This Week’s Thought

Posted on by Horizon Professional Services
Truck

By Brad Campbell –

Just a thought to help start your week.

I knew the old truck had issues.  It is several years old, has many miles on it, and has its own little quirks.  But, it is mine, it is paid for, and it still runs.  Or, at least it did.

Daughter and Hubby had borrowed the truck, and Wife and I went to get it and bring it home, making sure we left their house in broad daylight, just in case.  Well, only three short miles from the kids’ house, with me behind the wheel, it lurched, jerked, and shut off.  I’d made it to top of a hill, then carefully coasted off the side of the road into a mud-hole of a place that seemed to have been waiting just for me and whomever came along.  Quickly I called Wife, who had been not too far ahead of me.  And there on the side of an extremely busy highway curve in afternoon traffic we stood, along with Daughter and jumper cables and her Hubby’s Uncle who had seen us and circled back to lend aid.

We fiddled with this and that, then tried some of that and the other.  We called a friend, who suggested another who called another, and tow truck came to our rescue.  As I am writing this, the incident I’ve just described took place a couple of days ago.  I have more calls to make to tow shop and garage to line up who can do what when.

The Lord, no doubt at all, is always looking out for His children.  I knew truck had its issues, but it hadn’t been causing any great problems.  Daughter had used it a few times for very recent one-way hour-long trips with no problems.  As we left the house that morning to go after the truck, I instinctively turned on our carport light.  We were to be home well before dark, but God knew otherwise and certainly is the reason I flipped on that light switch.

God knew truck was about to pitch a fit, but took care of Daughter and her Hubby so that it ran perfectly for them, and saw to it that I was the one driving it when it quit.  God let me travel only three miles from the kids’ home before the machine stopped.  God orchestrated the straight stretch of mud hole along the side of the road that was plenty wide enough and long enough for all three of our vehicles and the tow truck to get out of traffic.  And God saw to it that the sun was still shining while all this took place just inches from maniacal drivers who were apparently off to the races for the afternoon.

Not sure what comes next for the truck, except that I know Who has His hand on the steering wheel!  And I’m oh so very thankful.  We stood beside that muddy stretch of roadside and laughed about God’s sense of humor and timing in it all.  What a wonderful God we serve.

Is He holding your steering wheel as you drive off into the week ahead?  I’m certainly glad He has a hold on mine!

Just a thought.

This Week’s Thought

Posted on by Horizon Professional Services
Fog

By Brad Campbell –

Just a thought to help start your week.

Very recently, I was driving my car down the highway, literally praying as I went that nothing or no one appeared in front of me.  The fog was so thick I could barely see the lines on the road.  I simply had to trust that I would get where I was going.

From time to time, my wife and I travel by airplane.  I snapped this photo from my window seat on one such flight.  The clouds were so thick in the air surrounding our plane that I was certainly thankful I wasn’t the one having to pilot that very large machine.  It was indeed an eerie scene from inside the plane, but we merely had to trust that the pilots and their equipment would get us safely where we were going.

Do you ever step out of the house on Monday morning, or maybe just get out of the bed on any given morning of the week, and you can’t see the end of the week for the “fog” in your mind?  Your calendar is full.  Your days are chaotic.  Perhaps you have the demands of family, employment, and even church weighing heavily upon you, and you have no idea how you’ll accomplish all you need to accomplish.  You can barely see the proverbial lines beside you or the end of the airplane wing because of the thick cloud of uncertainty, unpleasantries, and perhaps even fear that surround you.  You briefly enter panic mode.

But, you must remember that God is in control!  Have you ever seen one of those bumper stickers that says, “God is my co-pilot?”  Well, that’s a very dangerous statement!  If God is the co-pilot, then it means you are the pilot!  You best switch seats to avoid impending disaster!

Trust the Lord to pilot you, lead you, guide you, carry you, and protect you through the foggy cloudy days of uncertainty in today’s world.  For the Christian, we have a guarantee of arriving safely at our final destination!

Just a thought,

This Week’s Thought

Posted on by Horizon Professional Services
Stool Photo

By Brad Campbell –

Just a thought to help start your week.

Nineteen years.  That’s how long ago I wrote and sent my first emailed weekly thought.  Many of you are instantly amazed that I’ve even had that many thoughts of any kind!  But seriously, at times through the years, I’ve been asked this question – “Do you write out something and then find a picture to go along with it?”  The answer is that no, I do the opposite.  I settle on a picture and then just start typing.

