My siblings

Did you know that I have an older brother and a younger sister. I also had a younger brother but he died before I actually got to see him; but I did get to name him. If he lived he would have been called Dennis but since he passed away my parents let me keep my name for him "Timmy". I had a crush on this older guy at the time and his name was Tim!



I didn't see my older brother much when I was growing up because he was away at boarding school. The time that I remember him really standing is as my "older brother" was when I too went to boarding school. I hated boarding school (I went for part of grade 3), but fortunately my brother was there to take care of me; and that he did.


Greg is married to Robin and he has one son (Jesse) and a number of step-children. I really only know his youngest stepchild Allen.

Robin find it harder to get around now so Greg is trying to work from home by starting an internet business. He has an internet classified section where can buy or sell items. Feel free to check it out:
Canadian Classifieds
US Classifieds
The Gift Gallery

I remember visiting my sister in the hospital when she was first born. Since there is almost 6 years between us I had the fortunate advantage of having a real baby to play with when I was younger. I love the fact that she understands me and knows how I think. We can usually finish each others sentence.

As adults we lived together for a number of years and during that period she taught me how we were different and yet we are very bonded because of our underlining principles and goals. In less than a month she'll be marrying David; a guy that God brought into her life last summer; yet we're realizing he's been part of our family for years because many of our cousins know him

$$$$

I went to an interesting talk this week. It was about $, riches and wealth. The speaker says the bible has defined these 3 things differently. $ is a man made thing. Riches are what you have between $ and wealth and wealth is about a home, people etc. I happen to know this man belongs to Youth With A Mission and I know in Youth With A Mission people don't get paid. They trust God to provide for them so he's practicing what he is preaching and allowing God to be his employer. He left a his job at IBM to be a missionary with Youth With A Mission years ago and he says when he left he was asked, "what's it like to get your last pay cheque? and his answer was freeing...because he was free to do what God wants him to do"

I've got other friends in YWAM and I'm pretty sure I don't have the faith they have. I like the control of being able to take care of myself in a responsible manner. I think of Paul saying "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want." Phil 4:11-12
Well as strange as this may seem I find it harder with lots than with little. I've gone through the days of no food. No I didn't starve but I know what it's like to wait in line to buy a lbs of sugar but now I have. Is it right to spend on me??? A year or so God challenged me on this. Was I being a good Christian by not spending or was I just taking control of things God needed to control? Having means I need (or get to) decide where to spend. Do I believe God loves me enough to take care of me? It says He will but do I believe it? Am I prepared to obey Him no matter what? Do I believe He knows best? Will I allow Him to prove Himself to me?

Fortunately God can break through inspite of me. I decided to go on a Mission Trip to Guatemala. Since I can afford this and since I thought of it as a winter vacation I didn't see the need to ask others to help out. I just paid for it myself. What is neat is that when I arrived home from Guatemala I had a bonus cheque from work that covered this trip almost to the dollar! It's not that this $ is mine because I already promised God I would give it all away, no matter how much I got...but just the fact God, not I, decided to pay for my trip...I think this is cool. But God wasn't done here. He took my offering of my unknown amount on the bonus cheque and decided that I should have some too. You see, my boss came to me and told me my bonus cheque wasn't enough and he'd work on getting me more $...but the money to come is not part of my promise to God! I think it's awesome.

So now the Kingdom adventure continues. Since you've read this far are you prepared to follow God's direction now? Is God directing you to do something and you need money to do it? Can you take a little money and multiply it in God's kingdom? Here it is. I'll give $100 to the first 5 people that ask for it in the comments of this blog (if I know how to get a hold of you). I will then trust God to use them and the $ for Kingdom purposes. If you choose to report back and tell us how the venture went all the better. I know, some of you will think I'm crazy, others will think there is a catch, some may decide to use the $ selfishly; it doesn't matter. Remember, this website is dedicated to getting an eternal perspective on things. I'd love it if someone takes the money and comes back with a good story on how it was used for God's kingdom...but even if this doesn't happen I'm okay with it...because it's God's money.

Guatemala

What a neat adventure. I didn't realize it had live volcanoes and you can actually see them puffing out smoke (from a distance that is). My only disappointment here was I didn't actually see the orange lava (and don't think I'm the only one that thinks like this; my room mate on the trip wanted to see it too!)

I now have all my pictures back and I'm expecting pictures from other team members this weekend because I'm going to put together a power point presentation on the trip. They'll be showing to at Compass Point Church on March 26th. I'm not sure what time the services are there. I'm thinking it might be shown at all three services.

