Month: February 2026

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Salt and Light

Title slide with pictures of the two rock churches along the Blue Ridge Parkway

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
February 15, 2026
Matthew 5:13-20

At the beginning of worship:
Did you hear about the guy pulled over by police? The officer asked if it was his car. He said yes. Then the officer had him step out of the car and put his hands on the hood. He handcuffed the man and hauled into the station on suspicion of stealing a car. Yet, the man kept insisting it was his car. The officer put him into the holding tank and, taking his license and registration, began to check out his story. 

Thirty minutes later, the officer released the man and apologized. “I couldn’t believe it was your car,” the officer said. “You have all those bumper stickers about loving Jesus and and following you to church. When I saw you give the finger and heard you shouting obscenities and lay on your horn at that poor driver who was obviously lost, I just assumed you stole the vehicle.” 

You know, actions speak louder than words. If we’re a follower of Jesus, we need to remember this. 

Before reading the scriptures:
The last two weeks, we looked at the beatitudes, which make up the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount.[1]  I hope you read or watched those sermons on-line as we had to canceled in person worship due to ice and snow. Today, we’re heading into the middle portion of the Jesus’ sermon.  

Jesus begins with two emphatic statements directed at his audience. You are the salt and the light of the world. But these statements are not to be taken individually. The “You” used here is plural. If Jesus gave this sermon here, he’d say, “Y’all.” It’s all of us. Those who believe and accept Jesus, in other words, the church, are the salt and the light of the world.[2] We’ll look at what that means. Next, Jesus teaches about his relationship with Scripture and the Covenant. 

Let’s look at what Jesus has to say here.

Read Matthew 5:13-20

What does it mean to be the salt and the light of the world today? You know, salt is important. We tend to take it for granted, except for the past few weeks with ice everywhere, stores quickly sold out of salt. 

In the ancient world, salt was even more valuable and harder to come by than today during an ice storm. It preserved food and likewise, we’re to help preserve the world. When used sparingly in cooking, it helps enhance the flavor. We’re to flavor the world with Jesus’ grace. And, in a world without modern medicine, they applied salt to wounds to assist in healing. We’re to help heal the world.

Oddly, as a friend wrote on this passage, we’re the first generation to be paranoid about our use of salt.[3] Too much of it, we know, causes hypertension and other health problems. But we must have some, or we have other issues. Salt is the only mineral we take straight from the earth and consume. So, when Jesus said the church is the salt of the earth, he wants us to spice the world up, to help preserve the world, and to help heal it. 

In a way, light is like salt. Compared to light in the ancient world, it’s cheap. We have light everywhere. Sometimes we have so much light it becomes a determent of our ability to see things like the stars. Thankfully, we live where the skies are dark and the stars shine brightly, but that’s not the case if you live in an urban area. In a world without electricity and bright LEDs, when the sun wasn’t up or the moon down, you appreciated light. The only light came from campfires, or candles, or oil lamps. Each of these have a limit as to how far you could see before you slipped back into darkness. 

When I lived in Utah, I drove across central Nevada several times at night. I took highway 50, which Life Magazine claimed back in the 1950s to be the loneliest road in America. The other path was a combination of US 6 and Nevada 375, which is even a lonelier road, as you seldom saw a car at night.[4] 

Cutting across the state, you crossed many block-fault mountains which run north and south. Coming off the summits, you’d often see your next town, just a few lights clustered together, way off in the distance. The next sign of civilization, far away. If you needed gas, you’d hope that within the oasis of light a gas station remained open. Or if you didn’t need gas, you’d hope there was a place for coffee to keep you away. As for gas, I always tried to keep my tank above the halfway mark. 

As the church, we’re to be light helping guide the world. Maybe a better metaphor would be navigation lights which help boaters travel narrow waterways and inlets. In the daytime, you have buoys, but at night the buoys have colored lights on them. Remember the three R’s of navigation: red, right, returning. If you are coming into an inlet at night, you keep the red lights or buoys on your right or starboard side. The green ones go on your left or port side. As a church, as the light in the world, we guide people to Jesus, just as navigation lights guide people safely through an inlet. 

Both opening metaphors apply to how we live. Do we point the way to Jesus, or do we get so tied up in the world’s business and lose focus on what’s important? Interestingly, Jesus doesn’t tell us to become the salt or the light of the world. Nor does he tell us to become salter or shine brighter. Instead, he grants us these abilities. But there’s a warning here. If we squander these gifts, if we fail to use them for Jesus’ purposes, for God’s glory, we become worthless. Salt without flavor or a light hidden is of no use for the world. But if we use them properly, others can see through our efforts, God’s glory. 

