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Captain James Cook: World Explorer

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

Sometimes I ask myself: Why is English now spoken by hundreds of millions of people in virtually every country of the world?  Why do most people of English ancestry live anywhere but England?  Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada, South Africa, etc.  Perhaps it is because as seagoing islanders, the British were insatiable searchers for that which was beyond.  From the ranks of such inexhaustible seekers emerged the greatest of the 18th century nautical explorers –Captain James Cook.  James Cook had an unbounded curiosity and a deep interest in everybody and everything with which he came into contact.

Born on October 27th, 1728 in Yorkshire, Cook’s father was an impoverished Scottish farm labourer and his mother a simple Yorkshire village woman.  Cook began his sea life by lugging coal off the treacherous east coast of England.  There he learned how to survive the storms, fogs, hidden shoals, and tricky tides.

In 1758, Cook was master of the Pembroke, a 1,250 ton, 64-gun man-of-war.  In early 1759, the Pembroke joined a blockade of the Saint Lawrence River designed to prevent French ships from carrying supplies to the fortress colony of Quebec.  Cook led patrols up and down the river, charting every hazard, and marking a channel for the warships to follow.  During the British assault on Quebec City, Cook successfully navigated the massive Pembroke up the narrow, twisting, and frequently shallow waterway.  Without the help of Ship’s Master James Cook, it is doubtful whether the British troops could have taken the fortress by surprise.  With only a few years of elementary school education, no one ever expected that a ‘nobody’ like James Cook would one day be chosen as a navy sea captain.  Since the upper class were virtually the only officers, there was little chance of promotion by merit in that caste-bound naval world.  By sure grit and determination, he taught himself mathematics and astronomy, and at age 40, was chosen as captain, an age when most naval officers had passed their peak.

After being appointed captain, Cook went on to complete three global voyages from 1768 to 1779, exploring and accurately mapping more of the earth’s surface than anyone else before or since.  He became the first European to set foot in Australia, the first to fix the position of remote places accurately, the first to establish longitude (one’s position east and west), and the first to have extensive contact with all the various peoples of the Pacific.

It can safely be said that in his time no man knew the world as well as Captain Cook, and no other explorer had such an impact on the global map.  As a result, the name of James Cook is commemorated across the length and breadth of the vast Pacific: Cook Strait and Mount Cook in New Zealand; Cooktown and Cook’s Passage in Australia; The Cook Islands in Polynesia, and Cook Inlet in Alaska.  With Cook’s discoveries and surveys, the geography of the world was nearly complete.  Only Antarctica remained to be discovered.

Upon reaching Hawaii, the islanders worshipped Captain Cook as the god Lono.  Curiously, Lono was envisioned as a white god fated to arrive on a magical floating island during the holiday of Mahahiki.  Cook’s ships’ huge sails therefore were construed to be long staffs bearing Lono’s divine white banners.  When Cook returned to Hawaii from having explored British Columbia, he upset the Hawaiians who had then turned to the season for worshipping the god of war Ku.  Things went from bad to worse, and when Cook attempted to hold the king hostage for the return of a stolen cutter, hundreds of Hawaiians converged on him with deadly effect.  To many of his crew such as the future Captain George Vancouver, losing Captain Cook was like losing their own father.

Captain James Cook as a World Explorer was not afraid to check out uncharted waters. My prayer for those reading this article is that we too as world explorers may be willing to ‘walk in the spiritual feet’ of Captain James Cook.

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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The Unforgettable Captain Vancouver

 By the Rev. Dr.  Ed Hird

 

North Vancouver District…North Vancouver City…West Vancouver… Vancouver City…Vancouver, Washington….How did so many local cities get a Dutch name like Vancouver?

The name goes back to when the Canadian Pacific Railway came to Port Moody in 1886, and then to Vancouver in 1887.  Vancouver was first called Gastown, before being changed to Granville after Lord Granville for his part in birthing the Canadian Confederation.  Some key ‘movers-and-shakers’ wanted to name Vancouver ‘The City of Liverpool’.  The ‘Railway General’, William Van Horne, then vice-president of the CPR, felt that this newly incorporated city deserved a famous name to go with its famous future.  “This is destined”, said Van Horne, ” to become a great city, perhaps the greatest city in Canada.  We must see to it that it has a name commensurate with its dignity and importance, and Vancouver it shall be, if I have the ultimate decision.”

 

Since William Van Horne had been the driving force behind CPR’s rapid completion of the CPR line through the Prairies and onto Port Moody; he was listened to most carefully.  Sir William Van Horne went on to become the President of the CPR in 1888; before being knighted in 1894.  Both the Vancouver, Washington citizens and the Vancouver Island residents were upset that Van Horne had stolen their name given to them by Captain George Vancouver himself.  Fort Vancouver, Washington was established in 1824 as the first British Settlement on the West Coast.  The Victoria merchants were so upset by this ‘theft’ that they organized a boycott of all Eastern Canada companies who did business with Van Horne’s Vancouver.

 

Robert Beaven of Victoria complained how wrong it was that Van Horne, being an American citizen, could take so much control after only two years in Vancouver.  It is highly ironic that the CPR coast-to-coast railway, which kept BC from joining the USA, was to a very large extent managed and built by Americans.  Pierre Burton notes how upset some people were that Van Horne hired more Americans than Canadians to accomplish this nationalist task of uniting Canada by rail.

 

Why did Van Horne choose Vancouver??  Perhaps part of Van Horne’s attraction to Captain George Vancouver is that they were both of Dutch ancestors, and that both as orphans had ‘made good’ despite enormous obstacles.  Vancouver’s paternal family had once been the van Coevordens in the Province of Drenkte, Holland.

