Just a quick note that I am at the point of my Doctor of Ministry program of defending my thesis. I have submitted a rough draft and am travelling to Boston to present my defense on Tuesday the 24th of March. Then I will have to make some revisions and then prepare for graduation on May 9th.
A silly story maybe but I still remember Evel Kenievel trying to jump over the Grand Canyon. It was good to hear of his encounter with God that happened earlier this year. Here's part of the story (the rest can be found here and here.)
"America's Legendary Daredevil," Evel Kenievel, who was Baptized earlier this Year, Dies at 69
"I don't know if it was the power of the prayer or God himself, but...the power of God in Jesus just grabbed me. All of a sudden, I just believed in Jesus Christ. I did, I believed in him!" -Evel Kenievel
(Clearwater, Florida)—Legendary motorcycle daredevil, Robert Craig "Evel" Kenievel, died on Friday, November 30, at the age of 69. According to a FOXNews report, Kenievel had struggled with poor health for a number of years, including diabetes, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and fallout from his many injuries from stunts and hard-living.
In early 2007, however, Kenievel had a transformation of sorts, when he accepted Christ and was baptized by Rev. Robert H. Schuller, at the Crystal Cathedral in California. His actions, and the message he shared that day, spurred one of the most impacting services held at the church, when nearly 800 people spontaneously came forward to recommit their lives to Christ, and be baptized on Palm Sunday. Click Here to read that story. (Photo courtesy of Crystal Cathedral.)
Kenievel left behind former wife and long-time partner, Krystal Kennedy-Kenievel, four children, ten grandchildren, and one great-grandchild.
Aimee Herd : Dec 1, 2007 :
AP Staff-AP, FOXNews
This was a bit of a hectic couple of weeks. I attended a conference. My in-laws moved. I had a birthday. So I thought I'd post a couple of pictures. The first one is of my in-laws new house. The second is our house church.
I've mentioned and quoted Fred Peatross before and given links to his blog - which unfortunately he has now discontinued. However, he continues to send me an email "devotional" every once in a while and for the most part they are very good. I would like to give a link to these posts because they must exist somewhere in cyberspace but until I find them you can find some of his stuff here on hillschurch. (If someone has a link for him please forward it to me in the comments.)
His message is about the difficulty of forgiveness. I make a few comments at the end. Here is his email post.
Forgiving for Faulty People
Twenty-three years ago Pope John Paul walked into a cell in a Roman prison and forgave the man who tried to kill him. But the Pope is a professional forgiver which, on the surface, appears easier for such a high placed professional to forgive when he knows ahead of time that the whole world will be watching. It is much harder for an ordinary person, whom nobody is watching, to forgive and forget.
Never underestimate the demands that forgiving puts on the average person's modest power to love. Some skeptics, when they heard Jesus forgive people, challenged: "Who can forgive sins but God alone?" Novelist Charles William said that forgiving is really a game-we can only play at it, essentially we cannot do it.
We talk a good forgiving line as long as somebody else needs to do it, but few of us have the heart for it while we are dangling from one end of a bond broken by somebody else's cruelty. Yet people do forgive and they do heal themselves of their pain. But no one seems to be born with much talent for forgiving. It is love's toughest work, and love's biggest risk. We learn from scratch, and learning almost always runs against the grain.
The truth is we forgive best when we go at it in bits and pieces, and for specific acts. We bog down when we try to forgive people in a grand manner, because wholesale forgiving is almost always fake. Forgiving anything at all is a minor miracle; forgiving carte blanche is silly. Nobody can do it. Except God.
My Comments:
I would agree that forgiving is difficult. I would also agree that we go at it in bits and pieces. But I think forgiveness is a bit like the grief process that we go through when someone close to us dies. Because the truth is that we often have lost a friend or family member with the death kiss of betrayal. The initial offense or betrayal is like the funeral - you need to go through this process of accepting that you've been offended or betrayed and deal with it - acknowledging it, perhaps sharing it, and then putting it to rest. In that way forgiveness is an event - in Fred's terms "forgiving carte blanche" However, like grief, memories of the event spring up and need to be dealt with on a daily basis. These memories each need to be dealt with by another act of forgiveness. They become more infrequent with time but nonetheless still need to be dealt with and forgiven. The deeper the betrayal the longer the forgiving needs to go on.
