With Glowing Heart ... by Glynis M Belec

"Indeed, my plans are not like your plans, and my deeds are not like your deeds." 

Isaiah 55:8 (NB)

Last week was indeed  a true Canada Day 2017. Not at all like I had planned, but a fabulous one, nonetheless. 

A month ago, I had my agenda tidily filled in and my plans were in place. I had been asked to help organize, or at least participate in a local Art in the Park event for Canada Day. I thought that would be fun and I could perhaps help some of our local writers promote their work too, so I jumped in. The plan was also for me to have a book table decorated to the nines with my newest publishing hurrah - a story in Chicken Soup for the Soul Spirit of Canada. Perfect timing for my new Canadian title. I was excited and hoped to sell a lot of books.

Shortly after I had said 'sure thing,' though, I found out my daughter was going to be moving that very day. So I had to break it to the organizers that I was backing out. I felt bad but it was a case of priorities and I had to help. 

However, my plan was to pop by and enjoy Art in the Park later in the day, and help out if I got back in time. So all seemed well, all things considered. 

Then, wouldn't you know it, things switched again. Plans fell through for my daughter. I felt badly but then I thought perhaps I could recommit to helping out on Canada Day. I didn't jump in head first this time. I merely mentioned I might be able to come to help out on the day, in case things turned around for my daughter. The gal who had contacted me was so kind and told me to come if I was able. She would save a spot. So I planned again. 

But I shouldn't have bothered. 

It's not that things turned around for my daughter. 

It was my Dad this time. He had a bit of a turn - well a succession of turns and the short story is he ended up being put on a heart monitor. So there went any plans of my own. This was just prior to Canada Day. And I knew that I couldn't leave Dad for any extended time so it looked like I had to cancel everything. I did. 

As we did our devotions that morning, I remarked to Happy Hubby, who was also heading out to do some catch up on some work of his own, how differently the day turned out to what I had planned. 

"That's sometimes how God works," he said, kissing me farewell and leaving me contemplating. 

It was a good thing I stayed home, too. Dad ended up having a dizzy spell and his heart was racing just as I was helping him up. Right away I had to get him to lie in bed for a while and follow the doctor's instructions. Eventually things settled down and all was quiet in paradise. 

Later, once Dad seemed okay and I had given him breakfast and got a few things done in the kitchen, I went to the back patio door and stood quietly for a minute looking at my garden and the impending black clouds that loomed near. I was feeling a little frustrated and thinking about how my plans didn't work at all. I didn't get to help my daughter move. I didn't help with Art in the Park. I didn't get to set up my table and sell all those books that I had planned on selling. I didn't get to partake in typical Canada Day celebrations. And it looked like rain. 

Then I heard it. At first I thought I was imagining it. 

It started out soft and low. A solitary sound of a trumpet playing O Canada - and it drifted across our subdivision to my back porch. I opened the screen door and stepped outside, still in my pjs.  My heart stood to attention. My body followed suit as O Canada got progressively louder. Three times the distant trumpeter played it. For three minutes I stayed still. Smiling. Listening. Appreciating. 

I thanked God for sending me that special gift Canada Day morning. It seemed to focus me. Reminding me about my glowing heart and how God keeps our land glorious and free! 

The rest of my day was not at all as I had originally planned. I did the laundry. I wrote a little bit. I cleaned our bedroom, and sorted through things I had kept putting off. I cleaned the pantry. Wrote some more. Ran an online Oh Canada Trivia Challenge. Made some muffins. Smiled a lot. Counted Blessings. 

Not a day that I had planned. But it was such a peaceful, fulfilling, relaxing kind of day that I had not experienced in a long time. I kept thinking about the trumpeter. And O Canada. And the way God's plans are not our plans. Gratitude. 

