Another Fine Day of Shoveling

Last night was a beautiful night of light fluffy flakes gently falling to the ground. I haven't seen snow fall that gently since I was a teenager working at Silver Star Mountain Resort in Vernon, BC. It fell so gently, it could have been a Hallmark moment. It accumulated pretty fast last night so I went out and shoveled after my Tim Horton's coffee, and I am about to go out again and shovel the walk because you can't tell that I shoveled. I love the snow, I don't like the cold that comes with it, but I love the snow. When we were in Texas I would tell people that in Canada we can dress for the cold, but down in Houston, you can only get so naked before it becomes illegal. You can do more in the snow than you can without. Like, outdoor ice hockey, tobogganing, downhill skiing, cross-country skiing, snow boarding, telemarking (not to be confused with telemarketing), snow shoeing, dog sledding, ice fishing, etc.

Snow also brings a freshness to life also. It is pure white, and gorgeous and has a sense of innocence with it. Isaiah 1:18 says, "'Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become as white as wool."

So I am going to go out and shovel the snow, and remember just how much I have been forgiven by God our Father through our Lord Jesus Christ. His crimson blood has washed me as white as snow.

Christmas Morning

Well, it is still Christmas morning and the kids have opened their presents. Riley loves his new piano and sawyer loves pushing people around and taking their presents from them. I got an Old Spice gift set. You know you're getting old when you get an Old Spice gift set. So I thought I would read the back of my Old Spice after shave bottle. It says, "Do not apply while smoking." I don't have to worry about that, but the question needs to be asked, "Why would they put that on the back of an Old Spice bottle?" The answer.... Because somebody must have applied Old Spice while smoking. I wonder how much money they got for that stunt? As you open your Christmas presents, have a good laugh and read the warning labels on your presents, and why don't you just go ahead and post the dumbest ones on this blog. Have a Merry Christmas and have a Merry laugh while you're at it.

Tapestry

We are now in Calgary for Christmas time. Calgary has a little bit more snow than Medicine Hat, and it is bitterly cold. The nightly average all week will be -30 Celsius, or - 28 Fahrenheit. It is definitely not metal post licking weather. We got to go to church at Tapestry yesterday. Tapestry is our sponsor church in Calgary, and they treat us so well. They gave us an awesome Christmas present with over $200 worth of Gift cards to nice restaurants and other places, but that wasn't the highlight of church; the highlight was Fran. I have never met Fran before, but Fran has been going to Tapestry for a while now, and she is quite the prayer warrior. She prayed for Pathway, and that we would find a building really soon, but then she went off on a tangent, and the only way to explain it was that she was filled with the Holy Spirit because she started praying about the huge dreams that I had for Pathway that I have never shared with anybody except Leigh. She prayed for the gigantic dreams that we have, and for the people groups we are ministering to. As I said, the only way to explain it was that she was filled with the Holy Spirit and was confirming what we believe God is going to do with us in Medicine Hat and around the world. What a beautiful Christmas gift, thank you Tapestry, and thank you Jesus for blessing us with such a wonderful church family even though they are hundreds of kilometers away.

Along the Path

We have reached a neat little fork in the road for our blogging journey. Leigh and I have decided to continue this blog, "The Wilks Family in Medicine Hat," but it will only be on what is happening in our family. I have started a new blog titled Along The Path, that is about the journey of Pathway as we seek to glorify God in Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada and the ends of the earth. I think you will find today's post very interesting. I want to thank all of you who have journeyed with us through this blog. We have readers from every continent except South America. I want to thank you for letting us somehow be part of your lives. Please continue to read this blog, but also take a look at Along The Path.

First Mission Trip

The main part of our vision at Pathway is that each home group will do one in town mission trip per month. These mission trips are community service projects where we volunteer in the city in order to bless it. Our first mission trip will be at the Monarch Theatre on Monday night from 7-9 pm. We as a church will be volunteering our time to help renovate this awesome building built almost 100 years ago.

I got a phone call from a guy in our church today, and he told me that there is a pre-Believer coming to our place tonight. Saturday nights are reserved for Bible Study, but tonight we are having an American Thanksgiving. She told our church member that she wants to help out in our mission trip.

I am so pumped over this! We have non Christians already wanting to join us in Bible Study and Mission! This is Celtic Evangelism in action! People are seeing Jesus in us and wanting to be around Jesus!

I Don't Believe Jesus is God

Now that I have your attention from the title, please note that I base my life on the fact that JESUS IS GOD. But as I was teaching one of my guys in the college ministry how to write a Bible study, we began to talk with Lola in the student lounge. Lola is 18 and was sitting with In Sook, one of our Korean Believers who attends Medicine Hat College. In Sook missed our Bible study today, and asked how it was, I told her it was good, and asked Lola (who I've met before) when she is going to come to Bible Study. "When I believe in God," was her answer. Lola is from the far east Asian part of Russia, and she has read the Torah. She wears the star of David, does not classify herself as a Jew, and does not believe that Jesus is God. We had a great discussion today and she let me pray with her. Just as I was about to pray, another girl shows up and sits down with us.

"Oh, man!" I thought, "Isn't this just like the enemy!" We are about to pray with a non-Believer and the enemy shoves somebody in there to not let this happen. Boy, was I wrong! It turns out this girl has a father who is on faculty at the college. As a matter of fact, her father is a Christian. Not only is her father a Christian, but I was at her parent's house on Monday night, praying with the Christian Faculty for the students at MHC!

This young lady prayed with us and Lola, for Jesus to reveal Himself to her. I think we will have some great discussions with Lola and pray that salvation will come to her. I pray that one day she will say, "I do believe that Jesus is the Son of God and I love Him with all my heart!" Will you pray for Lola also?

The Monarch

I had lunch with a good friend of mine whose organization bought the Monarch Theatre in Medicine Hat today. My friend, George, showed me all of this theatre. This theatre is in a state of disrepair, but as he showed me all over the theatre, I felt like I was walking into the Phantom of the Opera. The theatre was built in 1911, and there are hidden crown molding that are the original moldings and plaster cornice still there almost 100 years later. We went to the "dungeon" where the original orchestra pit was. We saw the boiler room, found the old well and the original gas lights that operated 100 years ago. It was like a took a trip in Delorian at 88 miles per hour.

George asked me if our church could help him fix up the Monarch. He wants to turn it back into an operating theatre. For somebody who is not a Christian yet, to ask a church to help fix up something that will not benefit the church itself is a huge statement. You see, most churches are like ingrown toenails. They are ingrown, and they don't want to grow numerically, they want to grow deep.

George has seen how we are all about serving the city. And he has seen in us that we love our city and has the confidence to ask us to help him. What else can we say except yes? Our biggest thing in the church is serving the city, and this is a great way to serve, and for a community leader to ask us, a church that has not even had their first Sunday service yet to do this is quite amazing.

STASIS

Last night I had the awesome privilege of speaking to some high school students and young adults at a brand new ministry called STASIS. This ministry was created to help keep the young people out of the bars. Here in Alberta the legal drinking age is 18, and as most of you know, booze does way more harm than good. I have never seen alcohol bring something good into the life of a person or a family.

So I was asked to speak on the Armor of God. The armor of God is found in the 6th chapter of the book of Ephesians. Ephesians only has six chapters, so I explained to the young people that if we jumped right into studying the armor of God, it would be like picking up a novel and reading the last page. Sure you understand how the book ends, but you don't have any clue on how that ending ties into the book, and you may get the wrong idea about the ending because you don't even know the theme of the book.

So we looked at the theme of Ephesians and that is Unity. Unity in Christ and Unity in the church. It told them that Ephesians has two parts. Chapters 1-3 is all theology, chapters 4-6 is the application of that theology. We also looked at a very important phrase in Ephesians and that is the phrase, "In The Heavenly Realms" This phrase happens 5 times in the whole book.

1:3 God has given us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms.
1:20 God seated Christ at His right hand in the heavenly realms (to be at the right hand of God means to have the most powerful seat. It shows ultimate authority next to God)
2:6 God has seated us with Christ in the Heavenly realms (where is Christ seated ?)
3:10 the church will show the manifold wisdom of God to the demonic forces in the heavenly realms

The demonic forces once knew what is was like to be in the presence of God. They were angels who decided to follow the Liar, Satan, and they left heaven and every spiritual blessing they knew. Now we as Christians have all of this above, and we as the Church are showing them the wisdom of God. Do you think they are happy with that? Do you think that like it that we have something better than they once had? The answer is no, and they hate us for that. So that brings us to the last phrase:

6:12 - Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against rulers and powers and authorities in this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

So now that we have an understanding of what is going on in Ephesians, we can now take a look at the Armor of God.

