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I have come to realize over the years that we Indigenous people are historically event-oriented people, rather than time-oriented people. Our worldview is for the most part the opposite of the European or western worldview. This has caused so many conflicts over the years. The settlers came with a worldview focused on an individualistic and for-profit approach to life as opposed to a communal and sharing approach to life with the Indigenous People. When we look at the Word of...
To avoid my ho-hum attitude associated with taking earth and its marvels for granted, I try pretending. What if I lived in a distant galaxy and came to visit earth for the first time? What would I think of it all? I began my series on miracles with our atmosphere. I take it for granted. I breathe it in, walk around in it, view distant stars through it, and ignore the fact that without the atmosphere I would cease to exist. Flight is another matter. I have never lost my awe...
"There's darkness down there," our four-year-old granddaughter whispered as she peered down the stairs. She was right. Bright spots on planet earth seem scarce these days. I love cheering people up. In April, 2020, during COVID-19, I told my wife, "I'm pretty excited about my car. We just got 43 days to the gallon." But life can drain our joy tank. A few years ago, we made a can't-miss-investment in a hotel. The bank foreclosed. Thankfully, I invested in some airline stocks. O...
We had plenty of rules when I was growing up. No throwing cheese into the ceiling fan. Stop pouring ketchup on your pancakes. Obey your parents, that it may go well with you and that you may live past Thursday. Mom taught me other rules too: Love God with everything you've got. Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you. Make the bed when you wake up. He who starts the day cleaning his own messes will learn responsibility and make a fine husband one day. Through the years...
Many times I have heard non-Indigenous people say that they wish Indigenous people would "just get over it." Just get over all this talk about residential schools and financial payments from the government, and just move on with life. Most of the people who say this already have an established career, or sense of stability in their lives. These aren't people who are necessarily well off financially, but they have managed to make strides with their homes and their jobs and...
In my last article, I began a new series about God's miracles that are all around us. I still think about that thin atmospheric line protecting us from the cold blackness of outer space. Life is fragile, yet so abundant! We usually think of miracles as a healing or something supernatural and extraordinary, but to me, as I think of that thin line, even a mundane banana is a miracle. How did we get such things as bananas onto this planet? We didn't. That is the miracle! As leave...
I don't know about you, but I am finding that we are living in a day and an age that is full of inconsistent information! Everybody is sure of something but nobody's stories seem to agree. Contradictions fly at us from our TVs, cell phones and our laptops. How do we know what to believe? How do we know who is telling the truth? Yesterday, I was visiting a man on a local reservation, and he was certain of a very important truth. He told me that Jesus is the way, the truth and...
I saw my neighbor, Rose, walking to her mailbox and hurried to catch up with her. Rose and I were "friendly" but not "friends." We didn't visit each other but we'd talk a few minutes if we met at the mailbox. "Hi, Rose. I haven't seen you for a while. How are you?" I asked. When you ask people how they are, they usually say, "I'm fine." Except that isn't what she said. "My hair is getting thin. My eyes are bad, and I need new glasses but I can't afford them. My hearing is gett...
It was early September, and as the first green tree morphed to yellow, the thought came to me, "Here we go again-pretty soon the snow'll be flying!" In Cree we'd say Kiiyipa wii mispoon. No matter how you say it, there's no getting around the changing seasons! It also brought to mind the passage in Genesis 8:22 of how the seasons came to be. It came out of God's promise made to Noah after the worldwide flood was over. "As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold...
The Bible portrays so many pictures of the Lord Jesus being the caring, compassionate shepherd of His sheep. He is the Good Shepherd who will look for a wandering sheep and bring it back to His fold to be kept, valued and safe forever (John 10:28). With regards to the unrest of society and the continuing struggle for various people groups to be valued and accepted, God does have good news! Where is our source of value found? Let's imagine the mindset of a sheep, like the one...
My favorite mystery ended, and the screensaver satellite image of earth began. I felt too awake to go to bed so I sat, fascinated with watching the picture. I focused on the ribbon of atmosphere dividing our living planet from the frigid blackness of space. It looked so thin, so fragile. I felt uneasy. If that line went away, we would all be dead in a microsecond. I guess gravity must hold our atmosphere in place, but what if the One who provided life changed His mind about...
School. Do we really need it? English? We already speak it. Math? We have calculators. History? Those people are gone. Physical education? We have the great outdoors. Spanish? We have Dora the Explorer. Okay. I'm kidding. Truth is, I'm grateful for school. Without it I would be a very bad speelor. As it was, my grades began slipping in kindergarten. If I didn't know the answer, I got creative. What ended in 1945? 1944. Here are answers kids have written on tests. Q: If you...
