So, a couple weeks ago I learned a little about God's faithfulness and provision. On August 24^th I headed to Manning Park on my motorcycle for a family reunion. I made it about 20 kms out of Kelowna when my bike started to bog down. I realized I couldn't make it 200 more kms on a severally underpowered bike, so I drove home and got my truck.

The reunion was good. I wanted to drive home Saturday night so I could be at church the next morning; it was going to be my last Sunday in BC because the next Saturday I would be driving to Saskatchewan to go to school. So I headed from the campsite at about 7:00pm Saturday evening.

            Around 8:45 I was about 30 kms outside of Penticton on a straight stretch, when it happened. A dear sprinted across the highway, and I only saw it as it passed trough my headlight beams. It missed my right corner by about a foot. I had enough time to hit the horn and push in the clutch, but I don't think I got the break when a moment later the second dear ran in front of me. I hit the dear just behind its shoulder on the left side of my truck. There was a loud thud and glass from the headlight went flying up. I must have closed my eyes because I only remember hitting the dear and then coasting to the side of the road. I was starting to panic at this point. I opened my door and smelled radiator fluid, and realized that my cooling system had been damaged. Looking under the hood proved my suspicion. The hood and left front quarter panel were badly crumpled, and the left headlight was still on, but dangling by its wires. I spent about five minutes just trying to decide what to do. Should I hitch a ride? Can I drive it back to the last town? How far is Penticton now? I decide to try and make it to Penticton.

I got about a hundred feet down the road and saw a black bear lazily walking on the left shoulder of the highway. And then my hood flew up! The hood hadn't latched properly when I had looked at the radiator because the front was so damaged. I jumped out of my truck and tried to latch the hood. I managed to get it, but only after I jumped on it. The next morning I realized that the bear may have been watching this stupid human jumping on the hood of his truck. But at the time I just got back in and started driving.

The whole time I was praying that my truck wouldn't overheat. I could smell hot coolant as I went along. I watched the temperature gauge slowly creep up to the red line, the whole time trying to run my engine at the lowest possible RPM to cool it down, and putting it in neutral when I could coast on a hill. I made it about 10 minutes outside of Penticton when the temp gauge finally hit red. I decided to pull over for a few minutes and let it cool. My truck almost didn't start again, but I got it going. I have a Grandma that lives in Penticton, so I managed to get to her house and stay the night; my Dad picked me up the next morning. I called ICBC that night and found out that my insurance would cover the collision (minus deductible) and that there would be not points against my licence; now just to figure out transportation for the future.

As I said before, in a week I was supposed to be going to Saskatchewan for school. I received several offers from people wanting to drive me to Briercrest if I couldn't find a replacement vehicle. I looked at a couple but nothing really felt like it could be my truck. I was left wishing I hadn't gotten into an accident as I was looking at nice vehicles, but nothing that fit my needs. On Monday I called up a man who had an add in the paper for a 93' S-10. He said he had just placed the add and the clutch went on his truck, but it would be fixed in a couple days. Two days later I tried calling him but got no answer. I went to his house to see if it was in the driveway, but I didn't see anything there. As I was driving out of the complex that he lived in, I noticed a black truck that looked almost like the one I crashed. I though, "I wish that one was for sale. It looks just like my old one."

At this point I was starting to get discouraged that I wasn't going to find a vehicle. Shandel had offered to drive me to school, but we had decided that I needed to find something before Wednesday night. I managed to call the man with the S-10 and arranged to meet him after I went for dinner with my Dad one last time before I went back to school. Rod said that he would meet me in an open lot in front of the complex he lived in.

As my Dad and I drove up to the lot, I started to laugh. There, sitting next to Rod, was the black S-10 I had seen earlier in the day. As I got off my bike Rod said to me, "Here she is." and I was thinking, "Yes, here she is. It's Jireh!" (meaning provision). This was my truck! After looking at it and telling Rod that I was very interested in it, I mentioned that I was just waiting to hear from ICBC on what amount they would give me for my old truck (it was declared a write-off earlier that day).

The next day I received a call from ICBC. The adjuster told me to get some paper and start writing number down. He started "$2861.95" in my head I was thinking wow that's a lot; "Minus the $300 dollar deductible. And minus $144.30 for the GST credit. You'll receive a check for $2273.35." I was a little stunned as I got off the phone. I had been trying desperately all week to get evidence of what my truck was worth so I could get a fair settlement from the insurance. I thought it was worth $2500, and apparently so did ICBC! I had calculated that I needed to get $2000 from the insurance to buy the new truck, and I received more than that. I called up Rod and let him know that I wanted a second look at the S-10.

Rod had been asking for $3500 on the S-10. I brought a friend to look at the truck and we both concluded that it could very well be worth that, but I was gong to try and talk the price down. I offered him $3200. At first I thought he wasn't going to go for it, but he finally said, "Ya, I could sell it to you for that." That day I bought the truck; the next day I insured it and packed it, and then on Saturday I drove to Calgary. I ended up getting better mileage than I had ever gotten in my other truck (which was a smaller engine than the new one). I truly feel that God has been watching me through every step of this.

A little while ago one of my friends challenged me to write a blog on some of the 'workplace revelations' that I have been getting. A little background on what the means first. We had a conference at out church several months ago and one of the leaders who came had challenged me to keep my eyes open on the job-site (I work construction, building condo/retirement complexes). He had said there have been many lessons that he had learned from working in the trades as well.

