Learning by Example

by   August 16, 2026 with No Comments

By Ashlie Miller

Summer may be for leisure, but this summer I did a lot of learning in the form of a small teacher – my elementary-aged daughter. It was a summer of indirectly teaching and inspiring others by just being herself.

The first observation came at the end of a vacation Bible school (VBS). As a homeschooler, she has learned to express gratitude to other teachers leading various events and learning opportunities. During a VBS at a friend’s church, she wanted to make a thank-you for volunteers who led her group. Her friend caught the excitement, and together they managed to get all the children in their group to sign a card the two of them made. Shared gratitude is a thing of beauty.

Later in the summer, she attended a week-long Christian camp that encourages memorizing several Bible verses, ready to recite on the first day of camp. They are rewarded with fun prizes and points for their teams. Needless to say, it can spur a little bit of competition for those who choose to participate. Last year, she became both the youngest and the first camper that week to complete the challenge. This year, we learned that other young girls were inspired by her determination to try, and they, too, worked hard over the summer to complete their challenges.

Even her use of idle time became fruitful inspiration. While at camp, she learned to make a simple craft using yarn and pony beads. They made so many fun creations, and upon returning home, her first request was for more supplies to make them. She spent an entire waking day making numerous creatures that she later shared with friends at the park. One of those friends had just moved back to the area, her home still filled with many unpacked boxes. Her mother sent me a text later that day with photos of beaded yarn creatures she had made after scouring the moving boxes for her craft supplies.

Nothing she has done has really been extraordinary. They are just things that have been noticed. They have been noticed because of in-person relationships, conversations, and presence. She is not worried about a social media image or branding herself. She is inspiring simply by sharing good things with people she already knows.

What are people learning from me as I live and share my life with them in person? I wonder if I have ever told those friends who have indirectly taught me just how they have impacted my thoughts and behaviors, the way I express gratitude, or even challenged me towards being artistic or productive with my idle time. Today may be a good day to let a friend know just how they have impacted you and your way of living and enjoying life.

Skunks and Missionaries

by   August 15, 2026 with No Comments

By Doug Creamer

Skunks and Missionaries

            We were out late the other evening, but we had our dinner planned and quickly worked to get it on the table once we got home. I got the grill hot while my wife got the chicken ready. The chicken was cooking nicely while I was leaning up against the door jamb at the garage. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a little face a few inches from my leg. An animal was sitting under a plant, but I couldn’t really see it very well. I said, “Hello baby, how are you?” My voice scared the little critter. I thought it was a cat. I looked closer and decided the head was too small to be a cat. I briefly thought it was a possum looking for a nice place to sleep in the garage.          

            I realized it was a wild animal and I needed to be careful. I quickly stepped into the garage and slammed the door. It was at the moment that I wondered if the critter might be a skunk. There have been skunks in our neighborhood recently. That thought sent me running for a flashlight. When I got back and eased the door open I got a little whiff of the air. The critter left a little scent behind for me to enjoy…it was just a little puff…a skunk sent.

            I had dinner on the grill that needed attention but I didn’t want to get a skunk shower! He must have wandered away when I went to get the flashlight. The trouble is it left me hyped up. I didn’t relax until I was safely inside with our food. It took a little bit to quiet down.

            I want to ask God why He created skunks. I guess that goes for mosquitos, ticks, flies, mice, and a whole bunch of other critters. Some are meant for food for other animals but who would want to eat a skunk? I am sure that there is a purpose for all God’s creatures. It’s a lot like us. God has a purpose for each one of us. We weren’t made by accident. He created us with things for each one of us to do. Our job is to figure that out and to fulfill our purpose.

            I had lunch with a missionary the other day. He shared about life on the front lines and what his family was doing in order to share the gospel. It was interesting to listen to the daily challenges they face and how his team has to operate in the country. I asked my missionary friend about his dreams and ways he could expand his efforts in reaching out to the people. I was excited by his ideas and hopes.