The Belt of Truth
The Roman soldiers would put the belt on first because it connected the upper and lower armor. It brought unity to the armor.
We saw that Truth is not a concept. Truth is a person (John 14:6) We are to know Truth, live Truth and speak Truth (John 18:37, Jeremiah 9:23-24)

Breastplate of Righteousness
The Roman Soldiers would wear a breast plate to prevent spears and swords from penetrating the vital organs. We need to put on the breastplate of righteousness to prevent the enemy from destroying us from the inside.

We are given Christ's righteousness when we begin a relationship with Him (2 Corinthians 5:27) We need to be pure (1 John 1:9, Isaiah 1:18) Righteousness means to be right before God.

Shod your feet with the shoes of the Gospel of peace.
We looked at the idea of shoes in in the Bible. God told Moses to take off his shoes because he was on holy ground, Boaz took off his shoe and gave it to the other Kinsmen Redeemer, and now Paul is talking about shoes in Ephesians. Shoes in the Bible represented freedom. You could travel much farther with shoes on than without shoes. Shoes to the ancients were very much like a drivers license to a teenager today. It brings freedom, and that is exactly what the Gospel does, it brings freedom to your life.

We saw that we are to be prepared to share the Gospel at all times (Isaiah 52:7, Romans 10:15, 1 Peter 3:15) We need to be prepared daily to do this.

The Shield of Faith
Faith is the assurance of all things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1) Brian Lloyd, one of the host parents last night, is a Mac man and everybody there knows it. He is an advocate for the wonderful machine known as the Mac. I asked him in front of everybody if he had a conviction that Mac is better than PC? Of course the answer is yes, and so I posed the question, would we believe your conviction if you said that Mac is better than PC, but you owned a PC instead of a Mac? Of course the answer is no. So I posed the question, "How many Macs do you own?" "In this house we have 3 macs, I have one at work, and I facilitate the Mac lab at Medicine Hat College."
We can see that faith is the application of our beliefs. If we aren't applying to our lives what we say we believe, we lie to ourselves and to God and our faith is dead. (James 2:26) A dead faith means that it doesn't exist and you are still dead in your sins. Just because you say you're a Christian and go to church doesn't mean that you are a Christian because without faith it is impossible to please God. (Hebrews 11:6)

The Helmet of Salvation is the knowledge of the Gospel and my hope in Jesus Christ (1 Thessolonians 5:8, Philemon 6). The biggest spiritual battle will always be in my head. (Romans 12:2)

The Sword of the Spirit.

This is the only weapon in the Armor of God. The sword was actually a type of dagger that was meant to be used in close, hand to hand combat. The dagger was between 18 and 24 inches long. The Sword of the Spirit is both the Bible and Prayer. (Ephesians 6:17-18) We need to be training daily in the use of our swords. (Joshua 1:8-9)

I finished the Bible study with these four questions; please take the time to answer them for yourself.

1. How am I doing in these areas?
2. What do I need to stop doing?
3. What do I need to start doing?
4. When am I going to do this?

My Wife

I love my wife very much, and I am very proud of her. As I am confined to my hobbit hole downstairs, she is upstairs having a scrapbooking party. She invited 6 ladies, and one of the ladies invited another lady. That brings the total to seven ladies. Three of them that were invited are Christians, the other four are not. As circumstances would have it, none of the Christian ladies could make it tonight. Here's the cool part. One of the ladies that came is part of our Bible Study, she is not yet a Believer, and she brought a friend who is not a Believer either. Another one of the ladies is a good friend of ours that is not yet a Believer but wants to come to church as soon as we launch. The other one owns the Scrap Booking Store that Leigh goes to once per month to scrapbook with other ladies and build relationships.

I am so proud of my wife for building trust relationships and networking with non Christians. It will be cool to see all of these ladies come to Christ one day.

College Ministry At MHC

Today we had our prayer meeting/Bible study at Medicine Hat College. It's really cool to see what God is doing there. We had a new girl named Marina come today. Her coming today showed us just how much God is at work in the lives of the students at the college. The first thing out of her mouth after we prayed was, "What about outreach? Prayer and Bible study are good, but what about doing what we have been called to do?"

That was a very interesting question because last week we started my condensed version of the Bible study, Experiencing God, by Henry Blackaby and Claude V. King. Before we started our Bible Study last week, everybody was talking about missions, and being on mission, and the huge mission field in Canada, and other countries.

Last week we looked at the first 4 ideas in Experiencing God. Those are:
1. God is always at work
2. God pursues a continuous love relationship with you (me).
3. God invites you (me) to join Him in His work.
4. God Speaks
a. Through the Bible
b. Through prayer
c. Through the church (other Christians)
d. Through circumstances.

Today we looked at the fifth idea in Experiencing God and that is God's invitation to us (me) will lead us (me) into a crisis of belief that requires faith and action.

We got to hear stories today from how God was using the students in the College Ministry, and how God was glorified through it. So needless to say, we have a group of students who are not about playing "Christian" or playing "Church" but want to be authentic in their relationship with Christ and want to earnestly live that out in front of people.

So that being said, I asked the students at the end of prayer/bible study meeting if they would like to pray one week and do a Bible study the next week. They said how about we get together on Mondays and pray and on Wednesdays we can do Bible Study. Talk about students on fire for Christ!

Just think, all of this started from people like our mission teams and other faculty members praying on campus, and off campus for the students of Medicine Hat College. This all started with prayer. Never underestimate the power of prayer.

Another Milestone

Today Clayton, one of our church members, and I have almost reached a milestone in the progression of the church. We have found a location to have our services. I am just putting the carrot out there for you guys, and you won't be able to find out where we are going to be having services until we discuss it with the church first. All I can say is that it is a great location at an excellent price. I hope and pray we will outgrow it quickly. So if you would like to know where we are holding services, you will need to be at our place for Bible study on Saturday night or you will have to wait until we discuss it with the church first. Have a great day!

Bible Study

Bible study went really well last night. I love watching God move in the lives of people who just accepted Christ or are on the brink of doing so. Last night, community really began to happen. I facilitated the Bible study, but the Holy Spirit really took over. On top of that, it looks like we will have a worship leader ready for January. She used to live in the Hat, but moved back to Newfoundland a while ago. She told me last night that she will be here for January even if she has to live in a cardboard box. Talk about a passion to see a church start! Keep praying for us, it is exciting to see how God is moving.

Blogging From The iphone

This has been one of the busiest weeks of my life. Last Wednsday I wrote my math midterm. Since I haven't done this type of math for 15 years, I spent a lot of time preparing for it. It was a mentally draining week on top of that I did 4 Bible studies and a LOT of counseling. The highlight of the week is that Bryan, one of the coolest plumbers I've ever met, became a follower of Jesus Christ this week!

God has has been showing me a lot this week, especially with the majority of the people in town who do not know Jesus yet. A friend of mine who is searching for God came to church a few weeks ago with some other friends of mine, and he later told me that he has never been so scared in his life because he thought everybody was looking at him and judging him because he didn't know what to do. If this happened to my friend, how often does this happen to the average person, and is the one of the major contributing factors to them not starting a relationship with Christ?

So, we will be totally redisigning the website to make it attractive to a 25 year old male who could care less about church and church service will make a contemporary worship service seem ultra-traditional. We are learning that in Medicine Hat it is hard to start a church with home groups, but people who don't attend church would feel more comfortable going to a church service than a home group, mostly because for the non Christian a home group seems cultish. So we will be doing church services that will be attract the 20 something male who has no interest in going to church, but will give him the desire to follow Christ.

Halloween 2008

Riley and Sawyer both had busy days at school yesterday. They both got to wear their costumes to school and they had a parade and of course parties. Sawyer came home a tired two year old and on top of having a Halloween party Riley's class went skating and Jason said that in a couple of weeks Riley will not have to hold on to a sled while he is skating.

When Riley got home he crashed and had a good nap before we went trick or treating. At about 6:00 we went out and by seven Riley and Sawyers bags were both full of candy. Needless to say we stayed out until 9:00 when Riley the elephant decided that he was tired. The boys ended up with a pillowcase and a half full of candy. We had a fun night

Launch

Things were going so well for our church plant that we have been planning to launch next September, right after Labour Day. After discussing it more with my wife and praying, it seemed that God wants us to move the launch up to January. Let me tell you how we came to this.

We are seeing so much interest in the community about Pathway, especially from people who do not following the teaching of Jesus Christ. Most of these people would not feel comfortable joining a home Bible Study yet, especially since most Canadians are very private people and we feel uncomfortable being in someone else's home when we don't really know them.

Leigh and I were talking about this and she thought we should launch in January, right after Christmas break. We have a theatre available to us to use, but if we are going to do a small launch in a huge theatre, things may look very disproportionate and bring discouragement to visitors.

So Leigh suggested a community centre in our neighbourhood that has a city transit stop right in front of it. We couldn't sleep very well that night because we were both so excited.

