Sunday, November 7, 2010

THE MIRACLE at MCFARLANE LAKE

The year was 1977. It was summer, and it was our first trip home to Canada as husband and wife.

Eileen and I had been offered my Uncle Albert Magee’s cabin at the end of McFarlane Lake for a few days of R&R. Arriving by small boat and outboard motor; we had no idea that during the next two days our lives would forever be changed.

The purpose of our trip was to introduce my American wife, Eileen, to my home town of Sudbury and show her off to all my relatives and friends. For years I had been living without a Visa in the USA and now, after getting married, I could come and go freely between Canada and the USA.
So here we were in my home town, nestled in a rustic camp, accessible only by water, down an isolated corner of a pristine Canadian lake. We enjoyed the peace, the isolation, the sounds of nature, all of which were in dramatic contrast to the noise, pollution, and traffic of living in New York.

The sun was shining brightly over the quiet, still water. Eileen and I were sitting on a homemade bench on a hill just outside the cottage door. We looked at each other and the most insane idea landed inside our heads at the exact same moment. Why would we spend the rest of our lives in the chaos that was New York when we could live in the calm serenity of Sudbury? We had not previously thought of moving here. We had no discussions on the matter. These thoughts were right out of the blue. Or were they?

In the months leading up to our trip to Sudbury, both Eileen and I had been offered some amazing career opportunities. Eileen was being wooed by a medical firm to become their international director of marketing. The firm was located in Denmark, and they wanted her to move to their world head-quarters. I, on the other hand, had been offered a spot as a lounge act on the Las Vegas Strip, worlds apart from Copenhagen, Denmark. During this period, God was slowly drawing me back to Himself.

Through a series of bounced cheques from bankrupt bars and an increasing awareness of my rebellious lifestyle, God was letting me know that all would not be well if I stayed in the entertainment industry in New York. It seemed time for a change, but I figured it would be between Copenhagen or Las Vegas!

However, God was working out HIS plan for our lives that did not include Copenhagen, Las Vegas or New York.

His plan for us was centered in a little mining town, miles from any large city, in the middle of Northern Ontario by the name of Sudbury. A city in which I grew up, left, and was committed to never returning! But all that changed on a summer day, on a homemade bench, watching the sun sparkle off the waters of McFarlane Lake, when the God of the universe let us both know that He had a better plan for our lives than we had for ourselves.

Stunned that we would even consider abandoning our blossoming careers for the uncertainty of Sudbury, we headed back up the lake. Arriving at my parents’ home on Danforth Avenue, I posed a question to my dad, Kitchener. Would All Nations Church be willing to give me a job for just one year so I could transition out of the entertainment industry to whatever job God had in store for me? The answer was a resounding yes!

Eileen and I returned to New York to wrap up our lives there. I cancelled my performing contracts, went back to school and finished the last two semesters of my B.A. We discovered that summer Eileen was pregnant. After selling our house we packed up everything we owned in the Allied Movers van. When we finally returned to Sudbury (with four month old twins this time!), waiting for us was a lovely ONE bedroom basement apartment, a warm welcoming church family, and a salary of $9,000.00 a year. Prayers were answered. A prodigal son returned.

It was August, 1978: just over a year from when we experienced the Miracle on McFarlane Lake. Little did we know that this one year adventure would turn into a lifetime.