 

Captain Vancouver led one of the greatest expeditions ever undertaken.  His mandate came from a sudden threat of war with Spain.  British ships had been seized, the flag had been insulted, rights of British subjects had been violated, all in that distant port of Nootka on what came to be called Vancouver Island.  Captain Vancouver was sent to receive Nootka back from the Spanish, and to map the Pacific Coast. He and his men, squeezed into two ninety-nine foot sloops, covered 65,000 miles in only four years. Vancouver had meticulously mapped the continental shore line from latitude 56 degrees north, in southeastern Alaska, to his assigned southern limit. He proved once and for all that there was no mythical Northwest Passage.  It was a remarkable accomplishment, a tribute to Vancouver’s perseverance, drive, and energy.  Without Vancouver’s monumental work, it is conceivable that the northern boundary of Oregon might have been fixed at latitude 54/40 North and Canada today would have no Pacific shores.

 

Vancouver learnt well from his mentor Captain Cook in the methods of  warding off the dreaded illness called scurvy.  The seamen detested and grumbled at the strange dishes he made sure were included in their daily diet.  They only wanted salt pork, beef, and dried peas –their usual fare.  However, Vancouver provided them with extras in the form of pickled cabbage, malt, a peculiar-tasting beer, lime-juice, and something officially described as carrot marmalade.  They either ate their foods or were given the lash.  British sailors got the nickname ‘limey’ from this ‘peculiar’ practice of daily lime-juice.  Vancouver’s ‘limeys’ stayed alive and healthy when, in almost any other vessel afloat, perhaps half of them would be dead inside two years at sea.

 

Along the way to Vancouver Island, Captain Vancouver learnt many native languages with ease.  At one point, he used this skill to do successful marriage counseling that reconciled the King and Queen of Hawaii.  In a remarkably contemporary tone, King  Tamaahmaah denied his wife’s accusations of adultery, pleading, however, ‘that his high rank and supreme authority was a sort of license for such indulgences.’  The Hawaiian King was so grateful for Vancouver’s marital and political advice that he ceded all of the Hawaiian Islands over to the British Crown.  Shortsightedly the British government didn’t want another obscure little colony, and so refused the offer.  Just think…if we’d played our cards right, Hawaii could have become the 11th province of Canada!

 

Captain Vancouver inscribed the names of every officer he had ever respected up and down the coast. :  All in all, Vancouver discovered and named more than two hundred places.  As a young child, I remembered my mother commenting rapturously about Mt. Baker.  I had no idea that Mom was invoking the memory of Vancouver’s third lieutenant.  Burrard Inlet was named by Vancouver for an old shipmate of Europa and Expedition days in the Caribbean, Sir Harry Burrard of the navy.  Point Grey was named as a compliment to Vancouver’s friend Captain George Grey.

 

Many BCers don’t realize that the Spanish once ‘owned’ the BC Coast.  In honour of his cordial relations with the Captain Quadra who relinquished the Spanish claim to BC, Captain Vancouver gave to Vancouver Island the full name of ‘Quadra & Vancouver Island’.

 

Four years at sea began to wear down Vancouver’s spirit.  Near the end, he commented: “I am once more entrapped in this infernal Ocean, and am totally at a loss to say when I shall be able to quit it.”  To his brother Van, he wrote complaining about ‘these remote and uncouth regions’.  He never heard one word from his superiors in all of the four years.  After his heroic journey around the world, Vancouver received little acclaim and less money.  The admiralty took four years to pay the wages they owed Vancouver; the small amount they allowed barely covered his debts. With the horrific Napoleonic wars breaking out, no one had the time to worry about some obscure little settlements on the Northwest coast of what Queen Victoria eventually named as British Columbia.

 

Vancouver died broken-hearted and rejected at age 40.  His tombstone in Petersham was only a plain common grave that was soon forgotten about.  Years later, it is well-tended and is remembered annually by the people of British Columbia, who helped rebuild St. Peter’s Church after the Second World War.  On this 212th Anniversary of Vancouver’s death, may we each choose to be courageous on our journeys of life.  May Jesus the Captain of our souls keep our sails aloft and trimmed.

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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Sir Martin Frobisher: the first Canadian Pirate

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

How many of us have realized that the Canadian North was first ‘discovered’ 434 years ago by an English pirate?  A pirate, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.  Sir Martin Frobisher was arrested at least four times for high-sea piracy, but was let go with a scolding by Queen Elizabeth I.  Confiscating Spanish ships was one thing, but a good English ‘sea-dog’ was always supposed to keep his hands off English goods.  Frobisher ended up spending time in jail for confiscating English wine vats that had been on a French ship.  Upon release from prison, Frobisher decided to sail over the top of Canada through the mythical Northwest Passage to China.  His goal was to become rich by finding an alternative route for Asian pepper.  Because there was no refrigeration in those days, pepper was in high demand, being used by Europeans to make their meat palatable.

 

One of Frobisher’s specialties as Captain was to punish sabre-duelling crewmates by chopping off their right hands.  Frobisher was also a brave leader who thought nothing of diving into iceberg-strewn waters to rescue drowning sailors.  Once while on their way to Baffin Island, his ship Gabriel fell over on its side and began filling up with water.  Without a moment’s hesitation, Frobisher grabbed an axe and hacked off the foresail, enabling the ship to right itself.  Though a rough-and-tumbles privateer, he never went anywhere on his daring voyages without his bible.  Upon returning to England with three Inuit hostages and a mysterious black rock, Frobisher kicked off Canada’s first Gold Rush.  The Russian Tsar officially protested this kidnapping of Asian Siberians!  Frobisher claimed that his Inuit hostages were being held to seek the release of five of his crewmembers that had disappeared.  Before dying from English fog and food, the 3 Inuits thrilled the Queen by shooting royal birds and kayaking down the Avon River.