I make a lot of lists to remind myself of things I need to do. I make grocery lists and more often than not I leave them on my kitchen table. I go to the store without them and forget to pick up a few things. Then I have to make a second trip later in the week to get salt or butter or onions that I forgot. When I get a new calendar I go through it month by month and circle the dates of the birthdays of my family and friends. They are important to me. My friends would survive...
I remember Chris, a divorced single mom who'd recently lost her IT job. She was struggling to find her way in life, as well as to make a living for herself and her daughter. She was a believer, but that was often a struggle too. After an afternoon of helping her move to another apartment, we struck up a conversation about some life issues. The topic of foster parenting came up. I asked if she had ever considered becoming a foster parent. She responded with a resounding, "No...
I was part of the Sixties Scoop generation and so although I am Indigenous, I grew up in a different world, compared to my relatives on the reserve. Growing up in the city, we used to have company over to our house on a regular basis-especially on Saturday night. My parents were also part of a church bowling league and so on Saturday night my brother and sister would babysit me and have authority over me for that night. As I got older, I would go to youth night, where we would...
Question: I recently asked Jesus into my heart and I want to know if this means I shouldn't be living with someone I'm not married to? What if we have children together? Answer: When you asked Jesus into your heart you were born again. You are a new person and have a new life In Christ. "This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun" (2 Corinthians 5:17, NLT). God wants you to live the new life you received in...
It happened twice, two days in a row. Both times I was forgotten. Time moved, but I didn't. I was left alone, cuffed, in a stand-up-only cage. I love business. I truly enjoy the art of growing a business and pivoting to keep up with demands and market trends. Business comes easily to me. I am intrigued by the working parts, especially sales and P.R. (Public Relations). All businesses are, at core, based on sales, and to sell itself a business needs P.R. The image of the...
I have a very bad habit of living in the past; remembering when my children were little, which was the happiest time of my life. I wish I could turn the clock back and live those happy days again. I need to stop looking back. There is a saying: "Even God can not change the past. I have thought about the Bible story about Lot's wife being turned into a pillar of salt in Genesis 19:15–26. God had sent angels to lead Lot and his family out of Sodom and Gomorrah because the c...
Tabloids do their best to start rumours. Here are a few headlines I'm not making up: "Farmer shoots 23-pound grasshopper." "Man's 174 MPH Sneeze Blows Wife's Hair Off." "Satan's Skull Found. Bible experts call it the find of the century." Speaking of the devil, I heard a rumour that he was going out of business. He had a Blow Out Sale at his store there on 666th Avenue, offering to sell his tools to the highest bidder. His minions welcomed customers with sneers. Tools were...
I want to conclude my series based on my book, Walking with the Creator, with thoughts from the final lesson, The Creator's Victory. The beguiling serpent offered Eve some intriguing lies. He told her that the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would taste good and make her wise-and that contrary to what God told her, she really would not die. God had given her every good tree in the Garden except for the one that involved evil. I wondered why such a tree...
Our way of life has been changed in the last few months. Fear has gripped society. Social media and our news channels are bombarding us with all kind of stories, and we don't know what to believe! This tiny virus called COVID-19 has shaken the world! I wonder what the Lord Jesus would have to say about our response to such pandemic. Perhaps this for starters: • Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God (1 John 5:5). • I am the...
I was meditating the other day on the concept of gratefulness-a close cousin to the concept of thankfulness. Both have the common denominator of appreciation. It was just a few days after Covid-19 hit and many people were really concerned about where this all was going. I started to think about what all we had been blessed with. I thought about having a home-not everyone does, you know. I thought about how all my kids and grandkids were safe, secure, and had enough to eat-not...
We live in troublesome times with pandemics, economic woes, healthcare crises and more, yet our Heavenly Father can always be trusted. Always. He knows the plans He has for us (see Jeremiah 29:11) and we can have peace even in the midst of confusion as we find a new normal. Jesus speaks peace to us in John 16:33: "I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world."...
A Ring of Fire I have corresponded with Indian Life Ministries for about 10 years, and your newspaper, books, fliers and correspondence have been nothing short of a joy and blessing in my life. You have truly helped to instill the love of Jesus into my life. And that love has spread to countless people who have been around me and around those who were around me. It's very similar to a tiny spark that builds into a ring of fire. The difference being, that ring of fire is...
I took the time the other day to count the doors at our place. It took me about 30 seconds to figure out that we have 12 of them. It was kind of a mundane exercise, but it got me thinking about Closed and Open Doors and how God uses both kinds in our lives. The Open Doors are the opportunity ones. They can be captivating, motivating and exciting or, on the flip side, intimidating, overwhelming and downright scary! You see, open doors usually mean change! Change is a great...
