Author Archives: Clint Humfrey

The Encouragement of Fellow Travellers

Posted on by under Maverick

I am very thankful as I write because God has blessed me with a church that generously permits me to vacation in the winter time, and for all of the people who have served in the last weeks as I’ve been away. As 2016 fades in the rear view mirror and 2017 is already underfoot, let me express my thanks to Calvary Grace Church and my thanks to God for you all!

Since arriving home yesterday, I’ve had travelling on my mind over the course of 3500 miles we’ve driven. And when I think about God’s care for the church in the last year, even as he cared for my family on the road, it is a reminder to me of our common journey. As travelling pilgrims (1 Peter 2.11), each of us encourages the other as we go (Hebrews 10.24-25).


When we serve the Lord, we do so as followers of Jesus (John 12.26). There is a togetherness to our following so that Christians from the earliest days were collectively called the Way (Acts 9.2). We are on the narrow path (Mt 7.14), and Jesus, of course, is himself, “the way” as the only route of access to the Father (John 14.6).

The result of this travelling experience is that all of the saints who have desired ‘a better country, that is a heavenly one’, who have sought ‘a homeland’ and  who have sought ‘a city whose designer and builder is God’— all of these saints encourage each other by their travelling (Hebrews 11. 10, 14-16). A disciple’s faithful travelling encourages others to travel onward as well.

I was reminded of this when I was driving through Death Valley. The traffic was thick on the interstate and Californians were hindering traffic while texting or changing lanes at high speed within whispers of other car bumpers. Into the highway madness, a minivan pulled up beside me and the driver gave me a giddy smile and waved at me like we were cousins.

Was it another strange Californian?

As he passed I saw his unwashed BC license plate. He was just another crazy Canadian like me, far from home, trying to get back there. We were travelling together because we had the same destination. And that common goal gave us a common bond, even going through Death Valley.

Of course, as Christians, our journeyings are not simply a case of endless leap frogging in the passing lane. We follow Jesus Christ our Lord who has gone to prepare a place for us (John 14.1-4). He is the founder and perfecter of our faith, and we look to him (Hebrews 12.2).  Together, we look to Jesus (the “looking” in Heb. 12.2 is plural in the Greek text).

So I am thankful for the fellow travellers who serve in the church in everything from setting up chairs to laying out lessons.  I’m encouraged by your travelling and I pray you will be encouraged by mine, as we look to Jesus together on the road ahead.

Canadian Christians: Dwarfs, Deadheads or Douglas Firs?

Posted on by under Theology

It’s really encouraging to see all of the good and godly resources that are available to Canadian Christians today.

Consider what a blessing it is to have Tim Challies writing and  resourcing us, assisting in the discipleship of Christians all over the world. There are new initiatives like The Gospel Coalition Canada getting off the ground that intend to help Canadian churches grow in depth and unity. Good publishers print more books than mere mortals can attempt to read.

But for all of our resources, when we look at ourselves with a properly Canadian self-criticism, we can see that we’re not really where we ought to be in spiritual maturity. Our churches could be so much sounder, our prayers could be more frequent, our witness could be more winsome and consistent and our thoughts of God more clear and honouring to Him.

As usual, JI Packer has crafted a perfect picture of the contrast between first, what we look like today, and second, what we could aspire to under God’s grace.

Dwarfs and Deadheads

First of all, Packer says that the contemporary church is so affected by affluence that it has been making, “dwarfs and deadheads of us all.” [1]

With gospel-centred this, and grace-based that, it is jolting to think that we’re not really very far along. It can sober us up to think that our misplaced priorities, worship of glass ‘screens’ and affluent anxieties have kept us stunted.  All of these God-centred resources are helpful, and we should praise God for the blessing of them. But we need to be careful about being too big for our britches. God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (James 4.6).

One of the graces which God gives, is the memory of faithful believers who have gone before us. The biblical summary of this practice is found in Hebrews 11 where the author reminds his readers of the example of believers who have gone before them. Their historical example is intended to be a ‘useable past’ to encourage renewed faith and obedience.

Redwoods

That was Packer’s second point in the contrast.  If we are dwarfs and deadheads, we need to look at some examples of folks who weren’t.  So Packer turned to the English Puritans. In doing so, he crafted one of the most picturesque descriptions of Christian maturity which has come down to us:

On a narrow strip of the northern California coastline grow the giant Redwoods, the biggest living things on earth. Some are over 360 feet tall, and some trunks are more than 60 feet round. They do not have much foliage for their size; all their strength is in those huge trunks, with foot-thick bark, that rise sheer for almost half their height before branching out. Some have actually been burned, but are still alive and growing. Many hundreds of years old, over a thousand in some cases, the Redwoods are (to use a much-cheapened word in its old, strict, strong sense) awesome. They dwarf you, making you feel your smallness as scarcely anything else does. Great numbers of Redwoods were thoughtlessly felled in California’s logging days, but more recently they have come to be appreciated and preserved, and Redwood parks are today invested with a kind of sanctity. A 33-mile road winding through Redwood groves is fittingly called the Avenue of the Giants.

California’s Redwoods make me think of England’s Puritans, another breed of giants who in our time have begun to be newly appreciated. Between 1550 and 1700 they too lived unfrilled lives in which, speaking spiritually, strong growth and resistance to fire and storm were what counted.

Packer then summarized the appeal of this kind of maturity which the Puritans had:

As Redwoods attract the eye, because they overtop other trees, so the mature holiness and seasoned fortitude of the great Puritans shine before us as a kind of beacon light, overtopping the stature of the majority of Christians in most eras, and certainly so in this age of crushing urban collectivism, when Western Christians sometimes feel and often look like ants in an anthill and puppets on a string.