Sometime we are tricked into thinking that we haven't really forgiven the other person when one of these memories is triggered by an event. Sometimes we are surprised and dismayed by the depth of feeling that is exposed by these memories and think "How could I still feel like this if I really forgave?". But the truth is that we did forgive - we just need to keep forgiving. That's the tough part. To quote Eugene Peterson: "It's a long obedience in the same direction." Ultimately we really can't do it without God.
My nephew Andrew Gardner and his friend Ryan are sailing around the world in what looks like a 35 foot sloop. (Well he's not actually my nephew - he's the son of my wife's second cousin.) Quite an adventure for a couple of guys just out of university. They will be posting their journeys on a blog Ryan and Andrew... Sailing Adventures Around the World.
Sail On!
Hillschurch Blog turns one today.
A year ago I started this blog.
Reflections?
It's a challenge to blog regularly and also to be honest about the things I am going through. It is much easier to just find things that are interesting and report on them and link to them. Actually interacting with the world and allowing it to affect me and then report on that impact is much more difficult.
I remember the experience of first going to work with street youth at Church on the Street and Yonge Street Mission's Evergreen. I remember preaching "from a distance." What I mean by that is that it was easy to find scriptural truths and present them during sermons. It was much harder to find ways that that scripture had made a personal impact on my life and to show how I was currently living it out. The failures had as much (if not more) impact than the successes. I learned that I needed to let the scriptures live and speak through me. That means that before they came out of my mouth they needed to travel through my heart.
The same is true of blogging. It is much easier to report little nuggets of truth or interest or even of aggravation than it is to let that information pass through my heart and mind and conscience first and then reveal how it affected me. I made a commitment back then not to preach without living (or trying to live) what I was speaking. I realize that that commitment needs to extend to all of life. Don't say stuff you don't mean. Don't teach what you're not living. Don't distance yourself from life. Engage all of life - the pain as well as the joy. Don't play it so safe. Carpe Diem! (Seize the day!)
It's your birthday - live a little!
Elinor McNutt passed away Thursday (September 20th, 2007). Elinor is the wife of Earl McNutt, my former pastor at Stone Church. and ongoing mentor. Brigitte and I were on staff with them in the mid-eighties and early nineties. Those were definitely good days.
Although Elinor had been ill, the seriousness and aggressiveness of this last bout of sickness surprised me. A couple of years ago she had had an operation to remove cancerous tissue from her bowel. That operation was quite successful. I saw her in apparent good health only a couple of months ago. But recently she had been suffering some relapse. She had been in Markham/Stouffville hospital for the past few weeks in significant pain not only from the cancer but also from a blood clot in her leg. Pastor Earl is feeling the loss deeply. Please pray for him during these tough days.
Brigitte and I had the chance to see her last week and thought she was doing well even though she was in obvious pain. We were surprised that she had passed on so quickly.
This does bring up a few issues for me. Earl and Elinor were probably my "ministry parents" - the ones who helped me make it through those first awkward years of pastoring. Earl is the same age as my father. Elinor's funeral is on the anniversary of my mother's death. They attended my mother's funeral in Guelph. This time is stirring up a number of memories for me. It is a nostalgic bittersweet time for me and as a result i don't think I am always fully engaging emotionally in all the events that are happening around me.
It is strange how seemingly unrelated events trigger memories.
I had three funerals this week – all unique in some way. One was for a 37 year old who died of a heart attack that may have been induced by illicit drug use. Second was for a baby born prematurely at 25 weeks and lived for only 2 more. This one was tough (open casket!). The third was for a 76 year old man who died without family, – the building superintendent was his executor, his neighbours gave the eulogy – and only eight people showed up for the funeral plus me and a couple of funeral directors.
I also went to the hospital to visit the wife of one of my mentors – she has had a relapse of cancer and is not doing well. My neighbour came over on the weekend to talk because his mother is also sick with cancer and fading fast. Then we heard at church on Sunday another neighbour of someone else in our congregation who has been diagnosed with stage three (of three) of an aggressive type of cancer. And coming up this weekend is the one year anniversary of my mother’s passing.
Sometimes it’s difficult to know what to say to people to encourage them or to give words of comfort. But often it’s more important to just show up, to be there to be present with heart and soul. If we have a theology of the immanence of God and the fact of the incarnation where He became Emmanuel – God with us, and if we understand the Scripture that says “greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world,” then we know that when we show up, God shows up. Actually God is already there and we join Him in His work. Maybe that’s one of the most important things that we can say to people – God is the God who is already there. I think it was Woody Allen who quipped “Ninety percent of success is just showing up.”
