VALDOSTA — In his latest book, “A Christmas Cornucopia: Advent/Christmas Meditations,” former Valdosta pastor W. Hamp Watson Jr. applies the same insightful and folksy approach of his past volumes to thoughts and stories on Christmas.

“Not everyone will get just what you want for Christmas,” Watson notes in this book’s introduction. “But if you can experience an overflowing abundance of Christmas blessings in the heart and soul and mind, this effort will have achieved its purpose. It is my earnest hope … that there will be some who read and look and gaze like children with ‘longing eyes.’ I would be so pleased if some souls magnified the Lord because He has filled the hungry with good things.”

As for the “Cornucopia” part of the title, Watson has filled this book with an enjoyable and thought-provoking array of ideas surrounding Christmas. But it doesn’t center so much on the Dec. 25 date of Christmas as it does the Christian ideals behind Christmas.

Watson provides commentary on living a Christian life, living with the generosity of the Christmas spirit, in a tough world, 365 days a year.

And this isn’t another book dedicated to a “War Against Christmas” or putting the Christ back into Christmas of the past season, which became something of an un-Christmas-like effort itself. No, Watson is interested in making arguments for readers to put Christ into their lives.

That has likely been the aim of all of Watson’s books from the past few years.

Watson’s name should be familiar to many Valdostans. He served as the pastor of Park Avenue United Methodist Church from 1984-88, and he was district superintendent out of Valdosta from 1993-95. A Baxley native, Watson started pastoring United Methodist churches in 1951. He is the retired supply pastor for Glenwood Hills United Methodist Church, Macon.

Three years ago, Watson released his first book, “Frederick Wilson Still Speaks: Big Words for Our Time,” in which Watson didn’t write but rather compiled and transcribed some of the sermons of the late Dr. Frederick Wilson, a pastor who lived, preached and taught in Valdosta during the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Following that book’s publication, Watson discovered other sermons taped and/or transcribed prior to Wilson’s 1990 death, but there weren’t enough of these additional sermons for a second volume. Not by themselves anyway. Watson supplemented 10 of his sermons with six of Wilson’s for a very readable “More Big Words for Our Time: A Lift for the Living and a Gift for the Grieving.”

Last fall, Watson released a third book, “Little Stories, Big Ideas,” which combined his words with thoughts of numerous area pastors, including contributions from area names such as Bishop Marion M. Edwards, V.L. Daughtery, Bill Dupree, and more.

Watson donates the profits from all of his books to various causes, having raised thousands of dollars from each for the Methodist Home for Children and Youth; Wesley Glen, the South Georgia Conference’s home for adults with handicapping conditions; the Christian ministry of Magnolia Manor’s League of the Good Samaritan, which promises that no resident will ever have to leave due to lack of financial support. “A Christmas Cornucopia’s” proceeds will go to the ministry of Epworth by the Sea on St. Simons Island.

Even the profits of his books keep W. Hamp Watson in the giving spirit of Christmas each day of the year.



• Book info

The Rev. W. Hamp Watson Jr.’s “A Christmas Cornucopia.”

To purchase: Contact W. Hamp Watson Jr., 149 Cambridge Way, Macon, Ga. 31220; e-mail (whwatson2@cox.net).

Cost: $14, but is $16 with shipping and handling charges. If sending check, make it out to Epworth by the Sea.