Cast the Net Far and Wide

  THE MIRACLE JACKET With the times becoming so turbulent, and all the signs before Christ’s return in place, I want to tell as many true stories as I can about His special goodness to me all my life.             I remember a time when I had just changed jobs.   A graduate of Hamilton Teachers’ College, I had only been able to get supply work, and so accepted a job in Mississauga at a day care until I should get a teaching position.   Teaching jobs were hard to find just at that time.   However, between paychecks and beginning a job at which I would wear slacks, rather than dresses as in teaching, I needed a jacket to wear with the slacks, it being fall. My new landlady, from whom I had rented a furnished room, was selling some of her clothes.   For very little money I bought a beautiful, warm brown jacket lined with fleece.   The interesting thing is that while my landlady was shorter than I, the s...

BACK IN THOSE INA DAYS!      I was a newly born-again Christian, back in 1968.   Two Christian colleagues at the downtown Hamilton bank in which I was a current account teller at the time, had sensed my spiritual search, got others to pray for me, and had used a Gospel tract to lead me into an eternal relationship with our Saviour Jesus Christ.   What joy was mine, as I now attended Philpott Memorial Church, formerly the Philpott Tabernacle, a church with a heritage of city-wide revival in Dr. Philpott’s day, one even respected and remembered by my Anglican grandmother.               I had many mentors at the church as a new Christian: my Sunday School teacher- yes, at this evangelical church, adults attended Sunday School too for an hour before the hour-long service – my teacher training instructor and his wife, the organist; the elder who led me to the Lord with his wife and daughter, ...

                                 A CRY - A MISADVENTURE – AN ANSWER Oh, the excitement!   It was time for the annual school trip.   Rather than the usual educational trip by one class to a museum or farm, the annual school trip was more like a community event.   All year long, families saved up and planned for the day-long trip to Canada’s Wonderland, near Toronto.   Children whose parents could not go were assigned to another parent, usually the parent of a friend, so that they would have companionship.   Once there, the families were on their own, needing only to return to the bus by a certain time.   To disadvantaged children, as some were, it was educational to leave the reserve and travel to the Toronto area, to see new sights.   And it was fun! Rien and I were unable to go with Stephen one particul...

  Tailings When you go out into Christian volunteer work and your young children (aged 2 and 4 when we left) had no choice in the matter but had to grow up on two native reserves, you wonder if you should have made them suffer in this way.   Then your daughter goes to Bible College, becomes a missionary to Africa in charge of an orphanage of sixty children. I think of the scene in which repairs were being made to the orphanage and my daughter held her own with the African workers who wanted to be paid before they had finished the work.   They threatened my daughter, a young white female-against their rules, with reporting her to her boss.   Her famous response: “I don’t care if you report me to the Pope; you are not getting paid until you finish the job!”   This is no reflection on African workers in general. Then my son, currently vice president of construction in a developing construction company, agreed to be dunked in water at a “Dunk the Boss” event just ...

                                RED SALAMANDERS AND SNAPPING TURTLES The children had the wildest, most beautiful and educational playground in the world.  As a family, we explored its beauty often.  We went to the Cape Croker Park which was a money-making campground.  We enjoyed the swings, then walked or drove among the lovely, mature blossoming trees and the dense birch section which we dubbed the  ”birch ballet”.  In the woods near our home, we picked up pretty brown and white snail shells and watched for the small, red salamanders which I have never seen anywhere else in Canada.  We walked and waded along the beaches, collecting “fossils”.  Once, on the shale rock in the shallow water behind our house, we actually watched fish hatching. On Sunday afternoons, we usually went for a hike along the...

  n                                    THROUGH THE FAITH OF A LITTLE CHILD                                    Our time at Cape Croker was rapidly coming to a close.   Rien began attending house meetings at Saugeen Reserve, to the south of us.   A group, often including Georgina, would carpool every Friday night.   I stayed home with our young children, but waited expectantly for reports of the meetings.             The meetings were charismatic, Spirit-filled small-group gatherings where God moved and anything could happen: healings, deliverances, utterances in other tongues, prophecies, visio...

  (23 rd Psalm devotional)       JUST A BAG OF MARBLES           by Frances K. Van Mil Our family was at the farmers’ market two summers ago near Gimli, where my son lives. There were many colourful booths and craft demonstrations   on this busy Saturday morning. There were fresh farm vegetables, artists selling hand-painted cards and jewellery, knitted shawls, candles, pottery, baking and more.   My son bought us doughnuts hot off the griddle, and later a breakfast sandwich.   There were cute farm animals including a fearless baby pig who was let loose into the crowds.   There was a lovely garden and the smiling owner with his truck. I had my walker with me, and steered it into a booth, my two granddaughters calling, “Grandma!” when I forgot to stop to sanitize my hands. “Come in, Grandma”, said the smiling lady at the door.   No one else in the family was interested in this particular booth ...