This is not just true of helping people in times of difficulty but in all of our life’s mission. Alex Dyer said it this way:
“One important lesson I continue to learn in mission is that I am not in charge. It is God who extends the invitation and God who is in charge of the mission. Being open to God's mission means discerning where God is leading us, without our own expectations getting in the way. With this re-orientation, our mission is not a to-do list to remedy all the world's problems but rather begins with discernment on what God is calling us to do. We realize we are part of something beyond ourselves and we leave behind the delusion that this is dependent upon our performance. Our call to mission does not come from a sense of duty, rather from a sense of wondrous anticipation about what God has in store for us.
"We realize we are NOT called to solve all the world's problems. We are called to participate in God's mission. DAILY! After a few months in Cairo, I told my supervisor that I did not feel much like a missionary. I spent a lot of time talking to Sudanese refugees and drinking tea with them. My supervisor told me that is where mission work happens. It is the engaging with one another, in being present and sharing each other's stories. A large part of mission work is having tea.”
A couple of significant people within the Christian community passed away this week.
The first is Dr. James Kennedy, the pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. You may know him better as the founder of Evangelism Explosion or from his radio ministry Truths that Transform, or the author of a number of books like What If Jesus Had Never Been Born?. I had attended his church a number of times during vacations in Florida and was actually in Florida when we heard of his heart attack last December. We can see the steeple of the church from the balcony of the condo at which we were staying. 
A couple of the comments from the Sun-Suntinal article:
"The 76-year-old pastor died "peacefully in his sleep" in his Fort Lauderdale home around 2:15 a.m. Wednesday, September 5th, according to publicists for the 10,000-member church. By his side were Jennifer, his daughter, and Anne, his wife of five decades.
The Rev. Kennedy had suffered from several ailments since a cardiac arrest on Dec. 28. He underwent treatment at Holy Cross Hospital, then rehabilitation in Michigan, but never returned to the pulpit. His last sermon was on Christmas Eve.
In contrast to the folksy, Southern style of many televangelists — a term he disliked — the Rev. Kennedy crafted an urbane, intellectual approach, blending history, logic, rhetoric and Bible interpretation. He sought to reach not only ordinary people but government, cultural and academic leaders — "influencing the influential," he called it." There is also a nice tribute on the Evangelism Explosion page.
EDIT: Christianity Today put a list of reports and tributes together at their site.
The other person was Madeline L'Engle, a Christian author whose childhood fables, religious meditations and fanciful science fiction transcended both genre and generation, most memorably in her children’s classic “A Wrinkle in Time.” She died on Thursday, September 6th in Litchfield, Conn. She was 88. She earned a write-up in the New York Times.
We went down to the Beach again today – Brigitte, Kirstyn and I (Jared was off to London to see off a friend to university). That's Brigitte and Kirstyn sitting on the bench and the last picture is Kirstyn silhouetted against the sky. It was one of those late summer days that was just too beautiful to spend indoors. We brought books to read as we sat on a bench. We met some old friends from our Stone Church days.
It was a “longing” day. I don’t know why but this type of day creates this deep sense of longing in me for … I don’t know what really. Maybe it is just melancholy and childhood memories. Maybe it’s just that summer is almost over and those long, lazy days are just about gone for another year. Maybe it’s that I’m remembering other beautiful days that are steeped in warm fuzzy memories of days I will never have again. I don’t really know what it is that I’m longing for but days like this really bring it out. It’s an almost tangible ache.
Of course the conditions are perfect … a beautiful, cloudless sky, the late afternoon sun dappling through the trees, the fresh breeze blowing in off the lake bringing that sublte but distinct water smell to my nostrils, the view of the sparkling water and the sailboats skimming across the surface of the lake. And I had two of my favourite people by my side.
Then there’s the boardwalk and the people … the little boy running in that waddle that only two year olds can manage, arms and legs pumping furiously; the kaleidoscope of nationalities where you hardly hear anyone speaking English; where you see people dressed in bathing suits, three piece suits and everything in between; and the only place in the city where the dogs may actually outnumber the people.
It was an amazing afternoon. It stirs me even now as I reflect on my day. That sense of longing always points me to God. It is that feeling that convinces me that we are not alone in the universe. Someone once said that the longing for eternity shows that we were built for heaven. A day like today proves it.
Just a short announcement really ... My daughter arrived home from Germany this afternoon. She had such a great time and was blogging about it at her blog site Breaking Free From Routine. I think she has grown up a bit more because of her trip. Dad's are allowed to be proud of their kids.
