Birthday Milestones

Happy New Year Everyone!

Today Gary is celebrating his 75^th birthday – the last day of 2019 and a tax write-off for his parents way back when.  It is hard to believe that he has reached this milestone in his life.  He still doesn’t know how to spell “retire.”  After his scare last spring over experiencing quadruple by-pass surgery he now feels younger than ever.  His cardiologist is happy he is walking 3-4 km/day, 5 days a week and doesn’t want to see him for another year.  We are very grateful to God.

Tomorrow our eldest grandchild, Evan, turns 22.  Every New Year’s Day he celebrates his birthday.  It is interesting to note how important our birthdays are to each one of us no matter the number of the year.  And how else could we identify ourselves without giving out our birthdates for bank and credit card authorizations etc.?

Tomorrow we celebrate the birthday of a new year and a new decade – two more milestones. There sure are lots of 20-20 vision jokes going around; such as, “What do you call ketchup with 20-20 vision?  Heinz-sight!”  We have progressed so far through this past decade it is hard to imagine what life will be like during these next ten years. Evan is an electrical engineering student at Calgary University.  What will his world look like in five or ten years from now?  I still haven’t got a handle on Snapchat like our grandchildren do nor numerous other technologies that have developed.  The other day I asked one of them if it is now the style to wear a shirt tucked in the front of your pants and left out at the back.  And what about all the resolutions that come and go from one year to the next?  Why does the initial determination to change vanish so quickly?

We would really appreciate your prayers for our Hillside Church in Milton.  Sadly, we listened to Pastor Aaron read his letter of resignation this past Sunday morning from his position as lead pastor for this church plant. He and his wife, Sara, have gone through a great deal these past two and a half years – losing their ministry and business partners, moving four times, welcoming their third child and facing lots of sickness in their family.  They believe God is now taking them in a different direction.  Please pray that Hillside will continue and mature to a tall tree that will affect many lives in Milton, a place that is one of Canada’s fastest growing cities and a place that definitely needs more churches.

This past Wednesday we celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ once again with all the traditions that have grown up around this momentous event. Don’t you just love Mark Lowry’s Christmas song, Mary Did You Know?  It is amazing to me that our society, our world has acknowledged His coming for over 2000 years.  Every year we are free to acknowledge His birth is indeed a milestone. 

Enjoy the rest of your festivities and make 2020 a good one for Christ’s sake.

Wendy

Wendy.carter@kainos.org