We went to a friend's place after church the next day and got home about 5:00 pm. I was too excited and told Leigh that I was going to go prayer walk around the community centre.

The night before, a friend of mine who was second in command for Canada Day celebrations in Medicine Hat contacted me and wanted to talk to me more about our church. So after I prayer walked around the community centre, he and I went out for coffee at Tim Horton's.

He let me know some things that were going on in his life and asked me what the vision of Pathway was. When I told him, his said he was in. I told him that we were thinking about launching in January and I told him which community centre we were hoping to do it in. He told me that he knows the people in that community centre very well and has rented many times. He basically told me that he could get us in there. On top of that we have half our worship team put together now and tonight will be our third Bible Study in a row. I'm not talking about once per week, this has become a once per day thing now. God is on the move.

On top of that, we started our student ministry. We have had two meeting so far, and I started a facebook group for it. We have so much interest in the student ministry at Medicine Hat College that we have more people on the Facebook group then in the ministry itself. I think God is about to do something great in Medicine Hat.

The Summit

The summit is now over and I am waiting for a ride to the greyhound so I can get back to Medicine Hat. We had over 70 people at the summit all with the same mindset -- how do we plant churches in a country where people are so unchurched? We had Canadian born, and immigrated church planters there, we had American church planters who are investing their lives into Canada, we had partner churches from Wyoming, Colorado, South Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia up there asking us planters all the same question, "How can we partner with you to see the Good News of Jesus Christ come to Canada?"

We are in a culture that is so unchurched that most mission teams don't understand why the church planter says don't share the Gospel when you come up. Most of Canada is so unchurched that if you would try to share the Gospel in most cases it would be like trying to teach calculus to somebody who is just learning to count to 10.

Relationships. That's the key. Developing relationships and building community among people who do not yet have a relationship with Christ in order to have them see Christ lived out in you.

Pray for the prosperity of the city. Be involved in helping the city prosper. Jeremiah 29 goes well into that.

Don't be afraid to get your hands dirty, and be as real as real can get.

You may be wondering why this matters to you if you are not in Canada and are not really thinking about coming to Canada. Well, in South Carolina alone, during the lifespan of this generation's pastors, the percentage of South Carolina's evangelical population will drop into the single digits this generation. That's not including Georgia, or Texas or Louisiana. The Bible Belt is deteriorating and I believe it is because we have been doing church and not building the Kingdom.

It is very humbling when people who were teaching us at the summit were telling us that we are doing better at church planting up here than the Americans are down south because we need to do it out of necessity and not convenience.

I met a church planting strategist from Quebec who told me about 5 cities in Quebec, Hull, and Troi Rivier to name a few. These 5 cities are the most unchuched cities per capita in North America. One does not have to think very long about how these people's personal lives are and what their homes are like.

Church planting is not about building buildings are having nice services with excellent choirs, but is also about exposing a dying people to the living God in order to see transformed lives and communities.

All in all the summit was good. The days were long, we would start at 8:00 am and I would get home at 11:00pm, but we left refreshed, excited and encouraged.

What I'm Thankful For

We just finished celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend, and I thought it would be a good idea to put into writing about what I'm thankful for.

1. Jesus Christ.
Just because I am a follower of Christ does not make me perfect. As a matter of fact, as I try to live my life according to His standards I find myself lacking in so many parts and find myself as far away from perfection as one can be. That's why I'm thankful for Jesus, because I am found perfect in Him by Almighty God. Even though I mess up, and miss the mark time and time again, I experience His grace in my life.

2. My Wife.
My whole family was at my parents house in Calgary this weekend for Thanksgiving. I am staying here all week for a church planting summit in Calgary while my wife and kids left yesterday to go back home to Medicine Hat. My wife is my biggest supporter, and I really miss her right now.

3. My Kids.
I have the great opportunity of working from home. Because of that, I get to be around my kids a lot. Even though they go to school, I am at home when they come home, and most of the time I get to go and pick them up. My two boys are like bear cubs that play hard with each other, but they love each other dearly, love their family and their friends. Our oldest is in kindergarten and has WAY too many girlfriends.

4. For what God is doing.
I am definitely experiencing the grace of God right now in how the church we are planting is coming together. We now have about 20 people together for Bible Study and will have to split it up into 2 home groups next week or the week after. We also started our College Ministry at Medicine Hat College last Friday with six students.

5. Our Sponsor Churches
Without the financial, and volunteer support of our sponsor churches and the North American Mission Board, we would not be able to accomplish what is being done up here right now.

6. Deep Fried Turkey
I had a turkey deep fryer in Texas, but the pot produced a pinhole, so we got rid of it. I went out on Thursday on bought a deep fryer, and we deep fried a turkey up here in Calgary and roasted one also. The deep fried turkey did not make it back to the refrigerator, so we are left eating a whole roasted turkey for the rest of the week.

7. Having American Friends and Family
My wife is American and both kids are dual citizens, and that means we get to do this all over again next month with our American friends!

Can New Rubber Equal New Life?

This past summer I introduced myself to Jay and Andrea, a new family on our street that has a young daughter in Riley's kindergarten class. Jay is in construction and trying to get his mudding and taping business off the ground while working another construction job, and Andrea is a stay at home mom who is expecting another little one in December.

I walk to Tim Horton's about 3 times per day. It's about a five minute walk and I have to walk past Jay and Andrea's house to get there. About three weeks ago, I was walking home with my large double double, and Leigh's ice cap when I had a great conversation with Jay and Andrea. That conversation turned into a Gospel presentation. Andrea asked a great question and that was, "Can you ever do anything so bad that God will never forgive you?" I quoted Scripture to her from Romans 8:38-39 and that seemed to help her very much. For the next few weeks we didn't talk much. I saw Andrea at school when I would pick up Riley, we would have small talk, but nothing much.

Now this is where the story gets interesting. Last year somebody gave us a minivan. The CNBC (at that time CCSB) put brand new all season tires on it for us as a gift, and two weeks after we moved to Medicine Hat, the van gave up her last breath and died. Two weeks after that we bought our Jeep; however that van has stayed in our front driveway to this day. It has brand new tires, and I just can't bear sending the van to salvage with brand new tires. I wanted to give somebody the tires, but have not seen anybody in need.

Yesterday I was walking to Tim Horton's and spoke with Andrea and Jay and noticed that all four tires on their car were almost bald, and the snow is going to start flying in about 2 weeks. I told them about my predicament with the van and told them if the tires fit, they can have them for free. After I grabbed my double double, Jay came down to my place to check out the tires, and they will fit his rims on his car.

On my way back from Tim Horton's tonight Jay came running out of his house to meet me and after talking about Alberta Beef for five minutes he brought up the subject about God. He said, "Andrea didn't tell you this because it seemed a little too weird, but the night before you offered us the tires she prayed and asked God how we are going to pay for new tires." So here is two grown bald men, one with tattoos from his neck down and the other in a black hoodie, under a street light talking about the goodness of God. Both Jay and Andrea have not yet started a relationship with Jesus, but I invited them to go to Bible Study with us tomorrow night. He said, "I'm not sure if Andrea would go, but I really want to."

So can new rubber equal new life? I don't know, but when we give ourselves and our possessions away for the Kingdom of God, He has a way of using that to make Jesus more attractive to those He died for.

The US Financial Crisis 2008

It seems these days that everywhere you look on the news, everyone is talking about the financial crisis in the United States. Just last night, Washington Mutual was sold to JP Morgan for 1.9 Billion dollars. Banks are falling, crumbling like crumbs from stale bread, and people are losing their homes all because of people's greed. I am by no means a financial guru, but I did sell cars for 2 years while I was in Texas. One thing I started saying after my first 8 months of selling cars is that something like this would happen. This is why:

I have seen my fair share of credit reports, and the average American is is within a month of bankruptcy at any given time. People are so far in debt because they want things they can't afford (the same is true with Canadians). However, the US government is in the same boat as the average American. As of September 27, 2008, the US National Debt is $9,853,481,831,514.09. That is just shy of 10 Trillion Dollars! Now I don't know anything about the buyout plan the Bush government is proposing, but I do know that there are a lot of people against it, saying it will raise taxes and increase inflation.

It looks like the United States is in need of a financial saviour. Someone to cancel the debt of Wall Street, the debt of the nation, and the debt of the common family. Just for that national debt to be erased, each American, (man, woman and child) would need to pay $33,000 each! For a family of four that would be $132,000 and that is just to cancel the debt, that does not include government funded programs, wages, military and the like! In 2003 the average American family was in debt over $18,000 not including mortgage or car loans! It seems like America has a problematic lifestyle of debt that is next to impossible to dig out of.

Now before we go and start pointing the finger at the Americans for their debt we need to look at ourselves first. We all have ENORMOUS debt called sin that makes the US financial crisis look like a minor mishap.

