Fast and Friendly (Father's Day 2009)

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AND FRIENDLY CHILDREN: EXPENSE OR INVESTMENT? DOING THE RITE THING

What is Discipleship Training

Unleashed Unleashed

In depth training to energize your faith and help you discover the freedom and courage to live dangerously for God. 4 unique modules that together equal 100 hours of discipleship training.

Taken separately, each module is designed to equip you from God’s Word in one of the key areas that define a man: MODULE 1: Biblical Manhood MODULE 2: Sexual Purity MODULE 3: Husbanding MODULE 4: Fathering One on One leadership coaching from experienced and wise men of God. Peer mentoring with other men on the same journey as you are.

A smaller more focused event – limited to approximately 50 participants with small groups of up to only 8 – participants build meaningful relationships with each other and with the Promise Keepers Canada leaders.

Do you have a desire to grow deeper in your faith?

Do you want to learn more about the key areas of a man’s life? en ring M Me nt o Man ve No to Lea Behind n ing Me Equipp n! tor Me to Men

Go to www.promisekeepers.ca or phone toll-free 1-888-901-9700 for information on a module taking place near you

contents

father’s day, 2009

on the cover

father’s day issue Newsstand Price CDN $4.95

14 Fast and Friendly Meet the father who’s putting rally drifting on track Publisher: Brian Koldyk Managing Editor: Doug Koop Pulse Editor: Robert White

features 11 A son stacks up A Canadian kid is a sport stacking champion

advertising account executives: WILLIAM LEIGHTON: william@christianweek.org DARRELL FRIESEN: darrell@christianweek.org JIM HICKS: jhicks@christianweek.org Unless otherwise indicated, neither ChristianWeek nor Promise Keepers Canada guarantee, warrant, or endorse any product, program, or service advertised.

17 The day Daddy blew it All parents want what’s best for their kids, but …

AND FRIENDLY CHILDREN: EXPENS E OR INVESTMENT? DOING THE RITE THING

18 Children: Expense or Investment Strategies for the costly process of good parenting

editorial advisory board

20 Doing the rite thing Ceremonies can help fathers transfer values and confidence to children

KIRK GILES: Promise Keepers Canada JEFF STEARNS: Promise Keepers Canada PHIL WAGLER: Kingsfield Zurich MC SANDRA REIMER: Reimer Reason Communications DOUG KOOP: ChristianWeek Distributed by

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columns

departments

5 PK Podium

8-10 Pulse

Take time to be a dad

Curious events. Interesting people. Good ideas.

6 Help Wanted

ISSN 1916-8403

A good father is good to find

24 Power Play

13 Money Matters

Tools, toys and technology.

Cover: iStockphoto.com

Coping with job loss Editorial and Advertising Office 204-424 Logan Avenue Winnipeg, MB R3A 0R4

23 Out of My Depth Pick up the phone and call your dad

Phone: (204) 982-2060 (800) 263-6695

26 What Women Want Accidentally on purpose

admin@christianweek.org dkoop@christianweek.org Design: Indigo Ink Studios www.indigoinkstudios.com

SEVEN is a Christian magazine for Canadian men that exists to help men lead more fulfilling lives and leave enduring legacies.

The name reflects the seven promises that form the basis of the Promise Keepers organization, which works with churches to minister to men across Canada. one – A Promise Keeper is committed to honouring Jesus Christ through worship, prayer,

and obedience to God's word in the power of the Holy Spirit. two – A Promise Keeper is committed to pursuing vital relationships with a few other men, understanding that he needs brothers to help him keep his promises. three – A Promise Keeper is committed to practising spiritual, moral, ethical, and sexual purity.

four – A Promise Keeper is committed to building strong marriages and families through love, protection, and biblical values.

six – A Promise Keeper is committed to reaching beyond any racial and denominational barriers to demonstrate the power of biblical unity.

five – A Promise Keeper is committed to supporting the mission of the church by honouring and praying for his pastor, and by actively giving his time and resources.

seven – A Promise Keeper is committed to influencing his world, being obedient to the Great Commandment (see Mark 12:30-31) and the Great Commission (see Matt 28:19-20).

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PROMISE KEEPERS CANADA PRESENTS

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You asked for a Christian men’s magazine that was for Canadian men - a quality magazine that was relevant, exciting and biblical. We listened.

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VISIT WiseChoices.ca OR CALL 1-888-901-9700 to have these PK resources sent to your home.

PK Podium

Take time to be a dad Fatherhood is under tremendous strain

by Kirk Giles “You’re lucky. Your dad will play catch with you. I can’t get my dad to do anything with me.” The friend of my 11-year-old son, Joshua, spoke those words as he and I were playing baseball at the park one day.

I listened to that comment with a strange blend of pride and sadness. On one hand, it felt good to know that my son was hearing what a great dad he has. However, my heart also ached for that boy and his desire to spend some time with his father.

A few years ago, I was approached by some leaders in the urban core of Toronto regarding a series of gang related murders that had taken place. After much discussion, one of the core issues that presented itself was the issue of fatherlessness.

Since that time, Promise Keepers Canada has started working with two urban leaders to train them and to build a strategy to mentor younger men from the urban core to grow into strong fathers in the days ahead.

Fatherhood is under strain, not only in the inner city but across the nation.

An April 14 article from the Canadian Press describes a dramatic rise in domestic abuse situations across the country due to the stress from economic uncertainty.

According to Statistics Canada, more than 1.7 million children are growing up in a single parent family.

More than 55 per cent of single parent families in Canada live in poverty.

Many men who want to be good fathers have difficulty because their children are often split between two homes and two sets of values.

Whatever other complications life brings, every man I know wrestles to find the right balance between all of life’s demands and time with his children.

Fathers have a profound influence in shaping the social and spiritual lives of children. This is why focusing on fatherhood is so important to the ministry of Promise Keepers Canada. Our GameDay 09 conferences feature a Father/Son night on Friday night (for men of all ages), and specific workshops that help fathers and sons. Discipleship Training Unleashed features one entire module that focuses on God’s design for fatherhood, training men in the very personal journey of growing as a father.

Every year, tens of thousands of men receive a Father’s Day gift from their local church and Promise Keepers Canada.

All of these resources are designed to help increase the effectiveness and impact that we have as fathers in shaping the current and next generation of men and women.

This summer, take the time to listen to your children. When they want to play with you—stop and play with them. Take the time to look at the beauty of summer and point out God’s creation to them and begin to engage in their spiritual formation. As we are reminded in Ephesians 6:4: “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”

Kirk Giles is the new president of Promise Keepers Canada. He and Shannon have been married for 15 years. They are the parents of four children, ages 6-13.

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Help wanted

A good father is good to find

by Rod Wilson I have heard that a man’s view of God is heavily influenced by his relationship with his father. Is this true?

As a young boy grows up, he learns what it means to be male from the males around him. Typically the males that are close, in terms of friendship or social ties, are the ones who have the most influence. He also learns what it means to be in authority.

Teachers and parents, in particular, give him implicit messages about what it means to be in charge. All of this early learning happens quietly, subtly and often outside of awareness. But that it happens is undeniable.

The phrase, “heavenly Father,” as a description of God is often heard through the ears of our earthly experience. Those of us who had distant, removed, emotionally disinterested fathers are not warmed by the term “Father,” and the fact that “heavenly” is put in front of it only serves to reinforce our sense that God is distant, just like dad.

On the other hand, those of us who had caring, compassionate and vulnerable fathers who showed mercy and grace find ourselves drawn to our heavenly Father because we have experienced a good example here on earth.

These realities make us aware of the need to live our lives as fathers in such a way that our sons and daughters see a parental authority who is seeking to model his attitudes and actions after his heavenly Father. Those of us who have had bad modeling need to fill ourselves with Scripture and with the examples of other godly fathers so that the brokenness of our own histories does not lead to an inaccurate understanding of what God, the best father, is really like.