Douglas Firs

In Canadian churches we can pray that we would grow more like Redwoods and less like deadheads, as we seek to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with our own needy generation. Maybe a Canadian way to think about this Puritan-like goal would be to swap the picture of Redwoods for Douglas Firs.

Just stop and imagine what it could be like if local churches in Canada were filled with people who were like spiritual Douglas Firs. Not one or two “Big Lonely Dougs” (like the tallest one in Port Renfrew), but a spiritual forest of godly people, with new and old growth climbing skyward. We know it will only happen if our churches send their roots deep, and we withstand many trials of wind and fire. But let us hope and pray that God would grow the church in Canada “to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4.13).

[1] J. I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1990), 11–12.

photo credit: 

Bucked Off

Posted on by under Cowboy

I’m getting too old for this. Or that’s what I thought when I slowly rolled myself into the half ton as we went to gather cattle.

It all started fairly innocent. My brother and I were assembling horses for all of the kids to ride, his son and daughter and my two boys.  All told there were 12 creatures attempting to work together. If it was a military operation you’d liken it less to D-Day than to Custer’s Last Stand.

We finally got all of the kids mounted, re-assured in their anxieties and somewhat fitted into their saddles. Then my brother saddled his new horse, and only I was left.

Since my niece was riding my horse, the old campaigner Baldy, I was left to choose from the two horses left in the pen. I could take my brother’s old horse Speedlord. He was a now nearly ancient thoroughbred with more grey hair than me. I’d ridden Speedlord a few times over the years, and I remember when we missed a tight right angle to enter a gate and he fell over with myself being flung forward into the newly seeded field. Never was I so thankful for newly tilled dirt.

The other choice was none other than the fabled Strawberry Roan. My brother had recently bought him from a calf roper at an auction. In the show ring a young woman had ridden the Roan and it looked so broke that it was ‘bomb-proof’. That’s the label applied to a horse that is so tamed and trained that a bomb could go off and the horse wouldn’t be phased at all. I was naturally suspicious of the ‘bomb-proof’ claim, but I decided to go with the Roan.

The Roan stood very quietly as I saddled him and fitted the bit to his mouth. I was very attentive to his responses at each point. Would he balk at the tightening of the cinch? Would he rear back at the offer of the bit? He did none of these, standing shiverless just like his reputation claimed.

I still wanted to be careful. As I placed my weight onto the left stirrup I was ready to be flipped backwards if the horse reared, or to be off-balance if the horse lunged forward. But he didn’t move. He didn’t even shift his weight. He seemed to have been ready to accept me as a rider without any discomfort.

I swung my right leg over the saddle and let myself down onto his back. With my full weight on him I thought this would be the beginning of the rodeo if it was ever going to happen.

So for a second I waited. Nothing happened. No shivers. No nervous steps forward. At that point it was clear that either this Roan was as advertised, was completely bomb-proof, and was safe for children, or he was the most cunning critter I’d seen in a long time.

I leaned slightly to tilt the fender of my right stirrup so that I could secure my right foot. I had the relaxation of mind that comes from passing through an anxious experience without mishap. My thoughts turned to the safety of my boys and their cousins. Did I have a warm enough jacket on? I was looking forward to riding a new horse with my family on a blue sky day.

There was no way to anticipate it. It was one of the dirtiest moves I have seen. When I went to put my foot in the right stirrup, the Roan went completely vertical. His front end went straight up so high and fast that I thought he was coming over backwards in that vicious man-killing way.

I was trying to stay with him but the saddle horn had slammed hard into my sternum. He went backwards onto his haunches and I was pushed out the back of him. I couldn’t tell what happened then. He bucked on top of me and I felt a series of hammer blows come down all over me as my face was smashed down into the dirt.

He kept bucking and I crawled to the fence where my sister-in-law looked on in stunned horror. I grabbed onto the drill-stem fence and lifted myself up, turning to see that the Roan was still jump-kicking like the tenth round of the National Finals Rodeo. After he piled me he bucked to the west end of the pen, crashing into my brother’s horse then continued bucking toward the four mounted youngsters passing through them and making all of their horses offer a crow-hop or two. Only Scooter the little bomb-proof stud ignored the blustery Roan.

The bark was knocked off my nose and blood was coming out of it. I was hurt all over and I didn’t even know how bad until later on. My chest hurt, but I didn’t think my sternum was broke. Two neighbours within a few miles had broken their sternums in the last month, one from the slip of a heavy combine wrench, the other in a horrible highway crash. My chest was sore but I didn’t think I broke anything. My right knee hurt. And I had a vague soreness on my left thigh and left elbow.

I didn’t get back on. I didn’t ride. I was feeling sore and old. I chased cows in the pickup. There was still the enjoyment of watching my sons and their cousins and uncle round up the cattle. But my mind was mostly preoccupied with my aching pain and also something else.

I thought a lot about mercy as I motored behind the cows. God was full of mercy to me that afternoon. I could have broken my sternum. Or I could have been paralyzed at the neck. Or I could have been killed while my sons watched. The fact that I was puttering around in the truck was evidence of God’s great mercy to me.  As the old prophet Jeremiah said, “his mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3.22-23).

I knew more clearly than the pain in my chest that God had not given me what I deserved, but instead had continued to give me good things that I didn’t deserve. Even for a pastor who preaches about the grace and mercy of God every Sunday I still had things to learn. And on that afternoon, I was expertly schooled by a powerful sermon ‘preached’ to me by God through that Strawberry Roan.