Yesterday I was able to go up to Muskoka Baptist Conference grounds to visit a friend from Stone Church days. It really is a pleasure to see someone move forward and exceed both your expectations and your own abilities.
Paul came to Stone Church when I was on staff there in the late eighties or early nineties, dissatisfied with his fast-paced but destructive lifestyle and hungry for a change. God met him and I had the opportunity to coach him and encourage him a bit. However it was he who spurred us all on with his passion for prayer and commitment to the things of God. He was a pastor's kid who had drifted away so there was some residual stuff that remained in his heart and head because he grew up "sleeping on the pews."
I know it was a long process but the growth in his life was steady and the results amazing - and the time seems to have flown by. He dealt with the issues in his life, he went to seminary for his Master's degree and then on for his PhD in New Testament and now he is teaching at Azusa Pacific University - astounding me with his growth over the years and with many of the insights he has in Christian leadership. He and his wife (Cahleen) have also been involved in foster parenting and have recently adopted two children (a brother, Jonathan, and sister, Emily). Although the challenges of fostering and adoption are great, they make great parents.
The reason for the post is that although we only see each other a few times a decade, I still feel connected to him. I still would go two or three hours out of my way to connect with him and I still find that when we meet it is like iron sharpening iron. The challenge to many of us in our fast-paced, travel anywhere on earth, lose touch with friends, kind of world, is to reconnect when we can and enjoy the reconnection. These friends with whom we infrequently connect actually bring perspective into our lives. They remind us of our history and of the things we used to love to do. They teach us that we influence one another and that influence is significant and long lasting.
Because of our meeting I have resolved to send some more emails and to continue going out of my way to connect whenever possible.
A friend of mine, Tim Huff, that I knew during my Evergreen days, just sent out a sad email about one of the youth he had been working with who took his own life. I thought I would share the email with you.
Dear friends,
I spent the afternoon at the hospital bedside of a seventeen year old homeless boy, just praying and being there talking to him (even if he could not hear me?) while the machines monitored the quickening pace of loss of brain activity. No family present. And this evening he has passed away. He took his own life, as his history and his world had worn him past what he could handle. As always, he took a piece of my soul that I can not get back and that will always leave me wounded – at least in this lifetime. But far more than that – he gifted me immeasurably with his presence, even into his final hours.
At the hands of death alone, I have said “good bye” to more than 40 teenagers in my 20 years among street-involved youth. All have deserved the best in life, all have been precious, fascinating young ones with extraordinary potential and countless dreams for life and love. And, having framed every bit of my own theology around the absolute that God is always both just and merciful…I believe all these ones, so damaged in this lifetime, so far removed from knowing sustaining love that reveals otherwise, are made new now in His care. I have to.
But it does not excuse a society that belittles, hurts and ignores those seen solely as a bother or nuisance or worst of all…someone else’s problem. A piece of all of us dies with ones such as this, whether we recognize it or not.
In his honour, and the good stead of what is a nonnegotiable when it comes to doing what is vital…I plead with you, that today you would cherish the young people in your arms-reach and have them know how special and priceless they are. In your home, at your camps, in your neighbourhood, in your school rooms, in your churches, on the streets…maybe just some nervous young person training at the till at a McDonald’s who needs you to be a bit patient and smile…anywhere. What you do and say on this day could change a young life forever. I believe it with all of my heart. Our sons and daughters, your sons and daughters, without question…God’s own.
Wearily and lovingly yours, Tim
According to an AP report, Ruth Graham-wife of renowned evangelist, Billy Graham-died on Thursday, June 14th at 5:05PM, at her home at Little Piney Cove, North Carolina. She was surrounded by her family and husband, who had earlier in the day been "huddled at her bedside."
A lovely lady putting up with a travelling salesman (one of the best) for a husband (smile). See the full story here.
As well as writing, there have been a couple of other things happening.
Wednesday I was at another funeral - but this time I was the musician. That has never happened to me. I played an hour of background music on guitar and sang two songs during the service itself. It was a sad service because it was a six week old baby that passed away from a heart birth defect. The father did a masterful job describing his daughter and all they went through as a family. This little girl, Brooke, was born on April 5th - my daughter's birthday. There were times I had a hard time keeping it together. The family did something wonderful in memory of little Brooke - they established a fund to be given ton one family every year to help with their accommodation costs as they stay in Toronto to be with their child at Sick Kids Hospital. I was honoured to be part of the service.