Our next section deals with the purpose of Jesus’ ministry. Why did Jesus come? Was it to negate what God has been doing through Israel for the past 15 or 20 centuries? No, there’s still value in that work. 

When Jesus speaks of the Law and the Prophets, he’s referring to the entirety of the Hebrew Scriptures or what we call the Old Testament. Some Christians may attempt to ignore the Old Testament, but that’s not Jesus’ way. He values scripture and regularly quotes or alludes to passages from the Psalms and other books of the Hebrew Bible, especially Genesis and Isaiah. 

By linking the Law and the Prophets together, Jesus refers to a new covenant. The first covenant of the Hebrew people was established with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and renewed with Moses and Joshua and the Hebrew people. But in the latter part of Isaiah, God through the prophet speaks of a new covenant, one where Israel is to be the light to the nations.[5] The old covenant has been fulfilled, this new covenant will extend beyond the ethnicity of the Jews to all people. 

As I have pointed out repeatedly as we’ve gone through the opening chapters of Matthew, this gospel is most concern with Jesus’ message going out into the world. We see that in the beginning with the foreign wisemen coming to Jesus and at the end of the gospel with Jesus sending the disciples out to all corners of the earth.

What might we learn from this passage? While much of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount deals with our interior lives as we saw with the Beatitudes and will observe in the weeks ahead, we also see the importance of living in a manner which honors God. Once Jesus ascended to heaven after the resurrection, he left behind a church to do his work. That’s us. We’re to live in such a manner that people will want to be like us. As the old spiritual goes, “They’ll know we are Christians by our love.”  Will they? Amen. 

[1] See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2026/01/31/the-beatitudes-part-1-blessings-on-those-in-need/ and https://fromarockyhillside.com/2026/02/07/the-beatitudes-part-2/

[2] Douglas R. A. Hare,Matthew: Interpretation, a Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: WJKP, 1993), 44; and Fredrick Dale Bruner, The Christbook: Matthew 1-12 (1990, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004). 187-194.

[3] Scott Hoezee, https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2020-02-03/matthew-513-20-2/

[4] I wrote about one of these trips. See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/09/25/nevada-375-and-rachel-nevada/

[5] Jonathan T. Pennington, The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing: A Theological Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, ), 166-167.  See also Isaiah 42:6.

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Bodie, California

title slide with photo of road leading into Bodie
The Methodist Episcopal Church in Bodie

In early October, Sandy, a woman I had dated while in Pittsburgh that spring, flew in. She had an interview for a job in California, but before that spent a few days with me. On Friday night, we checked out the bars and nightlife in Virginia City, listening to Murray Mack pound the piano playing ragtime tunes. Then, on Saturday, we went with Victor in his old Bronco and checked out the country around the Comstock.  We were looking for the petrographs, which we never found. Then, on Sunday, after church, we packed up and headed South on US 395, with plans to visit Yosemite from the backside. I don’t remember if someone had suggested I check out Bodie or if I learned about the town on this trip. 

This being in early fall, bursts of yellow aspen dotted the mountains on both sides of the highway. Unlike in the East, where the fall landscape becomes colorful with reds, yellows, and oranges, in the West color shows up in patches up on the hillside. Our first stop was for ice cream at Bridgeport, an old town on the east side of the Sierras. Then we went to Mono Lake, a place I’d wanted to see since reading Mark Twain’s Roughing It late that spring. It was one of several books I read in preparation to moving to Nevada for a year. While at the lake, we saw the unique geological monuments left behind by calcium springs when the water was higher and experienced the brine flies that cover the shoreline. Thankfully, they don’t bite. 

Mono Lake looking toward the Sierras. I took this photo in 2013

As the light began to fade, we headed to Lee Vining where I rented the last hotel room in the town. This older hotel had shared bathrooms, something I was surprised to find in America in the late 1980s.

The next morning, we rose early and drove over the Tioga Pass to Tuolumne Meadows on the backside of Yosemite. Most everything had closed for the season, so after hiking a bit, we had to head back to Lee Vining for lunch. 

After lunch, we drove to Bridgeport, turned east and drove 13 miles on mostly a gravelly wash boarded road. At one point, we crossed a ridge and Bodie stood in front of us with mountains rising behind the town. The town’s old woodened structures and the mill’s industrial complex sheltered under tin, appeared to rise out of the sagebrush. Coming into town, we saw only a few trees, cottonwoods and aspen, nestled in ravines which protected them from the strong winds. We parked, paid our entrance fee as Bodie is now a California State Park, and proceed to spend several hours walking around the old buildings.  

