For many years, Billie and I followed gospel music all over the country. Occasionally, I find myself humming some of my favorite songs. One most recently that comes to my mind was written by R.E. Winsett titled "Jesus Is Coming Soon."

One of the verses goes as follows: "Troublesome times are here, filling men's hearts with fear, freedom we all hold dear now is at stake; Humbling your heart to God, saves from the hasting rod, Seek the way pilgrims trod, Christians a-wake."

More often than I care to admit, fear has a way of creeping into my life completely unannounced. To me this is the way Satan has of catching us off guard in our daily lives.

As we listen to the wind howling and the rain beating down, I recall another time many years ago that I experienced fear. It is at times like this that I remember Mama teaching us to memorize and repeat a portion of the 23rd Psalm. It, of course, says: "The Lord is my sheperd, I shall not want." This would usually put me to sleep immediately.

This reminds me that I have not fulfilled my promise to readers to bring you laughter from time to time. Some of my favorite stories about preachers came to me from one of my friends who was a preacher.

The Rev. Robert P. Turner was pastor emeritus of Target United Methodist Church near Holly Hill. It seems a religious census was being taken to determine who attended church and who did not belong to any church. In a county where Brother Turner was preaching at the time, all was going well until time to count the results, and a situation was discovered. One of the religious men of the community failed to answer the question about church affiliation. This was left blank. He was asked, "Why didn't you put a P?" He replied, "I didn't want them to think I was Piscoplian."

A little on the lighter side is a little story my friend Melvin told me about a character named Bubber. The story takes place in a prominent doctor's office. The place was filled with patients. Bubber walked into the office and approached the receptionist to register his visit. She asked him, "What have you got?"

He replied, "Shingles."

The nice lady gave Bubber a stack of papers to be filled out. Some time later, she directed him to a room. He was told someone would be in there shortly. The nurse soon came in and asked him what he had, and he again answered, "Shingles."

She told Bubber to roll up his sleeve, and she took his pressure and did all the preliminaries. She then directed him to another room, where he was told to remove his clothes and the doctor would be in shortly.

Soon the doctor arrived, and once again Bubber was asked, "What have you got?"

"Shingles," Bubber said.

The doctor then asked, "Where?"

To which Bubber replied, "In the back lot where I was told to unload them."

Lest we forget ...

T&D Columnist Rinehart Chewning is a longtime resident of Holly Hill. His column appears every Saturday.

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