 

All the credible scientists told Frobisher’s financial backer, Michael Lok, that the black rock was worthless ‘fools gold’.  But Michael Lok, being an early stock promoter of the less reputable kind, ignored their advice and instead consulted an Italian alchemist, Giovanni Agnello, who used ‘black magic’ to discern that Martin Frobisher’s rock was indeed gold.

 

The English business community, backed by Queen Elizabeth I, became so excited about the first Canadian Gold Rush, that they sent 15 Ships to Frobisher Bay on Baffin Island.  The Queen even lent her own 200-ton ship AID.  Gold Rush fever brought together the largest Armada of English ships ever assembled until World War II.  Frobisher’s public image was rapidly transformed by his stockpromoter, Michael Lok, from that of an uncouth pirate to that of the ‘rare and valiant’ Captain General embarking on a heroic mission. Everyone, including Martin Frobisher himself, believed that he had discovered the Northwest Passage to China, and that Baffin Island contained King Solomon’s hidden mines.  In this first English attempt to colonize the New World, Frobisher brought 120 would-be settlers, miners, carpenters, and an Anglican priest named Rev. Robert Wolfall.

 

On their way to Baffin Island, they faced desperate circumstances due to mountainous icebergs that could crush their ships like matchboxes.  The hardened sailors knelt down on the decks and prayed for God’s mercy. Two of the sailors’ prayers recorded for posterity by Captain Best were ‘Lord help us now or never’ and ‘Now Lord look down from heaven and save us sinners, or else our safety will come too late’.  With no radar or telecommunications to guide them in the fog, they saved the sailors on the sunken ‘Dennis’ by using trumpets, drums, canons and the two passwords: ‘Before the world was God’, to be answered by ‘After God came Christ His Son’. Captain Best recorded that Rev. Wolfall encouraged Frobisher’s men ‘to be thankful for their strange and miraculous deliverance’ at sea.  To celebrate their safe arrival on Baffin Island, Rev. Wolfall celebrated the first Anglican Communion service ever held in Canada, just 420 years ago.

 

After three Frobisher Bay expeditions costing over 20,000 pounds, including 3,500 pounds of the Queen’s money, Martin Frobisher brought back 2,300 tons of alleged gold to England.  This ‘gold rush’ treasure was promptly secured with 4 padlocks in the Tower of London and Bristol Castle.  Once the geologists found out that the Baffin Island gold was fool’s gold, Frobisher and many of his investors went into bankruptcy.  His financial backer, Michael Lok, was sent to jail.  To cover the embarrassment of Canada’s first Bre-X-style disaster, the 2,300 tons of fools gold was dumped into the Bristol Harbour and also used to pave roads.  Yet Frobisher never stayed defeated for long. Within a few years, he joined the British navy and ended up being knighted by Queen Elizabeth for defeating the Spanish Armada.

 

Sir Martin Frobisher’s story teaches us that all of us are on a journey, that sometimes our hopes and dreams turn out to be fools gold, but that God can even use our mistakes and turn them to a higher good.  My prayer for those reading this article is that God may turn everything that is against us to our advantage.(Romans 8:28)

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

 -previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


by 1 Comment

Secrets to a Healthy Marriage

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

Reflecting on what makes a marriage work, I was struck by how vital is the gift of forgiveness.  My wife, by the way, is very gifted at forgiving, probably because I have given her so much practice.  My wife is also very patient and persevering, as I have noticed that often in our marriage, it has taken me a while to really grow and change.  The fact that she never gives up on me, and that she keeps on believing the best for me, is a wonderful gift indeed.

 

I recently read a fascinating book entitled ‘Men & Women: Enjoying the Differences’ by the best-selling author Dr. Larry Crabb.  He commented that ‘self-centered living is the real culprit in marriages with problems.  Other-centered living is the answer.’  Many of us enter marriage thinking that our spouse will meet our deepest needs.  We then feel cheated when they don’t, and begin to close our hearts.  How many of us enter marriage with the view that we are there to serve our spouse?  How many of us see marriage as a way of serving God?  A marriage where both partners are committed to serving one another, to ‘washing one another’s feet’ is a marriage in which self-centeredness gets sidelined.  What will it take, says Dr. Crabb, to realize that our selfishness is without excuse and that our first job, in our friendships and marriages, is to recognize our selfishness and learn how we can change?

 

One thing that men and women have equally in common is that we are all equally self-centered and selfish.  Little growth in marriages take place, says Dr. Crabb, until we realize that the disease of self-centeredness is fatal to our souls and marriages.  Nothing exposes our self-centeredness more clearly than anger.  Because our hearts are deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9), we have an amazing ability to justify our own anger and bitterness towards our spouse, while simultaneously excusing our own bad attitudes.  Being angry at our spouses can be very attractive, because it makes us feel both powerful and self-righteous.  Having counseled dozens of couples over the years, I am continually amazed at the self-deception of many who convince themselves that the problem is their spouse, and that their personal faults are far more minor and merely reactive.  Self-centeredness is a cancer that blinds us from seeing that the problem is not merely our spouse; the problem is ourselves.

 

Our culture is saturated with excuses for everything.  It is not my fault.  It’s my spouse’s, my parent’s, my government’s, or my boss’ fault.  A.A. calls that ‘stinking thinking’.   Few of us are willing to do a thorough moral inventory of our own personal faults.  The bible uses a short, unpopular word for self-centeredness.  It calls it ‘sin’.  Sin doesn’t mean that we are axe-murderers or child molesters.  The heart of the word ‘sin’ is the ‘I’ at the middle.  The heart of most marriage problems is self-centered sin.

