An artificial fiber optic Christmas tree (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

An atmosphere can change, suddenly warmer and brighter. I’m sitting here at the warm and light-filled Cleveland State Community College library, which is open until 4:30 p.m. each day this week. Then Friday, like college libraries do, the CSCC library will close for the holidays.

So, since I don’t have Internet access at home, here I am at another library. Lord willing, I’ll be traveling from one computer to the next, during Christmas break, which sometimes seems too long.

I felt so blue this morning, again, the Christmas blues, but worse, because of so much tragic news, and now another family episode, splintering, hurting, wondering how to adjust, how to accept, how to get this knot out of my stomach, because of more strife and division and heartbreak.

I mention the late great preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon a lot here, because he seems to have understood so much of real life. One time, Spurgeon wrote that he was feeling low, then a friend wrote back to Spurgeon, about how much it meant to him to learn that even the great preacher felt sad too sometimes.

Spurgeon suffered from sporadic depressions, described in the book “Bright Days, Dark Nights: With Charles Spurgeon in Triumph Over Emotional Pain” by Elizabeth Skoglund.

The artificial Christmas tree looks pretty here, and peaceful, with shiny garland and green branches with, among other colors, lavender and green Christmas ornaments that don’t really shine, but glow, brushed light.

Today, I mailed Christmas cards to my children, with gold seals. It made me happy. It lifted some of the weight off my heart, to think of my children and send them cards. Children do that. You carry your children in your heart forever, no matter what. They glow from there, forever, luminous. Children change everything, for the better. I’m so glad they were born.

Related articles

• What Made Spurgeon a Great Preacher (pjcockrell.wordpress.com)
• “Then they will cease to wound and kill” by Charles Spurgeon (tollelege.wordpress.com)
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English: Barbecue grill sideview in Czech Republic. Česky: Boční pohled na gril. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The sweet smoky taste of barbecue, cooked on a steel drum grill by Bill Murray (not the actor, but the preacher) is very, very good.

Barbecued pork and chicken, along with a considerable variety of other foods, are featured Monday through Saturday, 7 a.m. until 7 p.m., (but not on Sundays) at Murray’s barbecue place on South Lee Highway in Cleveland, Tennessee.

I tried the pulled pork one recent Friday with sides of coleslaw and sweet baked beans. Texas-style fresh bread goes with the barbecue, too.

To find the outdoor eatery, look for a navy blue concession stand, sparkling clean inside and outside, sitting near and nearly next to Ms. Vickie’s Flea Market (www.msvickiesflemarket.com).

Be careful driving by, but look for the barbecue grill that sits near the concession stand. Murray, a former construction worker, built the grill out of scrap metal and he also does maintenance work for Wal-Mart.

If you hear a little about this man’s story, you’ll know sacrifice and sorrow somehow brought him to sharing good food and God’s grace in this southeastern Tennessee city. Murray’s expansive vision already sees hungry souls being fed along with hungry bellies. He wants to feature gospel preachers and gospel singers as well, right there on the paved surroundings next to the grill and concession stand.

From inside the stand, the preacher-cook took out a CD of “God Sends the Rain” and I don’t remember which singers sing the songs, but I recall the generosity of spirit shown that day by Murray and his friend, Bill Carroll, a former United States Navy cook and current owner of real estate at B & B Marina in the Cleveland area. Carroll prepared that Friday’s coleslaw, which was also very, very good.

Everything about Murray’s barbecue stand soothes the soul, from the colored Christmas lights designed to shine in the darkness to the old-fashioned comfort foods like biscuits or fried potatoes or fried bologna and egg with several other selections and soft drinks, all served with such cleanliness and kindness it would be difficult to go away feelin’ lost or hungry.

You may not believe this, but early that night when I walked to my car with my take-out barbecue plate, it started rainin’. Maybe it was a sign of blessings on the way…drop by drop, plate by plate, song by song and soul by soul. Stop by the barbecue place on the hill. If nothing else, you’ll be blessed by real good barbecue. (Update: I drove by this particular outdoor barbecue place just a few weeks ago. It wasn’t there anymore, that I could see. Don’t know what happened, but didn’t want to send you on a wild goose chase).

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