We have sinned multiple times against Almighty God. That is a very scary idea when the Bible is very clear that only 1 sin will land you in hell for eternity. There will be no purgatory, do not pass go, go directly to hell.

Most of us think that we are good enough to get into heaven, but lets look at it this way. Let's just say that you are a really good person and only sin 3 times per day. That is 1095 sins per year. Now lets just say that some of your days were better than others and you only sinned 1000 times per year. The average person in North America lives to be over 80 years old. So, a really good person would sin well over 80,000 times in their life. Remember 1 sin lands you in hell, and so a really good person deserves to go to hell 80,000 times over. Where are you standing right now?

Just like America needs some sort of financial saviour, we need a Saviour who will cancel our debts also. Imagine that you are in a court room and the judge looks at you and tells you that you are guilty of committing 10 of the strictest laws in Canada. He tells you that you will spend the rest of your life in jail or pay a $9,853,481,831,514.09 fine. Chances are you don't have that money since the US government doesn't have it either. So what's going to happen? You are going to suffer the consequences by rotting in jail.

Just before the judge slams down the gavel, somebody you don't know walks into the courtroom with a brief case. He says, "Your honour, I love the defendant very much." opens up his briefcase and shows the judge $9,853,481,831,514.09 in cash and says that he would like to pay your fine. What would you do? Would you take the free gift or would you go to jail for the rest of your life?

You see, that is what Jesus Christ did for you on the cross. He payed your sin debt so you didn't have to. It is a gift, but a gift needs to be received for it to truly be a gift. So how do I receive this gift?

You need to believe that Jesus paid your penalty and stop living life your way and start living life His way. The Bible says that we need to confess Jesus as Lord. That means He will become the boss of your life instead of you. You will live life on His terms.

You may be saying that you don't want that. Let's just review for a second. Banks are folding, people are losing their homes, the government is saying the dreaded "R" word, and we all know that it looks worse than the dreaded "R" word. Do you really think that if the Americans were able to get all of their debt canceled - from Wall Street, to US Government, to the average American family - would really say, "Wow, that was great, let's go into debt again!" Or would they rather put up new laws to prevent themselves from ever getting there again?

The question now becomes, do you want to live your life like a financial crisis, or do you you want to live it with eternal security?

Awesome Night

We had an awesome night last night. It was the very first night for the Medicine Hat College Christian Faculty prayer night. I was the only non-faculty member their last night. There were about 12 fine Christian faculty at the prayer meeting, all wanting to see their students come to know the Living God, Jesus Christ. I was asked to share the vision of Pathway, so I did, and let the faculty know that I will be starting a student ministry on campus also. They are excited about that opportunity. There are some underground Christian groups right now through ESL, but nothing publicly recognized within the College. Please pray that God will open up the hearts of those students at Medicine Hat College and that we would be the light of Christ in a very dark environment.

Scare

As many of you know, we had quite a scare with our 2 year old son this week. He stopped breathing on Monday afternoon, I (jason) was able to revive him as the ambulance was on the way to our house. While at Medicine Hat Hospital, he stopped breathing two more times, but they gave him oxygen and he was fine.

As soon as I could, I got onto my facebook account and sent out mass prayer notices for our son. We have seen God's healing power, our boy is back to his normal self, but got to take a plane ride to Calgary for testing. Thank you for all your prayers.

Jason

Hurricane Ike

We were in Texas long enough to experience Hurricane Rita, and we knew that we never wanted to go through that again. Leigh's parents live just outside of The Woodland's, TX and everyone is without power. Leigh's dad just emailed us from his blackberry and told us that they have experienced major house damage and have lost one vehicle. The eye of the storm was about 5-10 miles away from them.

While reading channel 13 news from Houston this morning, we see that there were tens of thousands of people who did not adhere to the mandatory evacuation pronounced by city officials. These are those who will be like the refugees from Katrina.

Please pray for all of these people who have lost their homes, vehicles and loved ones during this tragic times.

Bible Study

We will be having Bible Study this Saturday night at the Steer's home in Crescent Heights at 7:00pm. We will be going through series on the churches in the Book of Acts, what they looked like, what they did, the unique aspects of the culture of the times and how that all applies to us in Medicine Hat. We will also have some good food, coffee and some tea going on too.

The Laws of the Kingdom

Today was my last day preaching at Temple Baptist Church. I had a great time these past 10 weeks and people from youth to elderly came and thanked me for the sermons I preached. Apparently God used me a lot at Temple to challenge people to walk with Christ and not just play church. I showed two videos today that I found on Youtube. I hope you enjoy them.

I'm A Christ Follower



My Jesus

Blowing Your Mind The Right Way

Today I went and paid my tuition at Medicine Hat College. I am taking a math class this semester, and a research and writing class next semester and then I graduate! About time!

Today I was at the Starbucks at the college today and that particular one does not have interac (for my American friends, that is pay by debit card). So this guy in front of me wanted to pay by debit and was told to go to a bank machine. Out of the blue, my mouth opened and said, I got his two coffees, have a great day man. (they are Starbucks, Like what was I thinking???!!!???) He thanked me, and the lady working the Starbucks asked me if I knew him. I didn't know the guy from Adam and that just blew her mind that anyone would do that for somebody they didn't know. Looking back in hindsight, I could have given her the Jesus spiel - That's kinda what Jesus did for us - but alas, I wasn't thinking. However, I don't think that will ever leave her mind. Maybe we can talk more about that this semester while I'm at the college.

Thank you for not using school transportation

You may be thinking to yourself these people are crazy. This a true story for the last year we have been taking our oldest son Riley to and from school since we live so close to the school. Well this morning when I checked our mail I saw an envelope from the school district we are in. When I opened it I found a check and in the check was a little piece of paper and on the paper it says " This is your transportation allowance cheque for the 2007-2008 school year. It is for providing transportation to and from school for your child." This is crazy and some of the money will be used to get new clothes for Riley for school. Thank you Medicine Hat School district for blessing us!! We knew nothing about this. God is good!!!

Good Block Party

We did out block party today in Strathcona Park, and it was a huge success. We had some people from A Place Called Hope in Lethbridge, AB come out to help and a mission team from Wyoming came also. These people were a huge blessing. We served well over 75 people, and we have 3 families interested in Bible Study and many other families we can follow up with. God had answered many prayers today.

Friends and Weird Stuff

My friend Les, and his new bride, Rita, will be at our house tonight. They are from Salmon Arm, BC. I met Les at a College and Career Group in Salmon Arm when I was 19 years old. I haven't seen Les in about 10 years, but what happened to me today could not have happened without Les having something to do with it. I am not saying that Les did this, because that would be impossible, all I am saying is because Les is coming, I shouldn't have been surprised that this happened today.

Before I tell you what happened to me today, I need to give you a history of Les and myself.

Les and I are avid outdoors men. We are not hunters, but we love being out in the woods, or at the river and also hiking mountains together. My first summer back from Briercrest Bible College, Les and I went hiking Mount Rose Swanson outside of Armstrong, BC. This was a small hike, we could be up and down in about 4 hours. At that time I had a girlfriend back in Saskatchewan named Judy who I went to Bible College with. The purpose of this hike was to get to the top of the mountain and take a photo of the town of Armstrong for Judy.

We just started our hike when I saw a fresh pile of bear dung. I told Les to hold up, because I wanted to take this photo of fresh bear dung for my girlfriend back in Saskatchewan. I know - I'm a hopeless romantic that knows how to get the women, but somehow Les talked me out of taking a picture of bear dung that was hot off the press.

As we continued our hike, we got about three quarters of the way up the mountain when I heard a flock of partridge flying out of some trees. We must have spooked them somehow. I turned around to see Les running like a madman down the mountain. I yelled to him, "Where are you going? They were just partridge!" He yelled back, "IT'S A BEAR!!" I looked up and saw that Les was speaking the truth. What I thought was partridge was actually a bear ripping a tree out of the ground so it could get some good insects. I wasn't about to ask the bear to step out of the way because I realized that my life was in danger and all I really had to do was run faster than Les.

There was this other time that all of us as a college and career group decided to go tubing down the river. This was in August when our rivers in Canada have some sort of warmth to them. Les and I had a blast power swimming with the current, relaxing on tubes and having the time of our lives. Well, we got to the pick up point of the river where the other vehicles were waiting to pick us up and I saw this a little too late. Les got out in time, but I was having to really power swim up current, and I wasn't making good progress, the current started to pull me down. Just then a stronger swimmer from our group rescued me.

Today, I was doing some final surveying for our block party on Saturday, but before I went to the park, I thought it would be good to go and get a nice cold Ice Cap from Tim Horton's. As I was sipping my wonderful drink of decadence, I was walking the paved hiking path from Maple Avenue to Strathcona Island Park. I was on the path behind the Arena when I heard the scariest sound I have ever heard, and that was the shake of a rattle on a coiled up rattle snake.