O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

                                     Glynis

My Home and Native Land by Susan Barclay

Point Pelee

I don't know what it's like to grow up as a First Nations Canadian, but I know what it's like for a white Anglo-Saxon protestant whose family has been here two to three hundred years. My maternal grandmother's ancestors arrived from Londonderry, Ireland in 1768, while my grandfather's predecessors emigrated at least as early from Cork. They settled in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland respectively, pioneered the land and fished the sea. We can well imagine, looking from the position of all our modern conveniences, that the hardships were many and life fragile. Most of us take their perseverance for granted, but we stand on the shoulders of their labour.

Grand Pre, Nova Scotia

My grandmother's parents were farmers. Of their eight surviving children, only three were boys and as young men all were keen to relocate to Ontario for work. After a time, they persuaded their parents to move as well. My grandmother, the youngest child, was seven then. When she was twelve, her father succumbed to influenza. Her mother remarried but developed stomach cancer, and by fifteen my grandmother was an orphan. She went to work as a seamstress in one of Toronto's infamous sewing factories.

Heart's Delight, Newfoundland

My grandfather also lost his father at a young age. He too was the baby of the family. His older siblings left the "rock" for Toronto and he and his mother followed when he was fifteen. But my grandfather didn't like it and they returned to Newfoundland for two more years. When he was seventeen, they came back to Toronto for good, but it would be another 25 years before Newfoundland joined with Canada. For years Grandpa worked for the iconic Canadian company Massey-Ferguson.  

At the New Brunswick border

During my growing-up years summer vacations included only a few destinations, and unless we were camping in Ontario they all began with the letter N: Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and New Jersey (where my aunt lived with her husband and family after marrying an American). No one in my family traveled by air and it was a long drive to the east coast, but we entertained ourselves with I Spy, the Alphabet Game, and I Packed My Grandmother's Trunk. And thank goodness for the radio, though it wasn't much help in Quebec when you only had grade school French!

Quebec City

These were the years that included the grade 6 class trip to Ottawa and the grade 8 trip to Quebec City. Memories were made indeed! I have a photo of Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau just after he emerged from his limousine on Parliament Hill, and I'll always remember my first taste of tourtiere and the visit to Ste Anne de Beaupre. 

Pre- Confederation Bridge days

After university, and as my grandparents aged out of long car trips, my Canadian travels expanded. My mother and I drove to Prince Edward Island one year and took the Ontario Northland Railway to Moosonee another. I took my first plane trip and went to Vancouver alone. Several years later my husband and I took our children to Alberta. We drove through the northern United States, then up through Lethbridge and Calgary to Banff and Lake Louise. We came back to Ontario through the prairies and Manitoba. All of it was beautiful and very different. We are blessed to live in a country with such diversity.
 

Capilano Suspension Bridge, British Columbia

Alberta badlands

At the RCMP Headquarters in Regina, Saskatchewan

Margaret Laurence House, Neepawa, Manitoba

I am proud to be a Canadian through and through, born and bred. I am fortunate, I know, to have visited all ten provinces, though there is so much yet to see. My bucket list doesn't include the territories and Nunavut - I don't expect I'll ever make it there. But my husband has never been to British Columbia and I wish I'd gone as far as Vancouver Island when I was so close. This summer I get to go back to Gros Morne National Park in Newfoundland, then up to the Viking settlement and across to Labrador which I've never seen before.

Moosonee, northern Ontario

I could go on and on about my love for this great country, all that it represents and all that I've been privileged to see. Instead I'll conclude with this final thought: it's so easy to take what we have for granted. Let's do something different in honour of Canada's 150th birthday this year. Every person has a voice. Every Inscribe member has a gift for words. Let's take up our pens (or whatever tool you prefer) and make a stand for what we believe is required to keep Canada one of the best places in the world to live. Write articles, blog posts, letters to the editor, your member of parliament, your MPP or MLA. Canada has a great past. Let's do our part to shape its future, that God's hand of blessing would continue to rest here.

God keep our land glorious and free.  
________________
In addition to her posts here Susan maintains a website at www.susanbarclay.blogspot.com

Canada in Pictures by Steph Beth Nickel

How best to express my feelings about "our home and native land"? Why not share some photos I've taken?