 

Dr. E. Stanley Jones, founder of the Christian Ashram, once said that ‘there can be no love between a husband and wife unless there is mutual self-surrender.  Love simply cannot spring up without that self-surrender to each other.  If either withholds the self, love cannot exist.’  A man and his wife were having painful marriage difficulties. The wife went away to a Christian Ashram, and surrendered her marriage to the Lord.  When she returned home, her husband said to her: ‘Well, Miss High and Mighty, what did you learn at the Ashram?’  She replied: ‘I’ve learned that I’ve been the cause of all our troubles.’  She got up from her chair, came around beside him and knelt, folded her hands and said: ‘Please forgive me. I’m the cause of all our troubles.’  At that moment, her husband nearly upset the kitchen table, while getting down on his knees beside her.  He blurted out, ‘You’re not the cause of all our troubles — I am.’  There they met each other — and God.  Each surrendered to Jesus, then they surrendered to each other and were free.  Now this couple, instead of continually criticizing each other, are one in love and forgiveness.

 

My prayer for those reading this article is that many may find victory through surrender.

 

Dial in today to check out the online July 10th to 12th North American Christian Ashram. There is no registration cost. Donations are welcome. (If you have any trouble using Google Chrome to register, just use your mouse’s scroll button.)

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca

Many of our books include references to and stories about E. Stanley Jones.
To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.

To receive a personally signed copy of any of our books within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.


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Curse God and Die

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

There is a time in every life, comments Stephen Lawson, when all hell breaks loose.  Suddenly.  Unexpectedly.  Cataclysmically.  All hell breaks loose.  One day, life is sunny. Calm. Clear. Predictable.  Your job is secure. Your children behave. Your health is good.  Then out of the blue, like a violent, angry thunderstorm blowing across your landscape, tragedy strikes.  You’re hit hard.  All hell breaks loose.

 

Why do bad things happen to good people?  Why does tragedy strike those who love God the most?  Why do the good die young?   One of the most famous sufferers on Planet Earth asked all these questions.  He suffered so deeply that his wife couldn’t stand it anymore.  She said to her husband Job: “Curse God and die”.  In other words, get it over with.  It’s no use.  There is no future.  You could almost see Job’s wife as the first Euthanasia advocate.  Yet rather than choosing suicide, Job clung tenaciously to life.  Often human tragedies like the loss of career, family, or home leads to an even greater tragedy – the denial of any meaning to life.  This was the great temptation that faced Job, and that faces each of us at least once every 18 months on average.

 

Job went through horrendous suffering for 42 chapters, and yet he never once gave up.  He was tormented by insults from his friends, harrassed by their insensitive advice and browbeaten into admitting wrongdoing that he never committed.  Under attack, Job groaned, he wailed, he doubted and fell into deep depression, he lashed out like an infuriated animal….but he never cursed God.  No matter how discouraged he was, he clung to his integrity.  He never gave up his rock-bed conviction that he was not to blame for his terrible illness.  Thousands of years later, we modern, scientifically-sophisticated people are still often blaming people when they become sick.  Even in 1997, we can too easily be just like Job’s three comforters who just made their friend feel worse.  “Oh, you’re sick in hospital with cancer…Obviously you are not thinking enough positive mental thoughts, or jogging enough, or eating enough granola.”  One way or another, we can slip into psychosomatically blaming others for their illnesses.

 

Job was covered from head to toe with putrid boils that never stopped itching.  His feverish body hung limp on its frame, his eyes sank back into his head, and his ribs protruded from his skin.  Job’s three friends lacked the courage to feel Job’s pain, and respond rather than just react.  Job didn’t need a lecture from his three friends; he needed love.  He didn’t need a sermon;  he needed sympathy.  He didn’t need criticism; he needed comfort.  When we are struck down by tragedy, we need to know that our friends really care.  And we need to know that God cares, God really listens, and God will never leave us.

 

Why is it that so many famous writers, poets, philosophers, and scientists have turned time and again to the book of Job?  Perhaps because it easily takes its place among the masterpieces of the world’s literature.  The author of Job was a poet of rare genius who powerfully expressed our deepest feelings and thoughts.  Sooner or later, we all identify with Job because suffering is part and parcel of life.  We are bonded to Job through our common experience of pain.  Many reject God, but no one rejects Job.  Simply by suffering so greatly and hanging on for dear life through it all, Job has won our hearts.

 

As Stephen Lawson puts it, heaven is often silent.  In such times, the only answer God gives is a deeper revelation of Himself.  We learn that He is the answer we seek.  Ultimately we must not trust a plan, but a Person.  There is something about our questioning minds that longs for answers.  If we only knew, we reason, we could handle our pain.  Yet placing God’s infinite wisdom into our finite brains would be like trying to pour the Atlantic Ocean into a Dixie Cup.  It just wouldn’t fit.  It’s too vast and deep.

 

Job’s faith wavered.  He mourned.  He cried.  He protested.  He questioned.  He even cursed the day of his birth.  But he never cursed God.  In the face of adversity, he remained firm in his only hope – God.  When our world falls apart unexpectedly, we must  not dwell on why but on who.  Only God’s disclosure of Himself is powerful enough to heal the heart and relieve the pain.