My father has been very removed emotionally from me my whole life.

Is this going to impact me negatively?

Many men go through this challenge, so be assured. You are not alone. The “father wound” has plagued many men and severely hampered their abilities to be loving fathers.

Many fathers have bought into the idea that doing is more important than being, that thinking is more valuable than feeling.

This creates an interesting dichotomy.

On the one hand, many of these men are successful, have accomplished careers and are highly respected for their ability to think through issues and finish many tasks. On the other hand, they are often “successful failures,” in that they learned to do and think but have not learned to be and feel.

In the family environment, children who are raised by doing-thinking men often do not experience personal nurturing from their father, but only from their mother. As a result they feel the loss of affirmation from father and never really learn the ability to understand or express their feelings. Often later, when in their own family environment, they realize they are not well prepared to deal with the personal and relational side of life.

Rather than simply focusing on your father’s distance, it is often best to deal with one’s own struggles and ensure that you do not slip into being an emotionally distant person. Seeking wisdom and counsel from others, whether personal or professional, can help us walk this difficult road. With God’s help it is possible to break generational patterns and start a new direction that will be more wholesome and wholistic.

My wife really wants our children to turn out well. Should she be this intense about her parenting?

You have raised an important question because it does not relate so much to our desire, as parents, but more to the intensity of our desire. I am assuming that you, as a dad, also want your children to turn out well, but you are thrown by the intensity of your wife’s desire.

All parents want their children to turn out well. It would be highly unusual and even odd to not want this for your sons and daughters. And in this sense we are like our heavenly Father who wants the best for his children.

But there is a big difference between wanting it to happen, working to make it happen and demanding that it should.

When all our parenting is oriented to having great children, we can lull ourselves into thinking that we make this happen. The quality of parenting becomes an obsession because we think that by doing all the right things we will have great children. We then slip into demanding that our children do well so that they meet our agenda. If they are successful, we are perceived as competent.

Having the desire to have our children be good people and live full lives is appropriate and deserves our intense and faithful prayer.

But we cannot make that a goal because we cannot guarantee it will happen.

Alternatively, if being a faithful parent is our major goal, we can leave God with the outcome. It is not easy to do but pretty straightforward—pray for your desires and work toward your goals. Working toward your desires can create unnecessary intensity.

Rod Wilson is president of Regent College in Vancouver, where he also serves as professor of Counselling and Psychology.

He is the author of How Do I Help a Hurting Friend: Practical Help for Leaders and Laypeople (BakerBooks, 2006).

Could you use some help? Don’t shy away from asking. Send your questions to dkoop@christianweek.org.

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pulse

Curiousities. Personalities.

Ideas. Information.

by Robert White PULSE Editor

TODAY’S TEENS BETTER THAN YESTERDAY’S Today’s teens are less likely to smoke, drink or take drugs and more likely to enjoy being with their parents. They are also less likely to believe in God. So says University of Lethbridge sociologist Reg Bibby in the newly-released The Emerging Millenials. Bibby has studied teen behaviour since 1984, polling them every eight years as part of Project Teen Canada. The 2008 survey of 5,500 teens from across Canada paints a picture of teens that differs with the image most people have.

Today’s teens are less likely to have sex (56 per cent have never had sex compared with 51 per cent in 2000) and less likely to drink (a drop to 71 per cent from 76 per cent in 1984) or smoke (23 per cent versus 38 per cent in 1984).

Teens’ attitudes to marriage and family seem to have changed. Most still expect to live together before marrying—but 91 per cent do plan to tie the knot. And 90 per cent of both boys and girls expect to stay with the same partner for life.

They also plan on big families: more than 25 per cent want three children, 10 per cent want four and four per cent want at least five.

Teens also see their parents in a new

light. Almost eight in 10 say they get a high level of enjoyment from their mothers, and more than seven in 10 say the same about their fathers. But a quarter of the teens worry their parents are too busy.

Teens connect with each other through technology. Each day 54 per cent use a cell phone, 44 per cent text message, 43 per cent use Facebook, 42 per cent e-mail and 27 per cent access YouTube.

But they aren’t connecting with God. The number of teens who say they definitely believe in God, or a higher power, dropped from 54 per cent in 1984 to 37 per cent in 2008—while the number of atheists rose from 6 per cent to 16 per cent. And the number of teens who aren’t sure stayed at 31 per cent.

WORK CAN WAIT When country star Brad Paisley won the Academy of Country Music’s Male Entertainer of the Year award, he wasn’t there. Paisley spoke to the audience via satellite.

He felt since his wife was about to have another baby, he needed to be with the family.

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If you were told you were about to win your industry’s top recognition and they needed you to appear at the event, would you have the courage or humility to decline due to family reasons? Many of us hunger so much for the recognition of our hard work that our families take second place.

If you have a tough time choosing between your job and your family, stop and remember that your primary ministry is to your family. Your work can wait. (www.intetgrityresource.org)

ANXIETY ALERT Real men don’t ask for help. But a poor economy with job losses and business closures has driven men to look for help like never before. According to the Globe and Mail, demand for mental-health support has jumped, especially in Ontario.

“The Anxiety Disorders Association of Ontario reported a 20 per cent increase in men registering for anxiety management workshops” reported the Globe and Mail.

“Distress centres in southwestern Ontario have seen an increase in male callers— 22 per cent in areas with severe losses in manufacturing jobs.”

The article also noted increases in other parts of Canada. In Calgary men who called crisis lines are more likely to talk about financial stress.

“The idea is that men are supposed to be self-reliant, able to figure things out on their own,” says Andrea Groenewald of Journey Counselling in Guelph, Ontario.

She’s seen more men, on their own, seek help. “Traditionally men have come because someone else brings them.”

Men need hope. A study from Britain found workers recover from the initial shock of layoffs, but will continue to be anxious the longer uncertainty lasts. Adding to the tension, Canadians helplessly watch retirement savings shrink in a falling market.

Groenewald suggests a change in outlook

leads to hope. “Men need to recognize what’s going well in their life, not a myopic focus on the job loss” she says. “Don’t focus on one part and make your whole life.”

Some men will still bend under the belief of self-reliance and refuse help. Warning signs help is needed—even a close friend’s listening—include: withdrawal from friends and favourite activities, too much or too little sleep, sudden weight gain or loss, a loss of interest in sex and the start of—or increase in—alcohol or drug use.

WELCOME TO THE TWITTERVERSE Started using Twitter? Don’t follow the example of “theconnor,” a Twitter alias for a master’s student in California, offered a job at the high-tech giant Cisco. She shared the news by sending out a “tweet”: “Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.”

Depending on your privacy settings, Twitter entries can be seen by anyone.

Even if deleted from your page, tweets are easily found on Google and people can subscribe to receive tweets via news alerts—exactly how the Cisco Fatty comment was found.

Twitter is too new to have its own entry in company’s human resources packages— most haven’t even dealt with Facebook yet.

But there are a few things to remember while Twittering (or updating your Facebook status): • Treat Twitter tweets like e-mail messages.

• Thinking about what you’re sending before you hit the enter can save a lot of red faces.

• Rant over drinks with your friends, not on Twitter.

• Ask yourself: “Would you say that to your boss’s face?” If the answer is “no” delete the tweet and get back to work.

(Globe and Mail)

BAD MARRIAGES BAD FOR WOMEN’S HEARTS—LITERALLY For women, a bad marriage can be as unhealthy as being a couch potato.

University of Utah research shows women in bad marriages face a higher risk of heart disease than their husbands. These risk factors, known as metabolic syndrome, include: high blood pressure, blood sugar and triglycerides, waistline obesity and low HDL or “good cholesterol.” According to the Heart and Stoke Foundation, about one-third of all deaths (slightly higher for men) result from heart disease and stroke.

FACE TIME WANTED

In less than an hour, she received this reply: “Who is the hiring manager. I’m sure they would love to know you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the web.” It’s suspected theconnor lost the job in a story that’s quickly becoming a warning to those who love to Twitter.

