Your Spiritual Devotionals

Poems and Stories

Contributors Jerry E. McGaffney Larry Kennon Patrick Carmichael

Reflecting on the Beauty of God’s Creation

“My House in the Trees”

By Jerry E. McGaffney First Presbyterian Church, Covington My house is full of sun and moonlightGod drapes my windows with trees.

And each and every season brings New beauty and new color to the leaves.

In Spring, the green is gentle— A pale and fragile look, In Summer, the green is lush and dark As it hovers over the brook.

In the Fall, the leaves start dropping, And I think the leaves are sad To lose their “coat” and don the look Of Winter’s naked clad.

In the Winter, the pines show their glory— They stay “forever green” And decorate the days of Christmas With a holy, beautiful screen.

My house forever is a change of color, And Nature makes it known, I am happy in my “House in the Trees”, They make for a beautiful home.

“Instead He Comes…..”

Rev. Larry Kennon First Presbyterian Church of Covington What have we done this year? We have strewn Our world with the litter of our greed and indifference: Our hillsides bristle with junk remnants of our waste: Under our urban clouds we cough and weep: The fish in our seas die, the bees on flowers are fewer, and people Go hungry, and each breath we take finds another dead Somewhere from lack of food or addictions too strong to control.

Then, too, we have outdated wars in places like Afghanistan or Syria or Iraq, And the leftover violence from Ferguson to New York to Jerusalem Which we can't seem to forget or throw away.

Why doesn't He do something? He could come....

We know He could land in a crimson storm And set our chromosomes straight .and our lives .

Then, O then, we would pick up our trash and trash our greed.

We would give more of ourselves, we would say kind things To Obama and Boehner, to Biden and McConnell, And we would collect our arms and weapons And rocket them all to the Sea of Tranquility, And would reinvent an abiding love and a new sensitivity Toward all creation, to really feel The fear of the panic stricken victim of war by Isis terrorists The hunger of the hungry child in Burundi The sickness of the AIDS patient in Africa.

We would worship with bands and instruments of all kinds And unfurl our factory made banners to wave furiously......victoriously.....

If only He would come like THAT...

Instead He comes Under shepherd's stars...a Babe....His tiny fists clamped shut that will bleed for us.

THE U IN JESUS Before U were thought of or time had begun, God stuck U in the name of His Son..

And each time U pray, you'll see it's true, You can't spell out JesUs and not include U. You're a pretty big part of His wonderful name, For U, He was born; that's why He came.

And His great love for U is the reason He died.

It even takes U to spell crUcified..

Isn't it thrilling and splendidly grand He rose from the dead, with U in His plan?

The stones split away, the gold trUmpet blew, And this word resUrrection is spelled with a U. When JesUs left earth at His Upward ascension, He felt there was one thing He just had to mention.

"Go into the world and tell them it's true That I love them all - Just like I love U." So many great people are spelled with a U, Don't they have a right to know JesUs too?

It all depends now on what U will do, He'd like them to know, But it all starts with U. So Will U pass this on …

“When Jesus died on the cross he was thinking of you!”

Will you stand up for Him. Submitted by Patrick Carmichael First Presbyterian Church of Covington, GA

Anonymus

Treasures from the Heart , (A Christmas Memory)

By Larry Kennon First Presbyterian Church of Covington

Behind my father’s drugstore in Memphis, Tennessee, there was a public dump.

We kids loved to “check it out”, hunting among the castaways for whatever might be interesting or valuable. Sometimes we would take our BB guns and shoot rats among the rubble. Then, there were the “dump people”…people we watched who would scavenge these public garbage disposals, looking for food or whatever valuables they might use among themselves or pawn for money.

One woman, in particular, I remember. She was usually there with a dirty laundry bag and a boy-child of two or three years hanging onto her skirts. We kids called here “the lady of the dumps” because of her constant presence there on the dumpsite. We assumed she found shelter nearby but were never sure where she lived.

One day near Christmas, I was riding my bicycle delivering packages and prescriptions for the drugstore. I was twelve years old and wanted to make some Christmas money, and my Dad let me run delivery services for his customers.

On that Saturday afternoon in December, I saw a crowd of people at the corner of the street where people waited for the local bus. There were accusing voices and angry shouts. I moved closer and saw the woman from the dumps on the bench, her coat opened up, holding the little boy to her breast to let him nurse. “Such indecency”, someone shouted. “That kid’s too old for that”. Another voice rang out, ”Somebody get her off the street. White trash anyhow”. The woman never said a word, never pulled the nursing child away, but there was great torment in her face.

As the commotion increased, the local cop intervened, and after listening to the accusations, he took the woman roughly by the arm. “You’re under arrest”, he said, for being a public nuisance and exposing yourself.” He ushered her away…with the child still at her breast.

I ran to tell my Dad what had happened, how pitiful it had all been, how alone she seemed, how helpless I felt. “We’ll see about it later”, he said. After dinner that night, my father looked at me: “Want to take a ride?” I didn’t ask questions, but jumped and ran to the car.

We drove directly to the jail. My dad talked to the jailer and we went inside. The Memphis jail was a rude and inhospitable place. Each cell had an iron cot,but no real mattress, a toilet with no seat. The only light was over the door away from the cells. The room was cold and damp and smelled of disinfectant. Moving closer to the shadows, our eyes adjusted ro see the woman in the folds of the dark, holding the child in her arms. She would not look at us.

My father looked stricken by the sight and walked briskly to the woman. Very gently, he helped her to her feet, and assured her:”It’s all right now. I’ll take you home.” Outside, the night was still. We drove through the empty streets with the colored lights, greenery, and ribbons on the power poles, toward the public dump. My father chatted about the weather, the cold December night, but nothing personal. When he reached the dump, he helped the woman and the child out of the car. “Good night”, he said, as she quickly walked away,” and be careful where you feed the child”. She never looked back and quickly disappeared. We drove home in silence.

Two days before Christmas, my father called me to the backdoor of the drugstore. Someone had left a paper bag on the doorsill. My father said: “I think this is for you.” Inside the bag, there was a neatly folded handkerchief, a Boy Scout knife with a broken blade, and one bicycle handlebar with a stringy tassel.

There was also an unsigned, soiled Christmas card with a picture of the three wise men. The verse inside read: “We come to Christmas in HOPE’.

I asked my Dad, “Is this from the lady of the dumps?”, as we examined the contents of the paper bag. My Dad nodded, sighed, and bit the corners of his lips.

“Yes, son, these are real treasures from the dump…..her Christmas gift to you”.

I’ve never received a more meaningful gift or greeting. I’ve wondered whatever became of the child, and where the woman was. This cryptic message of life and hope haunts me in my memory at this blessed season. Treasure from the dump?

Treasures from the heart. Like my father sometimes did, I bite the corner of my lip and remember a poverty stricken woman with a baby at her breast. Some Christmas greeting it was…Believe it, we DO come to Christmas by hope.