The Canadian Trucker Movement, PART 1 - All the Details!

February 11th, 2022

You must meet Harold Jonker! Why? He is the driver of the first truck in the first convoy into Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

He is a strong follower of Christ and has led many people to Jesus during this remarkable protest of governmental overreach. In fact, when I called him, his opening words were, “You just interrupted our hymn sing!” (And by the way, Harold and his wife have 13 children.)

Hear Harold Jonker in-person this Sunday night on the World Prayer Network 5pm Pacific, 6pm Mountain, 7pm Central, 8pm Eastern.

How do you view the Canadian truckers convoy?

As of now, they are peaceful and committed to non-violence. In fact, according to interviews I have had with people “on the ground,” it is a family-friendly atmosphere.

Pray that outsiders don’t sabotage this movement. Contrary to Trudeau’s false accusations, there are no Nazi flags or racists. If there were or will be, they are infiltrators. The truckers who are protesting are hardworking, blue collar people who bring you every single item you have.

We have needed someone to help lead the charge against the avalanche of political despotism and governmental tyranny around the world. Well, God found someone. In fact, He found lots of “someones.” Truckers. Canadian truckers.

If God cannot find enough bold, courageous, godly pastors, He will find another way to accomplish what needs to happen. There were some strong pastors in the US. But not enough. There were not enough in Canada either. So, God had to find another way. And He did.

Admittedly, truckers might be an unlikely place for God to look. However, there are hundreds – thousands? – of examples throughout history where God used the “unlikelys.”

Examples of "Unlikelys"

In 1978, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find an associate clinical professor of pediatrics at the University of Southern California School of Medicine, where he also obtained his PhD in child development, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised a young Dr. James Dobson to the position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 1980, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a Hollywood actor who has been divorced, who was once a liberal, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised up Ronald Reagan in a national and international position of influence for righteousness.

In 1990, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a football coach at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and he is going to launch a movement for men called “Promise Keepers.” So God raised up Bill McCartney in a position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 2016, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a braggadocios New York City billionaire who has owned casinos, has been a playboy, who is in his third marriage, tweets too much, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised up Donald Trump in a position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 2022, God looked down on all of North America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a group of truckers in Canada who care about freedom and liberty, who hate tyranny and despotic rule and socialism and medical coercion, and I am going to use them by bringing them to Ottawa, Ontario to do what I need done.” So God raised up the truckers who formed the world longest convoy in a position (so long as they keep the nefarious outsiders out) of national and international influence for righteousness.

Hear Harold Jonker and others from Canada this Sunday night – World Prayer Network Call 108 – 5pm Pacific, 6pm Mountain, 7pm Central, 8pm Eastern – and hear what God has been doing in these convoys.

I love pastors. I am one. I have been one for 50 years. All the friends I have who are pastors love God, desire to honor Jesus, hunger for the Holy Spirit, and love the people they serve and desire to minister to those they don’t even know. They are men and women of God. I admire, love and respect them.

However, there are not enough of us, and some of us don’t always stand. It has been a Daniel 5:27 “tekel” moment for us as American pastors. Tekel means "weighed" — "you have been weighed on the balances and have not measured up." That describes American pastors. I take no joy in saying that. I see the failure of strong pastoral leadership in America's approximately 344,000 churches and their pastors. Sometimes, I see pastoral shortcomings when I look in the mirror. I see those shortcomings in me!

I have spoken at quite a few pastors' conferences over the decades. I have asked this question on numerous occasions: “How many of you can raise your hand and can honestly say that your community demonstrates more righteousness than it did 25 years ago?” Not one hand has ever been raised by even one single pastor in all those decades. Why? George Barna has the answer.

Barna’s (rounded off) figures are sobering:

There are approximately 364,000 places of worship in America.
Subtract all categories of religion outside of Christianity (Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Sikh, etc.) and that takes off approximately 20,000 places of worship, down to 344,000.
I am a Protestant, so allow me to focus only there, as I do not know the Catholic world nearly as well. That subtracts 20,000 more places of worship.
That leaves approximately 324,000 Protestant places of worship.
Of those, how many are liberal, leftist or progressive, feeling no compulsion to be true to the intent of the word of God? Barna says about 72%.
That leaves about 28% that consider themselves Biblical. Those are conservative churches: evangelical, charismatic, Pentecostal, holiness, fundamental, etc. That is approximately (rounded off) 100,000 churches.
That sounds like quite a few. But when Barna is asked, “How many, by definition, have a distinct Biblical worldview (applying Scripture to every aspect of life)," the answer is – fasten your seat belt – around 15,000 at best. (Note: I am sincerely hoping and praying that the severe governmental overreach into church life during Covid-19 has activated more pastors, but I do not know.)