            My friend will soon be returning to the missionary field and the work that God has called him to do there. I was thinking about our conversation on the way home. Each of us has a calling on our lives. We may not be called to the missionary field or to be a pastor, but we have a calling to do what God created us to do.

            Think about it. Would you like to attend your church if no one bothered to cut the grass? Would you like to use a dirty bathroom? What would happen if no one paid the church bills? It would be quite uncomfortable in our church buildings without heat and air conditioning. I have visited a church where no one greeted or welcomed me. I did not return. Imagine the chaos if we didn’t have elders or deacons in our churches. Can you imagine Sunday school without teachers? Every job makes a difference in our churches and no job is unimportant. God expects us to step up and do our part in making His church work. From the cleaners to the elders, we are all needed.

            I want to encourage you to consider what you are doing to help at your church. Every person is important to fulfilling the mission your church has been assigned in your community. Missionaries and evangelists help to win the lost, but once people are saved, they need pastors and teachers to help them grow and find their place in the body of Christ. From members of the choir to those who work with the children, God needs us all. Have you thanked those who quietly work behind the scenes to pay the bills and do the cleaning? Have you discovered your gifts and talents and found a way you can make a difference at your church? If God has a purpose for skunks, He has a purpose for you, too!   

Contact Doug Creamer at PO Box 777, Faith, NC 28041or doug@dougcreamer.com

My Modest Library

by   August 14, 2026 with No Comments

By Roger Barbee

As a life-long reader I was interested in a recent article in a major, national newspaper that focused on how nine contemporary authors arranged some of their bookshelves. I looked at the photographs and read some of the text. But I became disinterested because I had never even heard of any of the writers much less read any of their books. I pasted a copy of the article to my four sons and two never responded and the other two laughed at (with?) me. So, I placed all the communication about the article in my trash folder and forgot about it until this morning.

My modest library holds a vast range of books that are arranged by topic. The religion shelves hold books by Thomas Merton, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Elaine Pagels, C.S. Lewis, and other examiners of our spiritual selves. The western section is loaded with Wallace Stegner with many other lovers of that land such as Terry Tempest Williams. The shelves dedicated for Black studies have books by Gloria Naylor, Langston Hughes. Ernest Gaines, and other writers who are brave enough to investigate race in America. The four-tiered lawyer’s bookcase holds prized first editions and some are signed such as the treasured  copy of W.S. Merwin’s last book, Garden Time. Next to that collection is a closed cabinet with English writers. Some loved first editions of Thomas Hardy’s poetry sit on the top shelf beside a modest collection of J. L. Carr. There is shelf space for nature books and political ones and biographies. It is a small, personal library, but I am pleased with it and continue to add to its growth.

So what’s the rub concerning those nine writers and their libraries?

While I did enjoy reading some of their explanations for how a  particular shelf was arranged it still rankled me that I had never heard of any of them, so I went to Google and read of their successes and awards. It should be an humbling experience not to recognize the name of a best-selling author, but I felt none of that. In fact, I felt no negative sense for not ever having heard of any of the nine. I began to wonder if I am illiterate concerning current, popular authors. Am I a snob in by reading choices?

None of us,  I suspect, want to be illiterate about anything and never to be accused of snobbery. But what does this self-examination of my reading choices say about me? Discerning. That fits! We all are given gifts by our Maker and discernment is one of those gifts. So, while I may not know of or have read any of the nine authors in the article, that fact says nothing about them and their writing, but it reveals that I am a discerning reader who unlike other readers does not choose to “try anything” to read. But then,  there is still the chance that sometime in the future I will pick up a book by one of them and bring it home, read it, and find it one to keep and place it on a shelf in my modest library.

Home Creek Historical Farm

by   August 13, 2026 with No Comments

By David Freeze

Horne Creek Living Historical Farm Site

   On October 17, 1987, the Horne Creek Living Historical Farm was officially designated as a State Historic Site. On Friday, July 24th, Booper and I headed north to visit the farm and next-door Pilot Mountain State Park.