I don't know what it is with Les and I and near death experiences, but it will be good to see my friend again. Bears and Rivers and Snakes, Oh My!

I'll Fly Away

Last week we bought a nice gazebo that we have been eying at Superstore and it finally came down to a price that was too hard to refuse. We were able to buy the 10x10 gazebo and 2 36" glass patio tables for about $175. We have enjoyed our gazebo and it has been a place for me to work when the kids get too rowdy and a place where Leigh and I could go after the kids went to bed, just for us to have some time alone.

Well, as we were distributing our block party invitations today it got a little windy. We came home after walking through the neighbourhood for about 3 hours and had a nap. When I woke up I saw our beloved gazebo on the other side of the back yard. It looked like it put up a noble fight, but alas, it breathed its last. I had the unbearable duty of dismantling our new bought friend and realizing that it was mangled beyond recognition. I don't think it is a coincidence that I am preaching on storing up treasures in heaven and not on earth where moth and rust destroy. Good bye our beloved gazebo.

Awesome Wrap Up

What a time we had yesterday at Stampede! The relationships we started to build on Wednesday came to a blossom on Saturday. Our Mission Team from Illinois became great friends with a family that doesn't go to church. These people go down to Illinois once per year, so they swapped mailing addresses and phone numbers. The police department and I have a great relationship now and one of the officers that goes to all of the schools told me that he would definitely be calling me. Another cool thing that happened was our last mission team from Louisiana invited a police officer to our block party. He couldn't make it because he had to work, but he became one of the police officers that became really good friends with us.

Yesterday I was able to have four spiritual conversations with the people we built trust with, and it is always good when they are the ones that initiate it.

Everybody in the office, the GM and the President thanked us for what we did and also told us that we did an excellent job and all of the volunteers are raving about us. We ended up serving about 400 people throughout Stampede.

God Things At The Stampede

Today was our second day working at Stampede and God is doing some cool things. We have befriended 6 police officers in the past two days and we were able to get a group picture. Later on Pastor Davy and I were handing out water bottles to the ATB girls at the information center and they asked us if we knew if there was a child find center at Stampede. We didn't know so we went and asked our police friends and they said there would be one next year and asked us if we would run it. Wow! Talk about building trust relationships.

The Vice President of the Stampede came by tonight about 10 minutes before we closed up shop and asked our mission team from IL if they were going to come back next year. This is huge! We are first time volunteers and God is letting us build these trust relationships.

We saw Addy today. Addy is a friend of ours that I first met at Spectrum, then again at Canada Day and today she gave me a big huge hug. She told me that she is working Alberta Summer Games and I asked if I could join her. She is ecstatic, so in 2 weeks I get to work with Addy again.

God is doing some cool stuff right now.

Cool Things At Stampede

Our mission team from Anna, IL is here and we are working Stampede this week. Actually, we have the honour of serving over 100 volunteers at the Stampede. We are running a pilot project which is a volunteer lounge where they can come in, cool down and get something to drink.

Well yesterday I had 2 newspaper interviews not only about the lounge, but also about the church! These reporters heard the accents of our friends from IL and asked if they are the same group that comes up from GA each year! (My friends in GA, you don't know the impact you have made in this community.)

I let them know that they are a different group connected through the same denomination helping out the same way in Medicine Hat. They asked me more about the church and one of the reporters said that he didn't believe in organized religion but for some reason he ends up getting all the religious stories. I told him that was God trying to get his attention.

Since this is the first year for the lounge, not many people have been in yet since they don't know about it, but we have had 9 police officers come in for drinks, and about 10 other volunteers. I know that it doesn't sound like a lot, but all of them were placed there by God and we can see exactly how unchurched they are.

We had one lady named Barb who asked after she saw the mission T-Shirts from our team in IL, "Is your church new because it is Baptist?" She was about 45 years old and no clue about church. She is a very sweet woman, but totally unchurched and that is what we are finding her in The Hat. We have a lot of Church buildings, but a huge population of unchurched people that are wondering why people with Southern Accents are coming to Medicine Hat. Please continue to pray for more of these God moments.

Humbling

I know me. I know that I have messed up a lot in my life and I know that I am far from perfection. I also know that I serve a God who knows me better than I know myself and still chooses to use me. That is grace, as a matter of fact, that is amazing grace.

I am preaching my way through the Sermon on the Mount in a 10 week series I have titled The Laws of the Kingdom. I never thought that God would use me in this way - as temporary pulpit supply for a church in a different Baptist Denomination than my own in order to bring about a spiritual renewal in a lethargic church.
This past Sunday the worship team did an amazing job in leading the people of Christ into worship. It was the first time since we started attending the church in February that I have seen the whole congregation sing and not just mouth words.

I am trying to be very careful now especially as I write this because I am terrified of touching God's glory, and by no means am I trying to share His glory, I am just His servant whom He is using right now. I have had many people talk with me over the past month on how God has been using the sermons I have been preaching to change their lives. 2 weeks ago I preached on MT 5:17-48 and called it the Law of Relationships and it was about how God wants Christians to do relationships His way. After that I had some people ask where they could get a copy of the sermon. Then this past Sunday I had a lady come up to me after the service and tell me what the sermons I was preaching was doing to her life. She quit her job because she was not able to honor Christ there since they wanted her to continue to lie. On top of that, her and her husband are letting a needy family move in with them because they know that is what a Christian will do. The funny thing is I never told people to quit their jobs or let needy people in, this is the work of the Holy Spirit.

Leigh worked VBS at the same church last week and what happened there could not have been a coincidence. If you have been reading the blog for a while you may remember the prayer cards that I had made up. Well, Leigh was working with the boss of the lady who I gave my first prayer card to. I met her in February at a stationary store that she works at and did not know that she goes to Temple Baptist Church where I am doing pulpit supply. Well the boss told Leigh that her life has changed dramatically since I came in and prayed with her.

On top of that I just got word that we are about to get a large sum of money from NAMB for church start-up costs which is a huge blessing also. It will help us pay for our first 6 months rent, get a new sound system, a new Apple Laptop computer, a keyboard and an electronic drum set.

I never knew when we said yes to God over one year ago that He had all of this planned for us. It is so true that you will never know what God has in store for you until you step out in faith; it is only after you step out in faith that God starts supplying.

Gators, Chili, and Spiritual Conversations

A friend of mine who runs the downtown core for Medicine Hat contacted me a couple of weeks ago and asked me if I would help him with the chili cook off. It would be my job to hire 10 people to help setup, operate, and clean up the chili cook off where there were 4 city blocks closed in the downtown core.

I did what he asked and he was ecstatic, and it was my job to help supervise everything downtown and I got to use a brand new John Deere Gator to drive around the downtown core in. That was fun.

My friend later was talking to me about more spiritual stuff, he is not yet a believer but is definitely seeking a deeper spirituality, he just doesn't understand yet that the deepest spirituality one can experience is in Jesus Christ.

God Moment Today?

Since we have been here in The Hat we have started 3 Bible Studies and all three have collapsed. After reviewing everything we were doing we noticed that all three Bible Studies included people from the the same demographic - they were all in poverty, all uneducated (less than grade 12 education), and all living off the government.

Today I was praying while Leigh took the boys to VBS at Temple Baptist Church and was asking God to start building HIS Church because I don't know what to do anymore. Later this afternoon I told Leigh that I think we should take the kids to the park and on the way to the park I asked her if she thought that we should gear our ministry towards families with special needs children.

Here's my reasoning for this:
1. In NAMB's On Mission journal/magazine last quarter it showed that families with special needs children are the biggest unreached people group in North America today

2. We have 2 special needs children

3. Leigh has made friends with one of Riley's schoolmate's mother who is not a believer and she was asking what VBS was all about. Her son is autistic and is Riley's best friend and may end up going to VBS this week.

Leigh thought that was the way to go also.

At the park there were 4 people. 2 Adult ladies and 2 teenagers with special needs. The two ladies were talking and I didn't want to interrupt them, and then I heard them call to the two boys that it was time to go meet up with the others. That's when I flagged them down and asked if they worked with these special needs children or if they were their own. Both of them are their own and one of the ladies is also a worker. One of them is a Believer and goes to Hillcrest church here in Medicine Hat. We talked for about 10 minutes and they told us all about the different programs and support groups available. As a matter of fact they invited our family to the ball game tonight, they have 4 extra tickets!

We hit it off pretty well and they meet at the Tim Horton's by my house everyday around 4:00 pm, and every Monday night at Kin Coulee park during the summer.

Reading this right off the bat - it seems to me that God is in this, but I have thought that before and seen it collapse. Will you please be in prayer with us over this matter.