Once again, I am not taking shots at my fellow pastors. I love my pastor-friends. I feel like I know thousands of them. And I love, admire and respect them. But somehow we are not “measuring up.” And we are not standing up. We seem to lack the courage and boldness of Peter and John before the Sanhedrin. (Acts 4:13, “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.”) So God said, “I’ll go get Canadian truckers.”

Allow me to be deeply personal and candid – I have been in grief over the condition of evangelical and holiness denominations. I have been stunned at the level of compromise and capitulation – accommodating to the ways of the world – that were unthinkable a few years ago.

Weakness of the view of Scripture, is followed by a:

growing tolerance for the practice of homosexuality (various strains of so-called “Gay Christianity,” that is “practicing homosexuality” movements, or if they are not practicing, then no need to continue to list the sin as an adjective to "Christianity"),
refusal to truly defend life in the womb (consider “Pro-Lifers for Biden,” an example of those who, while claiming to be pro-life intentionally vote for candidates who have made it clear they are pro-abortion),
lack of support for Israel (replacement theology),
buying into Marxist CRT (Critical Race Theory)
dismissal of the inherent violence of BLM (the concept that black lives matter is a given; however the "Black Lives Matter," as a movement, is anti-Biblical at every point),
demand that white people apologize for being white.

Organizations we all once so respected, were so proud of – Christianity Today, the NAE (National Association of Evangelicals) , CCCU (Council for Christian Colleges and Universities) – have oftentimes become such a disappointment, as they wiggle through all types of casuistry to affirm the world’s ways, or seemingly try to “accommodate.”

Will the phrase “evangelical” even survive? I doubt it. It is too tarnished. Too corrupted. I choose to use three ABCs, that is:

“Authentically Biblical Christians,”
“Authentically Biblical Churches,” and
“Authentically Biblical Colleges.”

In the meantime, God is still at work, in rather remarkable and encouraging ways.

Here is how He did it and is doing it, in my opinion. This is not the way we might have expected. But He has always used the “unlikelys" and "unusables" (King David, and the twelve disciples, for starters). Allow me to give only five recent models of what could be hundreds – no, thousands – of examples throughout church history.

(These five bullet points are repeated from above.)

In 1978, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find an associate clinical professor of pediatrics at the University of Southern California School of Medicine, where he also obtained his PhD in child development, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised a young Dr. James Dobson in a position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 1980, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a Hollywood actor who has been divorced, who was once a liberal, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised up Ronald Reagan in a national and international position of influence for righteousness.

In 1990, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a football coach at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and he is going to launch a movement for men called 'Promise Keepers'.” So God raised up Bill McCartney in a position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 2016, God looked down on America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a braggadocios New York City billionaire who has owned casinos, has been a playboy, who is in his third marraige, and tweets too much, and I am going to prepare him to do what I need done.” So God raised up Donald Trump in a position of national and international influence for righteousness.

In 2022, God looked down on all of North America, could not find enough godly and bold pastors to stand up, so He said, “I am going to find a group of truckers in Canada who care about freedom and liberty, who hate tyranny and despotic rule and socialism and medical coercion, and I am going to use them by bringing them to Ottawa, Ontario to do what I need done.” So God raised up the truckers who formed the world longest convoy in a position (so long as they keep the nefarious outsiders out) of national and international influence for righteousness.

Say what you want about any of these, but they have been and are being used by God – with all their flaws (yes, they have as many flaws, spiritual failures, shortcomings and sins and you and I do) – to produce some righteous results.

God is doing this, not only in America and North America, but in other continents and countries as well. God looked at:

Hungary and found Viktor Orban and made him Prime Minister,
Brazil and found Yair Bolsanaro and made him President,
Bolivia and found Jeanine Anez and made her President (until the Communists came back in in 2020 and brutally threw her in prison where she still is – until we pray her out!),
Guatemala and found Jimmy Morales and then Alejandro Giammattei, and made them president – one after the other.

There are so many more examples like this, where God seemingly looks down upon the Earth and says, “I am going to use him,” or “her,” or “them”.

Yes, they were and are all flawed, as much as you and me, but God found them and used them, in part, I believe, because He could not find enough bold and godly pastors to lead in national righteousness.

That brings me back to the truckers. Are they all Christ-followers? Of course not. Many are. (There is remarkable ministry among truckers! Most people just don’t know about it!)

But even among those who don’t yet personally know Christ as Savior, there is enough of a vestige of Judeo-Christian values within them that they are willing to make a stand. And God is blessing them.

Many persons who are not of the Kingdom still understand Kingdom principles and often stand for them and (knowingly or unknowingly) operate within them.

