From
Phil (January 2010)From
Phil (January 2010)Thanks for stopping by the site. And thanks for your orders. Until further notice, every penny is going to help the needs in Haiti. This is being done through Compassion. These days I'm working on a DVD to accompany Making Life Rich Without Money as well as a new book (untitled) that should be out later this year. Meanwhile, stay in touch. If you'd like to join my growing Facebook family, just log on to Facebook, type in my name and request that we be friends and we can connect that way. If you'd like to receive my quarterly email update, just email Mike and we'll add you to the list. Meanwhile, I hope you enjoy this site. Here are a few articles that mention me. Hope you enjoy them. God bless you real good! Phil
Speaker
shares faith through funny stories
By
Graeme Morton, Calgary Herald
Phil
Callaway could probably have his pick of places to live in North America.
The
popular Christian speaker, author and humorist gets about 1,000 invitations a
year from church groups and secular organizations, inviting him to come and make
people think and laugh.
He
accepts 100 of those speaking engagements, creating a frequent-flyer lifestyle.
Yet, Callaway, 47, chooses to hang his hat in his hometown of Three Hills, 85
kilometres northeast of Calgary.
"It
keeps me wonderfully grounded," says Callaway of the town of about 3,000
people where he lives with his wife Ramona and three children.
"C.
S. Lewis once said you should 'do almost anything you can to live close to your
friends' and he's right. When I travel, I'm able to do it with my wife or one of
the kids. That's a blessing when you're on the road as frequently as I am."
Callaway,
who has just published his 24th book, Family Squeeze, will be close to home next
Thursday as the guest speaker at a sold-out, fundraising dinner for Teen
Challenge Alberta at Calgary's Red and White Club.
Teen
Challenge is a faith-based, residential drug and alcohol rehab program based
near Priddis. Callaway says he's impressed with the group's success rate in
turning lives around, and adds the plague of addictions is never far from his
heart.
"My
oldest brother Dave lives in the East Hastings Street district of Vancouver and
has had addiction issues for years," says Callaway.
"You
mention the term East Hastings and people just cringe, but that's where Dave has
found home, that's where he has found community."
Callaway
says it's all too easy to judge those publicly struggling with their own demons
when "there but for the grace of God go the rest of us.
"Most
of us, if we're really honest, have an addiction or two, whether it's drugs,
liquor or work. North America has a culture of addiction. It's like we're trying
to insulate ourselves from reality. I know I continually struggle to find
balance in my life," says Callaway.
That's
why Callaway has such respect for those who care for, and work with troubled
souls instead of literally or figuratively crossing the street to avoid them.
"Jesus
didn't have much use for the organized religion structure of his time, but he
loved being with the same kind of people who are living on the streets of east
Vancouver," he reasons.
Callaway
still shakes his head that he's been able to make a living for years doing
something that he got in trouble for in school --telling funny stories and
making people laugh.
"I'm
living proof that God uses the most under-qualified people to do his work,"
Callaway says.
"I
do what I do because I found God's grace too amazing to keep to myself."
Callaway,
who attends Mount Olive Evangelical Free Church in Three Hills, is quick to
dismiss the concept that he's a Christian comic. But he welcomes the chance to
use humour to talk with audiences about Jesus in particular and faith in
general.
"Many
Christians are reluctant to associate humour with worship, which I find strange.
We've made the church a long-faced place, and I can't understand that because
there's so much joy in the Bible.
"The
thought that God loves a guy like Phil Callaway is the greatest punchline of
all."
gmorton@tHeHerald.Canwest.Com
EDMONTON - Phil Callaway is a humorist, not a doctor, but next Wednesday he'll be administering a stress test to folks attending this year's Mayor's Prayer Breakfast. The stress test has nothing to do with treadmills and heart-monitoring equipment; everything to do with getting people to laugh and reflect upon the things that matter most. And hopefully, to realize that there's more to life than chasing after things that don't satisfy and getting stressed-out in the process.
Cracking jokes to illustrate the point, Callaway says that Albertans and other Canadians have forgotten that life is a marathon, not a sprint. "We have no time for the stuff that lasts because we're chasing stuff that rusts," says Callaway, who lives in Three Hills with his wife, Ramona, and their three children.