 Mom & the Kids

Cottage Country

Autumn Canvas

The Weight of Winter

Canada 150: Proudly Canadian by Sandi Somers

Today is Canada’s 150^th birthday as a nation. Throughout the country, celebrations commemorate our history, our heritage and our nationhood. This month our writers will honour Canada, focusing any Canadian theme that resonates.

A Legacy of Faith and God’s Faithfulness

November, 2004.

 “There it is,” said my nephew Trevor, driving into the parking lot. Across the street stood the Joseph Schneider Haus, almost hidden behind an old spruce.

At the Joseph Schneider Haus

This house, the first home in what is now Kitchener, Ontario, was built in 1816. It has been restored and is now a National Historic Site. But beyond the historical significance, it had special meaning for us: Joseph Schneider was my great-great-great grandfather.

Several years earlier, I had heard about this part of our family heritage. I was eager to learn more, and so when I attended a conference in Toronto, I connected with my nephew Trevor who lived in the area, and together we travelled to Kitchener.

 As we toured the house and outbuildings, I couldn’t help but think of the legacy Joseph and his family left us.

Joseph and his family arrived in Canada to set down family roots.

Trevor and I had come to explore our family roots.

          Touring the Haus and museum, we learned Joseph and his family had travelled by Conestoga wagon from Pennsylvania, taking over seven weeks. In contrast, I had flown from Calgary to Toronto in an afternoon.  

The day after touring the Haus and graveyard where Joseph and his wife Barbara were buried, and then watching the Grey Cup game (by the way, the Toronto Argonauts defeated the BC Lions 27-19), Trevor and I headed to the library at the University of Waterloo to see our Schneider Family Bible. Our forefathers had lived in Switzerland and purchased this Froschauer Bible in 1561. It’s a rare book indeed, one of only eight known copies of this edition! It even predates our English King James Bible by fifty years!

The librarian welcomed our visit. “About five or six family members from across Canada and United States come every year to look at the Bible and touch their family’s history,” he said, pulling the big brown book from the reference shelf.

Trevor Examining the Bible

He gave us white gloves before touching the antique book. I was already familiar with the Bible, having received pictures from a distant relative. But now touching it was electrifying.

           I felt the leather cover. The Bible had once been a high quality book, very expensive, but over the years it had become worn. Jewels once decorated the front cover. Had family members sold a jewel or two to pay for a passage to the next destination?

The Bible had been through a dramatic history, transported through boat trips, on wagons in winter and summer weather, surviving move after move after move through Europe, into Pennsylvania, and then to Kitchener. The centuries of use and travel had been hard on it.

If only it could tell it story! Those details are lost to history, but as Trevor and leafed through the pages delicate with age, we discovered clues. Corners and edges of the front and back pages, once worn away, had been restored. The book of James, the three Johns and Revelation, had fallen out. But someone with a vested interest in preserving the Bible had hand written those books.

Lastly, we looked through the pages containing the family genealogy, beginning in 1534. Different heads of families recorded marriages, children and deaths. The person who received the Bible after the father passed away wrote this important transfer. Migration from one location or country to another were noted. The personalities of the writers shone through with their artistic Swiss handwriting that included unique flairs and swirls. We couldn’t read the German, but on further pages someone had neatly translated the German into English.

I tried to imagine my ancestors who had owned the Bible. Had the father pulled his family together each evening to read the next chapter? Did they discuss God's faithfulness from His Word? Had they memorized large portions? I could only peek into this written heritage of their lives and journeys.

However, their voices behind the written genealogy echo across almost six centuries and across two continents, and speak of perseverance and faith in God.

It was a strategic weekend, as Trevor and I knew we were the recipients of a great heritage. Our forefathers had been part of making Canada the great nation that it is today. But more, we had touched their legacy of faith and God’s faithfulness.

“The faith we often take for granted has been defended at great cost,” wrote Lloyd John Ogilvie. “We are fortunate to have freedom of worship in which we can openly follow Christ. But we dare not take it for granted. It should spur us on to faithfulness and obedience to Christ today.”

I prayed that we, too, would leave a godly heritage to our families, churches, communities and Canada itself.