The Hits Just Keep On Coming!

I want to take this opportunity to thank all of those who have been praying for me. The Lord has been working through my circumstances in so many ways, time will not permit me to describe them at this juncture.

Additionally, I was attempting to have a date night with my wife last Friday night when I tripped over a curb in an unlit portion of a mall parking lot. I fell, managing to dislocate my left shoulder and damage the rotator cuff in the process. My orthopedist outlined a plan of action today that we both hope will allow me to avoid surgery. Pleas pray that this plan will be successful.

In the meantime, life goes on. I am becoming a little more proficient at typing with one hand, God has been blessing our church in a wonderful way and I am closer to my wife than I have ever been.

Also, my latest article is up at Baptist Press Sports. I invite you to check it out and let me know what you think.

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A Special Blessing

I appreciate the prayers and e-mails I have been receiving from so many of you. It is a wonderful encouragement and I am thankful to say I have seen much improvement in my health. I am still not back to 100% yet, but I am a lot closer than I was.

This song has been a special source of encouragement to me over the past few weeks. I want to share it with you and hopfully it will bless you as it has me.

Where I’ve Been

I hope all of you had a very merry Christmas and are enjoying this gift of a new year that God has so graciously given us.

I wanted to share with you what has been happening in my life over the past couple of weeks. I do not do this for pity or sympathy, but first of all to say that God is good, and secondly to  ask for your prayers.

On Christmas Eve, as my wife and I were preparing to attend a candlelight service at her parent’s church in Palatka, FL, my lungs suddenly began to fill rapidly with blood and fluid. I couldn’t get my breath and experienced a severe attack of anxiety. This lasted for about ten minutes and then it cleared up as quickly as it started. It is the opinion of doctors that I suffered a pulmonary embolism or blood clot.

During the medical followup, I was found to have an infection in my lower right leg (of unknown origin) that was causing my leg to swell to over twice its normal size. Additionally, my blood pressure was sky-high requiring me to go on medication.

After a battery of tests, bloodwork and x-rays, it seems that I don’t have any more clots (praise the Lord). Antibiotics and rest have helped my leg tremendously. We are still trying to get the blood pressure meds balanced out. Anyone who has ever gone through that knows how it makes you feel.

So this is why I haven’t been around the old blog block the last few days, it certainly isn’t because I haven’t been interested in seeing what my friends had to say, I just haven’t had the energy. Please keep me in your prayers that I will be able to get around again soon like I want.

During these days I have found much for which to be thankful. The gift of life itself has become so much more precious, I don’t think I have ever appreciated a Christmas more than this last one. The outpouring of love from my physical and church family has been amazing, I am truly blessed. Most of all, I thank God for my wife who has taken so much better care of me than any nurse would. Amy, I love you a bunch.

God bless.

Family Reunion

   Yesterday, I had the chance to attend a family reunion from my mom’s side of the family. We all went back to Franklin Baptist Church which has been in existence for well over a hundred years in the little farming community that is named after my family.

   We had a delicious meal after which we honored the oldest man in the family, Ausmus Betts. Several stood and told stories and said nice things about him. He is a very down-to-earth type of fellow, and was really touched by it.

   After a while, as usually happens, some of the “old-timers” start telling tales about the early history of the family. One in particular came to light that I thought I would share with you.

   During the Civil War or, as some of the older ones called it, “The War of Northern Aggression”, our family was living in the low country of South Carolina. Sherman had just finished razing Georgia in his infamous “March to the Sea” and decided to turn his attention to South Carolina. It was his intention to severely punish the state who had been the first to secede from the Union.

   Aunt Pet, one of my ancestors, and her family lived in the area between Savannah and Charleston. Being poor farmers, they had very little, but Aunt Pet had a pet pig of which she was very fond. When they received word that Yankee foragers were approaching she told the children to go tie the pig to a tree in the swamp behind their house.

   After a while, a platoon of Union soldiers came up to the house. Upon the sergeant’s orders, a couple of men went into the house to search for food. After a moment, the men came back and told their sergeants, “Sarge, there’s nothing here, these people are just as poor as we are. Let’s just leave them alone.”

