Rita and I met in Hay River, NWT where we both worked for Canadian National Telecommunications (CNT) the parent company of several phone companies across Canada. We had a good income and plans to use that income to travel the world for two years. Then, during our travels, I got the sense that God was calling me to ministry, a ministry that I could not understand, and I didn’t desire. As I was saying “no” to God, we were blessed with news that our first child was on the way. Then I got it in my mind to move to Newfoundland so our children would get to know my parents and siblings.

As Rita and I began to transition from the single to married life we began to experience the difficulties of marriage. The world has its own idea about marriage, as did we, but the Bible taught us that we were to submit to each other and to seek God’s guidance and direction. As we prayed, the sense continued to increase that God was calling me to ministry. But I wanted a family with Rita, a normal life, not the life of a minister.

No matter how much I resisted, I couldn’t shake the idea that God had called me to go and talk to people about Jesus. So I decided I would speak to people about Jesus, but I would not go into the ministry. In spite of hard work, our family became financially impoverished. I was offered a job as a logger with the Bowater’s Paper Company in central Newfoundland. I hoped it would be temporary work until I could get back working with CNT in Newfoundland, but that didn’t come through. I worked 3 years with Bowater’s until they laid the whole town off. We had many financial difficulties during those years with car loan, a house mortgage three sons, work that didn’t pay very much and an employer which laid us off every December and April. We could never get ahead financially. I had also read in the Bible that if we don’t work, we shouldn’t eat so I would not ask the government for financial assistance and during layoffs I became a door-to-door vacuum salesman.

The door-to-door sales provided hope to make money but also opportunities to meet people. In those days I was very hungry to know God. Often homes had scriptures or pictures of Jesus on their walls so I would ask, “Are you Christians?” My hope was they would teach me, but often they would say “no”. So, I thought to myself “they don’t need the vacuum, they need the Lord!” I had also decided I would not do anything to compromise the Good News, so if I spoke of Jesus, I would not sell them a vacuum. While I didn’t make much money, I had many opportunities to talk to people about faith in Jesus.

Strangely enough, most people were very interested to talk about Jesus Christ and the things of Scripture. There were times when people would ask me to pray for them, and so I prayed with them. And there were times that they asked me questions which I didn’t know the answers to so, that caused me to go and start searching the scriptures and learn how to be a better witness. I especially enjoyed the times when I met people who knew a lot about Jesus Christ and Christianity, because I was hungry to learn. And so, I would sit at their feet in their home as they taught me what they knew. In time I began to hear stories that many for whom I had prayed had experienced answers to the prayers. For Rita and I, there was much that we learned in the scriptures in those years. Sometimes we learned things we found very difficult. Such as God’s plan to support ministry is for people to give 10% of their income back to God. And not only give 10%, but on top of 10% to give offerings. This was a difficult lesson from scripture for us to learn when we were broke! With a mortgage, a car payment, three children to feed and a poor paying job, this hardly sounded like good news. We wondered what to do. But, by then, we had witnessed God’s faithfulness in so many ways. We decided to obey and give tithes and offerings from our income, as small as it was. We gave from the first fruits, not the leftovers. Did this cause all the windows of heaven to open and wealth to pour
down to bless us? No, it sure didn’t.

Once during the December lay off, we really needed food and chicken feed. I had no prospects of door-to-door sales until after Christmas. It felt like God wasn’t providing for us, and frankly it was embarrasing to think of the sound of the pennies and nickles that make up my tithe clinking when they hit the collection plate on Sunday. Filled with frustration I prayed, “God I am not like that poor widow who gave all she had, we are so poor I do not even have a piece of paper to wrap these few pennies and nickels so they do not tinkle when I put them in the offering plate. I do not know one way that you can help us, but we need money for food and to buy chicken feed, so our hens don’t stop laying eggs.”

The next morning there was $100 in the mailbox!

Then, that same day, the manager from Electrolux talked me into going once more to a lady who wanted to buy a new vacuum after Christmas. She wanted a nice new vacuum, but first she wanted me to buy her old vacuum for $100. How could I make that deal when I hadn’t had any sales? I went, not sure what to tell her, but it turns out her brother had bought her vacuum, so she used that $100 from her brother as the downpayment for her new vacuum. Finally, a sale!

Then, when I got home Rita asked, “Where were you? A man from Gander bought a new taxi and he wants you to be his driver.” This meant daily tips and commission. I had said “God I do not know one way you can provide me money.” Now, less than 24 hours later, He showed me His miraculous provision in three ways.

God says in the scriptures: “Obedience is better than sacrifice.” Even though we sacrificed by giving 10%, I was still refusing to obey the call of God. It was not until eight years later when I went to Bible college that we began to be blessed so that we did not need to struggle to make ends meet.

Looking back over our life we can certainly say that we have known God’s guidance, direction, and provision. Just as we had read in the Bible, Rita and I have experienced miracles, healings, and provision. We know God can make the impossible possible. Rita and I have also experienced much difficulty, trials, and hardships. Just as the Bible story tells the story of people who likewise had to learn how to walk with God, so did we. We, like they, learned to have our minds changed to think in the ways of God rather than the ways of this world. We, too, have had to learn how to trust and walk by faith. It doesn’t happen automatically.

The Bible covers over four thousand years and there were not miracles every day… but there were miracles, and there are still miracles today.

While the hourly newscasts with their bad news reports do not help bring hope or peace, I hope you are encouraged with this edition of Arctic News of people finding hope in Jesus Christ which I believe is the greatest miracle, and the greatest gift we could ever receive. “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” Ephesians 2:8