Twitter is like a giant chatroom where you can send out “tweets,” limited to 140 characters, about what you’re doing or thinking. Just like Facebook updates and the reply-all e-mails, tweets can land you in loads of trouble.

“The church has to have technology, or at least youth workers have to have some level of comfort with these things, not so much to be relevant but because you can’t communicate otherwise. It’s like not being able to use the telephone.”

—David Kinnaman, president of Barna Group, on the challenge of keeping up with and using technology to reach young people while keeping the core message intact.

Among 18 to 24 year olds included in a study analyzing various generations’ use of technology, Kinnaman found “what we’re seeing is that besides their attention deficit, in being so focused on technology, is a craving for real relationships, both physical and emotional, that often are best facilitated in a face-to-face relationship.” (www.ministrytodaymag.com)

Psychology professor Tim Smith and his research team assessed 276 couples between 40 to 70 years old who had been married an average of 20 years.

Each couple filled out questionnaires about the pros and cons of their marriages.

The cons included arguments, hostile feelings, as well as how much and often they argued about kids, money, sex and in-laws.

Couples also visited a university clinic for medical testing including the heart disease risk factors. The study also asked questions to detect symptoms of depression, which play a role in metabolic syndrome, which leads to heart disease.

While both men and women in bad marriages showed symptoms of depression, only women had more signs of metabolic syndrome. Men seemed to insulate themselves from the health issues caused by the emotional strain of a bad marriage.

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pulse

For women, Smith says the stress of a bad marriage “seems to have about as much of an influence as being a couch potato.”

Smith suspects the greater risk of heart disease comes from the increased attention women pay to the quality of their personal relationships. “Men are a little slower on the uptake when things are drifting off optimal,” he says. “They may not be as concerned when that happens. And they may work less hard to do something about it.”

Not all men and all women behave this way, but Smith says, on average, the stereotypes appear to be true. “I think of it as a chronic strain or burden. Those are difficulties that fall disproportionately to women in marriages. It takes its toll.” (adapted from the Globe and Mail)

DREAMS LEAD BEYOND OBSTACLES When you have a dream, you see things other people don’t. You don’t look at all the obstacles. You learn to look at the finish line and the success of the endeavour you’re attempting. When a person lives with a dream, they truly have a life worth living.

You won’t do anything if you don’t have desire. Once you have a dream, a burning desire is what propels it to become reality.

It happened with the Wright brothers.

They dreamt a flying machine and the desire to try, and that’s what gave them the right to be the ones to do it.

(Robert Rohm, Personality Insights)

WADING MOVIE QUICKSAND Trying to figure out what movie to see as a family these days is as difficult as walking on quicksand. Teri Haux, a mother and screenwriter, found a way to help parents wade through the quagmire of violence, sex and drug use in today’s movies.

“I grew up loving the movies, so much so, that I wanted to write them,” says Haux, author of Movie Viewer Extraordinaire: Discerning the Influences of Movies on Your Freedom, Family and Happiness.

Haux has a few tips for parents who want their families to enjoy movies consistent with their family’s values: Choose morals and standards. Before knowing what you don’t want in a movie,

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you need to know what you do want.

Let these standards guide your family’s movie wish list.

Regulate all media—Be a watchful parent who knows both what your kids do and watch.

Support the good and play down the bad.

You probably can’t get rid of all the harmful parts. Talk to your kids about what they see, making sure they understand the context.

Keeping quiet during the bad stuff suggests you think it’s okay.

Trust your feelings. Movies touch our emotions, so if you’re previewing a movie, and it feels wrong (or right), chances are it is.

Use movies to support dreams, interests and talents. Children imitate what they see, so expose them movies that inspire and speaks to interests and talents they already show.

“If you follow these tips, and work to match your values with the vast history of cinema modern technology allows us to access, you can teach your family how to become extraordinary movie viewers,” says Haux. (from a media release)

WEIGHING THE COST OF KIDS (AND PETS) Both make you feel warm and fuzzy, cause pain and heartache and cost a lot of money. But in the end both children and pets are worth your time, effort and money.

A 2004 Manitoba Agriculture estimate put the cost of a child’s first year at more than $10,000, reported the Institute of Marriage and Family Canada (IMFC) in a 2007 eReview. Every year after, parents spend between $6,700 and $10,000 until the child turns 18—making the total cost of raising a child just under $167,000.

And that doesn’t include the cost of college or university.

The Canadian Federation of Humane Societies (www.cfhs.ca) website says pet costs vary based on the kind of animal you adopt. Annual costs include: food, treats, vet check ups, grooming, licensing and boarding.

Costs differ from size and breed, but for a medium-sized, female mixed-breed dog, expect to spend about $1,071. Using that

as a base it can cost between $12,852 and $16,065—since dogs live 12 to 15 years.

A long-haired spayed female domestic cat costs about $870 annually. Using the same formula, a cat will cost $13,050 over its average 15-year lifespan.

What are not included are adoption fees, the cost of spaying or neutering or emergency vet bills. Pet owners also spend money on bowls, collars and leashes, toys, litter and litter pans. And don’t forget about replacing the chewed up slippers or scratched furniture.

But the intangible benefits of children and pets outweigh the costs. “Ask any satisfied pet owner about the pleasure they feel when they come home to a warm welcome from their cat or dog,” says the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association’s A Common Sense Guide to Selecting a Dog or a Cat. “When it comes right down to it, children can’t be subjected to a cost/ benefit analysis, because while the costs may be rather concrete, the benefits can’t be measured,” says the IMFC article.

“Parents see their children as people. And people have inestimable worth. The value of their lives isn’t something we can put a price on.”

features

A SON STACKS UP “He’s learning perseverance and the value of hard work.”

by Troy Dennis

My son Mark is a sport stacker. He takes special plastic cups and stacks them into pyramids—in about the time it takes to read this sentence. An electronic timer starts when he lifts his hands and it stops when he replaces both hands. There are different patterns and the World Sport Stacking Association has rules about how to stack properly.

He started a few years ago when we lived in Nova Scotia. His physed class couldn’t use the gym and, at first, he wasn’t excited about stacking. After he got his own set and began practicing, however, it became a passion and soon he was practicing an hour or two every day.

His first competition was in Miramichi, New Brunswick, and he surprised everyone by setting new Canadian records in almost every event. With that experience behind him, he attended the 2008 World Sport Stacking Championships in Denver, Colorado, placing second and third in events among the 11-year-olds.

As I write, Mark is returning from the 2009 World Championships, where he finished first place in two categories for the 13-yearolds, and has potentially set four new

Canadian records. I’m amazed to think that my son is among the best in the world at his sport. It makes me proud to know that he worked so hard and accomplished so much. He’s learning perseverance and the value of hard work as he stacks his cups.

I’m just as proud of how he has learned to handle his success. When we moved to Moncton last year, he could easily have promoted himself to try to win new friends but he didn’t. He is patient in teaching other stackers.

And he hasn’t let the attention go to his head. Its good to know that my son may be stacking up in more ways than one.

Troy Dennis is the Pastor of Family Ministries at Highfield Baptist Church in Moncton New Brunswick.

He writes a weekly letter on faith and character. Find it at www.onfireletter.com

Courtesy of Tro y Dennis

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money matters

Losing Your Job: How to Cope Emotionally and Financially “Out of work” needn’t mean out of hope

by Paul Emerton No matter how much you anticipated it or how many of your colleagues find themselves in the same situation, losing your job due to downsizing, restructuring or any other reason can be a shattering experience. In fact, psychologists agree that sudden unemployment is as emotionally stressful as divorce or the death of a spouse or parent.

The stress is magnified if you are your family’s principal income earner, making it a double-barrelled blow to both your ego and your security. The approach to dealing with it is to take action not only in looking for new employment but also in restoring other aspects of your life. Here’s how to get started.