Well the first one came about a month after the conference. Bare with me for a moment while I go back again for a little while. At the conference I had shared that a dream of mine is to see Canada back at the righteous foundation it was built on. The founding fathers of this nation believed that it was important to establish this nation under God. Just as the US has the phrase 'In God We Trust' the Dominion of Canada was born with a God honoring phrase; Psalm 72:8 "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth." The Dominion was born. Now back to my workplace revelation.

At work my partner and I brace and straighten the rooms before the floor system goes on. On one of the buildings we did, there was one corner that was always out of level, and the only way to fix it was to cut out a stud and pull the walls closer together. The reason for this was that the concrete on the foundation was not level. Every floor we had to do the same thing. I realized that the state that we find our country in is similar to this unleveled wall. The foundation is good, but something along the way has made it impossible to completely fix the problem; we fight it with every generation and it gets worse as we go along. so how can we fix it? Enter revelation #2.

The building I'm working on now is different from any other done in Canada. It is the first to use something called a Hambro floor system. Instead of using wood 'I' jousts with plywood on top, it uses steel joists with 4 inches of concrete on top. If the floor below is out of level, you can fix it on the next level with a new 'foundation'. The revelation? A new foundation needs to be laid in Canada. The old one is still there, we don't forget where we have come from, but the Kingdom foundation needs to be laid. I don't know what this looks like, but I'm pulling some inspiration from Daniel 2. Daniel interpreted a dream that the king of Babylon had. The king had seen a statue with a head of gold, its chest and arms of silver, it's belly of bronze, its legs of iron, and it's feet of iron and clay mixed. A huge rock smashed the feet and the statue fell. The statue represented different kingdoms, the head being the Babylonians, all the way to the feet being the Romans. The Rock fell when Jesus came to earth and His kingdom has already been established. I believe it's time for the rock to fall again in our country to create a new foundation. I think some Christians look at the world and say, "It's all going to Hell in a hand-basket anyways. Come, Lord Jesus, come." But I believe that this world needs to make one more stop at the feet of Jesus before it is judged. My dream depends on everyone in this country that calls on the name of Jesus. Things will change when we live out the dreams that God has given each of us, with integrity and perseverance. The responsibility falls to each of us. It's not going to be the politicians changing a law that will make a difference. It's attitudes and lives changing around individuals that will do great things. A bunch of little fires join to make a raging inferno.

When someone says the word 'worship', most people automatically think of music. This isn't totally true. Ultimately, worship plays itself out in our lives when we take the words of God and live them day by day. But there must be something to the prominence of music in worship. There is a power in music that is hard to explain. It can calm us like David playing his harp for Saul (1 Sam 16:14-23) and it can help to lead us into God's presence. We sometimes find ourselves being deeply moved in the middle of a song, and we may not know exactly why. Individual instruments seem to speak beyond notes and tones. I love it when a drummer starts really getting into their playing, getting into what some people call prophetic playing. I visualize each hit breaking a chain or wall that would prevent people from entering into a deeper relationship with God. I play the penny whistle sometimes. This instrument has a tenderness or an intimacy that other instruments may not have, and it can carry some a sense of mystery of who God is.

Beyond some of the instruments in music, there are the words that are sung in songs. I love some of the older hymns because of the words of truth that are found in them. The original hymns were a way of teaching people scripture because they couldn't read. These hymns are still true today and are rich in meaning. Adding music to these words help us to remember, and coupled with the power of music, carry a weight that can reach our souls. With all these parts to music, maybe it's no surprise that it has become such a large part of worship today.

I've seen a disturbing pattern developing in my church. In the last year there have been a number (most of them in fact) of young men who have turned their backs on what God has for them. The even more disturbing thing is that most of these men have had great ministries or the potential for ministries. This kind of worries me because I am another young man who is pursuing ministry in the church. However I cannot turn my back on God. I think Satan is trying to smash the things that God wants to do by attacking some of the leaders who would pose a threat. Personally I have had many things this year that have made me consider turning from God. I've had failures with sin that made me feel like I couldn't turn back to Him. But He has been faithful! God's grace has helped me to turn my back on those things that undermine my relationship with Him.

I think we need to be praying for the men in the church (young or old). I realize that the same thing is probably happening to women too, but the growing number of wayward men is something that has come to my attention.

So I've been asked what my quote means. For me the "desert" is a hard place to live in, but it is usually were the most growth happens. I'm at school in Saskatchewan, which in a lot of ways is physically like a desert (being really flat and barren, especially in the winter) compared to BC, where I've lived my whole life (take a look at some of my pictures of mountains. That's what BC looks like). Spiritually though I feel like I'm in the desert. I'm currently at a Bible College, which is, ironically enough, the hardest place to live out your faith. You study the Bible for marks, which makes it into a routine activity. I feel like God has brought me here, in part, to test how much I am willing to follow Him. The last month I have been faced with choosing between following God whole-heartedly, and just being another mediocre Christian. I had fallen into sin on several occasions which revealed some of my mediocrity. I think it would be better for me to choose to live a sinful life than to be half hearted in my attempts to follow God. I can't turn my back on Him though; He is too much a part of who I am for me to reject Him outright.

Jesus was in the desert when Satan tempted Him. After Satan was done, angels from God came to comfort Him. I'm so glad that Jesus was able to resist temptation because it means that He can help me resist it. I desperately want to come out of the desert and be able to say, "God has protected and strengthened me. He has given me passion for the things that His heart burns for and zeal against the things He despises (including those things in my life)."