Merry Christmas 2002! For the Downers, this is a year of commencement.

Abigail’s graduation in May will commence her transition from education to the business world. She will be moving to Atlanta to join the accounting firm, Frazier & Deeter, as a staff accountant with an emphasis in tax, after she sits for the CPA exam in November. Abigail will be able to walk three blocks from her apartment to the Bank of America Tower (the apartment serves juice and bagels each morning to all the daily walkers to town!), an even shorter commute than I had from home to my law office nearby for so many years. Abigail will greatly miss her family, roommates and other close friends and professors at Covenant College, but can’t wait to begin her career in accounting. Her friends have described being with Abigail as walking into a blanket of love and care. She has developed being a friend into a rare art form as her love for the Lord and for people overflows to those around her.

Paul’s election as Minister to Men for the sophomore class at Bryan College resulted in his establishing a weekly Band of Brothers discipleship Bible study. I was delighted when Paul told me, “I am modeling it after your Monday morning group, Dad. I share something from the Word and then draw the guys into a discussion of the Scripture. But the key is that we also share transparently about our lives and how the Lord is changing us so we can impact others for Him.” After sharing one night that they each needed to be looking for someone to disciple, and yet all needed mentors in their lives, one of his classmates approached him about beginning that one-on-one relationship. How thrilling it is to see the next generation carry on Susy and my passion for discipleship. Paul is excelling in his business courses and hopes to use his skills in business combined with his ministry focus.

Matthew has had an incredible year. He is the host of a weekly TV program shown on both our local ABC affiliate and the cable channel, called “Teen Talk.” It is typically Matthew’s responsibility to produce the shows, select the guests, provide the questions for the program, and control the flow of the show. They have done twenty-two shows thus far on topics such as drug abuse and Christian-based drug programs, teenage pregnancy and the value of abstinence, the perspectives of the Republican and Democratic parties, the local soup kitchen and how teens can participate, racial reconciliation, and educational standards in our county and what is being done to improve our school system.

After losing three of the members of the national championship mock trial team he led in May, Matthew has now reorganized his team for a new season. They won the McCallie Mock Trial Tournament in November, Matthew receiving the Best Attorney Award, and are hard at work on the new case for the regional and state competition. He has continued on the Executive Committee of the Youth City Council and thoroughly enjoyed his participation in the last election as a Grassroots Coordinator for the Republican party. Matthew’s big news is his acceptance to Harvard College. Susy and I spent several days on campus with him last month and we are excited about the incredible opportunity he has. There is a vibrant Christian community at Harvard committed to making a difference in the lives of the students and faculty.

Bringing home the gold again, Anna was the recipient of the Best Witness award in her team’s victory in the McCallie Mock Trial Tournament. Her moving portrayal of the battered wife who killed her husband in self-defense brought many spectators to tears. Anna is growing in godliness and loves to build in to her friends what the Lord is teaching her as she continues to seek Him. She looked elegant as Paul’s “date” for the Bryan Spring Banquet. Her greatest challenge this year has been overcoming the agony of the defeat of her Fantasy Football team which did not make the playoffs. Nonetheless, she immensely enjoyed going head-to-head with her brothers and cousins, among other pigskin gladiators of national anonymity.

Joshua just returned from 2 ½ weeks in the Congo and Israel with CBMC International president Tim Philpot. Their first mission was to begin to establish CBMC in the Congo. Joshua will never be the same after seeing people starving in the streets of Kinshasa, having some of the children win a place in his heart and finding a scorpion in his bed! Then they met 25 other CBMCers in Israel and walked where Jesus walked, praying for that strife-torn country and for CBMC’s influence throughout the world. Tim baptized him in the Jordan River! Joshua said that taking communion in the resurrection tomb was one of the most meaningful events of his life. Understandably, the Bible is coming alive to him in a new way, now, having seen some of the places that had previously just been words on a page.