Fishing

My brother came down from Calgary on Friday night and I took Saturday off of work. Last night I realized that I worked 13 days straight and boy am I feeling it now. So I thought it would be good yesterday to take my kid brother fishing in the South Saskatchewan River. We walked from my house to the river at 6:30 am and by 6:40 we had our lines in the water and by 6:50 I already landed 3 fish, one gold eye, and 2 walleyes. The gold eye was too small to keep, but we brought the two walleyes home and filleted those bad boys and fried them up, they were pretty good. We went back later that morning and he caught another walleye. I'm going to cast my line in the river later tonight and see if I can get anymore, I'm really hoping to catch a sturgeon; it's against the law to keep them, but the small ones are 3 feet long and the South Saskatchewan has about 10,000 of them.

Chili Cookoff

I have a friend who is organizing the Chili Cook Off for Medicine Hat and it looks like it is going to be the biggest one they have ever seen. He has asked me if our church would come and volunteer for Chili Cook Off! It seems our vision is getting out in the community and people who do not go to church, and organizations who are not necessarily Christian are inviting the Church to take part in the Community! This is such an honor to know that we are respected and trusted among the people of our community!

Excellent Turnout

Our block party couldn't have gone better! We had about 100 people show up and people were surprised that we weren't charging for any of the food or drink, they even asked where the donation box was and we had to tell them that this was a free gift to them, and it blew their minds. Throughout the whole block party we met 5 people who are interested in Pathway, one lady and her 2 children that live down the road from us have the same vision for church planting, but she goes to another church here in town that does some great work, but she also wants to partner with us. There were 4 other pre-believers that are at the curiosity stage with Jesus right now and are thinking about coming to Bible Study.

Our mission team was such a blessing today. They let me mingle and meet the people in our community while they served them. They are true missionaries at heart and we know that God is going to bless their work here in Medicine Hat. Many of the ladies have built relationships already with some of the locals and I know it is going to be hard for them when they go back to Louisiana.

There were about 100 people who showed up for the block party at Strathcona Island Park today and many of them came because of the invitations we left in the mail box. The cool thing about that was that all of them were looking for Jason because he had his name as the contact person on the invitations. So now there are about 100 people in our community that know about this church plant and know who we are and can contact us when they need help. Also when they see us on the street, they will be able to talk to us because that is very much how our community is - people just chew the fat with each other and that is part of our community's identity. I love it. Thank you FBC Sulphur for sending your missionaries up to us, and thank you Jesus for helping us love on this community that you love so dearly.

Big Day Today

I am writing this post at 8:00 am Sunday Morning. Today is going to be a busy day. I start off by preaching at Temple Baptist at 10:00 am, and then at 1:00 pm we start hosting our block party. We have got hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, pop, water and sno-cones to give out to people. We also have door prizes too. In the last 3 days we have had over 340 hits on our website 4 phone calls and 2 people on the street tell us that they are coming and bringing people. This is my very first block party and I hope it turns out to be a great success. I gave our mission team the day off yesterday, I have been working them a little too hard and I need them to be totally recuperated for today's block party. Today's block party is going to happen at Strathcona Island park where they have a place where we can cook, 2 play grounds and a water playground. It is a very well known park and many people come and visit. It is also on the Trans Canada trail, so in the 3 hours of our block party we will have about 50-100 people also walk past the park.

In another week and a half we have our last mission team coming from Anna, Illinois. Please pray for them, their names are Davy Miller, Beth Perry, Dexter and Susan Rhodes. Please continue to pray for our mission team from Sulphur, LA, I can see that God is using them greatly here in Medicine Hat.

Busy Day

What a day today was! The mission team and I start our day off at Tim Horton's in the morning and have a coffee and a breakfast sandwich. Leigh and the boys, plus James, Jim, Adena, and Linda went and handed out 500 more fliers today to invite people to the block party. So far, I have got 3 phone calls and 168 hits on the website in the last 2 days regarding the block party.

While they were stuffing mail boxes I took Janet and Debra to Lethbridge which is 2 hours away, but with the road construction it made it almost 3 hours. We had to pick up an ice crushing machine for our snow cones. It was cool coming on the way back because they got to see some buffalo for the first time.

After we got back from Lethbridge, the mission team and I went to Elk Water in Cypress Hills because there is no church there at all. They have some church camps, but no church. I got to hear the history of Elk Water also. It was a native community at first, but not a reserve. Later some of the ranchers in the area like the area and moved in, and the province like the area also and turned the area of Cypress Hills into Canada's only interprovincial park. The rule for provincial parks is that you cannot build a town inside the park, but since the town was already established before it became a park, it could stay but with restrictions. They could not expand the town site at all, so the only new building that could happen is if you tore down your old house and put up a new one.

We prayer walked around Elk Water and saw some things that God could really do over there and we are excited about that, then I was able to talk with Linda for a while. She is to the point of tears right now as she views the lostness here in Canada. Her heart is broken over how many people don't know Jesus and really don't care to know Him and it is obvious that God is doing a mighty work in Linda right now.

Louisiana mission trip Day 1-2

Well our mission team from Sulphur Louisiana made it to Calgary safe and sound. Jason met them at the airport and they followed him to Medicine Hat. Yesterday they started their day out by going to Tim Hortons and talking to people then they helped take down the tents that Jason had helped set up on Monday at the Canada Day celebration. Last night they did some prayer walking the the neighbourhood that Jason and I live in. They are great people ( all our mission teams have been awesome servants of the Lord. While on the prayer walk Jason and James ( the leader for the Sulphur team) was asked to leave a house by a guy who I guess did not like them talking to his friends. We also enjoyed fellowship around our fire pit in our backyard

Today the team went to Tim Horton's again and had coffee.(Thanks team for bringing me back an ice cap) They are now out handing out postcards to people in the community for our Block party that we are having on Sunday. Please pray for our mission team as they pass out these postcards that we will be able to bless lots of people on Sunday. They will be blanketing about 500 houses in the community we live in and then we will hit another community with the postcards. Please check back tomorrow for an update on what happened the rest of today.

The Smell Remembers When

Years ago Trisha Yearwood came out with a song titled "The Song Remembers When" and she sang about when a certain song came on the radio how it took her memory back in time to a young love that she once had.

Today I walked to Tim Horton's from my house and had a coffee and a breakfast sandwich and as I walked back to my house I could smell a familiar scent that took me back in time to my childhood. I could smell the water from the river and the wildflowers mixed with the native grass and the sweet scent of clean prairie air. The aroma took me back to when I was young and life was simple during my summers at Pasqua Lake near Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan.

My grandparents owned a lake lot cottage half way down Pasqua Lake that they called Num - Ti- Jah, and every summer we would drive from Edmonton and spend a few weeks of the summer time frolicking in the lake, fishing, water skiing and making forts down in the coulée areas where the deer would nest for the night. The smell took me back to a time that I longed for all year long as a young boy, and eventually a teenager, and then a young adult. It is amazing how powerful aroma really is. It can make you happy, sad, or even angry. It can make your mind wander and think of good times past, or sad times that you never want to endure again. It is surprising how the smell remembers when.

The Apostle Paul talks about the power of aroma in 2 Corinthians 2:15-16. He says, "For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life."

When it comes to Jesus, the smell will always remember when. We will remember how bad life was before we met Jesus and how much better it is now, but for others, the smell of Jesus is not so great. The smell is the stench of death, and they are reminded of how badly they hate the one who paid their penalty to turn the wrath of God away from them. For one the smell is sweet, for the other, the smell is bitter, but the smell will always remember when.

2 Salvations At Temple

I will be preaching for the next 10 weeks at Temple Baptist Church here in Medicine Hat until they get their interim pastor in September. I am spending 10 weeks on the Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew 5-7 and the series title is called, "The Laws of the Kingdom." Today's sermon was Law 1:Character and it was on the Beatitudes found in Matthew chapter 5, and these Beatitudes are really the 8 fundamental character traits that every Christian will have. The cool thing was 2 people got saved in the service!!! I love it when God uses me that way!

Fishing

Riley turned 5 a few weeks ago and his birthday money just showed up from Grandma and Grandpa in TX, so we thought it would be good to buy him his first fishing rod. We were going to buy him the one that shoots the hook out, but the guy at the counter talked us into buying the less expensive "Pixar Cars" fishing rod. I bought a fishing rod also at Wal-Mart and some hooks, then Riley and daddy made their way out to Elk Water to go fishing.

I wasn't even 10 casts in and my new reel from Wal-Mart decided to explode one me. I threw a cast and the crank handle flew right off into the water! The water was so clear from the dock that I thought I could walk around in the water and look for my handle. The water looked to be about knee deep from the end of the dock, so I slid in and realized it went past my waste. So I thought to heck with this, I'll go to the bait shop and see if they have a reel. I bought a $10 reel over there and I am starting to realize that most people that work in Elk Water don't live in Elk Water, they live in Medicine Hat. This is good information since we are looking at starting a church in Elk Water. I think I am going to need to consult somebody who has experience in resort ministry.

