Hockey

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Mystery Phone Calls

The other day I had a phone message, but I didn’t recognize the name.  My secretary said he asked for me by name and seemed to know me.

I went to my office and hesitated making the call, not being sure what this person may want from me.  Instead, I made another call, just to warm up to the idea of returning this message.  It didn’t help.  I again looked at the message, to try to figure out who this person might be, and how I might know him.  I decided to give it a shot; I made the call.

Some people answer the phone and start talking like you know them, and if you don’t immediately make it clear that you have no clue who they are, the phone call becomes awkward.

It’s agony when that happens. You strain to pick up on any tip the person may drop as they talk.  About a month ago, I was five minutes into a conversation before I figured out who I was talking to.  During that time I thought it was one person and then I thought it was someone else.  When I eventually figured it out, what the guy was saying finally made sense.  I was sweating on the other end of the line.

Thankfully, this guy didn’t leave me hanging.  He could tell I didn’t have the slightest idea who he was and asked, “You don’t know who I am, do you?”  When I said “no”, he gave me some context to place him in.

I had played shinny hockey with him years ago. In fact, except for one game of hockey he played with me about a year ago, I probably haven’t seen him in about 5 years.  Let’s just say he hadn’t been in my circle of associates for a long time, and I had only known him by his first name.  He phoned me because he knew I was a pastor and thought maybe he could talk some things over with me.

The guys I regularly play shinny hockey with all know that I’m a pastor.  Somehow it comes out.  When they find out, their language usually changes for a while, and when they slip up they usually apologize … at first.

Even though I’ve been playing hockey with some of these guys for years and years, not often am I asked for anything other than a pass on the ice.  This call was pretty unusual, especially given the fact we had been out of touch for so long.

We talked about setting up a time to meet and then ended the conversation.  When I hung up the phone, I just sat in my chair for a moment, thinking about how that guy came to call me at this particular time in his life.

Here’s the thing:  What we do today may not seem like it makes much difference.  In fact, one day may not make much difference.  But over a long time, being genuine to those around you may trigger something in someone, years from now, in their time of need.  That’s when being a consistent Christian example before them will make a difference.  God reminded me this week, through this phone call, that the testimony of my life has no expiry date attached to it.  So, I need to keep living a life God can use.

Until Next Time!

Pastor Paul

Question: How has your life, your testimony, your example made a difference years later?  Leave your comment below.

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Canadians and Hockey

There is something weird about us Canadians.  The other day I was out for dinner with my family – that would be 3/4 of my family because one quarter left us for Alberta five years ago and has not yet found her way back.

Anyway, we were in this restaurant having one of my favorite meals, hot wings. This particular restaurant had television screens all over and they were tuned to a sports channel.

I like sports so, even though the sound was off and pop music was playing through the speakers, I found myself watching what was on the screen.  About 5 minutes went by before I realized I’d been watching hockey highlights, goal after goal, great saves, and awesome hits.  But these weren’t highlights from last night’s games – they were from last year!  There’s a hockey strike on right now.

Now that’s Canadian.  It’s hockey season, so strike or no strike we’re going to watch hockey in some form or other.  It was funny because I was ogling the dekes these guys made on the goalies, and banging the table when the goalies made their out-of-nowhere glove saves.

I thought to myself, “Why am I interested in these highlights? I’ve seen them all last year.”  And after 5 or 10 minutes of watching in the restaurant, I’d seen them several more times.  But I kept watching, even though there weren’t many “Leaf” highlights.

I wasn’t the only one watching; my son was watching too.  We talked about what we were looking at as if it had some bearing on world peace or maybe war in the middle east.  There is just something about September that forces us to tune in; it flows through the veins of Canadians, like the urge to pack up the lawn mower and tune up the snowblower (man, I wish I had one of them!).

To be honest, I don’t think this NHL hockey strike is such a bad thing.  Right now my Toronto Maple Leafs have a perfect season going.  In fact, they’re in first place in the league.  I realize it’s a tie with every other team in the league, but hey, if the playoffs started right now, the Leafs would have a chance!

In one Toronto store, I saw on their TVs they were showing a hockey playoff game between Montreal and Philly.  I thought to myself, “This is Toronto and they’re showing a Montreal game?”  Then I remembered, if they showed a Leafs’ playoff game it would be in black and white!

Personally, I believe this strike comes at a good time.  The Leafs haven’t made the playoffs since the last strike so this strike should break the jinx … we’ll probably see them in the playoffs again regularly.

Here’s the thing:  We all have things that grab our interest, command our attention, draw our focus away from everything else.  But does that happen with God?  When you read the Bible, do you get lost in what it’s saying to you?  When you are alone with God, do you lose track of time and everything else around you?  I don’t think it will happen all the time, but at certain moments, seasons of our life, our God should grab our interest, grab our attention, draw our focus away from everything else.  If it doesn’t happen, we should look into why, and make some changes.

Until Next Time!

Pastor Paul

Question: When has God so grabbed your attention that everything else faded around you? Leave your comment below.