The road leading into Bodie. Parking is below the town and visitors must walk

Bodie shares a few things in common with Virginia City. Both areas were discovered in the late 1850s, just before American fell into the Civil War. But Bodie’s start was slower than the mines along the Comstock.  While Virginia City was remote, it was only 10 miles north of the Pony Express and the Overland Stagecoach route. Dayton, Mormon Station and Carson City, while small towns, were all close, while Bodie had only Bridgeport, which was not much more than a stage stop. And the Southern Sierras are higher and wider than the those around Carson City. So Bodie was harder to reach. 

Warning sign on road to Aurora r

However, 15 or 20 miles east of Bodie sits Aurora, Nevada. It’s discovery also occurred around the same time as Bodie. Aurora had higher grade of ore and in the early 1860s became very prosperous. One of its citizens in 1862, who learned how difficult mining came be, was Samuel Clemens. While in Aurora, he wrote a series of articles and mailed them to the Territorial Enterprise, a leading Nevada newspaper in Virginia City. This lead to a job which didn’t involve a pick or shovel and there, as a reporter, Clemens would begin to go by his nom-de-plume, Mark Twain. Sadly, lacking a high clearance 4-wheel drive vehicle, I never made it to Aurora. 

In addition to its isolation, Bodie sits at 8300 feet, two thousand feet higher than Virginia City. This is harsh territory.  While the Sierras capture much of the snow, it still snows here and there’s little protection from the bitter wind. It’s amazing to consider that once Bodie came into its own in the late 1870s, as Virginia City’s production declined, 10,000 people lived amongst these hills. In those early years, the town developed a mystic as a very violent place. Supposedly, one young girl whose family were leaving Virginia City for Bodie said, “Goodbye God, we’re moving to Bodie.” But such was the life early on in mining camps, which were mostly populated with men. 

Then, as with all mining towns, in the early-1880s, Bodie began to decline. But people continued to mine. In 1932, a young boy started a fire that burned a large portion of the town. Yet, even then, a few hung on, continuing to live and mine in Bodie until World War 2, when the government closed all gold mines as unnecessary for the war effort.  In time, the state of California inherited the town and in the early 1960s created a state park.  

While the state protects the town, private concerns own the rich hills to the south of the town. The mines were located here.. When I visited again in the spring and summer of 1989, I learned a Canadian mining company had its eyes on the potential ore in that hill. California no longer allowed cyanide leaching (a process to remove valuable metals like gold and silver from rock). To get around this, the company proposed to build a ten-mile-long conveyor. This would allow them to transport the ore to Nevada, where such operations are allowed. I don’t know what happened to such plans as California fought it. Such an operation with blasting and heavy equipment would be enough to destroy what’s left of Bodie. 

Bodie’s remaining mill

I would visit Bodie twice more during the year I lived on the Comstock. In late May, my parents visited. We took a two-night trip down to Bodie and stayed in a hotel in Lee Vining. While walking around the ghost town, it began to snow. This ddi not amuse my mother. I knew she didn’t care to share a bathroom with other guests at the hotel. I made reservations before leaving.

On this trip, we left Bodie and took another gravel road to the south, which came out at Mono Lake. Back in the day, train tracks ran down the cuts now used for the road. The train cut along the east side of Mono Lake, then headed into the hills south of the lake. There, east of Mammoth Lakes, a sizable forest consisting of Ponderosa and Jeffrey Pines grew. Lumbering operations cut the trees forr mining timbers, building lumber, and firewood. Kilns converted some of the wood into charcoal. The later found use in heading and in the milling process. The tracks never connected to another railroad and was only used to wood products.  Once the town declined, the train ceased to operate.

After a night in Lee Vining, we traveled over Tioga Pass, across Tuolumne Meadows which still had snow. We then headed down into Yosemite Valley where we spent the second night. The next day, we drove through some of the California mining areas on the western slope of the Sierras, before crossing back over on Sonora Pass and heading north back to Virginia City.

My third visit was late in June. Carolyn, whom I had been dating much of the year, and I took her daughters, Emma and Holly to Bodie and Mono Lake. We camped at Twin Lakes on the eastern slope of the Sierras, before spending the day exploring Bodie.

While I have been back to Mono Lake and over Tioga Pass several times since 1989, I haven’t gone back to Bodie. But I would like to see it again one day. Unlike Virginia City, Bodie is a true ghost town. You’re not allowed to stay there after dark, and the only residents are rangers working for the state. 

The photos were taken at different times. some were slides and others were prints. I have more photos somewhere!