"Alberta may be one of the wealthiest (places) in the world right now, but if wealth makes you rich, why are we spending so much on counselling? Because we're busier than wasps at a barbecue. "There is nothing productive about a coronary. There is nothing spiritual about a nervous breakdown."
In terms of his religious beliefs, Callaway, 46, is a follower of Jesus Christ. "I'm not into religion, I'm following His example," he says, adding that no one in history accomplished more than Jesus, and He did so without acquiring an ulcer. The author of 24 books, a syndicated columnist and a regular contributor to magazines in several different countries, Callaway got into writing in 1989 when he helped start the Prairie Bible Institute's magazine Servant.
His big break came when a Servant reader sent copies of his monthly column to Harvest House publishers, and the boss there "laughed so hard he couldn't eat his pizza." It led to his first book in 1993, Honey, I Dunked the Kids. Asking an author which book is his favourite is like asking a dad which of his children he prefers. That said, Callaway says his last book, Family Squeeze, is one of his favourites.
The book is about parenting children while parenting parents with Alzheimer's. "Quite a topic for a humorist," he says. "I found myself sitting at the keyboard grinning while wiping tears." Callaway uses humour not just to entertain, but to inspire. About 100 times a year, he brings his humour with a message to events like the Mayor's Prayer Breakfast, an annual event held at the Shaw Conference Centre.
Aside from the stress test and lots of yuks, Callaway will pass on some tips to mayor and city councillors on how to de-stress, and where to invest in things that will last. "Secondly," says Callaway, "I show them how to laugh so that when they're in the old-folks' home, all their wrinkles are in the right places. Laughter is the best exercise program I know."
dretson@thejournal.canwest.com
The Korean Times
Making
Life Rich Without Any Money
Phil
Callaway: Translated by Kim Jae-il from English to Korean; News N Joy; 274
pp., 10,000 won
If you pick up this book with the hope that it will give you advice on how to
earn more money, you've got it wrong. The book focuses not on materialistic
``richness'' but spiritual ``richness.'' Subtitled ``Finding Joy in What
Really Matters,'' the book is full of humor and insights of the author through
daily episodes.
He points out that there are tens of thousands of Web sites to advise on how
to make more money but there is no single Web site of how to ``spiritually''
enrich our life.
Believing in Christianity, the author strongly asserts that many people choose
the wrong path to happiness and true values.
-Chung Ah-young
Callaway’s new book becomes military favorite
Emily Werenga
[Syndicated in numerous papers]
THREE HILLS, AB—Every since his high school sweetheart agreed to marry him, award-winning author and speaker Phil Callaway says nothing can surprise him.
Yet he was nearly forced to eat his words after finding out the U.S. military is devouring his latest children’s book, Be Kind, Be Friendly, Be Thankful.
“This was much less of a surprise, but a nice one too,” says the Canadian author.
The book, written for a
“Military families are taxed to
the max when it comes to saying goodbye, so a book like this is geared to help
them through,” says Callaway.
While he can’t write: “Jesus loves you! If you need to know more, call my home number,” in large letters across the pages as he wishes to, Callaway still hopes to breathe faith into his young readers.
“I wrote about three things children need to do when tough times come, and the final one is to be thankful for what you have. A prerequisite to being thankful is to have someone to thank, and I pray the kids will find Him.”
Some would assume making people laugh for a living is easy. And Callaway, for the most part, would agree. “I’ve been blessed beyond belief to be able to do something I got in trouble for back in school: making others laugh. I f I can be doing that 70 years from now, I will be very happy and very, very old.”
Yet life has definitely thrown Callaway some hard-balls, and in such moments Callaway says he leans on his faith to get him be.
“I do what I do because I see
the joy it brings to others and because I believe it is the call of God on my
life,” he says. “That’s why I speak 100 times a year. I get tired, and
much of my writing has been about things I’m trying to practice: like
slowing down, and learning to trust when your wife has epilepsy and your
parents have Alzheimer’s.”