 

Job in his sufferings, said Mike Mason, resembled Jesus on the cross.  The only person who has ever endured more than Job was Jesus of Nazareth. We do not need to have nails driven into our hands and feet to know what a cross is.  A cross is a cross.  To be crushed is to be crushed, and we all have had a taste of this.  Job in his suffering was looking for what could only be found in a manger, on a cross, in an empty tomb.  The key to Job’s sufferings, and indeed to life itself, is the cross.  Jesus did not rise above suffering; he went through it.  Jesus let himself be captured by soldiers, tried by legalists and bureaucrats, condemned by a mob, scourged by mockers, and finally pinned and exhibited like a specimen insect… No amount of suffering could shake either Jesus or Job from their rock-bottom clinging to God.  Though he slay me, said Job, yet will I trust in Him.  We can either curse God and die, or bless God and live.  May we choose Life today that we and our children may live.

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

 -award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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O Little Town of Bethlehem

By The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

I will always remember my ‘star’ Christmas performance back in kindergarten days.  There I was dressed up as a Christmas shepherd, with my staff, bedrobe, and head-scarf.  I was so excited about being a shepherd that I forgot where I was supposed to meet the rest of the cast.  So I sat down at the front of the stage and waited for them to find me.  Unfortunately that lost kindergarten shepherd was never found, until the whole pageant was over.  I was most disappointed, and ‘vowed’ that day to never become a famous Hollywood actor.

 

Almost 2,000 years ago in the little town of Bethlehem (not Bellingham, as we’d often sing as children), a little shepherd baby was born in a filthy cow barn.  Many shepherds were drawn to admire this tiny little child, little knowing that this baby would one day become a Good Shepherd for many.  Years later, this christmas baby-turned-thirty said: “I am the good shepherd.  The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep”.

 

It is amazing how much that Christmas Carols speak to the hearts of adults and children alike.  Those of us living on the North Shore are well aware of the remarkable popularity of the Carol Ships travelling past Deep Cove and Cates Park year after year.

 

Carols have a certain poetry, romance, and mystery that draws us unfailingly year after year. When we sing: “Above thy deep and dreamless sleep, the silent stars go by”, we almost feel like we were there when the Christmas Star first shone bright.  Christmas Carols teach truth, but in a subtle way that feels entirely natural.  In singing “Yet in thy dark street shineth the everlasting Light”, we are reminded that there is a battle between good and evil, light and darkness, but that Light is always more powerful than darkness.  No wonder the Christmas baby later called himself the Light of the World.  He also said that whoever followed him will never walk in darkness, but have the light of life.

 

No wonder we love to sing: “The hopes and fear of all the years are met in thee tonight.”  There is something about the Christmas baby that inspires hope and banishes fear, no matter how cynical or jaded we tend to be.  Many Christmas Carols have a beautiful sense of stillness and quiet about them.  There is so little quiet and stillness left in our fast-paced, frenetic culture.  Maybe that is why we are drawn to sing: “How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given!  So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heaven.”  All of us need more inner peace, more shalom in our lives.  All of us need the stillness and tranquillity of the Christmas baby, known in Hebrew as Yeshua.

 

The deepest truths of Christmas go far beyond the beautiful tree, the tasty turkey, the colourful lights.  The deepest truths are invisible and silent, but still very powerful and real.  That is why we sing that “no ear may hear his coming.” Just like with the love between a man and wife, the most important things in life can’t be scientifically measured or technologically formulated.  Christmas is a mystery that defies all logical attempts to explain it away.  Christmas is the miracle of new birth, not only 2,000 years ago, but also potentially in our hearts.  That is why so many of us never tire of singing: “Where meek souls will receive him, still the dear Christ enters in.”

 

My Christmas prayer for those reading this article is that many may discover afresh the joy of the inner meaning of Christmas Caroling.

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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Dr Henry Wilson: AB Simpson’s Right Hand Man

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

When we think of ground-breakers in the field of children and communication, names like Dr. Piaget from France or Dr. Montessori from Italy may come to mind.  From a Canadian perspective, Dr. Henry Wilson made an enormous contribution to modeling healthy communication between adults and children.

 

Dr. Henry Wilson was called “Big Baby Brother” because of his uncanny ability to communicate with clarity and compassion to children of all ages.  His own daughter, Madeline, said that “the secret of his success with children in a great measure was due to his adaptability and his own youthful spirit.”  He was never too big to become as a little child to children.  He was never too holy to fail to be human at the same time; never too busy or preoccupied to fail to be gracious and empathetic.  Despite the enormous pain that he had experienced in his life, he was often seen with a smile on his face, and laughter on his lips.  Twice he had seen his wives die during childbirth, leaving him a widower with three young children.  Then tragically his only son, while boating, slipped overboard, and was crushed to death by a paddlewheel.  One of Dr. Wilson’s favorite quotations was “The mark of rank in nature is capacity for pain, and the anguish of the singer makes the sweetness of the strain.”

 

His own daughter Madeline commented that “he was really just a grown-up boy.  His work among the children was no mere studied professionalism.”  Henry Wilson could scarcely sit on a public platform and behave himself if there were a number of children in the audience.  Invariably he’d be seen making signals to the children, laughing aloud in happy self-forgetfulness, or holding three or four of them on his knees.  Part of Dr. Wilson’s secret was that he was always natural, and therefore enjoyed the naturalness of children, especially their love of laughter.  Studies have shown that pre-schoolers laugh 400 times a day, in contrast to the mere 15 laughs a day from adults.  Dr. Wilson was often called “the Sunny Man”.  “Pre-eminent above all his personal qualities”, said A.B. Simpson, “was his invincible cheerfulness, hopefulness, and joyousness.”

 

Dr. Wilson started a Children’s Alliance Fellowship which reached 5,000 children, each one of them praying for another child in an overseas country.  Each week he wrote a magazine article specifically for children entitled “B.B.B.” (Big Baby Brother).  Henry Wilson was a ground-breaker in tearing down racial barriers between children.  He had a particular love for the children’s song “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world, red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in His sight.”

