I usually stream something when I’m on the treadmill, anything that will make the time pass quickly. Things I probably wouldn’t normally watch are perfect. Right now, I’m watching the old television program, Nashville. It’s basically a nighttime soap opera with some fairly good country music. A lot of twist and turns in a plot generated by a large cast of characters. For me right now, it’s a distraction I need.

In an episode I watched this morning, one character says to another, “It’s important to be there for people in need.” Nothing about that line of dialogue makes it remarkable—nothing but the direct truth of the statement, a truth we sometimes find it easy to forget. That line resonated for me, and I share it with you now in case it becomes, as it did for me, a necessary reminder. As Miller Williams says in his poem, “Compassion,” “You do not know what wars are going on/down there where the spirit meets the bone.”

Amen.