A Paul for All ...

It's been a couple months.

My absence from here began with a graduation and a family trip. More about those later.

During our trip, though, we got the devastating news that Paul Cartwright had passed at 58.

It's hard to write about Paul without hyperbole ... he was special in just about every way that matters. And he had a great voice. And a screwey sense of humour. And he was a natural mimic who could "put on" just about any accent he'd ever heard ... including some foreign languages he didn't know!

But what I will forever remember about Paul is his faithfulness to his calling.

Paul was one of the most natural counsellers that God ever put on the face of the earth. People from all walks of life, colours, creeds and origins found in him someone who could relate to them and offer appropriate advice.

Paul was convinced that he was called to help those who didn't have an obvious financial access to counselling, and he served at the Christian Counselling Centre, a ministry of Calvary Bible Church here in Nassau.

He could have had great financial success in private practice, but Paul (and wife Priscilla, too) was convinced that if he bloomed where he was planted, his needs would always be supplied.

And that was true. We've lived close enough to them to know it is. We've seen it.

Paul was one of the "Divine Nobodies" that Jim Palmer talks about in an upcoming book by that name. Someone who's a bit of an unsung hero. The best kind, in my opinion.

His blessings weren't necessarily financial or material. At Paul's funeral a packed church and a quiet undercurrent of assurance were testimony, though, to just how blessed he really was.

And in a strange way ... and I don't know exactly how to express this ... Paul's legacy will make itself manifest.

Look forward to it.

Count on it!