Lets Begin

Changing course on a large sailing ship is work

• Sail are changed and set
• Halyard are ground on the Winches
• Sheets are set
• The old sails are stowed
• It takes energy and work

My nephew commented that one should write a book reflecting on faith and family
I suspect there are 2 many books of not 2 much interest here

Generally speaking if you are reading this

Live your life

Finally once a course is set, The ship is continually trimming for the variation in winds and sea, and so with life we also make many small adjustments....

Laid out are significant course changes that came after mid life....

Time

Waking up for open heart surgery, drouzy, foggy (for days) the realization one has been given more time.

• More time to use usefully
• A gift to be accounted for
• Another chance to maximize learning enjoy family work hard, build much and learn to love
• Drink deep from the well of life
• enjoy the world God has given

The risk is being 2 intense!!

Generosity

Riddle: What is the first strategy God uses to solve a problem

Answer:

Abraham and Lot needed to be separated. So God made them very rich so the land could not contain them both

Jacob and Esau where both super prosperous so Esau did not need to fight Jacob

King David was told he could have anything he wanted just not Bethseba


Answer is Generosity

So

• fretting over Kids
• Question how to finance everything
• Thinking more on needs than relationships
• Stressing over each childs choices
• Overwhelming emotions of handling the family

• fly and own a plane
• plan to sail a leg around the world
all to enjoy his creation
• resources to build a house that Amira loves
• Amira loves to spend time on her own!! and suports all the above

Togetherness

The Bible

1. Genesis 2:24

“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave/hold fast unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”

Kahlil Gibran "On Marriage"

You were born together, and together you
shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white
wings of death scatter your days.
Ay, you shall be together even in the
silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance
between you.


Love one another, but make not a bond
of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.


Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

A turning point to learn how to give space....

The Reformation

Question:

What do you do if after approx 30 year of marriage in the reformed tradition your wife announces out of the blue she is joining to Romain catholic church

Answer:

NOT Behave like the 'secular' church did during the reformation

Workout

Extreme Dedication and persuit to jujitsu by Abi has put this family on a course whose benefits include:

• Most of the family joining in
• lots of very sweaty disgusting cuddles (called rolling)
• A total workout
• A exercise in humilty
• Meeting eccentric people
• Greatly reduced screen time
• Dinners at 9 or 10pm!

On the Edge

You got me on the edge
Got me on the edge of my seat
I can feel it rushin' over me
You got me on the edge

(by Toby Mac)

When asking to do something difficult God seems to smile knowing we are asking beyond our abilities.
God knows how to deal with this.
We are putting one self outside my comfort zone, and so we call upon God.

On the edge have been many events,

• flying
• sailing
• motorbiking,
• working,
• building....

• Having an awe of weather/nature;
• Having an awe of God
• needing to trust knowing that God is in control

Ritual

My prayers are totally repeatitive

I have found praying my version of the Lord's prayer and using Paul's prayer as a template had created a beneficial spiritual ritual

Stop

After 25 year of marriage totally focused on working and earning enougth for the family, a very extreme working lifestyle - the mid life crisis had arrived.

The straw that broke the camels back was when Amira decided to spend her 50 without her husband, which prior I had unwittingly agreed. This followed years where money was liberally spent....

The emotional breakdown had arrived, along with too many unholy thoughts which I am not going to confess to here....

The first stop decision was made - I decided I would learn to fly. More stops would follow but God had to interrupt again...

Final

A better name than "Turning Points" maybe

Close encounters of the God Kind... quoted from Jesse Duplantis

So

• The span (number of days) of our life is determined - but not the number of heart beats.
  
• Within certain latitudes we are free to choose how to live - the resources follow the decisions ...
  
• So it remains for us to live our days well