About the Author
I was born and raised in Timmins, Ontario, Canada. I left the north in 1967 to attend seminary in Toronto. During those years in seminary I attended Oakwood Baptist Church and spent my summers doing Summer Student ministry in my home church, First Baptist, in Timmins, and in Fellowship Baptist Church in Peterborough, Ontario.
I was valedictorian at my seminary graduation, the first woman to be asked to assume that role. After graduation I was invited by Fellowship Baptist Church in Peterborough to become their Director of Christian Education. That position involved not only the traditional children's ministries but, as well, visitation and research for the pastor's sermons. We had a unique experience in Peterborough—I was full-time staff at the church while the pastor worked full-time as an engineer at Canadian General Electric and looked after his responsibilities on weekends and in the evenings. That experience planted seeds of independence and self-motivation that have stood me in good stead all these years. It was in Peterborough that I first began to write curriculum.
Since childhood I had sensed God's call to overseas missions, but there was never any specific place or role that caught my attention—at least not for very long. Every missionary who spoke was interesting, every country was a possibility—until the next speaker came along and the next country was presented!
Toward the end of my time in Peterborough, I felt the urging of the Spirit, telling me it was time to move along. The church needed a full-time pastor. They had grown far too comfortable with me in a full-time role and the pastor taking care of Sunday services and prayer meetings. But where was I to go from here?
One Sunday evening, a Fellowship International missionary (Fellowship of Evangelical Baptist Churches in Canada) came to speak at our church. It was as though God was writing my name on a wall with his finger. I trembled in my seat as I listened. This was the place. This was the time.
With a couple of twists and turns in the story, I was appointed as a missionary to Colombia, South America where I worked for almost eight years. My main responsibility there was teaching young men and women who were preparing themselves for ministry in the Colombian church.
Due to circumstances at home, I returned to Canada in the early 80s to look after my parents. As God put the pieces together of that situation, I was once more faced with the question: What now? One day I got a phone call from the Director of Fellowship International. A new department was being opened up and he had thought of me. I had been writing for publication since I was in seminary, and he knew of my interest and skill. I also knew the mission. The mandate of the new department was to keep the churches of our Fellowship informed about our missionaries, to write about our missionaries for the denominational magazine and to prepare written materials promoting the mission and our missionaries. I was blown away! It was the perfect assignment. I could stay in Canada to be close to my parents in case there was a need, indulge my passion for writing, and be a part of the mission that I had grown to appreciate so much.
This began a journey of several years at mission headquarters, then located in Toronto, Ontario. When the Fellowship made the decision to move its headquarters to Guelph, Ontario, I sensed that God meant me to stay behind in Toronto. For a couple of years I worked part-time as Christian Education Director at Oakwood Baptist Church and spent the rest of my time running a small desktop publishing business out of my apartment.
When the Lord took my parents home in 1991, I returned overseas, this time to Caracas, Venezuela, as part of a church planting team. It was here that writing took on a whole new direction, resulting in a devotional book in Spanish, Diseño Divino Para La Vida Diaria, (later also published in English as Divine Design for Daily Living.)
I returned to Canada in 2010 to accept a part-time position with First Baptist Church in Timmins. The circle was completed! I retired from that role in 2014, though "re-wiring" is a more accurate description since there is still much to do as far as service for the Lord is concerned. Now, it is a question of discovering just what that involves! I continued my role with Fellowship International, seconded to their Communications Department—still writing. Part of that role included Ordinary People With An Extraordinary God which is a history of people who have been a part of Fellowship International for the first 50 years.
In 2016 I moved to Guelph, Ontario. Since that move there has been a new church, Calvary Baptist, and an opportunity to participate on Calvary's Global Missions Team and to teach a mixed Bible Study group. I volunteered with the Fellowship to do some digital archiving for them and at the end of 2019 began to grow into the role of Fellowship archivist.
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| Abby in the foreground with Lou Lou squashed in the back! |
Now the big writing challenge seems to be to turn all the studies I have developed over these last years into a form that will make then useful to others. That may take some doing—I've been around a long time, and there are lots of studies! Two new books have already grown out of that time in the office: Once Upon A Christmas is a collection of tales both fact and fiction, and In the Shadow of the Cross, meditations on Calvary. A more recent addition has been A Question of Trust, a look at the sovereignty of God and the challenges of life.
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