    In 1900, there were 224,637 farms in NC, and 87% of people farmed. Today, less than 2% of North Carolinians farm. Concerns over the loss of our agricultural heritage led to the creation of the Horne Creek Living Historical Farm.

    Construction on the centerpiece farmhouse was begun by Thomas Hauser in 1875 or 1876, just [prior to his marriage to Charlotte Kreeger. The house is two-story, with a center hall and is built of logs, then covered by clapboarding (wooden weatherboards). The couple originally lived in the rear of the house as newlyweds, then added on the front of the house as the family grew. The house had four fireplaces, and the foundation of the house was available stone. The house was first painted around the turn of the century, when the exterior was remodeled with shutters, factory porch posts and banisters and connected the wellhouse to the structure. All this gave the house a more Victorian look. While there, my granddaughter retrieved a bucket of water from the 50 feet deep indoor well, all with the help of Historic Site Manager Lisa Turney. Turney made sure to tell Booper about the work duties the one small girl in the family had.

     Over two generations, 24 children lived in the house and most of them were born in it. Thomas and Charlotte had 12 of those kids, all but one were boys. The family congregated in the parents’ bedroom for conversations about the day, their work, school and their community.  

    Several generations of Hauser family farmed the land from 1830 until 1953. The family owned the land until it was sold in 1970 to become part of the Yadkin River Section of Pilot Mountain State Park. In its heyday, the Hauser farm like most of their neighbors depended on crops which had long been grown in the Piedmont—corn, wheat, oats, sorghum and flax. They also raised hogs, sheep, cattle and fowl as important food sources. They eventually added tobacco. The farm increased in size to 450 acres by 1900.

     The Hauser children and descendants provided information about the family and farm life. A wonderful quote came from Jeff Hauser. He said, “There’s ways of doing things if you have to. People talk about hard times now, they ought to go back a few times (generations). I mean you can do without a whole lot. If I had to, I could survive on a tenth of what I live on. And live good too. If you think about it, we were practically self-supporting. Of course we had to buy salt, coffee and sugar. And lamp oil. Those are the four main ingredients we had to have. With them, we ate like kings.”

     Martha Hauser Moser said, “I remember when we made eighteen pies. We had a pie shelf-I mean a pie bench. We made that many on a weekend and every one’d be gone.”

    The farm has a visitor center, a tobacco curing barn, sorghum mill, tobacco packhouse, cannery site, icehouse site, fruit house, smokehouse, dry house (for dehydrating foods like apples), chicken lot, wood lot, woodshed, outhouse, a double crib barn, cemetery and plenty of animals.

    The house is furnished in period style and is fascinating. At one time, four adults and up to 12 kids lived in the house, although some of the older boys left the farm as adults.

     Another family, the Sawyers, owned part of the land that now forms the historic site. The Sawyers were Black and although neither them nor the Hausers were famous for any reason, both families were representative of thousands of other families across the state at the turn of the 20th century. They were common people who left an uncommonly rich legacy for our state. Plans call for recreating at least part of the Sawyer homesite in the future.

     Also on the property is the Southern Heritage Apple Orchard, established in 1997 and dedicated to preserving old apple varieties. More than 850 trees planted preserve 425 different southern apple varieties which were on the brink of extinction. Two trees are planted for each variety, one a free-standing semi-dwarf tree up to 12 feet tall and the other is a dwarf tree. The dwarf trees are about six feet and are on a supporting wire system called “espalier.”

    The Horne Creek Historical Farm is a “Don’t Miss” in my opinion! We saw it in the drizzle and light rain and had the special benefit of having Historic Site Manager Lisa Turney as the tour guide. I missed it on the day about two years ago when I explored Pilot Mountain because the farm is closed, just like most NC Historic Sites, on Sunday and Monday. The biggest day of the year at Horne Creek is set for October 17th with the 33rd Annual Cornshucking Frolic event.

    The land around the farm is protected by the state park acreage, so modern development cannot encroach on it. The farm is less than seven miles from U.S. 52 and nearby towns of Pilot Mountain and King are within 25 miles of the farm. Just over 70 minutes’ drive from Salisbury, combine the farm and the state park for a spectacular and low-cost day of fun!