Anyway, Riley and I spent about 4 hours on the dock casting our line, but no bites; however, the sound of Riley giggling as he cast his line into the water and reeled it in was well worth the trip. We are going to try fishing over there in a few more weeks after our mission team from Louisiana leaves. We are going to take a well deserved vacation and spend the night camping at Elk Water.

Third Mission team- Sulphur Lousiana

Boy where has the time gone. Jason and I have been in Medicine Hat for almost a year now, ( it will be a year in August.) We have had a mission team from Grangerland, Texas that did prayer walking all over Medicine Hat. And then just a few weeks ago we had one of our sponsoring churches from Rome, Georgia come and help out with Spectrum and that was fun. On July 1, our third mission team from Sulphur, Louisiana will be coming to help with the Canada Day celebrations and we will also be hosting a block party. Please be praying for the mission team. The following are the names of the people that will be coming.

James Bailey
Jim and Linda Milton
Debra Vincent
Adena Vincent
Janet Peshoff

Please pray for safety and good health and no customs problems and that more friendships will be made and for a good turn out for the block party.

God Showed Up

Tonight was an awesome night at Bible study. We started this Bible study with a family about 3 weeks ago and tonight God showed up. I wrote a Bible study about 2 years ago that corresponds with Rick Warren's Purpose Driven Life and we started that tonight. We had a smaller crowd tonight with only 4 people, but all four got saved tonight! God is good.

Camping

About a month ago we bought a tent and we have had it set up in the back yard for about 2 weeks now. This has been the first time in a long time it hasn't rained so we thought we would try camping in the back yard. That was some fun. We have the nice big vestibule on the tent and Leigh and I could sit in there and talk while the kids pretended to sleep. Right now in Medicine Hat the sun doesn't set until 11:30 pm and it is back up at 4:30 am, so it makes for a short night of sleep, but tons of fun with the kids.

Approved

I got the call yesterday morning that we were approved to be Nehemiah Church planting missionaries through the North American Mission Board - one of the missionary wings of the Southern Baptist Convention.

This is an exciting time for us now and we are seeing God work here in Medicine Hat. We had a Bible study last Wednesday with 5 non-believers who invited themselves over. God is working in their lives right now and many times when God works in non-believers lives, He turns their lives upside down in order for them to call out to Him.

Deeper Respect

God has a way of opening my eyes to who Jesus is every day, and how Jesus lived while He was on earth. As I walk with the people Jesus would have walked with and loved on, I realize, not in my head, but in my heart, how deeply Jesus loves people. As I minister to people whose families have been riddled with the deep penetrating bullets of sin, I have a deeper respect for Jesus as He said, "Your sins are forgiven - go and sin no more." He didn't tell us to sin no more because we need to get better at not sinning, he told us to sin no more so our lives don't look like a used up target at the rifle range. These were the people who Jesus chose to walk with, to eat with, to share life with, and to give His life away for. I love doing what I do because it makes me live like Jesus, and it makes me love like Jesus, and that is a hard thing to do - walking through the muck and the mire of sin to bring the self sacrificing love of Jesus Christ to people who may end up saying no.

Reflections

I have been re-reading our brochures today and I am so excited that part of our vision is beginning to happen!

1. Pathway will be an active positive influence in Medicine Hat. We will be heavily involved in community service to show the people of Medicine Hat a tangible expression of the love of Christ.

I have mowed lawns, built fences, done other yard work and West Rome Baptist Church and I just finished volunteering at Spectrum this past weekend where the festival had the largest turnout ever at 47,700 people. Now I am preparing to help volunteer with the Canada Day Celebrations with Medicine Hat with our mission team from Louisiana. I asked my new friend, Don, if I could use him as a reference when I sent a volunteer email to the Canada Day board for Medicine Hat, and he knows the guy personally who heads it off and will give us a glowing report. I am also wanting to help out with the Alberta Summer Games in August.

2. Pathway will be a safe place to investigate who Jesus Christ is and will also be a safe place to grow in a relationship with Jesus Christ.

We are starting a Bible Study tomorrow with a family who is disconnected from Christ and they asked if they could come to Bible study with us! God is good! This family must feel safe to ask to come to a stranger's house to read the Bible when it is not part of their daily lives.

What A Week

So our West Rome team just left our house, and we are really going to miss them. They are a bunch a fun people who love God and serve Medicine Hat the way Jesus did, but here are some highlights:

I got to meet some very influential people in the city, and become friends with them. They got to see the difference in us compared to what they see in the stereotypical church. Spectrum had a church there that I am sure they will never invite back because they were all about themselves and what they can take from the community.

We will be starting a Bible Study Wednesday night with all non Christians who invited themselves over for Bible study and I had to give them a Bible because they didn't have one. Now that is a blessing right there.

One of the ladies on the board teaches children with disabilities at the High School and she has stuff ready for Riley, she's not a believer either but the relationship is being built.

I got to play with Jarrod's i-Phone.

I have been asked by one of the members of the board who is not a believer to come over for coffee.

One of the electricians who has been there for the past 5 years since West Rome has been coming up, finally asked, "So, what's up with this Jesus anyway, aren't we all God's children?" That lead to a great conversation between him and Jarrod.

I got to share my testimony with the guy who heads off spectrum.

As I am back in the Canadian context again, I am seeing how fragile strategic relationships can be. This other church in 35 minutes almost ruined 5 years worth of work because they wanted to promote their own agenda first without earning the right to promote.

I got to play with Jarrod's i-Phone.

Spectrum and falling asleep sitting up

Well today was a busy day for Riley and Sawyer. They decided that they were going to wake mommy up at 5:30 and not go back to sleep. After a two hour nap for mommy, Sawyer and Riley we walked to Spectrum. On the way to Spectrum, Riley got to see motorbikes jumping and he loved it and then Riley went on the rides, He rode a Power Wheels jeep, then he jumped in a moon walk and then he went on bumper boats and a miniature ferris wheel which he absolutely loved. After some water because boy was it hot out today, we walked home.

After dinner and some playing I put Sawyer in his PJ's and put him to bed, When I went in to check on him, he had fallen asleep sitting up in his big boy bed.

Please check our blog in the next couple of days as we will try to post pictures of our second mission team who have been working very hard selling tickets at Spectrum and dealing with our hot temperatures. We want to take this time to thank West Rome for all their hard work this week and we pray for safe travels as they had back to Rome Georgia Tuesday morning. And they also have paved the way for Jason and I to start a church here in Medicine Hat. THANKS WEST ROME BAPTIST CHURCH WE LOVE YOU!

They Arrived

Our West Rome team showed up today around noon. We were supposed to go help a man with his house this afternoon, but I called him 5 times today and he didn't answer.

Everyone arrived safely, but we had a mishap at the border and one person got sent home and it was his first time flying, but if we believe God's Word than we will know that all things work out for the good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose.

Tonight I get to meet all the cool contacts the West Rome team has made here in the city. This will be a busy week and I think I will be dog tired by the end of it.

On The Radio

I called Mike, the worship pastor at Temple Baptist, today and asked him if there were any complaints about my sermon yesterday. He said there was nothing but praise about the sermon and that it will be on the radio next Sunday night at 6:00 pm Mountain Time on Alive FM here in Medicine Hat. That is an exciting time when a sermon gets put onto the radio. Can one be proud and humbled at the same time? I don't know, but I do know that I am excited about the opportunity.

Messin' Around With God's Holiness

I was able to preach this week at Temple Baptist Church here in Medicine Hat. They are currently without a pastor and their interim starts in September. My sermon title was Messin' Around With God's Holiness, and it was about the story of Achan. I gave an alter call and during that time there were people that actually came out of the balcony to get right with God and I could here people crying and sniffling at the end of the sermon. There was a man there who was born in Canada and raised in Texas and he told me that during his 12 years in Medicine Hat that he has never seen an alter call and that they went to the Pentecostal church here in town just to get some excitement in their church service.

Our Date

Leigh and I went on a much needed date last night. We haven't gone on a date in 2 months since our last mission team was here. We went to the Beefeater Restaurant here in Medicine Hat and then went and saw Prince Caspian. It was so nice to get away from the kids for about 5 hours and just spend time together. That's what God wants to do with us, did you know that? God wants you to drop your daily hustle and bustle and just spend some time, one on one with Him. Go have a date with God!

6 Years

Today is 6 years of marriage for Leigh and I. Tomorrow we will have known each other for 7 years and we have 2 boys and are church planting missionaries in Canada. What a wild ride. It's always nice to recap on the things that God has done so why don't you join me on a stroll down memory lane.