More stories about my time on the Comstock:

Arriving in Virginia City, September 1988

David Henry Palmer arrives in Virginia City, 1863

Virginia City’s Muckers presents Thorton Wilder’s “Our Town”

Doug and Elvira

Matt and Virginia City

Driving West in ’88

Funerals on the Comstock Lode

Sunday afternoon drive to Gerlach 

Riding in the cab of a locomotive on the V&T

Christmas Eve

Easter Sunrise Services (a part of this article recalls Easter Sunrise Service in Virginia City in 1989)

The Revivals of A. B. Earle (an academic paper published in American Baptist Historical Society Quarterly. Earle spent several weeks in Virginia City in 1867)

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The Beatitudes, Part 2

title slide with photos of Bluemont and Mayberry Churches

Sadly, we’re again cancelling in person worship this week due to weather. Both parking lots are iced over and in some places with deep drifts. In addition, many roads are experiencing drifting, along with falling branches and trees, And the temperature on Sunday morning is expected to be in the single digits with wind chill being well below zero. Stay safe. Watch or read the sermon, or do both. Join us tomorrow morning at 10 AM on zoom (if you don’t have the link, email me at parkwayrockchurches@gmail.com). Check in on your neighbors. Hopefully, things will be better this week as the temperatures on Tuesday and Wednesday are forecasted to be in the 40s and 50s.

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
February 8, 2026
Matthew 5:1-12 (7-12)

Sermon recorded at Mayberry on Thursday, February 5, 2026

At the beginning of worship:
Life in the sixteenth century could be brutal. While good things came out of the Reformation, it being led by humans meant somethings were not so good. Catholics fought those within the Lutheran and Reformed Traditions, and we fought back. And those within the Anabaptist tradition, the ancestors to the Mennonite and Amish folks who live around us here in the Blue Ridge, caught it from all sides. Their persecution peaked in the Low Countries, what we know of today as the Netherlands. 

One of the martyrs of the Amish and Mennonite tradition is Dirk Willems. He was condemned by a Catholic court (although many Protestants at the time would have agreed with the court’s ruling) and ordered to be burned at the stake for his theological beliefs. Dirk was held in an old palace repurposed as a prison. He escaped, by collecting pieces of cloth and creating a rope from which he climbed down from his cell window and took off across the landscape. One of the guards saw him and gave chase. They ran across a wide frozen pond. Dirk, as a prisoner, had lost weight and made it across the ice. His pursuer wasn’t so lucky. He crashed through the ice and cried out for help.

Dirk turned back and saved the man, only to be recaptured. On May 16, 1569, he was led to the stake. A strong wind blew, which kept the fire away from Dirk’s upper body for the longest time. It’s said neighboring villages heard his screams, as he repeatedly shouted, “O Lord, my God.”  

What would you have done? Would you have helped the man or seen it as an opportunity to escape? What would Jesus advise? 

Before reading the Scripture:
I am splitting Jesus’ beatitudes into two halves, following the example of Dale Bruner in his commentary on the gospel. The first half of the beatitudes, which we looked at last week, focused on those in need. Here, we see God’s gracious side. With God, grace always comes before expectations. The second half of the beatitudes deal with our response to the needs of the world. For those willing to participate with God, a blessing is also given. Then, this passage ends with the reminder to those loyal to Jesus to expect persecution.  

Bruner, who wrote an outstanding two-volume commentary on Matthew, admits his struggles to preach on the second half of the Beatitudes.[1] As Protestants, we emphasize grace. And grace abounds in the first four beatitudes. But in the second set of blessings, we learn we can also be blessed for doing what’s right. Sounds like “works-righteousness.” Is it? 

Within our faith, a healthy tension exists between grace and law or works. While grace is necessary for our salvation, we are expected to respond to this grace in gratitude and love. We need both, grace and law. We are saved by grace, but we respond by doing God’s work in the world. Are we merciful, pure in heart, or a peacemaker? What does this even mean? Let’s look at our text for today. Like last week, I will read the entire passage but today will focus on verses 7 through 12 in the sermon. 

Read Matthew 5:1-12

The first set of beatitudes begin with three focused on those in need. They’re passive. The next set of beatitudes begin with three beatitudes focused on helping those in need. These are active, calling us forth to participate with God’s plan for the world.[2]Blessed are the merciful, the pure in heart, and the peacemaker. Let’s begin by considering what each means. 