                        A GREAT LOSS TO SOCIETY:   LACK OF THANKFULNESS             Although our family did not attend church when I was growing up, we still honoured the Lord in many simple ways which are so often lost today.  At  Christmas, for example,  there was always an evening of singing carols, and the faith in these carols was taken seriously.  I can still hear my father and my Uncle Dick each taking the part of a different one of the kings in “We Three Kings of Orient Are”, their bass voices ringing out in joy.  As we celebrated either the sumptuous Christmas feast or the autumn fruit-laden Thanksgiving repast, the host of the table, either my father or Uncle Dick, with whose family we alternated these celebrations, would at the very least utter a brief prayer of gratitude to God.  I remember that Uncle Dick always remembe...

                                                                     A Table in the Wilderness               Copyright Frances K. Van Mil      Things were dull.   Sometimes, there are periods in ministry when there is a lull, things are hard, you do not sense any direction from God nor sense anything good happening.   We were on a small reserve in Manitoba , living in a tiny, shabby box-like house in, of all places, a lumber yard. Let me tell you about our little shabby boxy house in the lumber yard. Then that will help you to understand why an inexpensive but pretty table c...

                                      A MUSICAL MEMORY – AND HOW THE LORD SAVED THE DAY!             I am remembering a special time in my life, and how it almost ended in bitterness instead of joy.               I had withdrawn from university right before my second year final exams   due to pressures mounting in my life.   I was living at home with my parents, recovering from poor mental health and had not yet begun to look for a job.               My dear mother, trained in psychology and having worked with mental patients, knew that I needed something positive to occupy my time.   I took her up on that and decid...

                                             THAT PERSON RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME               Lord, I have missed your will in so many ways!   I think of the time that a senior gentleman had fallen on the sea of ice behind my apartment building.   Both the ladies I was driving with to church and I immediately thought of the good Samaritan story.   In front of us was an almost identical situation.   A lady from an upstairs window called out that the superintendent had been called, and, more importantly, an ambulance.   My friend threw a blanket over him, said a few comforting words, then we left.   I always felt that I should have stayed with him until help arrived.     ...

  YOU WERE THERE – an Emmaus meditation Lord, I didn’t see You, but you were there when I cried myself to sleep , got confused in my bed at night, failed an exam, was demeaned, fearful, misunderstood-when I didn’t measure up;   every time I got lost, trapped, stuck in an elevator, on the highway with a broken-down vehicle, needing to hitchhike. You were Mr. Heaver, our grade eleven history teacher who silenced my classmates when my father’s name was all over the local paper for drunk driving and I, fifteen, was in the car;   You were Santa, the fairies, Father X, father Mehan; father “Chumleigh” – all the “fathers” who helped me before I knew my real Father God;   that compassionate philosophy professor with the soulful eyes; that stranger who picked up the strawberries I spilled in the doorway of No Frills.    You gave me whatever I needed at the time.   Some may have been angels.   But it was always You. Thank You.

THE CASE OF THE VERY TALL HYACINTH I was teaching in Britt, Ontario and living in a cottage on a campground.  I had had one date with my future husband Rien in January, to celebrate both of our birthdays.  He, a recent widower, had taken a trip to Holland to visit relatives, and had now come up to visit his old friend Harold, my landlord, to help him around the campground and to pursue me - even bringing me a sweet little blue necklace from Holland.  I was avoiding him, not sure about this relationship, and had gone down to Parry Sound, a three-quarters-of- an-hour drive which I had to take to get groceries.  I was on a mission to get a hyacinth, my favourite spring flower, hoping its beauty and fragrance would hurry spring along – at least at  my cottage.  I was not dressed for a date, since I was expecting to be alone.  Well, guess who was in the grocery store, not slicked up either?  Yes, Rien!  On hearing my quest, he, a professional ma...