Gotta’ Run: Horne Creek Living Historical Farm Site

Garden of Grace

by   August 12, 2026 with No Comments

By Lynna Clark

A gardening rule I’ve come to appreciate is this: When combining plants in a large container always use a thriller, a filler, and a spiller. The thriller is the plant that stands tall and gives presence. The filler is usually understated and fills in the gaps. The spiller flows gracefully over the sides adding beauty. Here’s a little example from my porch. What I really love about this combination is that it was all free. The tall bromeliad was a gift from my sister a few years back. It bloomed a giant red blossom and I hear it’s still got the potential to bloom. Right now, I’m not so sure. It seems to be content with just standing tall in the background.

The middle plants with the dark purple and gray stripes are Wandering Jew. My friend Ann broke off a few sprigs of that and I kept it indoors in a bottle of water over winter. Now it fills in the gaps nicely.

The bright chartreuse vine in the front is a sweet potato plant which also lived on my windowsill over winter. Together in the beautiful pot my daughters gave me, the combination is kinda pretty, especially for no money spent. Don’t you love making something out of nothing?

Some of us are still waiting to bloom. A lot of us are just glorified weeds. Some feel completely unnecessary. But the lovely blue pot wouldn’t be nearly as attractive if any of the parts were missing. I think it’s the combination of different strengths and weaknesses that makes the prettiest bunch.

Whether you stand tall, fill in the gaps, or spill over gloriously showing off God’s goodness, you are a beautiful part of the garden of grace.

“How strange a body would be if it had only one part! Yes, there are many parts, but only one body. The eye can never say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you.’ The head can’t say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you.’ In fact, some parts of the body that seem weakest and least important are actually the most necessary.”

-1Corinthians12:19-22

Shepherd’s Sticks

by   August 9, 2026 with No Comments

By Ashlie Miller

Many children (and some adults) gravitate towards collecting something, particularly things found outdoors. Our cabinet of curiosities is a veritable natural history museum, housing glass containers with various seeds, nuts, feathers, butterfly wings, snake skins, old nests, and seashells. Small tubes hold sharks’ teeth or tiny gemstones sifted from buckets of dirt. There are books with pressed leaves. Then, there in the corner are the current favorite walking sticks. Each of my children has gravitated towards certain textures or specific finds, but my youngest, whose name happens to be Shepherd, loves a good walking stick. How appropriate. This love was magnified when his grandpa found a small shepherd’s crook on a mountainside and gave it to him.

Sticks are humble extensions of something grand, often victims of a storm or a rotting tree, and then released to a forest floor. While that sounds like the end of a story, the more observant and thoughtful admirers of nature see great potential.

A sturdy walking stick provides support when we are weak. On an unpaved road, knee scooters will not serve you very well. And while one can acquire telescoping aluminum poles for two-handed use on a hike, a long walking stick can still provide great assistance. On a steep hill, a stick may keep you from falling and help you steady your steps. It may even serve to help someone else by pulling them up from behind you – an extra-long arm, if you will.

Sticks are good for clearing, poking, and stoking. Clear a path ahead to avoid thorns and briars. Poke the stick down into the ground to determine whether the covered terrain is unsteady or stable. Help a fire continue to provide warmth and light by stoking it to provide more fuel and oxygen. When things are just out of reach, a good stick will knock it into place, out of the way, or sometimes get into the right position to be grasped by a hand.

Others see even more grandeur in a humble stick, envisioning clever art to whittle into the head or staff of a rod. Why have a simple walking stick when you can have a conversation piece?

It reminds me of the shepherd’s staff in Psalm 23: “Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.” A rod and staff in the hand of a good shepherd is not merely a weapon or a tool of discipline, although guidance for dumb animals like sheep is a necessity to keep them safe. The staff gives support and help to needy creatures. It may clear out danger ahead or provide a sense of stability when crossing uneven terrain. Perhaps a fallen sheep can be scooped up by the crook of the staff and comforted by a warm fire tended to by his loving shepherd.

