Happy Birthday to our Jimmy!

Today. It's Friday. Yay! It's also April 29, 2016, the day before we celebrate the birthday of our middle son, Jimmy. He will be 48. Every day Jimmy deals with many different health issues along with a severe bi-polar condition. His quality of life is not always the best. I'm sure many of his hopes and dreams have given way to making it one day at a time. In the same breath, look at the photo, and it's very easy to see that he has many blessings to be thankful for. We do our best to help where we can. Happy Birthday Son and may God provide is our prayer. Amen. Love, mom and dad

Yesterday I shared some about my dad on the day observed as his birth date. Today, I want to mention my mom's dad, my grandfather, or Paw Paw Mac, as he was known to us. Today would have been his 116th birthday. When dad left the scene in January of 1954, we moved to a little bitty rural town in Louisiana where my granddad became the father figure in my life. He was a hard working, simple, sincere, and devoted man to his God and his family. He went to his reward at age 71 but he left behind a legacy of faith and integrity. His word was his bond. He did have his quirks, his blind spots, and he was not perfect. However, he did lay out before me and so many others the example of what it means to be a faithful steward of the life God had given to him. There's no doubt that I am alive today because of my dad. At the same time, if I have been able to somehow and in someway have a testimony for the Lord, then, I know that Paw Paw Mac had something to do with it. I do thank God for his life and his influence on me and so many others. Amen.

It has been pointed out to us time and time again that our family seems to revolve around celebrations of birthdays and anniversaries. That would be correct. Were I to remove these recognitions, along with odes to Community Coffee, from my daily blogs, there wouldn't be a lot of 'there' there. Don't misunderstand me. I'm not talking about substance, just volume of keystrokes. It has been an interesting and busy week for me. When it works like this, I can assure you, I have no problem sleeping at night. Okay. Full disclosure requires that I make it clear that I typically have no problem sleeping anyway, but, add some minimum amount of fatigue, and it makes it even more so. My wife might argue if that would be possible as she noted one early recent morning that she thought that I may not have moved all night. I wasn't unhappy with her analysis. Just thankful. I recently talked with a young man who has a terrible time sleeping at night. They have purchased a special mattress hoping it will help. They had checked out one of those with the fancy controls but it would have cost several thousand. I asked why he thought he couldn't sleep. He wasn't sure. I do know he is not alone. They tell us it is like an epidemic in our culture today. Maybe too much electronic media. Maybe too much stress. Maybe not enough chicken feather pillows. That last one was my contribution. This tells us all that if we are blessed to be able to get up and go each day and then able to lay down and rest each night, well, that is something we should thank God for. Okay. I'm done. What? You thought I had finished a while back but I kept going anyway? Good read. Enjoy your Saturday. Take care to meet up with other like-minded believers to worship and hear from God on His Day, Sunday. Then, join me for another round of 'who knows what' come next Monday. May God bless. Amen. ....More later.