Who are the merciful? Matthew, more than any of the other gospels, shows concerned for our moral life. For Matthew, being ethical, being moral, is to be merciful. It involves compassion. Twice in his gospel, Matthew recalls Jesus quoting Hosea, “I want mercy and not sacrifice.”[3] Jesus, himself, while often described as having compassion, more often shows what compassion looks like though actions on behalf of the needy.[4] Compassion sees or understands the needs of others and responds. It’s having empathy on behalf of others.[5]

Forgiveness is another component of this mercy which Jesus repeatedly demonstrates. Later in this sermon, in the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus links our willingness to forgive to our ability to be forgiven. “Forgive us our debts or sins, as we forgive our debtors or those who sin against us.”[6] Later in his gospel, Matthew recalls Jesus’ parable of the unforgiven servant. Here, the one forgiven a huge debt, refuses to forgive a man who owed him a little. The unforgiving servant’s ingratitude and inability to forgive leads to his condemnation.[7]

It’s hard to show mercy to those who have wronged us. However, it’s better than the alternative, letting hate and revenge build up inside of us until we explode.[8]

Next, Jesus blesses the pure in heart. While behavior is important in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus emphasizes internal purity. Sin isn’t just actions. It can also be words and thoughts. Angry words are as harmful as actions. Lust is as bad as adultery.[9] In Jesus time, the rabbis emphasized keeping all kinds of outward signs of faith. You obeyed the Sabbath. You ate the right foods. You avoided being in the company of sinners. But Jesus flips this on its side and insists his follower’s purity not be just on the outside but also on the inside.[10]  

We might say something like, “My heart tells me.” However, a pure heart goes beyond our feelings. Within Hebraic through, to speak of the heart includes the “interior life of the person.”[11] In other words, a pure heart refers to our thoughts, actions, and intentions. Seeing God is the blessing received by one who’s life is so structured. 

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God,” comes next. We hear this beatitude with the background drumming of war around the globe and think it would be nice to have a few more peacemakers who could save Ukrainians from Russian attacks on their hospitals and apartment buildings. Or those who bring peace to South Sudan, Congo, or even between us and Iran, Cuba, Greenland, and Venezuela. 

While such peace is to be desired, we must understand two things. In Jesus day, the “peacemaker” was the emperor, who by brutal force brought peace to the entire Roman world. But is that really peace when you crucify anyone who threatens your peace? Can we have peace without justice? 

Secondly, peace in a Hebriac sense goes beyond the absence of conflict. Peace implied wholeness. One commentator suggests this verse might be translated as “Blessed are the wholemakers.”[12]

Matthew concern for relationships between people shows up later in this sermon. Jesus orders those angry with another to reconcile even before they make an offering to God. Then, in the 18thChapter, Matthew records another set of Jesus’ teachings about how we should attempt reconciliation. Jesus encourages us not to blow up conflicts but to attempt to settle them quietly, one-on-one. Only if that doesn’t work, should you involve others.[13]

Jesus doesn’t expect us to settle all the world’s conflicts. While some may be called to such work, all of us can do our part to create a peaceful oasis around us. We should all strive to reduce conflict and to create an atmosphere where everyone can flourish. This is especially needed in our own nation. We’re walking on a slippery path. As we saw with the fifth beatitude, we’re called to help those in need (Blessed are the merciful). Yet, here, in the seventh beatitude, we’re also called to bring peace. I suggest this includes bridging the gap between those who support and oppose the current Administration. It’s tough work because neither side trusts the other. But that’s where peacemakers come into play. If we attempt to faithfully walk this narrow path, we’re promised a special relationship to God as we’re adopted into his family. 

After the three helper beatitudes, Jesus reminds us of that old saying, “No good deed goes unpunished.”  His last two beatitudes are for those who experience persecution. We should carefully note, the reason for the persecution isn’t about us, but about our striving to do what is right and to remain faithful to Jesus Christ. “When you’re ill-treated because of me, you’re in good company,” Jesus says, “for the same thing happened to the prophets.” 

The beatitudes end on a note reminding us to expect persecution. Staying faithful to Jesus and his teachings can come at great cost. We may be disliked, disowned, or suffer fiscal or physical attacks. But if we remain true to our Savior and strive to help those in need, we’re reminded in these blessings that God will remain with us in this life and in the life to come, we’ll discover our rewarded in heaven. 

Strive to do good. Stand up for the underdog. Reach out for those who fall. Provide aide for those can’t help themselves. Look out for the marginalized and persecuted. Yes, by doing such good deeds, we may find ourselves persecuted or killed, as we recently seen in Minneapolis. But that’s the price we pay to live with a clean conscience. Remember Dirk Willems. He had a choice. He could flee and live. Or he could help another in need and, as Jesus will discuss later in this sermon, love his enemy.[14]

We’re called to follow Christ and to base our lives on his life. Jesus helped those in need and he ended up crucified. Perhaps his last two beatitudes foreshadow what was ahead for him and some of his followers. But remember, it’s better to strive to do what is right in Jesus’ name than to ignore those in need around us. Amen. 