 

Dr. Henry Wilson was born in Peterborough, Ontario in the year 1841.  At an early age he won the Wellington scholarship and entered Trinity College, ultimately receiving a Doctorate of Divinity in 1883.  His first ministry was as curate of the Cathedral of St. George’s Kingston, Ontario.  There he consistently ministered for 17 years until one day “disaster” struck:…He met the Salvation Army.

 

In those days, few had ever heard of the Salvation Army, and what they had heard was treated with great suspicion.   Dr. Henry Wilson, a highly educated and cultured Anglican, committed the unpardonable social sin of being seen with the likes of the Salvation Army.  In Dr. Wilson’s own words, “I found myself one night kneeling at the penitent form of the Army, pleading for pardon and peace, and needing both, as much as the drunkard on one side of me and the lost woman on the other.  I saw myself as never before, a poor lost soul, just as much as they, so far as the need for a new heart and a right spirit was concerned.”  Initially the Dean of St. George’s Cathedral told Dr. Wilson that he approved of the Salvation Army and would stand by him if trouble came.  When 80 members of the Salvation Army publicly received communion at the Anglican Cathedral, Dean Farthing openly thanked God for their coming.  Dr. Wilson’s ministry expanded dramatically, with over 300 young people now flocking to his weekly bible study.

 

Then, out of the blue, the Dean pulled the plug, and ejected Dr. Wilson from the Cathedral, insisting that all connection with the Salvation Army be severed before Dr. Wilson could return.  Dr. Wilson’s own bishop offered him little support.  Instead his bishop spoke of “the grotesque in the Army’s performances” and Dr. Wilson being “betrayed into (his) eccentricity by cerebral excitement”.  In an age when organ music reigned as Queen, the drums and trumpets of the innovative Salvation Army were seen by his bishop as regrettable “extravagances.”  General William Booth, who founded the Salvation Army in England, was famous for shocking middle-class English society by his bold innovations.  He freely borrowed from the beer-hall tunes, and gave them new lyrics, saying, “Why should the devil have all the good music?”  When General Booth visited North America in 1907, Dr. Wilson was there with his hand raised and his voice uplifted in blessing over the bowed and silvered head of General Booth.  For his friendship with the Salvation Army, Dr. Wilson paid a great price.

 

Fortunately for Dr. Henry Wilson,  Bishop Henry Potter of New York was far kinder to this innovative Anglican, and gave him a position assisting another well-known Canadian, Dr. William Rainsford at St. George’s.  Dr. Wilson began reaching out to the down & out by renting the back of a saloon each Sunday morning for a worship service. Even though Dr. Wilson was fluent in the study of Greek, Hebrew, and Latin, he never lost touch with the basic needs of the poor and needy.

 

So Dr. Rainsford introduced him to another  Canadian friend, Dr. A.B. Simpson, who also destroyed his health while at University before being miraculously healed.  In Henry Wilson’s own words, he “labored with a weak body, twice seriously injured by accidents almost fatal: for years prey to dyspepsia of the worst kind; to liver disease and all its attendant miseries; with nervous depression and fainting fits after the slightest exertion. A burden to myself, a constant anxiety to my family and friends, a nuisance to doctors, and a kind of walking apothecary shop. Idragged through my work with what sickly weariness and painfulness they only know who have suffered like things.”

 

Through A.B. Simpson, Henry Wilson learnt about the healing power of Jesus’ resurrection life that is available to each of us.  After anointing for healing, Henry Wilson was miraculously healed.  He said years later at age 67 ” I am in every sense a younger, fresher man than I was at thirty.”

 

Dr Wilson was so grateful for his healing that he became a strong advocate in praying for the sick.  Wilson said “The center and the source of this divine health is the Lord Jesus Christ, now at the right hand of God, in His glorified humanity, like the sun in the center of the universe. The medium by which this glorified humanity passes into ours is the Holy Ghost – the breath of God – the air of heaven, like the atmosphere surrounding our earth and transmitting to it the light and life-giving powers of the sun in the heavens. This is the A, B, C of Divine Healing.”

 

Henry Wilson went on to become A.B. Simpson’s closest friend and associate, serving as the first President of the International Missionary Alliance, which sent thousands of outreach workers all over the world sharing the love of Jesus.  Among his outreach ventures was the care of over 1,000 orphan children living in India.  He also served as the President of the Seaman’s Institute, the President of the Nyack Seminary, the Senior Field Superintendent for the Christian & Missionary Alliance, and the Chaplain of the Madgdalene Home for women coming off the streets.  All this he did interdenominationally with the full blessing of his Anglican (Episcopal) Bishop who even authorized him to serve as Dr. A.B. Simpson’s associate, serving Anglican communion each Sunday in a interdenominational context.  Dr. Henry Wilson is another Canadian who tore down barriers between races, denominations, social classes, and age distinctions.

 

May we all learn like Henry Wilson to be “Big Baby Brothers” and “Big Baby Sisters” in bridging the generation gap between adults and children.

 

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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The Medical Benefits of Laughter

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

Dr. Patrick Dixon MA, MBBS, is an English physician, business consultant and futurist internationally respected for his creative research and analysis.  In 2005 he was ranked as one of the 20 most influential business thinkers alive according to the Thinkers 50 (a private survey printed in The UK Times).  His Global Change website has had over 12 million different visitors. Dixon has written fourteen books covering a wide range of issues and trends including risk management, digital society, geopolitics, consumer shifts, health care, biotechnology, social issues, politics and business ethics. Futurewise, first published in 1998, uses the word FUTURE as a mnemonic standing for “Six Faces of the Future” which will impact every large business: Fast, Urban, Tribal, Universal, Radical and Ethical.