I have a Good Shepherd who serves me daily through His Holy Spirit and His Word. These helps are more than just a crutch, though those poor in spirit enough to recognize their weakness and need are indeed blessed (see the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5 in the Bible). They are my constant comforts and companions.

Do you have a good walking stick?

Anniversary

by   August 8, 2026 with No Comments

By Doug Creamer

Anniversary

            We all celebrate anniversaries of various types. The most common we think about is a wedding anniversary. We celebrate the anniversary of our annual trip around the sun, which we refer to as our birthday. We recently celebrated the 250th anniversary of our country on July 4th. Our country commemorates the anniversaries of D-Day and Pearl Harbor day.

            The anniversary that I have been thinking about for the past week is the anniversary of my Dad’s passing, which was August the 4th of last year. It’s hard to believe that a year slipped by so quickly. I have been thinking about the events that led up to his passing and what I was doing.

            There were a couple of occasions soon after his passing that I picked up my phone to call him. It is a strange feeling to realize that someone important in your life is no longer there. My Dad read my columns and in his younger years he was confrontational about the content. In his later years, I looked forward to his email responses because he offered more positive feedback and his questions led to more open-ended discussions.

            I find it interesting how often I think about my Dad. Unpleasant memories have softened with time. I find myself savoring the good memories. One thing I have done numerous times is wonder what Dad was doing when he was my age. Then I would think about what age I was when he was my current age. I would try to remember what was going on in my life. It is strange how our minds work.

            Some say time heals all wounds. When we lose loved ones I am learning that time doesn’t heal those wounds. Certainly, the day-to-day feelings can ease with time, but there are still unexpected moments when we remember and feel the loss. An odd one came this year around Father’s Day. I was walking through one store and they had a display in the middle of the aisle with Father’s Day gifts, which really didn’t bother me. But they had put some cards on the display and there was a perfect card sitting front and center. My Dad loved to golf and this card was one of the best golfing Father’s Day cards I have ever seen. The emotions that stirred caught me off guard.

            So anniversaries come as reminders of both wonderful things that we celebrate and sometimes painful things that we don’t want to remember. One anniversary that we all seem to enjoy celebrating each year is the coming of our Lord…Christmas. Sometime in the next two months retailers will begin stocking things to celebrate Christmas. I’m not ready for that! We also remember the anniversary of our Lord’s crucifixion on Good Friday and celebrate His resurrection on Easter Sunday. Many churches celebrate and remember the arrival of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost Sunday.

            We celebrate our birthdays, but do you remember your spiritual birthday? Our spiritual birthday is the day we accepted Jesus as our savior. I have fond memories of the day I accepted Jesus as my savior, but I do not know the date. It was summer and I was young. I remember the church and the circumstances and can see it all in my mind. It was a special day that I enjoy reflecting on from my past.

            Our minds can work for us in both positive and negative ways. We can remember bad things that happened in our lives, moments we wish never happened. Those kinds of memories I wish would fade for all of us. We can also remember the good things, especially the spiritually good moments in our lives. Maybe we went to a conference, heard a special speaker, enjoyed some beautiful music, or had a special moment with the Lord. These are things we should reflect on, memories we should ponder and enjoy. Moments we grew or made changes in our lives are important to celebrate and remember.

            I want to encourage you to spend a few moments reflecting back on your spiritual life. Remember your growth. Remember your victories. Remember making it through the hard times. Remember the revelations. Remember the verses that are special to you. Remember your rebirth and baptism. God wants you to celebrate these anniversaries…these moments when you overcame and found victories. Why? There are still challenges ahead for all of us and we need to remember how God came through for us in the past to see ourselves overcoming our current circumstances. Remember how He came through for you in the past, He will come through for you again…trust Him!

Contact Doug Creamer at PO Box 777, Faith, NC 28041or doug@dougcreamer.com

Here is a picture of my Dad…..

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