This is supposed to be the season of joy and giving, a time for celebrating the birth of the Christ Child.

The joy has been tempered in our community, which has been rocked by the tragic and unexpected deaths of two of our local residents.

Charles Allen Lemaster, an employee of a local industry, apparently was killed in a freak accident when he was caught in a feeder belt. Lemaster was a veteran and the father of two children.

Dwight Larry Moody, a local youth pastor, had apparently pulled off the road to check something on his truck when he was struck by another motorist and was killed.

Moody also left behind a grieving family.

We are sure that residents of our community will keep both of these gentlemen and their families in their prayers.

Their untimely deaths might well remind each of us that we do not know the time of our departure from this earth, and so we should always take that extra minute to be nice to someone or to tell our loved ones how much we care, not just during the Christmas season, but all year long.