Dr. Dixon  has made a stunning diagnosis of the medical benefits of laughter.  Out of five million medical research papers published around the world since the mid-1960s, Dr. Dixon discovered  hundred of papers analyzing the phenomenon of laughter.  The first thing Dr. Dixon noted is that some people hardly seem to laugh at all.  Everything is taken seriously.  Such people, notes Dr. Dixon, are hard to live with and often have a tendency to be morose or depressed.  Someone who can never laugh is as emotionally imprisoned as someone who can never cry.  Doctors and nurses, commented Dr. Dixon, are now realizing that laughter is a powerful way to reduce tension and stress, creating a sense of well-being, increasing contentment and alertness, helping us place the problems and difficulties of life in context.

 

Medical research has discovered remarkable impacts on our hormonal levels, in response to laughter.  Laughter has been shown to shut down the “stress” hormones like cortisol, dopamine, adrenaline, and growth hormone, keeping them at lower healthier levels.  Such hormones are released when we are tense, working hard, worried, or afraid.  It is all part of the fight or flight reaction built into all of us, enabling us to either overcome an attacker or dash away to safety.  In our modern business culture, however, all the “stress hormones” are released, but no exercise follows and the body suffers.  Consequently, says Dr. Dixon, we develop stomach ulcers, our arteries clog up, we become irritable and develop many other symptoms – all because our bodies are pumping out hormones that we don’t need.

 

Laughter is remarkably selective in what it shuts down.  In the  Journal of the American Medical Association #267, Dr. W. Fry notes that the endorphin protein, a natural morphine-like substance in our bodies, seems to remain constant in laughter, even as the stress hormones are being shut down.  Virtually all of us learn to laugh at four months of age, something which requires the action of fifteen facial muscles and changes in breathing.  When we laugh, at first the heart rate increases as does our rate of breathing.  After our laughter ceases, there is a period of relaxation, easing muscle tension and useful in breaking the muscle spasm in some neuralgias and rheumatism.  It has been estimated that 100 good laughs are equivalent to 10 minutes of rowing.  Dr. James Walsh, in his book Laughter & Health, described laughter as a massaging of all the organs within the body.  Cumulative laughter throughout the day, says Dr. Fry, may be significantly greater than that of an average marathon.  He describes laughter physiologically as an aerobic experience, an internal stationary jogging!

 

Laughter, comments Dr. Dixon, also aids lung ventilation, helping people with chest problems to clear congestion.  Research by Dr. McClelland, Dillan & Baker shows that laughter significantly increased levels of salivary immunoglobin A, a vital immune system protein which protects us against respiratory illnesses.  Dr. W. Fry at the 4th International Conference on Humour in Israel noted that laughter improves alertness, memory, learning, & creativity by releasing catecholamines into our body.  Laughter also has a measurable impact on reducing high blood pressure.

 

Why are we often attracted to others with a good sense of humour?  Because we seem to intuitively know that the ability to see the absurd, the ridiculous and the entertaining in the serious and trivial helps keep us mentally stable and healthy.  Somehow the burdens of overwork, excess responsibility, and the grief of life can fall off our shoulders, as laughter lightens our hearts.  Dr Patrick Dixon reminds us that laughter is not a frill, but a medical essential. Perhaps that is why the old proverb reminds us that there is a time to weep and a time to laugh.

 

My prayer from Psalm 126 for those reading this article is that our mouths may be filled with laughter and our tongues with songs of joy. May the Joy of the Lord be our strength.

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

-previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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Mayor William Howland of Toronto the Good

By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird

 

Why is Toronto, Ontario, sometimes called Toronto the Good?

It goes back to Mayor William Howland of Toronto*, a public servant who was so dedicated to helping the disadvantaged that he gave away most of his wealth.  Son of the Honorable W.P. Howland, the first Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario, William was possessed with a bubbly enthusiasm and phenomenal capacity for hard work.

By the age he was 25, William was president, vice-president, or a director of more than a dozen companies in the fields of insurance and finance, electrical services, and paint manufacturing.  When he became president of the Queen City Fire Insurance Company in 1871, he was the youngest insurance company president in Canada.  As well, Howland was President of three influential organizations: the Toronto Board of Trade, the Dominion Board of Trade, and the Manufacturer’s Association of Ontario.  Out of his love for his country, he served as Chairman of the Canada First movement, personally financing its weekly newspaper ‘The Nation’.

 

At age 32, Howland was led to Christ by his priest, Dr. W.S. Rainsford of St. James Anglican Cathedral.  His life-changing experience gave him a new passion for helping the poor.  He became involved  helping with the Hillcrest Convalescent Hospital, the YMCA, the Haven Home for Unwed Mothers, the Prisoner’s Aid Association, the Central Prison Mission School, and the Toronto General Hospital.  Night after night, Howland visited the slums, going from house-to-house, and reaching out to the poor, the sick, and the alcoholic.  He also purchased 50 acres to start an Industrial School in order to steer youth away from the life of crime.  Other initiatives were his building an alternative school for drop-outs, and a Home for the Aged and Homeless Poor. When he began to teach an interdenominational bible study for 100 young men, his new priest J.P. Lewis objected to Howland’s involvement with non-Anglicans.  Out of this rejection, he began the interdenominational Toronto Mission Union, which operated seniors’ homes, convalescent homes, and Toronto’s first-ever home nursing service.

