Birthdays and Courage

Yvonne and I had a great time with Gerry Fowler, family, friends and Gerry's church community called Bethel Chapel ... all located in beautiful Sault Ste Marie. Gerry is a very capable board chair, friend and all-around travelling buddy. As I joked with his friends, "I've shared a room with Gerry and heard him snore on several continents and in many languages!" Let me dare to say that we make a great team as board chair and CEO and I look forward to more years working together.

Gerry invests in the lives of people, families and his community. His birthday celebration was filled with the love of family and friends, and that was a simple but profound tribute to Gerry's investment strategy. Yvonne and I had some great conversations but none more meaningful than our conversations (over two days) with Debbie and Dave Yule. They have a deep faith and great courage as they face Debbie's cancer along with the barrage of appointments, treatments, life-altering changes and the ever-present fear that Dave could become a single parent!

People question faith when they see us in the normal stuff of life. People doubt the love of God in the midst of tough circumstances on a personal or global scale. But it is difficult to doubt the courage found in faith that you encounter in the presence of Debbie and Dave. To be clear, they do not think of themselves as special, or so-called saints. No, they see themselves as ordinary people who do not seek to stand out in any way. But somewhere along this journey, a local community rallied with prayer and action, and then a larger community joined in. Now they journey together loving, supporting and learning through challenges of life and a life-threatening disease.

From a distance, many of us join this journey by praying. You can too! Check out their Facebook group for updates.  Please Pray for Debbie.