Accept and understand your emotions.

You have a right to grieve, feel anger and recognize that you’re depressed. Give yourself time to acknowledge these feelings and share them with your spouse or trusted advisor or pastor. Then promise each other to move beyond them and take charge of your lives.

File for employment insurance and other benefits. This does more than create income; it demonstrates that you are taking charge.

resume convincing? Can you improve your demeanour? Do you need different references? Do you need to consult an expert for assistance?

Recall other challenges you overcame.

If you faced difficult transition points in the past and handled them well, reflect on how you managed to deal with them successfully, and the inner strength you drew upon. Find ways to apply that strength again.

Assess your personal strengths and goals.

Many people evaluate losing their jobs as a turning point in their lives because it provided an opportunity to pursue a dream of independence or a career shift.

Like many other challenges in life, unemployment focuses our minds on the basics. Family, friends and faith suddenly become more valued than ever, and they are key to sustaining our strength during times such as these. Do not be shy about using them to help yourself and others.

Seek solace in your faith in Jesus and proper confidence in your abilities, and nowhere else. Alcohol and drugs may ease the pain, but they won’t put you back to work. Find strength in your friends and your faith.

Two essential words: Be patient.

If you don’t succeed in the first few weeks or months, review your strategy. Is your

Paul Emerton is a Certified Financial Planner and Senior Training Specialist with FaithLife Financial.

Reduce your expenses. Talk to creditors about extending loan periods and reducing monthly payments. Set a tight household budget and stick to it.

Share the facts with your children. Don’t try to hide the situation from them. Gently explain what has occurred and that some changes are being made for a while—you may not leave the house at the same time each workday, or you may not be able to afford some things the family had planned.

Young children tend to blame themselves for family problems. Assure them that they did nothing wrong and you will continue to love and protect them.

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features

Meet the driving force behind rally drifting

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by Bruce Soderholm Fred Weidner was enjoying a terrific ride through challenging terrain in the early stages of a rally race. To a novice, the experience would feel like driving through a foaming carwash at full speed with a sense that everything could come through the windshield at any moment. Suddenly Weidner turned his driving partner.

“I think we made a mistake,” he said.

“We just went right and all the other cars went left.”

In what must have seemed like a frenzied scene from one of The Love Bug movies, they found their way back on to the course, figuring the mistake would cost them dearly.

At the awards ceremony, however, Weidner was shocked to discover his car had taken top prize in its class.

The incident is an apt illustration of Weidner’s life journey. Growing up in Toronto in a devout family and trotted off to German school and accordion lessons, he has seen his life diverge from the path he might have envisioned in those early years. What he initially thought of as detours in his life—a passion for motors, engines and all things mechanical—have turned out to be main thoroughfares. And in an unexpected set of life circumstances, he feels like he’s taken home top prize at a number of levels.

Affable and soft-spoken, Weidner is married with three kids. But even as he approaches the big 4-0, he has a certain kid-in-the-candy-store glint in his eyes.

This is not altogether surprising, given that he gets to run around in a cool car—a custom rally 2002 Subaru WRX—which he also races.

He gets to feel the grip of rubber on the road and take it beyond that—to spin, drift out or deliver more donuts than a Tim Horton’s supply trailer.

He even lays claim to inventing a new sport—Rally Drifting.

Weidner, a marketing manager for a window manufacturer, sees Rally Drifting as a God-given opportunity to pursue ministry, recreation and his love of cars

simultaneously. Rally racing (which has been around almost as long as automobiles) involves racing cars on closed roads in timed stages using modified production vehicles that are still street legal. Typical modifications include safety features such as roll bars and advanced braking technology, along with special suspension systems to absorb the shock of coming back to earth after being airborne.

Drifting is that phenomenon where the driver intentionally oversteers (causing the rear wheels to lose traction while the front wheels point opposite to the turn) through turns while preserving vehicle control and a high exit speed. This driving technique has been popularized in the Fast and Furious film franchise, which released its fourth title in the spring of 2009. “Every 16year-old driver, or every driver with the heart of a 16-year-old, loves to fishtail around the corner,” observes Weidner.

On the Rally Drifting courses he designs, “only two cars race at a time. The cars start side by side but are immediately split onto separate but identical tracks… [which] rejoin just a few feet before the finish line.” he says. And even though they race in tandem, The drivers’ results are judged by their individual times. Rally Drifting is possible on many different surfaces, including dirt and ice.

On pavement, its biggest enthusiasts are the tire manufacturers who, says Weidner, “can sell a thousand dollars worth of product every 10 minutes.”

Weidner’s big break came shortly after he formed an informal club of rally drivers who shared his faith and connected with the organizer of a huge Monster Truck event taking place at the domed Rogers Centre in Toronto. The net result was an opportunity to showcase the new sport to a huge audience—more than 100,000 during one weekend. Other races soon followed, including another stadium event in Montreal playing to a capacity crowd.

While stadium spectacles are still in the mix, the next stage of growth in Rally Drifting is now happening on a grassroots scale as the lion’s share of future events take place at smaller, but enthusiastic venues.

Agricultural and rural county fairs, the types where tractor-pulls happen annually, are fertile ground. Whatever the venue, Weidner is hoping to reach a broad audience with what he terms “good, clean fun.”

Twists and turns While Weidner’s life route has taken some unexpected twists and turns, he’s come to love the adventure inherent in pursuing the road less traveled. He refers to himself as an Average Joe. “Although I tried, I never once made the honour roll in high school,” he writes.

“I wasn’t Mr. Popularity, nor was I the captain of the football team. Yet none of that matters.” He did recognize his interest in all things mechanical and pursued an undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering. During the second year of his undergraduate experience, his Christian faith came to fruition. He’s never looked back.

After achieving his Professional Engineer status, Weidner recognized that he had a knack for management and subsequently pursued an MBA degree—a story in itself.

He also got married and is raising a family— another story in itself (see sidebar).

Weidner recognizes he has been fortunate. But he doesn’t want to keep his good fortune to himself. He’d like to model himself after the example of King David who, in the story of his best friend’s son Mephibosheth, sought to pay forward the mercy and good fortune he had been shown.

To this end, Weidner formed an organization called “Canadian Motorsports Ministries” to reach out to racing fans who have only a passing familiarity with faith and church.

He is particularly hoping to connect with young men, especially those drawn to the dangerous and deadly thrills of street racing,

seven – issue seven father’s day 2009 page 15

features

where the pile of body bags grows ever larger. Many thousands of charges are laid each year in North America in an effort to curb what is becoming an increasingly more visible social evil. Weidner has a vision for getting these young men off the street and enjoying motorsports in a controlled and much safer environment.

While he knows the compelling urgency of “the need for speed” (“I’m young enough to remember and old enough to know better.”), he points out that the thrill in racing is not solely connected to speed.

“If you go 60 km an hour on the 401, you’ll be bored out of your mind.’ he says “But I can take you down roads in the middle of winter, especially in the dark, on narrow roads that are barely wider than your car, on ice, at 60 km an hour and [I guarantee] you’ll be white-knuckled.”

Weidner wants Canadian Motorsports Ministries to provide an opportunity for those same young men who are enamored with street racing to channel their driving passions in a safe direction. He hands out small placards at events during autograph sessions encouraging youngsters to “Work Hard: Play Hard” with an emphasis on acting responsibly, including the need to make wise decisions (“Life: No Rewind”) early in life.

As far as taking his ministry further is concerned, Weidner cites that his greatest current need is for people or organizations who have a driving venue (e.g. a large enclosed parking lot) to volunteer their space so that he and his fellow ministry enthusiasts can teach driving skills at safe speeds on a pylon course. Weidner would love to be

fielding any and all offers of that sort.

Where Rally Drifting in general, and Canadian Motorsports Ministries in particular, will end up, the Lord only knows.

Whatever happens, you can be confident that Fred Weidner will be the driving force behind it.