[1] Frederick Dale Bruner, The Christbook: Matthew 1-12 (1990, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004), 179.  For discussion on Protestant and Catholic interprets of the two halves of the beatitudes, see pages 183-187. 

[2] Bruner, 173, labels these two sets of beatitudes as “passive” and “active.”

[3] Bruner, 173.  See Hosea 6:6.

[4] Kenneth E. Bailey, Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels (Downers Grove, IL:  IVP Academic, 2008), 82. 

[5] See Andrew Purves, The Search for Compassion: Spirituality and Ministry (WJKP, 1989). 

[6] Matthew 6:12. 

[7] Matthew 18:23-35.

[8] Bailey,  82. 

[9] Matthew 5:21-22 and 27-30. 

[10] Bruner, 15

[11] Bailey, 84. 

[12] Bailey, 172.  For more on Pax Romana, see Douglas R. A. Hare, Matthew: Interpretation, A Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: JKP, 1993), 42. 

[13] Matthew 5:23-24, 18:15-18.

[14] Matthew 5:43-48.

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Review of my January readings

Title page showing parts of the covers of the books I read in January 2026

I did a lot of reading in January thanks to the bitter cold temperatures…

Rick Atkinson, The British Are Coming: The War in American, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777

 (New York: Henry Holt, 2019), 776 pages including notes, sources, and index. Also included are maps and plates of photos.

This is the first of a planned trilogy by Rick Atkinson on the Revolutionary War.  The opening books covers the beginning of the war. He starts at the battles at Lexington and Concord, and continues through Washington’s surprising victories in late 1776 and 77,. This was Washington crossing the Delaware with his ill-prepared army on Christmas Eve, routing the British Hessian soldiers in Trenton. That winter, he eventually pushed the British back toward New York. A lot happened in these first two years. 

Atkinson not only provides the American point-of-view for the war, but also the British. He takes his readers inside debates in Parliament. We learn of King George’s thoughts on the war and the British empire. Not all Britains were in favor of the war. But some like the king felt if they lost the war, it would be an end to the British Empire (which was just beginning to grow).  

It’s been a long time since I studied much of the history of the war. While I knew of the battles around Boston, I didn’t realize just how successful the campaign was against a larger and more powerful foe. The British retreated and regrouped in Nova Scotia before moving south to New York. I also knew of our attempts to capture Quebec, I didn’t realize just how much effort the colonists put into this endeavor. While it ended in failure, the Canadian invasion served as a major offensive for a rag-tag army.  

Much of the war covered in this book, especially after Washington assumed command of the army, became an attempt to avoid major battles and to live to fight another day. Washington sensed this would be the best way to slowly wear down the British (and their German merceries). America even attempted novel ways of attacking the British including the first attempted use of a submarine. In a way, I found myself making a parallel to how Ukraine has held out against Russia since 2022. They must keep holding on as they wear down a larger Russian army. And, Ukraine has also utilized new technology to make the most of their smaller army.   

Atkinson also covers the early war in the South. I grew up near Moore’s Creek. This brief but important battle often gets left out of American history books, I appreciated Atkinson’s treatment on the engagement. Click here to read a talk I gave to the St. Andrew’s Society of Scotland on Moore’s Creek.

By the end of 1776, the colonists had lost New York and New Jersey andretreated beyond the Delaware River. Things looked desperate. At this time, most armies didn’t fight during winter. Washington, however, took a risk. He crossed back across the Delaware to attack the British soldiers (mostly German Hessians) on the opposite bank. He continued to press forward, winning small engagements and driving the British back to the Hudson River.  

I look forward to reading his next volume which deals with the middle years of the war.  This is a great book to read in 2026, as we celebrate our nation’s 250-year history.  

James Dodson, The Road that Made America: A Modern Pilgrim’s Journey on the Great Wagon Road 

(New York: Avid Reader Press, 2025), 396 pages.

The Great Wagon Road ran west from Philadelphia to central Pennsylvania where it turned south through Maryland and the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and then crossing over the mountains and flanking the east side of the Blue Ridge south through North and South Carolina, ending in Augusta, Georgia. Daniel Boone’s father traveled this road to settle along the banks of the Yakin River in North Carolina. Daniel, a wanderlust like his father, would create a spur off the Great Wagon Road, the Wilderness Road, which ran through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky. 

The Great Wagon Road brought many Scot-Irish and German immigrants into Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. The Conestoga Wagon, the vehicle of choice in the 18th Century, was designed and built along this road. Many important battles in the Revolutionary War occurred on the eastern and southern ends of the road. The Civil War would see major battles along the western side of the road.