  THE HAM (Memories of a new bride: having my parents-in-law over for dinner) We were living in Wainfleet, Ontario. I invited my mother- and father-in-law over for dinner.   Isn’t that what you do?   They were living in        .   At first, Opa said, ”No!”   But Oma said, “Why not?” And that was that! Meanwhile, more than nervous about the dinner, I was planning to serve ham: my father’s special recipe.   Dad was a gourmet cook, and had invented as wonderful recipe for ham, involving basting it with white wine and apple juice. Rien’s sister Jenny , serving as the go-between, informed me that her parents would be arriving at around 4:30 the day of the dinner. I think my nervousness came more from my own family background, as the Van Mils were much more casual about everything. On the day of the dinner, I had a scrumptious dessert made (this being what I am best at).   I was on the telephone throughout the cook...

  WHEN MARGARET AND I PRAYED… Our aging mother was in a Hamilton hospital having just had heart surgery.     All was well, except that one of her doctors had a very disturbing attitude.   We felt that he thought that hospital and physicians’ care would be better spent on people in their twenties and thirties than on an older person who had already lived most of her life.   But he forgot one thing:   this was our mother! As my sister Margaret and I fervently prayed on the telephone that night, we asked the Lord to change this doctor’s heart, and to remove all ungodly influences on his thinking. The next day, the doctor was more subdued and softer in his attitude.   Even our brother, who knew nothing of our prayers, remarked, ”He is different!” Margaret and I just smiled, and offered thanks to the Lord who cares so much for family and each of our lives.

HIS STILL WATERS     When I had just received a large amount of inheritance money-( There was pressure after having had so little for the last while, people asking for things, my trying to atone for past lack by buying expensive jeans for the kids, etc,; a Christian counsellor urging me to do something for myself (I bought china and silver);   All of a sudden, I found myself on a retreat.  Rien was building a church on a northern reserve, and suggested that I meet him in Souix Lookout, to shorten the time before his return.  I left the teens and my sister with some pizza for supper and took off.   Driving all alone,  I enjoyed the serenity of nature, peace, hearing God’s voice saying peaceful, encouraging things, etc. I stopped for ten minutes to watch a young bear eat by the side of the road; I saw a moose family with baby; an eagle;  I only remember the stillness of the woods, trees, and the wonderful peace it brought me.   I...

  A PART NO ONE ELSE CAN FILL I woke up this morning feeling overwhelmed with the tremendous burden of the prayer needs all around me, and my own inadequacy to meet them.   If I am called to pray for the situation in the Holy Land, for instance, how would my small contribution really make a difference?                 Somehow I felt that the Lord was taking me back to the time of my conception, and showing me that of all the sperms available, He had allowed only one to succeed in fertilizing a certain egg, to create me, not at all by happenstance as so many believe, but to bring to life the vision He already had of me with all my personality traits, motives and talents – the person He knew that this particular union would create.                 Along with the life God saw ahead that I would live, with all my mistakes and joys, inclu...

                                                              A Christmas Reflection             I remember one Christmas when I had no money to spend on gifts.   My husband and I had got past the need for expensive presents and learned to enjoy the intangible gifts of nature and family.   But how my mother’s heart ached for my two teenagers.             A few days before Christmas, I felt stirring up in me an idea for two individualized wall-hangs.   I found some brightly striped canvas, dowels, scraps of felt, inexpensive gold ornaments and a tube of “Goop” glue, ...

  HIS ADVENT INTO MY LIFE At Christmas we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, the promised Messiah.   I would like to share some of the process of receiving Him into my own life, for His advent means nothing if He is not received personally.     My mother read me Bible stories as a child, along with other literature.   I remember enjoying the story of Baby Jesus’ birth, as well as the story of Samuel, hearing God speak to him.   In Grade Three I had a Christian teacher who taught us all the children’s hymns during five-minute breaks of standing beside our desks.   Later, in Grade Five, the Gideons came in and gave each student a New Testament.   All the way through elementary school, religious instruction was scheduled, and many ladies came in with Bible flannelgraph stories.   I remember in Grade eight hearing about Pharaoh’s dream of the seven fat cows and the seven lean cows.   We also said the Lord’s Prayer ...

  EVERYTHING’S GOING TO BE ALL RIGHT There are two things I keep on the wall behind my bed to remind me that, no matter what I am going through, Jesus is in it with me, and will make it come out well.               The brown wooden plaque with the famous praying hands in relief was a wedding present from the minister who conducted the marriage ceremony of my husband Rien and me so long ago.   I am reminded daily to bring my deepest concerns to Him in prayer, and to pray for others.             The painting, possibly a copy of a more famous painting, possibly not famous at all, gives me peace every time I enter my room.   There is a thatched cottage, a stream with a little bridge with a person standing on it, gardens and beautiful spring apple trees and other trees in bloom - all pink and green with blue skies above.   I am transported to the verses...