Fred Weidner signs autographs at a major event in Toronto.

RALLY TO THE FAMILY Fred and Sandra Weidner are partners in a rare adventure of parenting. If moving from parenting two children to three is like shifting from a man-to-man to a zone defense in basketball, imagine going from zero to three kids all at once. That’s what happened to the Weidners.

Five years ago they vaulted into the parenting world when their triplets were born. You can’t help but feel for Sandra when you discover that the average birth weight of Megan, Evan and Lauren was six pounds, roughly double the birth weight of most triplets. This statistic is currently being considered for inclusion in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Like most parents, Fred wants his children to have it easier than he did.

He also knows that parenting behaviour, for better or worse, is usually based on what’s been modeled in your own life.

Not surprisingly, his children are involved in piano lessons and sing in a choir.

One benefit of music lessons is that “it teaches you how to learn,” he says.

Family means a lot to Fred. He has drastically cut back the number of rally events he competes in because of what it costs those who are near and dear to him— and this despite a terrific aptitude for the sport and a history of consistent podium finishes. “You’re responsible to your wife and your kids,” he says. “I don’t drive in the Canadian championships any more because it was too much time away from my family.” Also, it costs a lot to be competitive. Does it make sense to spring for a quarter million dollar rally car, he asks?

“Or do I do the responsible thing and pay down my mortgage?”

The need to give greater priority to his family led Weidner to the concept of Rally Drifting as a sport. He sees the idea as an answer to prayer. Rally Drifting is a safe form of motorsport. It’s still a thrill to watch, but in its present format “no one is going to put you to the wall” as might happen in a NASCAR event. Better yet, he can enjoy his automotive adventures in a schedule that he controls; a control that allows Weidner to balance something beyond his tires and suspension— notably, his life.

— Bruce Soderholm

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features

The day Daddy blew it Put your kids first. All other work is secondary.

The day I blew it as a father and learned an important lesson from my oldest daughter started much like any other Tuesday—the day reserved for making pastoral visits to our parishioners.

I dressed our two-year old Valorie in her snowsuit and packed her into the makeshift car seat in the back of our 1962 Volkswagen Beetle. Jo gathered up her purse and diaper bag and, pregnant with Leanne, struggled into the passenger seat.

I asked Jo to brief me on the first of the families on the list. As she began to remind me of names and relationships, little Valorie kept asking questions: “Where are we going?

When are we going to get there? Will there be kids for me to play with?”

Her constant questions interfered with my executive briefing and I suddenly turned and brusquely said over my shoulder, “Valorie, I’m getting tired of all those questions.

Please sit and be quiet.”

For the next few minutes everything was quiet as Jo and I discussed the people we were going to visit, what topics to bring up, and which ones do avoid. Switching lanes I glanced into the rear view mirror and saw Valorie’s little face crumpled with grief. Tears were streaming down her cheeks, her little shoulders were heaving with silent sobs.

“What’s the matter with Val?” I asked Jo, having already forgotten my exasperated outburst.

As Jo turned to face Val, I heard her little voice sobbing, “Daddy is getting tired of me.” That’s when I pulled over to the curb, stopped and, leaning my head on the steering wheel, cried bitterly. We pulled her into the front with us and made a hug sandwich until we all stopped crying.

to good music, organize play dates with “nice” kids and pick out the best school we can afford. We want them to interact well with others and be successful in whatever they decide to do in their life. We all realize that success in reaching life goals in the future depends a lot on our education today.

That is why we especially want our children to do well in school.

Yet, according to Dr. Knudsen and his three fellow members of the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, it’s the earliest years of life, long before starting school, that forever shape an adult’s ability to learn. Working independently, the four authors each came to the conclusion that a child doing well in school does not depend as much on the quality of the education as on the healthy interactions with parents during the early, preschool years.

“It’s all about playing with your child,” said Dr. Knudsen, “A child’s eventual ability to learn calculus or a second language starts with the neurons that are shaped by positive interactions with nurturing adults.”

One of the authors of the study, Jack P. Shonkoff, MD, founding director of the newly established Harvard Center on Children said,

by Jack Popjes “The key issue is the nature of kids’ relationships with the important people in their lives. It’s not about the toys, it’s about the human connection.”

Not surprisingly, the Bible speaks to this issue as well. “Parents, don’t come down too hard on your children or you’ll crush their spirits” (Col. 3:21, The Message).

Ouch! I certainly crushed Valorie’s spirit that day in the Volkswagen. Even though it happened more than 40 years ago, writing this story of the painful lesson I learned then brought tears to my eyes again. Since I tend to be purpose driven, I resolved to set having solid, positive relationships with my children as a life purpose to work towards.

I am sorry for the pain I caused my little daughter, but I’m not sorry for the lesson I learned. Put your kids first. They are your primary ministry. All other work is secondary.

Jack Popjes is a former executive director of Wycliffe Canada. He describes himself as a speaker, writer and linguist/translator. He and Jo now live in a cabin on the shore of Sandy Lake, a 45-minute drive north west of Edmonton, Alberta. Check out his web site: www.thewordman.ca

Work mattered more Jo and I wanted the best for our little girl.

I had no intention of hurting her, or making her feel unwanted. We certainly did not want to place our ministry work at a higher priority than raising our child. Yet that is exactly what I had just done.

What’s more, according to studies done by professor Eric Knudsen, PhD, of Stanford University School of Medicine, I had verbally knocked her down to a low priority while she was at the most vulnerable, sensitive and impressionable age.

All parents want the best for their kids.

We buy them expensive toys, expose them seven – issue seven father’s day 2009 page 17

features

Children: Expen$e or inve$tment?

Strategies for the costly process of good parenting.

by Henry Friesen How much have we invested in our children?

A lot, that’s for sure. The kids have cost a ton of money, time and much more.

And we’re still working on the final tally.

Our road to parenting success was winding and challenging, not at all like the prairie highways by-passing our town. This article describes strategies that worked for us.

There are still occasions when I wonder what might have been. Like recently.

“Where have I failed you as a father?”

My older son thought I was joking. I’d heard of a father-and-son team tackling Mount Everest together. Thinking we had missed the ultimate bonding experience, I queried my son. Had he ever yearned to climb the world’s tallest peak? His immediate reply: “Never even thought of it!”

Seriously, I was hoping to get at least a glimmer of interest, but to no avail. Should we have climbed more hills when he was a youngster? Spent more time vacationing in the mountains? Or should I be grateful that his major recreational pursuits (hockey,

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hockey and hockey, in that order) had stayed within my net worth?

With three children in college (sons 18 and 24, daughter married and 27), I am now reaping what I sowed, for better or worse. Future teaching will consist of carefully worded recommendations, not blunt commands. It’s probably unreasonable to expect dramatic changes.

Fortunately my wife and I have a lot to be thankful for. The kids’ daily lives all demonstrate their commitment to Christ.

They are healthy and know how to work.

And with one, four and eight years of postsecondary studies under their belts respectively, they have learned a lot that we were unable to teach them.

Our children did not stay within a neat set of parameters as they bounced through childhood. Like most parents, we experienced times when challenges loomed overhead like dark clouds with nary a silver lining in sight. Those difficult times certainly enhance our thankfulness today.

What did it cost to raise our children?

That depends on your perspective. For us, children were a long-term investment, an opportunity to raise well-rounded adults.

And now we’re reaping the dividends.

I realize the result could have been very different. Many parents are heartbroken due to bad choices their children have made.

To those parents, and all others reading this, I recommend looking forward. You can’t change the past.

Our children are wired differently, but some things seem to have inspired all of them—sometimes with a vengeance! Here are a few things that appear to have yielded positive results.

Delegate decisions. We wanted our children to become well-adjusted, contributing members of society. This included learning how to work, earning an income and spending wisely. They needed to learn how to make decisions for themselves.