Dodson, a descendant of those who travelled the Great Wagon Road, sets out in an old station wagon to follow the road (Today, US 30 across Pennsylvania and US 11 through Virginia roughly follow the path). As he travels along the road over several years (as opposed to traveling from Philadelphia to Augusta in one trip), we learn about his relationship to the road and interesting things which occurred along it.  One young woman joked that he, an older man driving a station wagon, reminded her of Clark Griswold, a character played by Chevy Chase in the National Lampoon Vacation movies. 

In addition to his descendants having traveled this road, another experience drew Dodson to it. In college he had attended with his girlfriend, Kristin Cress, a Moravian Sunrise Service at Old Salem. A professor at Salem college told him about a nearby ford on the road. The young couple caught some of the excitement of the road. They planned to marry. But before they could, Kristin, a student at Appalachian State who worked in a restaurant, was killed at work during an armed robbery. Slowly, throughout the story, we learn more about Kristin. 

Dodson seems a bit odd to be writing a book about history and his experiences along the road. After all, much of his career involved reporting on golf. But he nicely blends his experiences and the history of the road. 

Not only does he explore the good parts of history, he also presents the shameful past such as the murder of the Conestoga Indians around Lancaster at the end of the French and Indian War. The Conestogas had signed a treaty with William Penn and had lived peacefully in a village. I found this hopeful at a time when our nation’s current administration orders the National Park Service to remove interpretation signs which they feel exposes shameful events in our past.  As he points out, “The past cannot be unremembered,”

Dodson spent time in his childhood in Roanoke, Virginia with his aunt Lily. As he stops in Big Lick, Roanoke’s original name, he recalls those times including attending with his aunt to an African American Church. On this trip, he visits 5thAvenue Presbyterian Church. There, Vernie Bolden, one of my fellow clergy members within the Presbytery of the Peaks, showed him around. One of the windows in 5th Avenue’s sanctuary, a historically black church, depicts Presbyterian and Confederate General Stonewall Jackson. As odd as this may seem, when the church was built in 1906, Jackson’s body servant during the Civil War, ‘Uncle’ Jeff Shields, spoke. Jackson also taught the parents of the pastor at that time, Reverend L.L. Downing, to read.  Dodson, however, acknowledges the racial problems in Roanoke, as it was one of the first cities in the south to establish Jim Crow laws. 

A year ago I read Neil King, Jr., An American Ramble. King’s walk from Washington DC to New York City, covers much of the early ground of Dodson’s travels, especially around Lancaster and York. Both write about the history of this area and of the two contemporary 19th Century bachelors: the abolitionist Thaddeus Stevens and President James Buchannan and their role leading up to the Civil War. Also, the Amish and Quaker’s fascinated both King and Dodson.  And both authors are willing to look at the noble and ignoble aspects of history. One difference is that King walked, which limited how far he could get from his path. Dodson, who drove, was able to enjoy things off the main road. 

I enjoyed this book. On a personal note, it’s possible the Garrisons came down the Great Wagon Road, as they settled south of Winston Salem. However, most of my ancestors came from the Scottish Highlands and settled in the Sandhills along the upper reaches of the Cape Fear River. And a few migrated into Virginia shortly after Jamestown and made their way south into North Carolina before the Revolutionary War.  

A couple of quotes:

“Better mind your P’s and Q’s, came from early taverns which sold beer as pints and quarts.” (324)

“Do you know how America was created. The English built the houses, the Germans built the barns, and the Scot Irish built the stills.” (379)

Robin Wall Kimmerer, The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural

 (New York: Scribner, 2024), 113 pages.

In this short collection of essays, Kimmerer envisions a new way to approach community building. She bases her ideas on her study of nature, especially the serviceberry tree. As she did in her other two books, Gathering Moss and Braiding Sweetgrass, she draws on her background as a native American as well as her knowledge as a scientist. But essentially, in this work, Kimmerer writes as an economist, even though she denies knowing much about the science. Or maybe she mostly writes about community building, for that’s what she envisions.

Observing nature, especially serviceberries, she suggests we look for ways to change our local economics from one based on scarcity. In such an economy, money is made by exchange of items in demand, to a society based on reciprocity.  The Serviceberry freely gives of its fruit. The animals who live around it enjoy not just the abundance of berries but share the abundance with others. In addition, they also performing necessary deeds which strengthen the life of the host plant. 

While Kimmerer doesn’t suggest we can quickly do away with the supply and demand economics, she does create a vision for small scale changes of sharing which could help enrich the lives of the participants.  She makes her case while sharing personal stories along with her knowledge of the plant world. 

This is a delightful book and I recommend it. 