 

Because of his great compassion for the poor, he was elected as Mayor of Toronto in 1885, with a strong mandate to clean up the city.  Howland signaled his arrival in the mayor’s office by installing a twelve-foot banner on the wall, reading, “Except the Lord Build the City, the Watchman Wakes but in Vain”. Despite fierce opposition, Howland was so successful, that Toronto became nicknamed ‘Toronto the Good’.  As champion of the poor, Howland and his Alliance friend, Rev. John Salmon, would tramp the lanes and alleys, feeding the poor, praying over the sick, and comforting the sad.  With a population of just 104,000, Toronto had over 800 licensed and unlicensed saloons.  Over half of all criminal offenses recorded in 1885 were related to drunkenness.

 

Howland is described in Desmond Morton’s book Mayor Howland: the Citizen’s Candidate as the first reform mayor in Toronto’s history.  Due to bureaucratic corruption, municipal garbage collection was all but non-existent.  Even City Hall’s own garbage was rarely picked up.  Rotting garbage fouled the alleyways, yards, and streets, giving Toronto a reputation for flies, stench, and disease.  With no general sewage system, Toronto lived on the verge of a typhoid epidemic.  Children swam in the same Toronto harbour area into which raw sewage was flowing from the ditches. Toronto’s fresh water supply was sucked through leaking and rotting wooden pipes, half buried in the sewage and sludge of the Toronto harbour.

 

Howland believed that we didn’t usually need more laws; we just needed to enforce the ones that already existed.  He shocked the city bureaucrats by enforcing the already existing bylaw which forbid the depositing of garbage within the city limits.  After he threatened to send the city commissioner to jail for breaking this bylaw, garbage miraculously began to be collected!  Howland also worked hard in the construction of a trunk sewer system, to redirect the sewage away from the Toronto Harbour.  He had such a dramatic impact in reducing the crime rate that other mayors began visiting Toronto, hoping to imitate Howland’s miracle.

 

During his re-election campaign in 1887, all the taxi cabs were paid off by Howland’s opponent so that they would refuse to take Howland’s supporters to the polling stations.  Women however (2,000 widows and single women with property) had just been given the vote.  So they held up their long Victorian dresses, and trucked through the snow to give Howland the moral reformer a second term.  When Howland was re-elected by a landslide, over 3,000 of his supporters at the YMCA hall spontaneously burst into singing ‘Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow.’

 

After he unexpectedly stepped down as Mayor after two terms, Howland became the founding President of the Christian Alliance (which later took the name C&MA: Christian and Missionary Alliance).  The unique interdenominational nature of the early C&MA allowed Howland to be its president, while still remaining an Anglican.  When he died unexpectedly at age 49, his funeral involved Anglican, Alliance, and Presbyterian clergy.  With more than a thousand mourners on foot from all social classes, it was the largest funeral procession that had ever been held in Toronto.  A poem published in the Toronto Globe said of Howland:

And not Toronto mourns alone; All Canada his fame had heard; His name is dear, a household word, And far and wide, his worth was known.

May William H. Howland continue to be a living symbol of the difference that just one Canadian can make.

The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, BSW, MDiv, DMin

 -previously published in the North Shore News/Deep Cove Crier

* My Torontonian interest stems from being the great-great grandson of Thomas Allen who served as Toronto Alderman  for 19 years during the late 19th Century.

-award-winning author of the book Battle for the Soul of Canada

P. S. Click this Amazon link to view for free the first two chapters of our new novel Blue Sky.

“I’m afraid there’s been an accident…”

12bdf6ff-3021-4e73-bccd-bc919398d1a0-7068-0000031133e7b4d9Sandy Brown and her family have just moved to Spokane, Washington where her husband, Scott, is pastoring a new church. With a fresh start, Sandy is determined to devote more time to her four children. But, within weeks of settling in their new life, the Brown family is plunged into turmoil.

Sandy receives shocking news that her children aren’t safe, which brings back haunting memories of the trauma she experienced as a girl. Then, the unthinkable happens…

A brutal attack puts Sandy on the brink of losing everything she’s loved. Her faith in God and the family she cherishes are pushed to the ultimate limit.

Is healing possible when so many loved ones are hurt? Are miracles really possible through the power of prayer? Can life return to the way it was before?

Blue Sky reveals how a mother’s most basic instinct isn’t for survival… but for family.

If you’re a fan of Karen Kingsbury, then you’ll love Blue Sky. Get your copy today on paperback or  kindle.

-Click to check out our marriage book For Better For Worse: discovering the keys to a lasting relationship on Amazon. You can even read the first two chapters for free to see if the book speaks to you.

  •  

-The sequel book Restoring Health: body, mind and spirit is available online with Amazon.com in both paperback and ebook form.  Dr. JI Packer wrote the foreword, saying “I heartily commend what he has written.” The book focuses on strengthening a new generation of healthy leaders. Drawing on examples from Titus’ healthy leadership in the pirate island of Crete, it shows how we can embrace a holistically healthy life.

In Canada, Amazon.ca has the book available in paperback and ebook. It is also posted on Amazon UK (paperback and ebook), Amazon France (paperback and ebook), and Amazon Germany (paperback and ebook).

Restoring Health is also available online on Barnes and Noble in both paperback and Nook/ebook form.  Nook gives a sample of the book to read online.

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

To receive a signed copy within North America, just etransfer at ed_hird@telus.net, giving your address. Cheques are also acceptable.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

Indigo also offers the paperback and the Kobo ebook version.  You can also obtain it through ITunes as an IBook.

-Click to purchase the Companion Bible Study by Jan Cox (for the Battle of the Soul of Canada) in both paperback and Kindle on Amazon.com and Amazon.ca 

To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.


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AB Simpson: An Unsung Hero

A. B. Simpson: A Canadian maverick
To purchase any of our six books in paperback or ebook on Amazon, just click on this link.