   Just as they were preparing to leave, something agitated the pig and he let out a loud squeal. The soldiers went into the swamp, found Aunt Pet’s pig, killed it and ate it.

   During the family business meeting, we voted unanimously to continue the family grudge against the Yankees for another year.

Busy

The last few days have been a non-stop parade of fellowships, committee meetings, funerals, classes, church services and other activities. They have left me with little time for writing and the few times I have had a moment, the old noodle just wasn’t percolating.

I’ll be back.

We Survived

We had a great time on our campout and didn’t get eaten. I’m a little pressed for time today, so I will try to post a full write-up about it later. I’ll just say that it was a very relaxing and profitable time.

God is such a wonderful Creator.

Favorite Things About Fall

   As I sat watching my son practice soccer last evening, I noticed a cool edge in the weather. It immediately caused me to perk up, fall is in the air!

   Fall is my favorite season. There are so many things about it that I love: cooler weather, football, hunting, bonfires, Thanksgiving…so many things.

   So what do you like about Fall? Or, if you prefer another season, please share with us why.

   God bless and have a great weekend.

Is This Happening Too Fast?

   I don’t claim to be an expert in economics. Wall Street has always been a somewhat fuzzy image for me. I tend to think of it as I would, say…Camelot or Atlantis. You know, places that sound really cool and magnificent, yet are somehow not on the route of my destiny.

   All the same, I tried to pay attention in school during economics and civics class. One thing I learned is that a free-market economy is the best system for growing and managing the wealth of nations. Free enterprise stimulates growth, allows someone with little or nothing to work hard and prosper and it also provides a money machine that is self-correcting.

   I also paid attention in history class. I learned that once government gets involved in something, it seldom, if ever gets uninvolved. Occasionally this is a good thing, but more often than not it leads to unnecessary restrictions, and somehow, less money in the pockets of taxpayers.

   This leads me to my title question, is this happening too fast? You’ve probably figured out that I’m talking about the proposed financial bailout. I’ve heard many pundits say with sad resignation, “Something must be done.” All eyes seem to turn to Washington where opinions are like armpits–everybody has two and under close scrutiny both of them smell funny.

   Honestly, I’m still playing catch-up on this issue, but I get the idea that perhaps Congress is as well. As I peruse this situation, however, there are some thoughts that keep emerging from the fog.

   First, this situation can be traced to one problem: greed. It is nothing but greed that caused some to abuse the opportunities of the free-market system. As my brother recently said in a conversation we were having about this topic, no system will be better than the people who are in it. What we are seeing is not a failure of the system, it is a failure of human character.

   Second, I hate to see the government get involved. While it has been somewhat refreshing to see the bi-partisan effort at helping Americans out of this mess, we are looking at scenario where the government is about to buy a $700,000,000,000 slice of the American economic pie. Anybody who pays that much for something is going to feel obligated to keep it. I can’t help but feel that this is going to bring us much closer to the brink of socialism.

   Is the banking business the only one to be this close to imploding? What about health care? What about energy? What about insurance? The problems of the banking sector will doubtless cause ripples that touch these other industries. If they begin to cave, will the government attempt to nationalize them as well? I can’t help but feel that this bailout may be establishing a dangerous precedent.

   Again, I’m no expert. These are just questions that I have about this situation. Maybe I’m wrong–I certainly hope I am.

   I do know one thing, I’m glad I know the God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills. He owns the hills, also. As a country boy, I can’t help but think that He owns the ‘taters in the hill, too.

Lakefront Property

Tropical Storm Fay payed us a visit this weekend dumping a grand total of 21.5 inches of rain in a 36 hour period. In addition, we had about 4-5 hours of tropical storm-force winds and our lights were out for about 20 hours.

Given all of this and the fact that I live at the low end of my neighborhood, I can now say that I live on lakefront property…for a while, anyway.

Thankfully, it’s not in the house.

Ya’ Think?

I couldn’t believe this news headline:

Experts Say Gasoline Is Overpriced

 

It appears that only when Congress hears from “Experts” do they get the message.

Speaking of which, someone once broke down the word “expert” for me. “Ex” is “has-been”, “spurt” is “a squirt under pressure.”