Subscribe  

May 21, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

With my wife growing up in the South, she looked forward to a spring that was getting underway by early or mid-March. With me growing up in the North, I got used to spring beginning a little later than that. And in some places in the North, if you miss the Fourth of July weekend, you might miss summer. But let's stick with spring right now. Some people look for, let's say, the first robin to mark the end of winter. For my wife, it was the daffodils. Those bright yellow flowers were the harbingers of spring for her - as well as a way to mark her early spring birthday. Living in the North, I had to do some really creative florist work to try to get her some birthday daffodils. Of course, it was cheaper than paying for counseling for her, right? But this particular year, she got to pick the first daffodils at Grandma and Grandad's old farmstead. Yeah, back where she grew up. Grandma's been gone for quite a while now, but the flowers that Grandma planted a long time ago? They're still blooming!

May 17, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

When you're five years old, you have a number of those milestone experiences - a lot of "firsts." Like your first soccer game. Yeah, our five-year-old grandson had that. I reminded our daughter that she had joined that much-talked about tribe called "soccer moms." Yeah, our grandson had never played soccer before, and he didn't have an older brother or sister to learn from. So his first game was, shall we say, a great learning experience. And he did a good job. But not good enough for the kind of performance most firstborns expect of themselves. Though he got the ball several times for his team and moved it down the field, he didn't score any goals, and he was bothered that he missed one. Right after the game, he gave his mom his two-word summary of how he thought he did. He just said, "I tried."

May 11, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

There's just enough of a kid in me, I really like those glass elevators they have in some hotels. You know, you get in on the main floor and then you ascend to the top floor, all the time you're watching the big things in the lobby become small things in the lobby. And the limited view you had down there, oh, suddenly turns panoramic. Or if you've been in one of the world's great skyscrapers, you may have tried some of those elevators. We're talking lobby to observation deck in like seconds; rising scores of floors in less time than it takes to place some phone calls. So, at 10:02, you're down in the lobby or even the basement and at 10:03 you're looking out over the entire city - all because of an elevator.

May 3, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

When our kids were growing up, we made a lot of memories hiking up mountains and through some really great forests. And then, of course, grandsons. They started making those same kinds of memories with their daddy. In fact, they were on one of those forest hikes with Dad, and the older brother had an idea. One that he had, no doubt, gotten from watching his father and what he had done with him. Little brother's legs started to tire out, and big brother said he wanted to carry little brother on his back. Well, there actually is now a photo showing big brother with little brother on his shoulders. Is he Super Boy? No. There's a third person in the picture. It's Daddy standing behind, supporting little brother on big brother's shoulders.

April 29, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

We've always been big Winnie-the-Pooh fans at our house. Our kids always enjoyed having that read to them, and now they read it to their kids. There's one scene from Winnie-the-Pooh I really remember.

April 23, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

Because we have so many Native American friends in the Southwest, I was carefully watching a ravenous wildfire in eastern Arizona. When you're told to evacuate, honestly you never know if you'll have a home to come back to.

April 5, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

One day I caught a snatch of a TV talk show which I otherwise would never have seen. But the host was interviewing a former FBI agent. He's a man who successfully infiltrated the mafia for several years, and he'd been responsible for bringing evidence in some major indictments against mob leadership. Now, one factor in his underground life was a major source of criminal income. OK, here he was, a pretty straight person, surrounded by cocaine. Well, the host asked the FBI man an interesting question. He said, "Did you ever have to use cocaine?" That's a pretty good question, I thought. After all, his life depended on his fitting in, right? Well, he said, "No, I never did." And the host said, "Well, how did you avoid it?" I liked his answer. It might even help you when you're feeling the pressure to fit in.

March 19, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

It was so cold in the house when I woke up that bitter winter morning. The thermometer announced to me it was like 40-some degrees in the house! I mean, my kids had some good laughs and some rare comments when they saw me praying that morning in front of an open stove in the kitchen. Look, it was the only warm place in the house! Well, Mr. Furnace came over, and he checked things out and informed us that we needed a new thermostat. As soon as our thermostat was working, the thermometer had better news for us; the house was warming up again! It is amazing what a difference a functioning thermostat can make!

March 5, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

It was a pretty amusing billboard; a cartoon drawing of a wide-eyed, bewildered-looking squirrel, holding a broken cable in his paws. The sign just said, "Call before you dig" and he gave a toll-free phone number. The utility folks have this problem. I'm not sure if it's with squirrels; it certainly is with people. They start digging and they cut right into their lines and their cables. I mean, those could be gas lines, phone lines, or phone cables. And in the process, the happy diggers make a big mess for the utility company and their customers. A mess that could have easily been avoided.

January 20, 2021

Download MP3 (right click to save)

When a member of our family would "shirk" a chore they had at our house, we had a familiar line that we used jokingly. Somebody would say, "Oh, it's so hard to get good help these days." Actually, I first heard that from a friend of mine who said that about trying to find a housekeeper. Now, that wasn't a real heavy issue for us, hiring a good housekeeper. We had a family!

                

GET IN TOUCH

Hutchcraft Ministries
P.O. Box 400
Harrison, AR 72602-0400

(870) 741-3300
(877) 741-1200 (toll-free)
(870) 741-3400 (fax)

STAY UPDATED

We have many helpful and encouraging resources ready to be delivered to your inbox.

Please know we will never share or sell your info.

Subscribe

Back to top