The Talking Tools

"Your friend Jon is really growing in his faith, isn't he? It's been fun to see him plug in at church," Uncle Ken said as Landon helped him replace the worn-out boards on the porch.

"Yeah," Landon said.

"His solo with the junior choir was great," Uncle Ken said between creaks and squeaks as he pulled nails. Landon didn't answer. As they worked, he was very quiet--too quiet. Uncle Ken put down his hammer. "Landon, is everything okay?"

Landon sighed. "It's just that Jon does everything better than I do. I used to sing solos, but now Jon sings most of them. He's the star student in our class at church too--he brings more visitors and learns more Bible verses than anybody else."

Uncle Ken nodded. "Get the tape measure out of the toolbox, will you, Landon? Let's measure and cut the new boards." He grinned. "What would you think if the hammer got mad when we started using the tape measure? Or what if the tape measure said, 'You left me in this box for an hour, so I'm not going to measur