Joshua’s love for politics was satisfied for a short time when he was “Mayor for a Day” in the YMCA Youth Leadership program on the day they focused on government. It was his responsibility to lead the 40 young people to negotiate a final city budget of $20 million from a proposed budget of $34 million. The negotiation skills he has been using on his mother all these years came in very useful! A few weeks later, with Matthew’s encouragement and support, Joshua was elected President of the Youth City Council for the 2002 – 2003 school year. His vision is to develop a program which will establish mandatory community service and counseling for high school drug offenders. They also hope to establish a web site to match employers with teenagers needing employment. Finally they plan to address the low ratio of Chattanooga high school graduates who go on to college. Joshua, also in an attorney role, along with Matthew and Anna, continues to pursue mock trial as a defending national champion. He has a busy year ahead of him!

Susanna’s big hope is to get a kitten after Christmas. It would be the fourth kitten this year in a loving, but tragic line of cats that have brought both joy and tears to Susanna, as the Lord has taught her many of life’s most challenging lessons. One of Susanna’s greatest joys is sharing a room with her spiritual mother, Anna, (and keeping her awake at night with endless questions for her big sister), visiting Abigail at college, snuggling with Mom with a good book, and going on hiking dates with Dad.

After the family’s annual trek to St. Louis for the Great Annual Underwear Exchange of 26 this year (with nephew Mark’s fiancée, Chandra, added to the family) the girls are going to the American Girl headquarters in Chicago with Grandma Rena, Aunt Mary, and cousin Hannah, to celebrate Hannah and Susanna’s 10^th birthdays. The guys and I will head to the grandparent’s house in Steamboat for a DNA ski retreat with fathers and sons from Omaha, Chattanooga and Colorado Springs. Whose idea was it anyway to save a little money and drive? I must have lost my mind!

Susy commenced her busiest year ever with the great challenges of homeschooling three highschoolers, as well as keeping Susanna on track in fourth grade, traveling and speaking with the family and me for DNA, running the office, and being the world’s greatest wife and mom to a bunch of pretty busy folks. She is in the process of updating our website which we initiated this summer. (Check it out at www.DNAministries.org.) Her greatest joy continues to be discipling her children and encouraging and building deeply into women around the country whom she touches through telephone, email and face-to-face.

Recently, a friend said to Susy, “How did you get such perfect kids?” Susy almost fainted! As we share some of the successes of our children this year, please don’t be misled. Each one is on the Potter’s wheel, still working on character and temperament issues in many ways. Some still struggle with consistent times in the Word, others with getting rid of the last vestige of “the bratty streak.” We don’t mean to portray anything but that we are all still “in process,” daily needful of God’s grace, especially me.

For DNA, this has been a year of maturation. I just finished the busiest fall in memory, from September through Thanksgiving, speaking at men’s conferences in 11 different states in 12 weekends, including other meetings for outreach purposes. Now I am enjoying a slower December, which began after the NCMM national conference where, after speaking to 550 men, I had the incredible joy of leading this group of pastors and men’s ministry leaders from around the country, in a kneeling prayer asking God to hear each of our commitments to disciple at least one man over the next twelve months.

My greatest joy has been to see my family, men I am discipling, and others grow closer to Christ, and in my own life to continue to come along side men, especially two men I reached out to, one in the Army, and one in the Navy, who fought in Viet Nam only miles from where I was. They are now considering more closely the claims of Jesus Christ. Was He just another “good guy,” a fraud, or is He truly the incarnate Son of God, the Messiah, the One who changes men and women from the inside out, freeing us from the bondage of our sin and fear through his forgiveness and trustworthy promises.

As we enjoy the holiday season, it is an important time to ask ourselves how we are doing, I mean really doing. Consider Christ’s words found in John 14:6, “I am the Way, and the Truth and the Life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” Do we have another plan? Did we make one up? Are we truly trusting in God’s plan, receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior?

This has been a magnificent year of ministry and enjoying my family and friends. But far and away the greatest event of my life this year was being the morning outreach speaker for the Raleigh CBMC. Seven organizers filled the room with approximately 150 people, one year after the tragedy of 9/11, complete with Marine Color Guard, firemen, policemen, dignitaries, and business men and women. What could I possibly say on this morning? I knew it would be like no other event at which I have spoken. As I arrived, it truly was a gloomy morning. Hearts were obviously heavy as I began my message commemorating those who gave their lives for us. We honored the dead, we expressed support for our government and our President, and I shared how John Atkinson had taken my place in death in combat in Viet Nam, but also, more importantly, how Jesus Christ had taken our places in death on the cross.

