I got down the North Carolina map and looked up Siler City. There it lay in the center of the state, about an hour’s drive from the conference center where I would be spending three days. I knew then that I would be taking an afternoon and driving to Siler City to find Aunt Bee.

Frances Bavier had played the aunt to Andy Taylor and son Opie in the 60s sitcom “The Andy Griffith Show.” Over the years, along with much of America, I loved the program more in reruns than when it was fresh. By the late 1980s we were living in Charlotte and I learned that Miss Bavier, perhaps in her 80s by now, had retired to Siler City. I might not be able to actually meet her, but one never knows about these things, and I surely would not if I did not try.

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As a second-grader, newly relocated with our family from the rural South to the coal fields of West Virginia, I felt vulnerable and misplaced. When the children laughed at my backwoods accent, I shut up. On the playground, when the students chose sides for games, being the smallest boy in the class meant I was picked last. When the prettiest girl in the class could never remember my name, I was hopelessly sunk.

I am well acquainted with feelings of inferiority. I know intimately the sense that everyone else is better, stronger, bigger, and smarter. Inferiority complexes are killers–destroyers of hope and joy and vision, striking victims with a paralysis preventing them from taking any kind of action.

That’s why I was surprised to learn that churches have them.

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Recently I heard a church choir offer a hymn of praise to Satan. I’m satisfied they did not know what they were doing, and would not have done so had they thought about it.

As the C-Span cameras focused on the flag-draped coffin containing the body of former President Ronald Reagan in the Capitol Rotunda, the other C-Span outlet replayed the 1973 funeral of former President Lyndon Johnson. We beheld mourners gathering inside a Washington, D.C., church to pay their respects with tributes, a sermon, and several hymns. Then, as the pallbearers ushered the casket from the sanctuary, the choir sang:

A mighty fortress is our God

A bulwark never failing;

Our helper He amid the flood

Of mortal ills prevailing.

But still our ancient foe

Doth seek to work us woe,

His craft and power are great,

And armed with cruel hate,

On earth is not his equal.

A-men.

Only one verse, end of hymn, end of service. I sat there stunned, wondering if anyone else noticed what had just occurred. By singing only the first verse of “A Mighty Fortress” the choir had paid tribute to the devil himself–using Martin Luther’s words, admittedly–and had left the matter there, as though nothing more needed to be said.

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Last Wednesday night in Indianapolis, Franklin Graham spoke before a convention hall filled with Southern Baptists and brought us up to date on his parents. His father, the venerable evangelist Dr. Billy Graham, has endured a couple of difficult surgeries lately, lives in pain, and has trouble getting around. But, he’s gradually improving and expects to be preaching soon. Mrs. Graham–the equally outstanding Ruth–spends her days in a wheelchair, no longer able to walk.

Franklin said, “The other day, Daddy hobbled into Mother’s bedroom and said, ‘I feel so bad. I feel like the Lord is ready to take me home.’ Mother said, ‘That must feel wonderful.'” As we laughed, Franklin said, “He won’t get any sympathy from Mother!”

I feel bad enough to die. When I die, I’m going to Heaven. That will be wonderful.

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Seventeen of us sat in the seminary classroom that evening, complaining. It was September of 1972 and our beloved New Orleans Saints were playing in town that Monday night, with the game broadcast on television. As pastors, this would be one of the few games we might be able to attend. Unfortunately, our doctoral colloquium ran to nine o’clock and attendance was mandatory if we expected to graduate on time. With the game blacked out locally, we couldn’t even watch it on television. Through this cacophony of grumbling, the professor entered the classroom.

V. L. Stanfield was a legend on the campus of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Over six feet tall, he added to the effect by wearing western boots, an oddity in our city. He laughed easily and welcomed laughter in his classroom. Stories about him abounded, including the time he told why he moved to a French Quarter apartment above a bar: “I’ve always wanted to live above sin.”

Striding toward the front of the room, Stanfield called out, “Well, who has been a good boy today?” He was obviously in a playful mood.

“I have two tickets to tonight’s football game,” he announced, “which I am going to give to two of you.”

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Since our family reunion has become a tradition with more than a decade of regular get-togethers, we are building some new customs of our own. First, we hold our meetings at the old home place, built a hundred years ago by our grandfather, and secondly, we sit around a Saturday night bonfire in the front yard until midnight telling and retelling the family stories. This last part is what I want to tell you about, specifically the account of the 1951 murder of one of our neighbors.

The first time we sat in the fire-splashed dark telling our stories–that would be May of 1994–I decided to bring up the story of Mrs. B’s murder. It was the most exciting thing to happen in our county for years and the young folks had more than likely never even heard about it.

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That year Junior Roman’s cotton was the best ever seen in that part of North Alabama. His twenty acres looked like a December snowfall in Wyoming. Had the bolls suddenly turned loose and dropped the cotton to the ground, it would have been knee deep. When a half bale to the acre was the rule for most farms, people drove for miles to gawk at Junior’s crop.

I had been looking for just such an opportunity. My pride as a farm boy was at stake, and here was the chance to redeem it.

It all stemmed from our high school classes in vocational agriculture. When we were not discussing the sex life of Herefords and Durocs and vicariously of sixteen-year-old males, we turned the class into a primitive macho testing ground where every one sought a territory over which he was the champion.

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I still remember the day Marta walked into my office, plopped herself down, and asked me to pray that she and Ward would be able to have children. I promised to pray, and did, regularly. In time, they had three of the brightest, sweetest children you’ve ever seen. They are young adults now and barely know me, but I take special joy in having prayed them into the world.

Not long ago, I began to pray that God would send Mack a wife. I said, “Lord, Mack is a truly fine person. He has kept himself faithful to you all these years. You must have a godly woman out there somewhere who would be right for him.” He did. I performed Mack and Kathleen’s wedding last winter.

My son Neil was on an outing with his three children. The day before, he had suggested they pray for good weather. On their way to the park, he asked 10-year-old Grant if he had prayed for this beautiful day. “No,” he said. “I forgot.” He asked 7-year-old Abby. “I forgot, too,” she said. “Oh, good,” said her twin Erin from the back seat. “Then it was my miracle.”

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I’m still hoping to see a loon. If in fact they really exist.

A generation ago, the Henry Fonda/Katharine Hepburn move “On Golden Pond” hooked America on the loon. The old couple sits on their porch in late evenings enjoying the sounds of the loons on the lake while the setting sun does fascinating things on the water, and a hundred thousand people–me included–were ready to move to New Hampshire. Until that movie, I had no idea how fascinating or desirable these birds were. And since loons are yankees (i.e., based in northern climes) and I’m a southerner (Alabama originally, New Orleans at present), I did not expect to actually see one.

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Nearly twenty years ago, some of my siblings started worrying about our larger family. “The old folks are leaving,” they said, “and pretty soon, there will be no one left except our generation-the ‘cousins.'” Our mother came from a family of nine brothers and sisters, while our dad had eleven, so we were blessed with plenty of fun cousins and doting uncles and aunts. It was a great situation-all of us kids growing up together, visiting one another in the summers, and getting into trouble together. Now, with our parent’s generation aging, we all decided we needed to see each other on a regular basis.

Family reunion. The very term conjures up all kinds of crazy images-weird uncles, rambunctious kids, silly cousins. We sent out letters to everyone and for a couple of years tried holding reunions at various city parks and lake homes. Nothing really ‘took’, however, until we got smart and decided to hold the get-together at the only logical site-the old family homeplace.

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