Blog – Page 2 – Jeff Hampton, Writer

Last Saturday we had two dozen members of the Autrey family at our home in Garland. It was a family reunion, but in some ways it was a foretaste of heavenly reunions to come.

LeAnn’s mother, Thelma, was the fourth daughter and last child born to Taylor and Ella Autrey in Grayson County, Texas. At 102 years old now, Thelma is the matriarch of a family tree with branches stretching to Illinois, Oregon, the Texas Hill Country and various locations here in North Central Texas.

March 26, 2026March 26, 2026

Easter Confusion

For Wilshire Baptist Church

We were eating a late lunch at home on Tuesday when we heard the familiar wail of the city’s emergency sirens. But then we looked at each other with the same thought: It was the wrong day of the month, wrong day of the week, wrong time of day. Something was not right.

The sirens are tested at noon on the first Wednesday of every month. Any other day or time and it means it’s not a test. We’d already been out and about that morning and knew the weather was fine. So why the sirens? It didn’t take long for folks on social media sites like Nextdoor and Ring to start asking the same question.

March 19, 2026

The Herald of Easter

For Wilshire Baptist Church

Nothing heralds the coming of Easter for me more than the call of a blue jay on a sunny, cool spring day when flowers and trees are just beginning to bloom. The call sometimes has two notes at once, creating a distinctive harmonic sound, and it’s music to my ears as Easter approaches.

Why the blue jay? For most of my growing up years we went to my maternal grandparents’ house in Orange, Texas for Easter. It felt like a sacred pilgrimage as we left home at dawn, drove to Tyler and descended down through the Piney Woods passing farms and small towns, lumber yards and sawmills, dogwoods and sumac. Then, during our four days in Orange we’d visit extended family and friends, play in the shady green yard and take long walks around the pretty town full of old houses, old trees and azaleas. And then on Sunday, there’d be church, lunch, an Easter egg hunt with a white coconut bunny cake, and then we’d pile into the car for the six-hour drive home.