Saturday we attended our neighbour's Bat Mitzvah party. Tamar, the Bat Mitzvah girl, has always struck me as a shy quiet girl. Boy was I wrong. She loves to act and sing and be in front of people. All the three children in the family did great as they all participated - they do like being in front of a crowd - and they did a great job.
Sunday was the Global Day of Prayer. We went down to Ricoh Coliseum - along with thousands of other - to pray for our city and our country and worship. It was, at times, very moving - surprisingly moving actually. I found myself in tears a number of times as I was impressed at how passionate people are and especially at how much God cares for the people of the city and the world. Millions of people all over the world were praying as well in most of the nations of the world. Check out the global website here and the Toronto website here.
While you're checking out websites, you should check out Kirstyns's. She was also at GDOP and was moved to begin praying for the media in our country. Check out her comments on her blog.
Yesterday I was in Guelph to visit my family. My sister Dorothea and her husband Michael were in town visiting from Halifax (yes we went to see them on our road trip). We went to the cemetery to visit my mother’s grave and to see the grave stone that had been erected. We conducted a little ceremony in the very-cold-for-May weather and then headed back to my brother’s place for a barbeque. You can see some of the pictures here.
This weekend was another North Toronto 24 hour Worship and Prayer event. I often have a chance to lead worship there and did the 3-5pm worship and prayer slot on Saturday afternoon. It is an amazing time of connecting with God for me and after two hours I leave spiritually refreshed but physically exhausted.
As most of you know I am working on a Doctor of Ministry degree at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary. This week they announced that Dr. Haddon Robinson, well known as a great preaching instructor was named the interim president of the college. This is unusual because Dr. James Emery White, who was just appointed as president earlier this year has resigned, effective June 30, 2007, due to family considerations which resulted in his unanticipated inability to relocate as planned from North Carolina to Massachusetts. I’m not sure that it will significantly impact my studies but because GCTS is so influential in Evangelical circles it will create a bit of a buzz. Check out the full story HERE.
Jerry Falwell passed away this week also at 73. Although not a particular favourite of mine, he was influencial in establishing the Religious Right in the USA and getting political conservatives mobilized. His life was significant enough for CNN to publish a story.
And if you haven't already noticed, I've been playing with my layout again. I suppose I won't be completely satisfied until I know html and can write my own blogger program.
After a tragedy like this what can you say and what can you do? Scott McKnight posts a thoughtful response at Jesus Creed which I copied below. What can we do? We can pray. We can comfort the afflicted. We can mourn with those who mourn. We can allow ourselves to be in relationship with the wierd and the difficult people around us even though it's hard. When we say "of course" to Jesus when he asks us to love even the least of these, we don't always know what we are getting into. Lord help us notice the lost and lonely. May we not pass them by.
Virginia Tech: What can we do?
by Scott McKnight
We can pick up the pieces of rubble left aground by the cold-blooded murdering of 32 Virginia Tech students, but we cannot make sense of the senseless shards of rubble we find. A professor who perceived that the young man was deeply troubled and fellow students who knew the same; lives of 33 familes now wrecked and young adults who will not return for the summer; security measures that can never be secure enough to block tragedies and police investigations that didn’t take the turn we wish had been taken. What can we do? What do you think?
We can hold the entire school, the families, the police force, the medical doctors and nurses still tending to the wounded and all involved unto our God as an offering in the hope that we can heal the grieving and guide our country.
But we can’t make enough laws to prevent troubled, isolated individuals from penetrating into the fabric of a reasonably-safe garment to unravel parts of it.
We can be more sensitive to the troubled and more vigilant in seeking help for roommates, students, acquaintances, and those we encounter whom we believe are a threat.
But we can’t find our way into the inner world of everyone so that we can with breathless certainty discern those who might explode at any moment.
We can fight for justice, establish better laws, and live out our vocation in peace and justice and love. And we can urge the media to remove the videos of the murderer — those videos can have no redemptive value.
But we can’t create a completely safe world, a perfect environment, or a society in which no one with evil intent can ever enter.
We can live by the Jesus Creed, but we can’t force anyone to live by it.
For these reasons, and more beside, we can pray what Jesus taught us to pray:
Our Father who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.
I guess when you hit 50 you start having less to say. I posted a week and a half ago and then had a busy weekend. We attended a friend's son's Bar Mitzvah - both the synagogue portion and the party the next evening. Everything was top notch. Adam, the Bar Mitzvah boy did great in his reading, the food was fabulous, the party was great and our hosts are such great people.
