In the past 8 months I have lost a lot.

I have lost and then gained only to lose BIG shortly after that!

It sucks – it well and truly it sucks.

All of it started at the beginning of July 2019 with the completion of my 2 year commitment with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) Vancouver. The vision to pioneer a discipleship school with a focus on skiing/snowboarding I had been stewarding for 17 years had been fulfilled. I can’t even begin to articulate what that feels like! You could say that it’s like being shot out of a cannon… 17 years of striving, blood, sweat and not a few tears were suddenly concluded. Trying to explain to someone how it feels to have a canvas that blank is, shall we say, difficult. That vision to start an SDTS dictated every single major decision of my adult life, not just the minor ones on the side, every one.

Let me explain…

I was 18 when God gave me this visionary download (complete with ideas for logos and locations).

I left and adjusted relationships to align better with it.

I left my job at the beginning of the busiest season of the year to move to New Zealand for 6 months to attend a snowboarding discipleship school. If you’re going to start one, you should probably do one!

I sacrificed thousands of dollars going to conferences and gatherings around the world to connect more with the snow sports ministry world.

I spent a year working with a team to try to plant a new church in Whistler.

I have put my foot in mouth more times that I can count and stepped on a couple toes.

I even told my sister to move to Mammoth to do a ministry school with people that I loved, but more on that later.

I have lived to California to connect better with different ministries.

And finally in late spring of 2017 I got the call (literal: Facebook message) to join YWAM Vancouver to start a snowboarding discipleship school: the previous 15 years all mushed together into a ball.

I tell you this in a vague attempt explain the gravity how I got to July 2019.

I felt completely adrift – blasted out of a cannon into space – a spaceman without a tether – a vast, fathomless, terrifying abyss of possibility spreading infinitely in front of me – the template that had up until now directed my life: removed. Incomprehensible anxiety gaped at me. The best I could come up with was a line from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy…

“So now I need to find something else for my entire life to be about.”

From the outside looking at in that abyss of infinite possibility looked like the ultimate adventure! Nothing but opportunities stretched out before me and nothing to hold me back. I was lost, directionless. The drive that had made up my identity had been stripped away. You can’t see the forest for the trees right?

At that time our whole family was on a camping trip in Pemberton. Cody was competing in the Canadian Paragliding Nationals, Cherise was volunteering a bit at the competition, as was I, and we were having some great family bonding time! Meeting new friends, introducing them to Mennonite foods, laughing lots.

A glimmer of hope in the form of an idea was beginning to flicker in my mind: I was going to talk to Cody in the fall when life calmed down a bit about joining up with his new production company to see how I could fit my skillset to the business! I was going to be all right. I could weather this storm of tumultuous emotions! There was light at the end of my tunnel…

August 14, 2019

“Cody’s been in a paragliding accident, we need to pray that he’ll be all right!”

That was 1:00pm.

I checked his InReach tracking map. It looked like he was all right.

5:00pm – he’s gone.

Life as we knew it stopped. My sister’s husband, one of my best friends, my brother in-law had gone on the final adventure 50 years too early. He was supposed to have been best man at my wedding (whenever I get married!), uncle to my kids, me uncle to theirs, a couple of old guys sitting on the porch in the mountains sipping whiskey talking about all the foolish adventures we went on as young men. The media projects we were going to work on together… that dream didn’t even have a chance to be born before being taken away!

The details month that followed aren’t terribly important for this story but if you want to see the video that was compiled for Cody’s memorial it’s at the bottom of the page.

When I got home I wanted to rip off as many of proverbial bandages as possible as quickly as possible. I went to church my first Sunday back in Canada to see some friends and “get it over with” as soon as possible. I remember that one of the songs that the band led that morning was about how Jesus was raised from the dead that we may have life. I couldn’t sing those words – they weren’t fair. It was a battle to stay through the entire service, I wanted to run away from the sympathetic looks and hugs from well meaning friends. For months I would get angry when I would go to church and we would sing about Jesus’ resurrection power. It still wasn’t fair. I know people who have seen people raised from the dead and God knows we prayed that over Cody’s body! I couldn’t see the justice in it.

Over the past several months I have moved past my anger. I still get a little teared up when the “right” song comes through the speakers but I have come to the conclusion that sometimes I’m not OK but I’ll be all right. The waves of grief and loss both of a dream fulfilled and a best friend lost still wash over me I know I’ll be fine.

“I’m not OK but I’ll be all right.”

Since Cody passed away we have had other friends in the action sports world die as well. It may sound strange but it makes me pretty angry! Not that they’ve left us doing a sport that they loved but that they may have gone from this world no knowing about Jesus resurrection power and love for them. Call me selfish but I want to see them again some day in heaven! And believe me, Cody does too.

And now?

I still feel adrift but I’m floating towards that massive blank canvas in front of me unencumbered by expectations filled with an expanse of opportunities. I’m coming to terms with the fact that I can now do anything I want – I have been released from one dream to search out another. I wish I could do it with my best friend but I know he’s looking down on me cheering me on to that next great adventure God has in store for me.

I’ll do them proud.

**Valentines Day was 6 months since Cody passed away and to the friends that took me snowboarding that day, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, you did more for me than you could possibly know.