One is that he was just coming off coronary bypass surgery.  Less than a month earlier.  He was doing well in his recovery, but you know that medical people warn against depression and other kinds of personal crises which can overtake someone in this condition.  Another is that a combination of the weakness from the surgery and the strong medications might have left him disoriented.  He could have gotten lost.  Yet another is that he has been abducted and carried off somewhere without a trace.  Still another is that he decided to leave and had in place a detailed plan which has him disappearing in such a manner that no one could ever find him.  There are examples to illustrate each one of these possibilities.
   
In the meantime the family waits and hopes increasingly against hope that he will turn up, come home, be found, or something like this.  Rumors are running rampant, on the other hand, suggesting all kinds of wild scenarios about what might have happened to him.  The rumors are not helpful but confusing and damaging.  The man's family is exhausted physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.  Regular contact and prayers are helpful from many church families.  The law enforcement agencies are on the case.  They are consummate professionals, and if he can be found, they will find him.  When they do, then you wonder with some apprehension what he will be like.  Will he be harmed?  Will he have changed?  Is he leading a double life?  Does he have some serious illness about which no one knew?
   
No one likes to have a great big question mark--?--in the middle of one's day or of one's life.  Yet that's what this family has and also to a great extent our South Jackson/Byram community.  If you read this message, please remember this family--unnamed--in prayer and their very supportive community.