Dear Editor,
With the celebrations for Canada’s 150th anniversary coming to a close, I find this observation most appropriate to share with everyone regarding worship at this time. A time to reflect and give thanks to God for all our Blessings.
If little churches which dot the villages and prairies could speak, what tales they could tell. They could tell of the pioneers working from dawn until dusk, tilling the soil, hewing timber endeavoring to eke out a home and living for themselves and families, sometimes against adverse conditions.
What impelled the building of these early churches? The early training raised in a christian home and the magnitude of prayer to give them the stamina to carry on! Perhaps too, they were filled with the same spirit which impelled the Pilgrim Fathers to leave their down-trodden homeland, setting out in their frail little crafts to cross the broad Atlantic Ocean, frought with so much danger and endurance to find a new home on the farther shore, where they could exercise their God-given rights to worship in their own way.
What faith and courage it must have taken to undertake such a journey. Small wonder they knelt and kissed the ground and offered up prayers and thanks to God for their safe deliverance. The churches could tell too, how the pews were filled every Sunday by the pioneer families. Sunday, then, was a day to relax from their labours, with no work done except what was absolutely necessary. Sports were unknown, and the preacher with his horse and buggy was a familiar sight calling on the congregation.
The answer lies in God!
Judy Talbot
Esterhazy, SK