As a quick summary though; we had a great team, I painted a lot and worked on getting over my fear of heights, we put on a couple of kids programs and we got to tour. Our full weekend away we got to spend in a tourist place near a lake surround by mountains.

Ephesians 4

I've had an interesting experience over the past 5 years where everywhere I go God seems to be pointing Ephesians 4 out to me. I've been to different denominations, cities and countries and everywhere verses from Ephesians 4 have been highlighted.

I've just come back from a 2 week short term mission to Guatemala and while we were gone we studied the book of Ephesians. When I heard we were doing this I smiled inside and wondered what God was going to do here. I was told I could choose a passage but I decided I'd just wait and see what got assigned to me. I eventually got the last 1/2 of Ephesians 3 assigned to me so I thought hummm, I got out of Ephesians 4; but that only lasted 1/2 a day. I was then asked if we could fast track things and if I could do all of Ephesians 4!!!! Go figure.

I don't know if Ephesians 4 is just a message for me or if it's wider spread that that but what I do see are struggles in churches such as contemporary versus traditional, younger people versus older people, and the philosophy that the church is made for the church attenders versus those outside the church. Ephesians 4 gives a lot of practical points on how to handle these issues.

Here are a few I've picked up on:
a) Stay focused on the Trinity (not other people) verses 3-5
b) Be humble (Jesus demonstrated this by leaving heaven to live with us; He didn't get what He was entitled to...until later) verses 2, 8-10
c) Show the fruit of the Spirit (see Gal 5:22 for more description of what I mean). verses 2, 15, 32
d) Watch your mouth verses 25-26, 29, 31
e) Be teachable verse 17

Feel free to add more on what you get out of these verses.

Hope

Today I was looking at the gorgeous view in my backyard and thinking of the hope that is within me.

Over the past few years I've done a little bit of studying about what's happening in the churches in Canada. Reginal Bibby is the main socialist that I've studied. One of the things he's said is "The prevailing school of thought says that while Canadians have growing spiritual needs, churches are becoming emptier and emptier. " These types of comments have led me to ask; are the churches dead? and the thought that comes to my mind when I ask this question is; are the trees dead?

So, you see the picture from my backyard this morning? Are the trees(churches) dead? or is it that we're not all made to be evergreens? or is it that it's just for a season they appear dead? What are your thoughts?

Can Christians have fun????

You're darn right they can have fun! Did you know that Jesus first miracle was to increase the wine supply at a wedding! Of course to think that one needs wine to be happy is a mistake too. I think the best way to be happy is to be who God made you to be. For me this means soaking in a hot tub, reading a book, a sunset canoe ride, snow or water tubing, walking and sharing about things that count with a friend, and discovering new sites in God's wonderful creating. What is it for you? Don't worry about what others think you're suppose to be...be you; after all God knows the real you.

So this month, besides tubing, and X-country skiing I'm going to a CSI seminar! (that's right CSI...discovering how the Waterloo police solve crimes.) That's also fun for me!

The Cost of the Cross

Lately I've been challenged with the task of leading a Youth Alpha. The idea is you present the same material as the Adult Alpha course but far more interactively. This means I've had people (namely Margaret and Stephanie) scrounging around for videos and music for me. This course also contains experiments and games. Fortunately others have done the course before and left ideas behind. For instance, this week is talking about the power of the cross. To illustrate this you take some water and add some food colouring to it and make the water really dirty; then you take some bleach and add red food colouring to the bleach to represent the blood of Jesus; then you take this mixture and add it to the dirty water; although it's not instance, within an hour or so the water is completely clean again! "Oh the blood of Jesus, that washes white as snow".

Even with this great illustration though I still find the concept of the cross hard. I guess it's because I haven't been raised with the Jewish and Moslem heritage of animal sacrifices. It was Henri that found a story that solidified this concept for me; check it out at: http://dailywisdom.gospelcom.net/archives/old/1996/04/dw-04-12-96.html

Thanks!!

To my colleagues and friends that helped at the Wish Tree; Although it's slow at times it all added up

Alpha

If you know of anyone who wants to find out about the basics of Christianity I HIGHLY recommend the ALPHA course http://www.alphacanada.org/
It's a life changing course. The Salvation Army in Kitchener has an introductory supper on Jan 8th at 5:30pm. Supper is free and there is no obligation to continue the course. If people want more information they can definitely call me (519) 716-6586.