These truckers inherently know that God did not create government to abuse its people, but to protect them. And they are willing to risk their occupations, their equipment, their livelihood and their safety to declare “enough is enough.”

Some call it a protest. And it may be. Peaceful protest is right. But it is so much more.

SO LONG AS IT DOES NOT, ON ITS OWN, TURN VIOLENT, God is going to bless it. SO LONG AS IT DOES NOT TURN VIOLENT (unless caused by outsiders planted to make it look violent), the Kingdom principles of human dignity, freedom of conscience and control over what one puts into the “temple of the Holy Spirit” (one’s own body – that is, medical freedom) will be blessed by God.

Some think it is about medical mandates. And it is. But, it is more. So much more.

This is spiritual. Yes, you read that right. This might – just may be – even be a precursor to a revival. Only time will tell. But it might be.

My wife, Rosemary Schindler Garlow, observed – at least in what we are observing in the peaceful and appropriate conduct up to today, February 11, 2022 – that these truckers are like those who marched across the Jordan, and around the walls of Jericho and sounded their horns (shofars). They truckers have marched across Canada, and now around Ottawa and sounded their “horns.” Notice that Trudeau does not like their “horns.”

^{A popular meme circulating the internet, comparing the truckers to Joshua’s army around Jericho.

(Some humorous trivia: Years ago, a group of people in our church formed a “Jericho March praying car caravan,” driving on a 30 minute portion of three freeways that formed a triangle around the church I then pastored in the heart of the Dallas-Ft. Worth, Texas area. We drove – or I should say, we drove and prayed – around the highway triangle seven times, like the ancient Israelites at Jericho, praying that God would “bring down the walls” of resistance to the Gospel. As the “prayer car caravan” was ready to complete its seventh round or “march,” I borrowed a friend’s Dodge Ram truck so that as we ended our “march,” I could sound the “ram’s horn.” Back then, we did not know of any people who had real Biblically-based ram’s horns (shofars), like we do today. This was our creative attempt to emulate the Scriptural account. The present-day Canadian truckers are sounding their “horns.”)}

Rosemary went on to say they are the modern-day “circuit riders,” like those who traversed 18th century England and early America, carrying the Methodist expression of salvation and holiness. (I wrote my doctoral dissertation on these Methodist preachers on horseback, the circuit riders.) I would add that, rather than each of these present day “trucker circuit riders” having one horse, they each have many horses (horsepower) as they advance the message of freedom and liberty.

They have become, I believe, the “Paul Reveres of Canada.” They are warning us. Or they are the present-day manifestation of the Boston Tea Party. They are leading a God-inspired revolt against tyranny.

As noted, this is so much more than a protest. It is spiritual. It rides on the same impulse which beat in the human hearts in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s as the tyrannical USSR collapsed.

It is inspired by the same heartbeat which gave the global triumvirate of Ronald Reagan, Margret Thatcher and Pope John Paul II such influence when Communism collapsed in Poland after the Pope’s visit, triggering the eventual overthrow of the USSR across Eastern Europe.

These are the “deplorables” – a term used by one prominent U.S. Democratic political candidate for president – coming to understand that they are, in fact, not deplorables.

These are the masses coming to grasp that the elites don’t rule them. God does.

Many of them realize that the God of the Bible is the one who has all authority, and He chooses to give it to “We the People.”

Trudeau has no clue what is happening. He may tamp it down for a while, but he will never be able to permanently stop it.

Biden does not understand it.

It is not Republican, though many Republicans say they identify with it.

It is not Independent, though more and more Independents may be affirming it.

It is not Democratic, although some Democrats will likely experience it.

It is so much more than that.

It is not partisan. It has little to nothing to do with political parties.

This is not Republican vs. Democrat.

This is not Right vs. Left.

This is, however, Right vs. Wrong.

This is Good vs. Evil.

This is Biblical vs. Anti-Biblical.

This is God vs. Anti-God.

Some people know it. If they don’t know it, they sure feel it. And they, as sure as heaven, are not going to take it anymore.

So long as the truck convoys can avoid outside agitators inciting evil actions or words, God is going to bless this.

The truckers may set Canada free. At this point, it is too early to tell. Then maybe America, then possibly Australia. Then country after country. We are now hearing of trucker convoys beginning to formulate in places as far away as Israel.

I recognize that Trudeau may temporarily beat them down. But he won’t keep them down. Because the flame for freedom put in their hearts by Almighty God can never be extinguished.

These words are not hyperbole or melodrama. That is the promise of God who will still be here after Trudeau and Biden and all the other enemies of freedom have ended their times of enslaving the people whose liberty they can never permanently take.

Political leaders did not give it. Thus they cannot take it.