Our criteria for giving them “room to decide”

was not whether they were making the right decision, but whether they would learn from whatever decision they made. We believed that if they learned how to make age appropriate decisions and how to deal with the consequences, leaving home would be an easy transition. For example, one important lesson was giving them a specific clothing budget before they were teens. The most difficult part was Mom learning not to buy any clothes for them on her own.

Seize the moments. Teaching children to make good financial decisions is a challenge at the best of times, never mind when their parents have different mental calculators.

When I asked our youngest how he learned to make “money” decisions, he noted two things. Given that our primary beverage at home was cold water, we usually ordered ice water when travelling or eating out.

We made sure our children understood why, in dollars and sense. Son says the symbolism of consciously making this choice has impacted his decisions regarding larger items.

As a long-time Type 2 diabetic, my preferred fast-food outlet is Subway. For reasons unknown, our kids decided it was their favourite as well. Son remembers that I always picked up the tab for whole-wheat subs, but not for white. He says this helped him understand healthy choices (but he confessed Italian is now his favourite).

Teach by example. During the first years of marriage we recorded expenses, but mostly for their nostalgic value. This changed when we moved into a new house with triple the floor space of previously rented quarters.

We decided to save a budgeted monthly amount in order to pay cash for all furniture.

It was amazing how many items were no longer a priority after saving for six months to buy them. Our children learned about “delayed gratification” and that money doesn’t grow on trees. They also witnessed (and talked about) their parents keeping records, planning their spending and tithing to their church.

average” in at least one area, something to be passionate about.

In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell notes that it takes 10,000 hours to become excellent at anything. For our children that was hockey, with special thanks to my wife, who was their biggest booster, statistician and archivist. They knew she attended as many games as possible because she really wanted to be there.

Our street was “hockey central” for many years and we spent countless hours travelling and in rinks. Fortunately, each of the kids had years on both winning and losing teams, learning important lessons from each. Our children played a variety of other sports during the “off” season, but none with the passion they invested in hockey. To my disappointment, music lessons were short-lived.

Think (way) ahead. We began saving for Bible college a month after our oldest was born. We never “preached Bible college” because we wanted it to be their decision.

However, we made sure the kids heard about the fund and why we thought it was important. We supported our favourite college financially, occasionally hosted staff in our home and gave the kids the opportunity to attend college youth events.

It probably helped that they all loved the hijinks that are part of dorm life. Bible college is not an elixir that will cure whatever ails kids. But our children are proof that it can be a training ground where young adults learn a lot about life while they study God’s word and more.

Barter for responsibility. At age 15 I dropped out of high school to help on the family farm. Five years later, when I started my post-secondary odyssey as a mature student with no family financial support, I understood the value of an education.

A year in Bible college, a degree and subsequent professional designation opened many doors, even though I had to prove myself after I stepped through them.

We wanted our children to have the same opportunity.

And we wanted them to think of Bible college in particular as an investment, not merely a bigger debt load. I made them an offer: “We’ll help you finish college without debt—or pay your tuition (but nothing else)— provided you record all your income and expenses and try to follow a budget.”

Planning always included tithing on their incomes, even though indirectly it came out of my pocket. This has been a journey in relationships, with each child responding differently to the offer.

During our daughter’s first year in dorm, I found out she hadn’t washed her sheets in more than a month. With suitable indignation, I broached the delicate subject.

She exclaimed, “But Dad, that costs money!”

I noticed this hadn’t kept her from buying a few CDs. My logic may have been simplistic: If they learn these financial skills in college, albeit for somewhat selfish reasons, like riding a bicycle they’ll never forget them.

I also figured that paying attention to their finances would help them see college as an investment and make them better marriage partners. I haven’t changed my mind.

There were many other “life lesson” opportunities along the way. For example, all children deserve a chance to have braces.

I can’t think of a better (or more expensive) way of learning about “short term pain for long term gain.” And lessons learned from running their own businesses can’t be measured in mere dollars. They will be valuable no matter what their future holds.

How much money have we invested in our children? I have no idea, and I don’t intend to do the math. I do know one thing: The return on investment sure beats the return on my retirement savings.

Henry Friesen figures being a chartered accountant is a handicap when teaching children about money. He lives near Winnipeg.

Support a passion. Every child deserves an opportunity to learn to be “above

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features

do the rite thing Rites of passage provide a path of honour and blessing for young people

by Ben Volman Gordon Dalbey was 20, serving as a Peace Corps volunteer in Africa, when a Nigerian colleague explained the male tribal rites of passage. Every year, village men gathered the boys near adolescence, around age 11.

They surrounded the mother’s hut to “call out” the son who is inside. The mother opens the door reluctantly, but the call gets louder and more vigorous until she steps aside. Even then, the boy must make the decision to come. Initiates leave the village for a time of physical and spiritual training.

On their return, each receives a new hut with tools and land from their father to live independently.

When he was 20, Dalbey scoffed at the native custom. In later years he felt humbled.

By contrast, he saw the shallow proofs of manhood that were supposed to validate his own generation: getting a driver’s license at 16, buying cigarettes, getting drunk and going to pornographic movies. “We are lost males,” he writes in Healing the Masculine Soul, “cut off from our masculine heritage— abandoned to machines, organizations, fantasies, drugs.”

Isn’t the church supposed to fill that void? Traditional congregations have a strong heritage of preparing youth toward first communion and confirmation. But most evangelical churches have no structured programs for adolescent life passages. Young people are encouraged to take a step of faith in Jesus, but that doesn’t fulfill their need for parental and community affirmation.

Doug Koop grew up in Africa, the son of missionary parents and raised his own family in Winnipeg. His church traditions lacked a formal rite of passage for young men. But when his eldest son, Nathan, reached 13, Koop knew he had to mark this coming of age. So friends, family, neighbours and the church community gathered to affirm Nathan and acknowledge the role they had all played in his development. As editor of Canada’s national ChristianWeek newspaper, Koop reflected further in an editorial.

“Why are rites of passage important?

What deeper impulse prompts the human

seven – issue seven father’s day 2009 page 20

longing for social acknowledgement of life’s transitions?” he asked. “Part of the explanation relates to the enduring need for civility and community, and the fundamental desire to know why we are on this earth.”

And then it got personal. “My son, Nathan, turned 13 this summer. While he isn’t yet a man, he’s not the child he was just a year ago either. His life is at a turning point. We marked the turning point with a celebration..., a symbolic and ceremonial attempt to articulate his moral and spiritual heritage.” He recalls how one of the participants most impressed by the ceremony was a non-Christian neighbour.

“He won’t fully appreciate what he was given this evening until he is much older,” she said.

Indeed, Nathan hasn’t forgotten.

“It means more to me now looking back,” he wrote back to an e-mail inquiry. “I also reflect on what trajectory my life has taken in the 13 years following that party. The faces I remember being there are people of strong faith, and perhaps that has formed my own faith.”

Significant points Christian author and teacher Craig Hill stresses the importance of blessing children at significant points in their life cycle. In his book, The Ancient Paths, he says this is vital to instill an inward awareness of their identity as God’s creation with a meaningful destiny.

“When blessing does take place at those crucial times, it releases an extraordinary inner security and confidence,” Hill writes.

He uses the Jewish model of the Bar/Bat Mitzvah (“bar” is son, “bat” is daughter; mitzvah refers to the commandments in the Torah given by God to Israel, thus “Son or Daughter of the Commandments”). Hill’s alternative ceremony for Christian young people is called Bar Baraka (“Son of the Blessing”).

Val Dodd, senior pastor of Burloak Christian Fellowship in Oakville, Ontario, strongly promotes Hill’s approach. Dodd’s

passion on this topic was birthed 20 years ago when he and his wife were called to ministry in his native Ireland. That sense of call came with an unusual pre-condition: he knew that he must ask for his father’s blessing. Dodd’s father, a traditional Catholic, had initially been hostile to his son’s faith although, by then, they had reconciled.

