Thanksgiving Weekend (10/10/09 - 22 Comments)
It is Thanksgiving Weekend here in Canada--about as early a Thanksgiving as we ever have, I think. It comes a long time before the American equivalent, at any rate. The Canadian Thanksgiving is a fair bit like its American counterpart, though without the storied history. Where Americans have great stories about Pilgrims and the Indians who saved their lives, Canadians just know that we get the day off and that it's a good day to...
Got To's and Get To's (09/24/09 - 22 Comments)
A couple of days ago I sat down with Aileen and a blank piece of paper. On the top of the paper I wrote, "If we were better parents to our children we would..." and then, between the two of us, we began to jot down ideas. We thought of some of the things we would do if we were to be the kind of parents we really want to be--parents who love our children,...
Familiarity and Contempt (09/09/09 - 15 Comments)
When I need to travel by plane, I often catch a shuttle to the airport. This is one of those little buses that will pick me up at my door and drop me at the terminal. The service is a little bit expensive (and getting more so), at least compared to having Aileen drive me, but the cost is well worth it when compared to waking the family at 5 AM and bundling them into...
Counseling Myself (08/17/09 - 17 Comments)
Just about a week ago Aileen and I celebrated our eleventh wedding anniversary. The Lord has been kind to us and, though in many ways we feel like we're just getting started, at the same time we can look back on an ever-lengthening legacy of God's faithfulness to us. Last week I paused a few times to think about the last eleven years and began to wonder what I would say if I could go...
2000 (04/22/09 - 23 Comments)
A long time ago I added to this web site a little counter. It is way down at the bottom right of each page and it increments by one number each day. It simply tracks the number of days since I made a commitment to blog every day. That was back on October 1, 2003. I first put it there as a challenge and as a reminder to write something every day. I had found...
The Ears of the Deaf (03/23/09 - 37 Comments)
Last weekend I enjoyed participating in the Ligonier Ministries National Conference, both as a blogger and an observer. It was a joy to gather with almost 5,000 other Christians so we could spend three days focusing on the holiness of God. This marked my third time going to this conference and each one has proven valuable to my knowledge of God and my love for him. This one may well have been my favorite, at...
Mom Shovels the Drive (03/02/09 - 51 Comments)
Mom always shovels the driveway. It's a phenomenon I've noticed time and again. We live in a neighborhood that has a lot of single moms. I suppose the statistics dictate that most neighborhoods have more than their fair share of single moms. But ours seems to have an unusual amount. I think it is related to the housing prices here. We live in (quite literally) the most affordable housing in town. It is one of...
Like Love (02/23/09 - 42 Comments)
I've been to my share of conferences in the past few years and quite a few of these have been geared toward pastors. There's a phenomenon I've noticed at the beginning of these events. In many cases these conferences are an opportunity for old friends to reconnect. Many times pastors have been attending the same conference year after year and have met new friends there or have reconnected with old friends from their college or...
Freedom in Christ (01/21/09 - 26 Comments)
(Continued from yesterday) My friend and I had taken hours out of our weekend to clean Barb's squalid, rundown house. But then, when she got home, she was angry--very angry. Now there was one thing I neglected to say about Barb. Beside her couch/bed was one of those Rubbermaid containers, the kind with several drawers. Each of these drawers contained an assortment of silk Hermes scarves. Each of these scarves, we later learned, had been...
A Slave to Sin (01/20/09 - 20 Comments)
Barb claimed to be a psychiatrist, but my guess is that she was not a very good one. One day she had asked our friends, her next door neighbors, to help clean up her house a little bit. She was having trouble with her finances and wanted to sell off a few valuable possessions. But first she needed to tidy up some. I volunteered to pitch in. Our friends regarded Barb as more of a...
A Blog Is Born (01/04/09 - 26 Comments)
Continued from yesterday and the day before. And so it was that I found myself an entrepreneur--the owner of my own company. The story of this little company cannot be separated from the story of this blog. I've told the story of this blog's early days, but will tell it again here. In September of 2002 I decided, rather on the spur of the moment as I recall, to begin my own web site. I...
Effectual Worrying (01/03/09 - 21 Comments)
Continued from yesterday... It was almost seven years ago that I was laid off and started my own company. I began without money and without loans. Since that time we have never lacked for anything important. There have been times where we have had to be frugal to get by, but God has always provided. It is rare, I think, to receive such a dramatic and instantaneous answer to prayer. God had clearly orchestrated that...
An Answer to Prayer (01/02/09 - 24 Comments)
In April of 2002 I was bored. Not just a little bored either, but mind-numbingly, depressingly, discouragingly bored. Having recently been laid off from a job I had held for several years, I was now working at a new job where I was system administrator at a small company in downtown Oakville. Though the pay was good and the office's location was great, the job itself was terribly drab. It was repetitive and boring--there was...
The Communion of Saints (10/18/08 - 5 Comments)
Yesterday I had the privilege of speaking at Chinese Gospel Church in downtown Toronto. It's a church right in the heart of the city in the area known (not so creatively) as Chinatown (if you ever go there you will quickly find out why it has this name). I told the people there that, when I was growing up in the suburbs, we used to go on class trips to Chinatown as a kind of...
On the Giving of Thanks (10/13/08 - 10 Comments)
If you've been reading this site for a few years, you may remember the time I wrote about my old van leaving me stranded on the side of the highway. My lease was nearly over and I had to drive across town (about one hour each way) to visit a car dealer and have him put a price on my van. This happened to be a rare occasion that I did not have my cell...
No Fickle Fan (09/17/08 - 9 Comments)
A couple of weeks ago, I went to watch the Toronto Blue Jays take on the Tampa Bay Rays (baseball, for those of you who may not follow professional sports). For the first time in recent memory I went to the game on back-to-back days, both Friday and Saturday. When they announced the group that would sing the national anthems for Saturday afternoon's game, I knew I was where I needed to be that day....
Got To Get To (07/25/08 - 25 Comments)
My children have been behaving a little bit strangely at bedtime in recent days. My son tends to be melancholy in the evenings at the best of times but recently has been getting worried as soon as we tuck him into bed. Two nights ago he was concerned that the Sith were going to attack him (how he even knows who the Sith are is beyond me) and last night he was worried that the...
Resolved (07/13/08 - 14 Comments)
This is just about my favorite time of day. The house is quiet and no one else awake. It allows me a few minutes to myself—time I use every day to read the Bible and pray. I know that in a few minutes the family will begin to stir. Nick and Abby will wake up and Michaela will not be far behind. It won’t be long before the quiet is punctuated by their childish squabbles...
Becoming a Better Apologizer (03/21/08 - 28 Comments)
I was in a bad mood yesterday. For weeks now I’ve been trying to figure out something simple with a nearby bank—or something that should be simple. It has been a comedy of errors, really. Every time I try to do something (anything!), it seems that their incompetence or ignorance is working against me. I’ll receive a phone call telling me to come in and sign papers, but when I get there I’m told that...
The Public Nuisance (03/05/08 - 42 Comments)
Elizabeth is a public nuisance. Her status is not official yet, but it will be soon. The local police have encouraged the families in this neighborhood to fill out the paperwork that will fulfill the legal requirements. It’s probably the best thing to do. When that paperwork is complete the police will no longer be forced to respond to her every call. And she calls a lot. When a car parks a little too far...