I closed by recounting the story of the four men who, while trying to escape from one of the towers shortly after the terrorist attack, were encouraged along with their other office mates not to go down the stairs through the smoke and fire, but to go up to the roof to “safety” where someone said, “There will be helicopters.” Everyone but the four men went to the roof. Against the others’ advice, those four men went down through the smoke, heat and fire and found safety and escape below. The rest of the office charged up the stairs, believing sincerely in the advice to go up, given by well-meaning people, only to find a locked door at the top with no helicopters. They were sincere in their decision, only wrong in their plan. Dear friends, don’t embrace a failed plan, however sincerely, because regardless of the sincerity with which they are executed, failed plans are still the way to death and destructive circumstances. This Christmas, celebrate the way of life. Jesus said, “I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly.” John 10:10

After my closing remarks in Raleigh, I wept with joy as the seven organizers went through the cards of the 70 who prayed to receive Christ. You see, that day those seven businessmen gave their friends and fellow citizens the advice and direction to the way to eternal safety. With a ten-fold return, or even more, those seven men in the CBMC of Raleigh are at the top of my “hero list” this year.

From our family to yours, we wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Phil Susy Abigail Paul

Matthew Anna Joshua Susanna

QUOTABLE QUOTES 2002

I NEED A TIME ZONE MAP – It was only after the telephone call and on the way down the road that Susy said, “Was that Richard you spoke to on the phone, honey? Do you realize that with the change of time zones, it was 4 in the morning for him?” “Huh,” came the reply, “I noticed he wasn’t very talkative.”

AN OVER-50 COMPLIMENT – Susanna, with a deeply sincere tone in her voice, while studying my forehead, said, “I just love your hairline, Dad . . . it’s really cool . . . it’s kind of in the shape of a ‘W’.”

HOW HEALTHY IS TOO HEALTHY? – Both struggling on a diet, Susy and I were thrilled that Joshua came up with a global family diet edict that the family would not eat anything but fruit and vegetables until further notice! We enjoyed the help on our discipline, but Joshua lamented later that he broke the cardinal rule of never proclaiming a diet on a full stomach. It lasted a week!

MOM HAVING TOO MUCH TO DO – Once again, trying to cover for the fact that she had too many things going during the cooking of the dinner and that the chicken was just a tad overdone – like 300% – she announced that we were having Chicken Jerky.

DON’T LOOK A GIFT-COMPLIMENT IN THE MOUTH – Mom to Susanna, “You’re such a hard-working little girl, Susanna,” to which the reply was, “Thanks, Mom, but I was very lazy the other day. I didn’t feel like doing anything so I just sat on the floor of the pantry and read cereal boxes.”

A LACK OF BROTHERLY TACT – From Joshua to Abigail, “Boy, Abigail, your new hair-do makes you look even smarter than you are!”

FORFEITING PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY – Little of whatever small automobile aptitude I have, has been passed on to the kids, as was obvious by Abigail’s call one day with level 10 excitement, “Dad, guess what? I learned how to put oil in my car today! I took it to a lube place.”

WHAT’S REALLY IMPORTANT? – Seeing Anna uncharacteristically bewildered, exhausted and frazzled, I thought that the pressure of Mock Trial, the PSATs and her heavy school load must be weighing heavily on her, so I decided to give a few words of comfort and asked if I could help. With a sigh, and almost a tear, she said, “Oh, Dad, it’s just terrible. I just don’t know what to do. My fantasy football team has gone 0-3 the last three weeks and I’m just not sure what defense to start on Sunday!”

THE ESSENCE OF GENEROSITY – Trying to express to her roommates her eagerness to share her clothes, Abigail reversed the metaphor and said, “Whatever is yours is mine.”

ROLE REVERSAL – A tactful daughter, pointing out, in a nice way, that Dad was perhaps driving her car a little aggressively said, “Dad, you know the nose of my car is a little bit longer than your van, and therefore it may be harder for you to judge how sharply to make turns.” As I still didn’t get it, Abigail finally blurted out, “Dad, both hands on the wheel would be great. Or at least one would be good!”