Dodd vividly remembers arriving at his father’s door to ask for a blessing and the words he received: “Jesus, I bless my son and Brenda, my daughter in law, to go preach the Gospel,” his father said. “I believe that was the day I became a man in my spirit and life,” says Dodd. “It changed me inside.”

Later, he was attending one of Hill’s Family Life Seminars when he heard Hill explain the significance of a father’s blessing.

“Then a light went on and I wanted to see that happen in other lives as well.”

A consistent emphasis in all the material around adolescent rites of passage is the critical importance of the father. Based on his extensive experience as a Christian spiritual counselor, Dalbey stresses the need for young people, especially young men, to have their father actively present in their lives as they reach puberty. In the child’s early years there is a primary dependency on the mother. But the father’s role increases as the young person expands their vision beyond the home.

The young person sees the father as a mentor preparing them to have functional lives out in the world.

Dodd regrets that Christians have lost a common source of blessing which is celebrated each week in the traditional Jewish household; the Sabbath blessing from the father to his family. “The Jewish people have something we don’t have, a sense of impartation of family blessing from the father,” he says. “We have tried to replicate the Bar Mitzvah through church confirmation, but that event has no impartation of blessing from the parents to the children, particularly the father’s blessing.”

iStockphoto.com

Family blessing As senior pastors, Dodd and his wife Brenda began to teach their congregation about family blessing and were astounded by the profound response from their people.

Men in particular began traveling back to their fathers for blessing, even over long distances. One of his members, John, seized on the concept so strongly that he traveled back to receive the blessing of his father-inlaw in South Africa. Dodd says, “They all felt as honored and blessed as I did. It’s never too late. I was 40 when I received the blessing.”

After teaching these principles to their church, the first Burloak event to honour their young people was held in 2000 and proved very rewarding. Since then, they have developed and refined the format of the ceremony. About 80-90 young people have gone through the program which is based on the blessing of Isaiah 43:1: But now, this is what the Lord says— He who created you, O Jacob, He who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; You are mine.

The five components of the ceremonial

blessing include: a confirmation of gender identity as the young person goes from the mother to the father across a stage; release into manhood or womanhood; calling forth the young person’s positive character qualities; a recital of prophetic words reminiscent of Paul’s words to Timothy (2 Tim. 1: 5,6) and a pronouncement of specific blessings as the parents lay hands on their child and anoint them. Members of the congregation then gather round to bless the young people. The church also affirms single parents, for example, having Godly men stand with the single mothers.

The Dodds were surprised to learn how many Christians hesitate to bless their

Val and Brenda Dodd

children from feelings of inadequacy, and this has led to an emphasis on supporting family life. “We’re developing a culture of honor and blessing in the family and the church,” says Val Dodd.

In addition to Craig Hill’s books and Family Life Seminar, including his book on Bar Baraka, Val Dodd recommends Gary Smalley and John Trent’s, The Blessing; Rolf Garborg, The Family Blessing and Robert Lewis, Raising a Modern-Day Knight. Dodd is also available to do seminars on generational blessing for churches.

Dodd fully agrees with Dalbey, that a young person’s search for validation into an adult identity remains one of the most compelling and troubling areas in their lives.

“We have children looking for acceptance in all the wrong places and a variety of experiences to satisfy that need,” he says.

Providing a path of honour and blessing gives young people the motivation to live out healthy core values and affirm their best qualities before they head out “to make the big mistakes.”

Ben Volman is a freelance writer based in Toronto.

seven – issue seven father’s day 2009 page 21

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Out of my depth

You should call your dad Moments that wake us up to something bigger, or shake us down to something deeper.

by Mark Buchanan The last time I spoke with my dad was June 17, 1996. It was Father’s Day. I rarely phoned him—our conversations were mostly awkward and terse, often edgy.

He was, in his worst moods, combative, a churlish atheist spoiling for a fight, stoked up with fresh volleys of mockery. He’d tell me he just watched a documentary about war in the Middle East or starvation in the horn of Africa or an earthquake in Asia, and where was God in all that suffering? Or he’d gloat about the fall of some prominent televangelist, and why wasn’t God enough?

I found him tiresome. Sometimes I told him as much.

So on Father’s Day, 1996, I called him out of duty, and also because my wife told me I should. We were leaving the next morning for a week of holidays, to an almost phoneless paradise, and it was now or never. So I did as she said.

He sounded old and tired and sad. He was nursing deep regrets. He apologized three times for his failings as a father. My heart softened toward him, and I told him, No, you’ve been a good father. Then I was stumped for instances. But he seemed genuinely remorseful, and I got desperate.

I prayed to God to remind me of good things he’d done, and said, and been.

God flooded me with remembrances.

Sacrifices he’d made. Vices he’d conquered—not the least of which was a decades’ long addiction to alcohol.

His faithfulness to my mother. His kindness to strangers. His unbending truthfulness, no matter what it cost him. His courage.

God flooded me. And in turn, I poured it back on him. I told him all the things I remembered about his example and his character. We laughed about funny memories. We got teary over painful ones.

It was the longest phone conversation I’d

ever had with him, and the warmest.

We both ended with, “I love you.”

The next day he died. Our family had just arrived on the island and settled into the cabin where we were to spend the next week. Night was gathering. Heavy footfalls on the steps. A shadow falling on the window. A light knock on the door. There stood the caretaker, grim and downcast, a slip of paper in his hand. A number on it.

My brother’s.

I knew right away. For some things, we have instincts. I walked down to the only phone on the island, in a little booth at the edge of the public wharf. I picked up the receiver, held it a long time, studied the pinholes in its mouthpiece. I dialed slowly.

My brother answered. The flatness in his voice told me what I already knew, but he proceeded to tell me anyhow: our father had died that afternoon. It was over quickly.

A massive coronary. Ironically, it happened as he rose to take a phone call from his heart doctor.

I think often about Father’s Day, 1996, and the day after. I think about all those phone calls. Mostly, I think about the first one, the call I made to my dad. It wouldn’t

have happened without my wife’s persistence, or God’s providence, or his grace. I think about how glad I am for it, and how sorry I’d have been if, following my own impulse, I’d put it off. I marvel at the turn the conversation took, toward tenderness and thanksgiving. Toward love.

We all have our reckonings. We all have those moments that wake us up to something bigger, or shake us down to something deeper. That phone call, and what happened next, is one of mine.

My life reoriented because of it. I move a little slower, more deliberate. I try to speak less, and weigh my words more. I seek the good in others. I say thank you a lot, and mean it. I say I love you every day, many times, to many people.

And I listen better: to friends, co-workers, strangers, my children, my own heart. And to my wife. Especially when she asks me to make a call.

Mark Buchanan is an author and pastor living on Vancouver Island. He is the author of five bestselling books and numerous articles.

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power play

Great games. Great toys.

Great gadgets.

Reviews by Sandy McMurray

POWER BUG SWATTER www.amazon.com

Summer BBQs and flying insects go together like, well, like picnics and ants. You want your grilling to attract an admiring crowd, but you often get a cloud of bugs as well.

The time-honoured response to flying insects is a rolled-up newspaper or a fly swatter (or a big stick; anything you can smash them with). But this is the 21st century. Perhaps you should get a bug zapper—one of those gadgets that utterly destroys bugs with controlled bursts of blue lightning.

Wait—what if you could combine the two?

The rechargeable power bug swatter from iTouchless is designed to electrocute flying insects on contact. It combines the bugdestroying power of electricity with the satisfaction of swinging a club. Tim Allen would be proud.

The output power is relatively low, and the handle is double insulated, so it poses no danger to children or pets. Still, the company emphasizes that the power bug swatter is not a toy. Not a child’s toy, anyway. Enjoy!

DRESS FOR DINNER NAPKINS http://www.spoonsisters.com/ Not every dinner is a formal dinner, but there is such a thing as too informal. A plain white tshirt is not always enough.

What can you do if you find yourself underdressed at a semi-formal dinner party?

