"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life." —John Lennon

Meaning? Purpose? Many of us may have struggled with defining our purpose. Let me share a personal story about my search for purpose.

Grandpa Smith lived out from Harrisburg, Arkansas on Possum Hollow Road. He was born in 1888 and like many, many men of that era, did not have much formal education. However, there was no doubting his intelligence as his wit was very quick and sharp as a razor.

Have you ever used a rock tumbler? You put rocks in a barrel along with different grades of sand, from coarse to fine. The coarse sand chips away the corners of the rocks to make them into a common shape, whereas the fine sand polishes the rocks with a shiny surface.

Have you ever lost someone dear to you and it feels like there is a hole inside your heart? The disciples probably had an overwhelming feeling of grief after Jesus died and they buried his body. The Gospel of Mark describes a gruesome and hopeless scene of the disciples seeing the place where they laid the body of their innocent Messiah (15:47).

Sue sits on the last pew – right on the aisle. She wandered into our midst from some run-down rental property, looking as if she were in need – of some basic hygiene instruction, perhaps of some medical care, perhaps even a case worker.

The little town in which I grew up, Kensett, had about nine hundred people when I was born. Today, Kensett and the much larger town of Searcy share a common border. However, their respective city limits used to lie two or three miles apart.

Growing up in a small town in Central Illinois we were blessed to enjoy the presence of a Carnegie Library. At one time the town of DeLand was the smallest community in the country that was awarded such a prize.

Our family likes to watch a show that is on the History Channel, "Forged in Fire." It is a competition between four blacksmiths to make knives out of various metals. Sometimes the metals are dirty or not pure.

Just breathe! Did you pause? Sigh? Take a deep breath? Often, we have to make a conscious choice to rest and reflect. Let’s take a few moments to reflect on preserving God moments.

Love. It’s a word, right? It’s an interesting word, and we seem to use it all the time, but what is it?

Indulge me as I tell a story. There once was a man, and he loved cars. He particularly loved roadsters. They were his passion. But there wasn't anyone else around who had the passion for roadsters that this man had.

Friday is Groundhog's Day. If it is cloudy when a groundhog emerges from its burrow, then the spring will arrive early. If it's sunny, the groundhog will see its shadow and retreat back into its den, and winter will continue for six more weeks. The groundhog mistakes its own shadow for something real. What is reality?

There was a little boy in a village in northern Ghana, West Africa. He was wearing the only piece of clothing he owned, a scruffy pair of cotton underwear. They were dirty, at least the part that remained of them was dirty.

“The lightning struck a Transformer.” Those were the words I heard my dad say to my mom as the power went out. We didn’t often have storms where I grew up, and even when we did, they were short-lived and mild. But not this one.

I need to preface this article by stating that the title, "Beauty, the Invisible Embrace," is not original with me. The book by that title was written by John O'Donahue, an Irish poet, author, priest, and philosopher.

Grandma Shelton was raised near the tiny White County town of Sidon. Across the hills to the east was the settlement of Clay where my Grandfather Shelton grew up. Grandma once said the only thing she used to know about “that Shelton bunch” was that they “drank and made music.”

On a recent Sunday afternoon, from my vantage in Sue's sofa in her joyously-festooned den, I reveled in the comforting rise and fall of familiar women's voices. I admired golfing Santas frozen in mid-swing on her mantel.

Take a few minutes and go on YouTube and listen to the song “Mary Did You know”. The second verse ends with the last two lines,

Did you know

that your Baby Boy has walked where angels trod?

When you kiss your little Baby you kissed the face of God?

The man in the eighteen-wheeler pulled into the parking area of my dad’s restaurant. He had gotten into the habit of parking his big rig there over the weekends. Dad went out and asked him to move his truck, explaining that his customers needed the area for parking.