This is Jason's story, and Leigh may feel obliged to fill in her story later today, but it happened way back in February of 2001. Since 1998 I had a pray list of what I wanted in a wife. I would pray over that list every now and then and here are some things that were on that prayer list:

1. She had to be a Christian
2. She had to support me in my ministry
3. She had to be a Mennonite, or from the South because I needed someone who could cook really well
4. I had to get to know her before I dated her - since I had the habit of dating women without knowing them and therefore wasting my time.
5. She had to be my best friend

Then I had 2 bonus things that God could answer if He wanted to, but didn't need to. The first was that her dad worked in the White House, and second that she came from a family that was well off. Don't ask me why I put those in there, I put them in there when I was like 20 or 21 so it was just stupid youthful thinking. Well guess what, God answered everyone of my prayers on the list, even the bonus prayers. So, onto the story

It was spring break/seminary week at the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary and I, being the very studious person I am, was writing some essays in the library. After boredom sunk in I had what seemed to be a cigarette craving, except it wasn't for a cigarette; it was to go onto a chat room. I had never been on an internet chat room before so it was all new to me. I am a Christian so I googled "christian singles chatroom" and I picked the first site that showed up. That is where I met this girl. We started emailing back and forth and so on, and weeks later I got the nerve to ask her for her phone number. I was in Canada, and she was down in Abilene, TX. I called her later that night and she asked me, "You go to the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary, right?"
I said, "Yes, I do."
She replied, "I think my uncle went there."
"Who's your uncle?" I asked.
"Don Dilmore." She responded.
"How old is he?" I questioned.
"About 75." was her answer.
"I don't think he came here because we have only been around since 1987."
"Ok, well he went to one of those schools up there anyway."

Then next day I asked my friend who was the manager at the bookstore if she knew a student there by the name of Don Dilmore. "I have some of his books in the back." she replied. I was a little upset because we are a small school and you have used books you weren't telling me about? "No, Jason, Richard Blackaby wrote in his books."she replied.
"So what's the big deal? Richard Blackaby writes in my books." He was the president of the seminary at that time.

"You don't understand Jason. This is Don Dilmore's new book, New Beginnings, Richard Blackaby did the forward in it, Don was the Vice President of Development for the Canadian Southern Baptist Seminary."

Wow.

Anyway, her dad got wind of this and flew me down to Houston to meet his daughter on May 19, 2001, and that week I asked her to marry me. May 18, 2002 we got married in Houston. That is the short part of the story, I will see if Leigh wants to write anything else.

Go and Learn What This Means

I love reading Jesus Stories in the Bible. I am reading Matthew right now and Jesus is hanging out with pre-Christian people - the ones that religious people won't touch with a 10 foot pole - and actually eating and having a party with them. Jesus isn't there by Himself, he has some of His disciples with him and they are out enjoying the company of these people who are not yet connected to God. As I read the Scriptures I see that there were some religious people that Jesus got along with - like Nicodemus because he was searching for the Kingdom of God, but there were many others that Jesus couldn't stand because they thought religion was the way to God.

So these religious leaders find out that Jesus and His cronies are hanging out with the "wrong" people - and that just looks bad. I've run into that before. Religious people trying to do the religious thing don't want their religious family and or friends hanging out with "sinners" because their family or friends may get defiled.

So Jesus catches wind that these religious leaders don't think hanging out with these people is a good thing and basically tells them off in a nice way. He told them to "Go and learn what this means, I desire mercy, not sacrifice. For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."

I figure there are 4 camps one can be in.

1. You are religious and have no non-Christian friends and can't stand being around people who smoke, drink, cuss and other stuff. They're sinners and deserve to die.

2. You are a Believer, and have non-Christian friends that you hang out with, but don't know how to bring Jesus into your conversations.

3. You are a Believer that hangs out with non-Christians because you love being around them, and they are attracted to the Jesus you represent.

4. You are not yet a a follower of Jesus Christ.

If you in camp 1, please take a look at the Scriptures and realize that disenfranchising yourself from people not connected with God is not healthy at all, and you may be on the road to making sure some people will never enter the Kingdom of God. Start being more like people in camp 3.

If you are in Camp 2, start spending more time with Jesus. Jesus will start rubbing off on you and pre-Christians are attracted to Jesus, they just aren't attracted to church because of people in Camp 1.

If you are in Camp 4 and have been hurt by people in camp 1, please accept my most sincerest apologies. Just try this, I know it will seem silly, or you may not want to do it because of past experiences with "Christians", but ask God to bring somebody into your life who can introduce you to the Real Jesus. If you have a Bible - I know this is asking a lot - but try reading the Book of John, it is the 4th book in the New Testament in the Bible. If you want to start reading it right now, just click here.

You see, Jesus was The Sacrifice. He did it all to bring people not connected with God into a relationship with Him so they could find fulfillment and start their lives over again. He wants to give you purpose and joy in your life - in both the good times and the bad times, and He does this through His mercy. I am trying more to work on the mercy part, but it's coming...slowly. Just remember that mercy is not getting what we deserve.

Small World

We keep on receiving mail for other people at our house and this morning we received mail with a very familiar name on it. It was the name of a girl that I went to school with from kindergarten to grade 11. We even used to live on the same street in Spruce Grove, AB. She now teaches English at a school in Korea and she is on my facebook, so I thought I would facebook her and tell her that I got mail with her name on it. It turns out that she used to own this house while she was in college her in Medicine Hat. What a small world!

Our day at the Park

Last Sunday after church we spent some time at the park. Riley got to go for a bike ride and Sawyer played at the playground. We took stuff for sandwiches also and had a picnic. There are some beautiful parks here in Medicine Hat and we spend a lot of time on the trails that run right next to the river.

First Bible Study

We were planning on having our Bible Study on Monday night, but scheduling said that couldn't happen, and last night it had to be postponed, so we had it today at 9:00 in the morning at the hospital where our kids get together and play for their therapy. Raelynn who is a Christian, but doesn't know the Bible very well, brought her step sister, Nichola, who has never been to church and never read the Bible. It went really well, Nichola had a lot of good questions and seems really interested in the first chapter of John.

Till That Soil

I rented a rototiller this morning from Home Depot and began to till our garden. Our garden was full of weeds and was as hard as rock, plus I pulled up some huge river rock from deep in the garden. I'm talking about 70 lb rock that the frost heaved up high enough for our rented rototiller to jump around on.

We have a fair sized garden, it took me almost 4 hours to rototill the thing. As I was tilling this ground the parable of the sower came into my head, and I couldn't help but to look at how these tines from the tiller would scrape away at this tough soil and break it up and I realized two things.

The first thing was that I have to let God till my heart, and a lot of times that is painful. Just think about getting run over by a rototiller - not fun at all. The second thing that came to my mind had to do with church planting.

I need to be asking the Holy Spirit to continually be tilling the hearts of the people in Medicine Hat. This isn't a long process, but it is a hard process getting the land ready for planting some good seed. Then God waters it and grows it and soon we will have a harvest. (I hope)

After I finished tilling the garden, I walked through it and sunk ankle deep into nice soft black soil. We will start planting our garden next week. Our neighbour behind us used our garden for a few years and says he has pulled out potatoes the size of ball caps.

I also got a call from Temple Baptist Church today and will be preaching the Mother's Day service this Sunday for them. The worship Pastor, Mike Deibert, also wouldn't mind if people from his church came and helped us in our church plant because he wants to see the Kingdom grow in Medicine Hat.

Dwight, Brooks, Medcine Hat and Elk Water

We had a great time with Dwight yesterday. We prayer walked my community - The Flats, Crescent Heights, and Elk Water. On our way to Elk Water I was telling Dwight that there are a few thousand Sudanese in Brooks. Most of them work at the meat packing plant. He knew of the Sudanese community in Brooks and wants to help me get a Swahili Bible Study going - I don't even speak Swahili! Tim G. is on Dwight's staff, and he was IMB in Africa for many many years, and speaks Swahili fluently. He has some contacts in Brooks where I may be able to start a Bible study. I can start it with his help and facilitate as we pray for a Swahili pastor. So please pray for that situation.

We went to Elk Water, and the wild turkey's were out. Dwight was out there calling the wild turkeys and having them strut by the car. They were huge birds. There are well over 250 houses in Elk Water, but only 40 people that live there year round since it is a cottage community inside Cypress Hills Inter provincial Park; however the amount of full time residents doubled this year from just over 20 last year. Grangerland First Baptist Church from Grangerland, TX has adopted Elk Water and wants to serve the community the way West Rome Baptist Church has served Medicine Hat for the past four years.

I have one more semester left before I graduate - only 3 classes. The cool thing is they are all freshman classes too, so I can take them at Medicine Hat College next semester. I was away from my degree plan for over 3 years so it changed on me, for the better. When I started my degree, it was not accredidated, but now it is. There is no official Baptist work at Medicine Hat College, so as a student I have full rights to start something there. Dwight told me there may be funding availble for me through the Convention if I started a Baptist work in the College.

I just want to thank Dwight and the CCSB for the tangilbe gift they gave us yesterday.