So, as I was scrolling back through hundreds of photos on my phone, I ran across this one.  Granted it’s a stock photo, a screen shot that I took while roaming around the internet a while back.  With the exception of its color, this stool is exactly like one that my mother’s parents had in their home as long as I can remember.  There were fourteen of us grandkids on that side, not to mention the spouses and kids of the older ones.  It was a rare privilege for any one of us to get to sit at the “big table.”  But sometimes, when maybe there were only a handful of us visiting, we would gather ’round that dining table, which I love to tell others now sits in my own home, and the smallest of us would get to sit on the stool.  We might perch up on the top, or when the seat was raised, sit on one of the lower steps.

I don’t know who in the family wound up with that old stool.  I’ve longingly looked at some like it in various antique or junk stores through the years.  But it isn’t even about the stool.  It’s about the memories associated with it.

For that stool, to me, represents times gone by.  It is a symbol of simpler days – maybe not for our parents, but for us as we grew up.  It represents being initiated into the wonderful sit-at-the-big-table crowd, listening to the grownup conversations, even if we didn’t contribute.  It reminds me of the countless meals that were spread upon that table, the cold fried chicken, bacon, and biscuits that we kids would reach up under the tablecloth that had been thrown over it all and sneak some of.  That stool is a reminder of times, places, and people I have loved and held very dear.  I would like to find a stool like it.  I want to sit on that seat again.

I am so very blessed to be a part of a loving, Bible-believing and teaching, church FAMILY.  Granted, I’m the pastor, so I see the gathered crowd from a different angle than most, but I stand in front of those pews, those seats, and I remember the faces of so very many dear Saints of God that have long passed to their eternal reward.  A twinge of sadness arrives for but a very brief moment, but then I’m reminded of those same things the old stool reminds me of – – times, places, and people that I have loved and held very dear.

If you haven’t been to church lately, if you haven’t sat upon an old church pew (or even a newer more comfortable seat that has replaced those pews), if you haven’t been where those who raised us worshiped together themselves, then may I urge you this very week to go looking for your seat?  There’s something about those special seats that bring the world together, remind you of Who and what matters most, and puts everything into perspective again.

Time is precious.  Please take your seat at the table.  Oh what glorious conversations await.

Just a thought.

This Week’s Thought

Posted on by Horizon Professional Services

By Brad Campbell –

Have you ever seen a totem pole?  We would normally associate a totem pole with a Native American location.  We saw several totem poles of varying heights, shapes, and colors on our trip to Alaska this summer.  The two pictures you see here are of the same pole.  I just “zoomed in” for you to be able to see a little more detail.

Contrary to popular belief, the Native Americans did not create the totem poles or use them for religious-type ceremonies or worship.  The totem pole was designed to represent their people, their land, their culture, and the animals around them.  Some poles are naturally much more detailed than others.  Each face on the pole tells a part of the story of the people who created it and placed it there.

As a pastor, I have the opportunity to stand in front of my church family and face them.  I see their faces, and I see their smiles or frowns.  Because I know the people, I can also see their stories.  I see their backgrounds, their hurts and failures, and their happinesses and successes.  Most of all, I see the One Who created each and every one and placed them here.

A totem pole is designed so that as one looks upon it, they will be reminded of their story.  They will be reminded of the places, times, and situations from which they came.  They will be reminded of everything that brought them to the place where they now stand — as a witness to those who will continue to see.

We Christians take our places in the world around us each week, representing the One Who placed us here.  We tell our stories, even if silently, of the places and times and situations from which we come, each and every part of which has made us into the person we are today.  And as we stand together in this world, we form a totem pole, if you will, of a mixture of answered prayers, healed hurts and diseases, cares and love of the Father, and so much more.

Wherever you stand this week, you are being gazed upon.  Some are looking simply at the outside – the dress, the colors, the smile or frown, the hair-do, or even the location where we stand.  But if we stand true long enough, if we stand strong long enough, prayerfully they will begin to see the Creator we represent.  They will see the details in our creation, the work of His hands upon our lives, the many stories we have yet to tell of the goodness and the grace of a loving, forgiving, almighty God who placed us here to be a representative of Him.

Stand strong like the totem pole.  The world is watching — and so is the Creator.

Just a thought.