, I found myself in the country enjoying a mellow and comely summer evening. I aimed my chair toward a far-away tree line in the west and read under a huge walnut tree while Lois took photos of our new grand-niece, Bailey Hope. Her big brothers, Riley and Wyatt (do these […]
One of My Favorite Sounds
In May of this year we invited Tom Harmon to speak to the men of our church on a Saturday morning. We started early and served the men coffee and a light breakfast by the fireside before the sessions began. I prayed for a good turn-out. When I stepped out of my study and turned […]
Sinkhole Syndrome
Donald Whitney’s writing is always fresh, practical, simple, profound, and biblical. He has posted a helpful article called “The Sinkhole Syndrome” here. It’s worth taking three or four minutes to read. It might keep you out of deep, deep trouble. Since 2005, Don Whitney has been Associate Professor of Biblical Spirituality at The Southern Baptist […]