Sam Ragan, The Collected Poems of Sam Ragan 

(Laurinburg, NC: St. Andrews Press, 1990), 275 pages.

I have known of Sam Ragan, a former Poet Laureate of North Carolina, most of my life. He edited “The Pilot,” a newspaper in Moore County from 1969 to his death in 1996. While staying with my grandparents, I would read his newspaper and hear my grandmother talk about him. Then, later, for many years, thanks to my grandmother, I received his newspaper while living in New York and Utah. I supposed this was her way of keeping me grounded to the North Carolina Sandhills.

As far as I know, I only meet him once, at a poetry reading in Lincolnton, NC, on April Fool’s Day, 1984.  I purchased two of his books and had him sign both. One I gave to Flora Abernethy, my date for the event. I kept the other book (Journey into Morning), which he signed and dated for me. This is how I knew our meeting was on April 1st. This collection of poems contains all his published work. This is my second reading of these poems. 

Ragan’s poems often draw from a glimpse of life which he captures in a few words. His words are positive and uplifting, as he celebrates life. While he writes about other months, October and April seem to be his favorite. The breaking of morning is his favorite time of day. Most of these verses take place in North Carolina, especially the Sandhills which were settled by Highlanders from Scotland, about whom he has a bit to say.

In addition to the Sandhills, he makes an occasional foray down to the Coast or to Raleigh. We meet interesting characters. A teetotaler who only drinks every fourth year on election day. It’s his way of expressing his opinion.  Or the preacher whose church steps were taken over by bees, keeping people away. Taking a torch, he burned the bees then preached a hell-fire sermon.  And we learn wisdom of one of his fellow editors who insisted the “function of a newspaper is ‘to print the news and raise hell.’” 

Ragan’s voice sounds best outdoors. The reader senses his love of flowers (azaleas and camellias for their beaty and lilacs for their fragrance).  He describes a storm moving through a grove of longleaf pines, and the birds seen in his garden during the seasons. The water’s edge often draws Ragan’s attention. He even named one of his books The Water’s Edge. 

This is an enjoyable collection, and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys poetry. 

cover of "We Must Be Brave"

Frances Liardet, We Must Be Brave 

(New York: G.P. Putman & Sons, 2019), 453 pages. Audible, 16 hours and 7 minutes. 

I’m not sure what drew me to this book when I saw it on an Audible two-for-one sale, but it sounded intriguing. I then picked up a copy at the library which allowed me to read some sections slower. I enjoyed the story which begins in 1940 Britain. Germany bombs the port city of Southampton. As the city burns, people flee to surrounding villages. Ellen and Selwyn Parr volunteer to help. On one bus, Ellen discovers Pamela, a young girl, asleep in a dirty blanket in the back. No one seems to know where her mother is at, but a few women seem to think she was on the bus before this one. Only later, they discovered she died in the bombings when a bomb struck the Crown Hotel. 

Ellen, who did not want children, takes Pamela and insists on keeping her. Unable to find any relationships who want the girl, she stays with the Parrs for the next four years. The book flashes back to Ellen’s troubled childhood and her meeting of Selwyn. She was 18 and he 39. Selwyn has his own story as he had been in the First World War. He’s now a miller in the village of Upton. Then, in the spring of 1944, as the Allies prepare to invade Europe, her father, who had been a navy surgeon, returns. Wounded, he lost the use of one hand, which ends his surgery career. Claiming Pamela, he sends his daughter to his sister in Ireland to raise. 

Pamela and Ellen correspond for a while, till her aunt in Ireland calls a halt to the exchanges. Pamela longs to return to England, even trying to run away. Ellen continues to write letters, but saves them. Then, in the 1970s, there is a flood. Ellen rescues a girl named Penny, from the flood and from her alcoholic mother (her father is with the military in Northern Ireland). In a way, the story repeats, but once Penny is older, she comes across Pamela who is a glass blower living in the American Southwest. She arranges a visit between Pamela and Ellen, who is 90 years old in 2010. 

This wonderful story centers on the love Ellen gives to both girls. It’s also a story about the heartbreak caused by the loss of children, which led me to post a story a few weeks ago about Becky, a foster daughter I’d hope would become an adopted daughter. Ellen was in her early 20s when she met Pamela and Pamela was over 70 when they were reunited. 

Not only is the story wonderful and I found myself caring about all the characters (and I left many characters out in my short synopsis),but Liardet’s writes beautifully. I love how she brings the senses into the story. You felt like you were in damp Southern England or the desert of the American Southwest.  She also includes some surprise twists, such as what happened to her real father. 

As one who doesn’t read a lot of fiction, I enjoyed this book and recommend it.