Callaway ultimately credits his faith to the life of his mother. “No atheist has ever been able to explain my mother’s life, so I’ll stick by my mother’s God. I’m so thankful that a holy God loves the likes of me. It’s the greatest punch line in all of history.” Read the full interview with Emily
Phil
Callaway was a class clown, but it was easy, he says, because he went to Prairie
Bible school in Three Hills, 140 kilometres northeast of Calgary – “the Holy
City” – where “there were even more opportunities than normal for getting
into trouble.”
Phil’s
been in trouble ever since. Trouble is his middle name. Laughter is his other
middle name.
“I
realized early in life that my spiritual gift is goofiness,” says Callaway,
44, the special guest at the Time Out stress relief breakfast, downtown in 10
days time.
“God
gave me a warped mind,” he says, “and it’s amazing to see humour open the
doors to people’s hearts.”
Calgarian
David Penton, running a desk on the oilpatch, got the idea for a “stress
relief” breakfast a few months ago.
He
was having tea with a friend whose life was crumbling to pieces, causing a great
deal of stress.
“You
could use a belly laugh,” Penton said, and his sad friend agreed.
Then
Penton realized everybody needs a belly laugh. Everyone suffers excess stress.
Everyone but Phil Callaway, who vents his stress by causing belly laughs.
So
Penton tapped Callaway to speak at this downtown breakfast. Callaway works
cheap, since he can’t hold on to money.
“Our
Visa card was stolen, but we’re not reporting it, since the thief spends less
than my wife,” he explains.
In
the 1980s, after graduating from Prairie Bible College, Callaway began working
as a graphic artist, doing layout for Prairie’s Servant magazine. When he saw
the articles sent in, he said, “I can do that,” and he did.
A
Servant reader later sent copies of Phil’s monthly column to Harvest
House publishers, and the boss there “laughed so hard he couldn’t eat his
pizza.”
That
led to his 1993 book Honey, I Dunked the Kids.
Twenty
more books and 500,000 in sales later, Phil looks back, constantly amazed.
“I
really don’t understand comedy. I’m not good at analyzing it. But it
doesn’t matter. People don’t want essays on humor. They want to laugh,” he
confesses.
“Laughter’s
a foretaste of heaven, a force outside ourselves we can’t control, God’s
hand on a hurting world. But I think comedy works best if it’s directed at
ourselves.”
In
1994, as Phil was beginning to get into public speaking, his wife, Ramona, began
suffering violent seizures. Her family has a history of Huntington’s
disease—her brother has died of it—so Phil and their three kids prepared to
lose her.
Phil
then discovered you really learn how to laugh only in hard times.
“I’d
be doing a radio interview in one room with the door ajar, while my wife was
having a seizure in the next room,” Callaway remembers.
Later,
Ramona was diagnosed with controllable epilepsy, but, by then, Phil’s career
as a de-motivational speaker was careening out of control.
“If
you’ve been in deep water, folks know they can trust you,” he says.
“But
my message has always been, ‘making life rich without money.’ If money’s
what you pursue, you’ll be miserable whether you get it or not.”
The
downside of being ruled by money should be obvious, Callaway muses. “American
Idol judge Simon Cowell was asked what he wants in life, and he said, ‘More
money.’ So the interviewer said, ‘You’ve already got $90 million,’ and
Cowell answered, ‘Not enough.’”
“It’s
sad. Money’s a good servant, but a lousy master.”
CTV
News anchor Daryl Janz calls Callaway one of Canada’s funniest speakers.
“He’ll
have you doubled over with laughter, then nail you with a truth that knocks you
back,” says Janz.
“He
takes normal, everyday life and sees the real humor in it.”
“My
wife’s hair dryer has a label, ‘Not to be used while in the shower.’ The
microwave manual says, ‘Not to be used for drying pets.’ And I’ve seen a
stroller with, ‘Remove infant before folding for storage,’ “ he marvels.
“And people think I’m crazy?”
Callaway
ponders the relationship between his comedy and his Christianity. He quotes
Jesus: “In this world you will have trouble, but be of good cheer; I have
overcome the world (John 16:33).” And he thinks the issue is trust in a world
awash with anxiety.
“Some people laugh to forget, but I laugh to remember,” he says. “I remember that God loves a guy who used to recycle cigarette butts from hospital ashtrays—without sterilizing them. There’s hope for anyone.”