My sisters found a reel to reel tape in our Drayton Valley, AB home labeled “Grandma Singing”. One of them had the tape transcribed to a CD and I turned the file into mp3s. Here is my dear Irish Grandma singing Irish ballads from memory. I remember helping to record these, it had to be somewhere around 1969/1970 when Grandma was in her late 70s.

I haven’t heard my dear grandma’s voice in nearly 40 years. What a blessing, thanks Maureen for taking the initiative on this.

The Dear Little Girl

• The Dear Little Girl

The Little Irish Colleen with Her Old Plaid Shawl

• The Little Irish Colleen with Her Old Plaid Shawl

Impudent Barney O’Hay

• Impudent Barney O’Hay

John E. Ashbrook is with the Lord. Long-time pastor of Bible Community Church in Mentor, OH, he slipped beyond earth and into heaven early this morning.

I was acquainted with him through his son-in-law (one of my best and closest friends) and daughter. His son-in-law planted the church my brother now pastors just a few hours north of us. Through this connection I got to know Dr. Ashbrook a little bit. I got to know him better through his writings. What a blessing to have known him. What glory for him to now be in the presence of our Saviour!

The obituary is here.

An article by another young man he influenced is here.

His publication ministry is here. I am not sure what will happen to this ministry, but perhaps you can still obtain some of his books through them.

We miss him. Mom talks about him all the time. I think about him every day.

For him, though, things are better than they ever were among us.

One day we, too, will know what he now knows.

Today we lost our dog after a long life for his breed… normal life expectancy about 9, he made it to 14. The last few months he turned very frail, eating sporadically, the last day or so not at all. Last night and today he was so weak he could barely stand – and he struggled to stand because he had to cough, fighting against fluid building up in his longs. It was obvious to us all that things would not get better so today we made a visit to the vet – the little guy’s final visit.

We know that a dog is just a dog, but we can’t help but think this end is not the way God intended things to be.

NAU  Romans 8:20-22 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.

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For those interested, I have posted the audio for my dad’s funeral sermon at our church site. My brother, Paul Johnson, pastor of the Grace Baptist Church of the Comox Valley preached an excellent gospel message from Ps 34.6:

This Poor Man Cried

We have also posted my eulogy, a spoken version of my earlier post about my dad:

Poor Boy off the Farm

May these files be used to edify saints and perhaps even bring a soul to Christ.