Here’s one answer: Dress For Dinner napkins.

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Tuck one in under your chin and you’ll feel like you made an effort to dress appropriately. The napkins have a fake tie drawn right onto the product, which creates the illusion that you’re a snappy dresser. Dress for Dinner is the perfect accessory for your next semi-formal barbecue or formal picnic.

removable power train that requires less than one minute to assemble or disassemble, without tools. The Mokai can be transported on top of your vehicle, eliminating the need for a trailer.

GRILL DADDY PRO GRILL BRUSH www.grilldaddy.net The Pro Grill Brush from Grill Daddy is like a steam cleaner for your barbecue grill. Fill the handle with tap water and turn the grill on low before scraping. The heat from the grill warms the water, creating steam that loosens the gunk on the grill.

The result: baked-on food and grease are removed and grill grates are clean. It’s safe to use on steel, iron, and porcelain grill grates. The Pro Grill Brush has two sturdy handles to provide leverage and keep hands away from the heat. Removable brushes are dishwasher safe.

You’re welcome.

MOKAI JET-PROPELLED KAYAK www.mokai.com What do you get if you add a motor to a kayak? You get a Mokai.

The Mokai watercraft is a go anywhere, do anything jet-propelled sport boat that can take you places no ordinary kayak can go.

Paddle to a quiet fishing spot or power up the engine and zip across the lake in record time. Mokai gives you access to previously inaccessible coastlines and waterways, untapped fishing holes and deserted beaches.

Mokai is equipped with an axial flow jet pump powered by a Honda four-stroke engine. This patented design results in a

WATER WARFARE www.isoaker.com Water fights are a summer tradition in my family. As the weather gets warmer we break out the hoses, sprinklers, squirt guns and water balloons, and we begin to dream about the epic (and soggy) battles ahead. This year, I’m thinking about the Little Tykes Beach Ball sprinkler, and the Super Soaker Arctic Blast, which has a chamber for ice cubes, so you can shock your opponent with blasts of really cold water.

For those who are serious about their water play, iSoaker.com is a serious resource. This website is to water warfare what Google is to searches. Check out the iSoaker.com Armory, which features photos and statistics about every squirt gun you can imagine (and many more). There are also repair guides, complete with photos of the insides of many squirt gun models, so you can figure out what’s wrong and how to fix it. iSoaker.com also offers a unique list of

water games, complete with rules and regulations for play. If you want to do more than just run around this year, you should visit and bookmark this site.

After you land a few planes, helicopters start to appear. Then larger, faster aircraft show up and things get a more complicated very quickly. It’s a great game that’s a lot of fun.

POWER CUP www.thinkgeek.com Power Cup is a 200-Watt power inverter that safely provides standard 120 Volt AC power from any cigarette lighter socket.

Use the two AC plugs to power a DVD player, game console or laptop, or to charge your cell phone. Power Cup also has a USB port that provides 500mA to charge iPods and other USB-powered devices.

Power Cup fits in a standard cup holder, so it stays in place when you’re driving (or boating). Other features include overload protection and a low battery shutoff that prevents you from sucking all the life out of your car battery.

The only down side? You need another place to put your coffee.

PAPER AIRPLANES Electric Plane Launcher (both available from Amazon) www.amazon.com If video games aren’t your thing, try launching and landing a few paper airplanes instead. The World Record Paper Airplane Book contains models and instructions to build more than 100 planes including the world record holder.

Once you’ve folded a few stationery flyers, try them out with the Electric Plane Launcher. This science kit uses two motors and some spinning discs to launch paper airplanes at high speed. Get the kids off the computer and give them a physics lesson.

Some assembly is definitely required.

FLIGHT CONTROL www.firemint.com This simple, addictive game for iPhone or iPod touch nearly prevented me from finishing this column. I bought Flight Control for 99 cents on a whim and have been playing it constantly ever since.

Flight Control casts you in the role of air traffic controller. Aircraft appear at the edge of the screen, one at a time. Your job is to direct them to a safe runway, by tracing a flight path on the screen with your finger.

You get one point for each plane that lands safely.

If anything crashes, the game is over.

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What women want

Accidentally on purpose Most of the really memorable moments in our lives happen by accident.

by Sheila Wray Gregoire I fell in love by accident, which is out of character for me. I am a compulsive planner.

I have to-do lists of to-do lists, and though falling in love was on that long-ago list, I meant to fall in love with someone else.

But one day, while I was hanging out with my best friend at university, I realized that he and I were more than friends. And I told him. It took him a while to come around, but he did eventually, and the rest is history.

Most of the really memorable moments in our lives happen by accident. Think about the last time you as a family laughed so hard milk came out of somebody’s nose. What started it? Strange bodily noises often launch many such instances of hilarity, but it could also be an inside joke or a strange face. If those strange bodily noises had been emitted when only the stinky one was present, no one would laugh at it for generations to come. But because you were all in the same room, it becomes the stuff of legend.

With most shared laughter, though, the intensity of the hilarity is inversely proportional to the thought that went into the matter beforehand. Anyone who has sat at the dinner table after a proud 7-year-old has mastered the art of belching knows that it isn’t humorous when it’s forced. It has to be an accident.

I think the same is true for our serious memories as well. They can’t necessarily be planned. They happen when you’re tucking in your daughter, and a little hand reaches up squeezes your neck as she says, “I’m so glad you’re my daddy.” It’s precious.

We women often go too far to create these Precious Memories. We bake cookies and plan a night of Monopoly only to find the kids get sick eating the cookie batter, the

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batter that survives gets burnt, and nobody wants to play Monopoly anyway. Then we get grumpy and wonder why nobody appreciates us.

While we women plan and fail, though, many men fail to plan. And that’s the funny thing about these accidental moments: they’re not really accidents at all. Family accidents—at least the good kind—rely on two things: time and attention. When we spend time with our families, things happen.

When we don’t pay attention, they don’t.

Our society has it backwards. We think quality matters, not quantity. But that whole quality time thing was made up by people who didn’t want to feel guilty about being so busy. Now no one had more to do on this earth than Jesus, but He still took time to talk and eat with everyone, important or not.

He made people feel comfortable with Him because He gave them His attention. He probably laughed at jokes, and may even have cracked some Himself. He enjoyed life, and so did those who were with Him. I know you’re busy. Everybody’s busy.

But planning for downtime is still possible.

Friends of mine were tired of the monosyllabic grunts they received from their teenage boys when they asked, “How was your day?” So they put in a hot tub. Sitting in hot, bubbly water seems to loosen teens’ vocal chords and real communication finally took place. The parents were thrilled, at least until the teenage girls in bikinis started to show up. But that’s another story.

Maybe you don’t have a hot tub, but you can still plan for uninterrupted time with your kids. Summer’s here, and nothing builds family legends like Dad trying to set up the campsite in the rain while the kids complain that they’re hungry and Mom asks

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why this tent peg is so bent. You may be miserable at the time, but that story will live on forever.

You need to take the lead on this, because when we women do, we try too hard. Men are much better at spontaneity than we are, because if we’re venturing somewhere, we need to know what food needs to be packed, how many changes of clothes may be required, where all the bathrooms are along the way and, by the way, where’s the first aid kit? We’re exhausting.

Men are more prone to picking an idea and running with it. And chances are something unexpected is bound to occur.

No matter how much we try to stop you, then, stick to your guns. After all, most family memories have a “minor disaster narrowly averted” element. It all adds to the charm!

So let’s have some fun this summer, accidentally on purpose. Plan, every now and then, just to do something silly together.

Or even plan to do nothing at all! Either way, spend time together, pay attention, and then sit back and be amazed at what everyone will remember later.

Sheila is the author of several marriage books, including Honey, I Don’t Have a Headache Tonight: Help for women who want to feel more in the mood. You can find her speaking at marriage conferences around the country, or at www.SheilaWrayGregoire.com.

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