I actually think that the rite of passage concept (like a bar Mitzvah) is actually a great concept for youth and helpful for their transition into adulthood. However in our culture ... it may be more helpful to be doing it a few years later than the entrance into teenager-hood. Those early adolescent years are tough. They still seem like children in so many ways. In some places they do a sweet 16 party for girls. That seems to me to be a better age to do a coming of age event.
I think we should do a big party for every significant transition. We already do birthdays. Weddings, graduations and retirement is all celebrated in some way. How about a moving away from home party when your adult children finally move out on their own? Well maybe it becomes one long party for the empty nesters. Or how about a "turning middle aged" party? Or maybe a mid-life crisis party? When exactly does that happen? How about a "halfway through raising your kids" party? This way you know how long you still have to go.
All in all I think life should have more parties. Jesus believed in parties. I think being with Jesus would actually have been lots of fun - challenging to the core, but fun. Raising dead people, calming storms, healing lepers, confronting the religious establishment, feeding 5000 people, lots of road trips. There was always a crowd and lots of opportunity to celebrate life and life passages.
Well, I turned 50 this week. I saw it coming for a long time but when it actually hit I was a bit surprised by how old it sounds. I don't feel any different. I was at a retreat on my birthday with a group of about 50 other leaders from the GTA and somehow they found out it was my 50th (my wife has a guilty look on her face). When one of them wished me a happy birthday he said "I thought you were younger than me - but you're actually a few years older!" Maybe it was intended as a compliment but I suddenly felt older.
My Dad also celebrated his 54th wedding anniversary this week - the first one with out my mother who passed away in September. I ached for him and felt the loss more greatly myself. Today is my mother's birthday as well - another tough day. I usually bought her a dozen yellow carnations on her birthday. Life goes on but it's not always simple or easy.
This email has been making the rounds and helps us picture who's actually doing the fighting.
Rembrance Day – The Canadian Military “Man”
The average age of the Canadian military man is 19 years.
He is a short haired, tight-muscled kid who, under normal circumstances is considered by society as half man, half boy.
Not yet dry behind the ears, not old enough to buy a beer, but old enough to ... die for his country.
He never really cared much for work and he would rather wax his own car than wash his father's; but he has never collected unemployment either.
He's a recent High School graduate; he was probably an average student, pursued some form of sport activities, drives a ten year old jalopy, and has a steady girlfriend that either broke up with him when he left, or swears to be waiting when he returns from half a world away.
He listens to rock and roll or hip-hop or rap or jazz or swing and to a 155mm howizzitor.
He is 10 or 15 pounds lighter now than when he was at home because he is working or fighting from before dawn to well after dusk.
He has trouble spelling, thus letter writing is a pain for him, but he can field strip a rifle in 30 seconds and reassemble it in less time in the dark.
He can recite to you the nomenclature of a machine gun or grenade launcher and use either one effectively if he must.
He digs foxholes and latrines and can apply first aid like a professional.
He can march until he is told to stop or stop until he is told to march.
He obeys orders instantly and without hesitation, but he is not without spirit or individual dignity.
He is self-sufficient.
He has two sets of fatigues: he washes one and wears the other.
He keeps his canteens full and his feet dry.
He sometimes forgets to brush his teeth, but never to clean his rifle.
He can cook his own meals, mend his own clothes, and fix his ownhurts.
If you're thirsty, he'll share his water with you; if you are hungry, his food.
He'll even split his ammunition with you in the midst of battle when you run low.
He has learned to use his hands like weapons and weapons like they were his hands.
He can save your life - or take it, because that is his job.
He will often do twice the work of a civilian, draw half the pay and still find ironic humor in it all.
He has seen more suffering and death then he should have in his short lifetime.
He has stood atop mountains of dead bodies, and helped to create them.
He has wept in public and in private, for friends who have fallen in combat and is unashamed.
He feels every note of the National Anthem vibrate through his body while at rigid attention, while tempering the burning desire to 'square-away' those around him who haven't bothered to stand, remove their hat, or even stop talking.
In an odd twist, day in and day out, far from home, he defends their right to be disrespectful.
Just as did his Father, Grandfather, and Great-grandfather, he is paying the price for our freedom.
Beardless or not, he is not a boy. He is the Canadian Fighting Man that has kept this country free for 140 years.
He has asked nothing in return, except our friendship and understanding.
Remember him, always, for he has earned our respect and admiration with his blood.
And now we even have women over there in danger, doing their part in this tradition of going to War when our nation calls us to do so.
