Bio

Dan Knight

Origin

My parents immigrated from the Netherlands to Canada in the early 1950s. Both families ended up in the Niagara peninsula, particularly the area served by Riverside Christian Reformed Church (Wellandport, ON). By the time I was born (1958), my parents had moved to Hamilton, ON.

Immigration

When I was four, my parents packed up the whole family and all their earthly belongings and moved to Grand Rapids, MI - heart of the Christian Reformed denomination and home of the Young Calvinist Federation (now Youth Unlimited), my father's new employer. We lived a block from Wealthy and Fuller; we were members of the Eastern Ave. Christian Reformed Church.

Education

My schooling began with kindergarten at Sigsbee School, just three blocks from home. Starting with first grade, my parents sent me to Baxter Christian School. This was probably a half-mile away - and just a block from church. I attended Baxter through fifth grade, when the school was closed and all its students sent to Oakdale Christian.

During eighth grade, my parents bought their own home near Eastern Ave. and 28th St. All three sons switched to Seymour Christian during semester break. Extracurricular activities included yearbook and track. I also got the camera bug in 9th grade.

I attended Grand Rapids Christian High for 10th and 11th grades. Due to the merger of Central and East Christian, 10th grade was spent in the former Seymour Junior High building. During two years at GRCHS, I was involved in debate, yearbook, and mathematics. I took first place in a statewide mathematics competition held at Ferris State College during 10th grade.

Relocation

The summer of 1975 had its ups and downs. I'd made profession of faith the previous year and spent six weeks in Toronto, ON, on a SWIM (Summer Workshop in Ministry) team. Later in the summer we moved to St. Catharines, ON. Senior year. New community. New school. New church. It was not something I looked forward to.

Beacon Christian High was very small. I was in the second or third graduating class. We had 34 graduates in 1976. I was yearbook editor. After Grand Rapids Christian, Beacon was a disappointment. So few students. No advanced math or science program. Not much of a challenge academically. I was used to 95% or better for an A; here it was 80% (a higher standard than the public schools in Ontario, which set it at 75%)! I did earn very good grades. :-)

College

The best thing about the sojourn in St. Catharines was getting away from Grand Rapids. I experienced a very different subculture than I was used to. In retrospect, it changed my life for the better. I chose to attend Trinity Christian College (Palos Hts., IL) instead of returning to Grand Rapids to attend Calvin College. My goal since 1975 was the pre-seminary program and a philosophy major.

Dr. Maarten Vrieze taught freshman philosophy. "Close the books and put away the pens. You're going to learn to think." I learned the Philosophy of the Cosmonomic Idea, the philosophy first formulated by Herman Dooyeweerd, a Dutch Reformed philosopher. Those lessons remain with me to this day. Although I graduated from Calvin College, I got my educational foundation at Trinity.

During two years at Trinity is worked as school photographer, edited the student newspaper, helped found the Christian Ministry Club, was involved in religious drama, and was part of a group composed entirely of non-CRC friends.

Back to Grand Rapids

Again my family moved, this time returning to Grand Rapids. I elected to transfer to Calvin College. Living at home would save money. It would be good to return to Grand Rapids. Calvin had more classes to offer. But after three years away, I was an outsider.

During the Calvin years, I was on yearbook staff, became director of Christian music at WCAL (the student radio station), took every writing course available, was involved with Calvin's Intervarsity chapter, and met the woman I would marry. Linda and I left Calvin in May 1981 and married in August.

While dating, Linda introduced me to her church, Church of the Servant. They were meeting at the Mulick Park elementary school back then. I'd never been exposed to liturgical worship, but I grew to love it. Within a year I was on the worship committee helping to write and polish those liturgies.

We bought our first house in 1982. Our first child was born there in 1983. Linda returned to Calvin in 1984 to earn a degree in psychology. She graduated in May 1986, just weeks after our second son was born. I went back to Calvin in the Fall and ended up with a group major in history, English, and philosophy.

Sojourn

We moved to Virginia Beach, VA, in February 1987 so Linda could pursue an MA in counseling at CBN (now Regent) University. I got my first job selling computers at the local Heath/Zenith outlet. Our third son was born in Virginia Beach. When Linda discovered she was pregnant for number four, we decided it was time to come home. Linda truncated her three year program, earning an MA in education. On Thanksgiving Day 1988 we returned to western Michigan.

Home Again?

It was a very good experience being on our own. Both our families live in the Grand Rapids area; Virginia Beach was a very different experience. We returned to Grand Rapids changed in several respects. Although it was nice to be back at Church of the Servant, we didn't fit like before. So many new faces. Different values. It no longer nourished us like it had before; both we and the church had changed.

I sold computers for Radio Shack for several months, then landed a "real" job at ComputerLand. Here I was surrounded my Mac lovers - I was the lone DOS geek among them. Over time, they won me to their way. I got my first Macintosh, sold my Zenith, and have never looked back. Over time I moved from sales into purchasing and inventory management.

When ComputerLand's finance company changed it policy from net 90 to pay as you go, it wasn't good. With many net 30 customers, it was impossible to pay as equipment was sold, so the owners filed for bankruptcy protection. It didn't quite work - over the next nine months we all lost our jobs and they lost the store.

Seminary

I had a few hundred dollars in my retirement account. The dream of attending seminary returned. I talked to my pastor and some others. They pointed me to a program for the foreign language challenged, so I enrolled in the MA program for missions and church growth at Calvin Theological Seminary. My first class (January 1992) was with Dr. Craig Van Gelder. I fell in love with research and learning. Unemployed, I invested a lot of time and effort in a massive research paper with an intimidating title, "A Statistical Survey of Grand Rapids Christian Reformed Congregations, 1970 to the Present." I sold 20 copies. Everyone was impressed. The paper is on my website in a slightly updated version.

That June I was hired as a book designer by Baker Book House. My extensive computer background, particularly on the Macintosh, was a big plus. In addition to book design (interiors - see a portfolio of my design projects ), I spent a good deal of time in troubleshooting and computer support.

Baker was kind enough to flex my schedule around my course load at Calvin. It undoubtedly helped that I only took one course at a time.

During this time, we were involved in a church plant which failed. This helped us discover that we no longer fit well with Church of the Servant. We began searching for a new church and discovered Immanuel Reformed Church. After a year, I joined the choir and discovered how much I love to sing. We were also involved in several small groups.

In 1994, I took Canadian Church History for the opportunity to learn more about my roots. Again, I did a lot of research, this time writing a paper on the broad assortment of Dutch Reformed denominations in Canada. That paper, retitled The Dutch Reformed Presence in Canada, is also on Reformed.Net.

In 1996, I helped lead Baker Book House onto the Internet. We established a presence on the Web, set up an email connection to the Internet, and entered cyberspace. I worked as a full time Information Systems manager until January 2001, and I still designed books as time permitted.

I no longer attend classes at Calvin Theological Seminary, but do occasionally continue my research, which was the impetus for setting up this site. At this point, I don't anticipate returning to seminary.

Beyond Baker

In January 2001 I took the big step of incorporating my publishing business, which at the time consisted primarily of Low End Mac. Following the Macworld Expo in San Francisco, I turned in my notice at Baker Book House. I have been working for Cobweb Publishing, Inc., since January 29, 2001.

In the summer of 1996, we ran through the Network program at church. Network is a tool to help discover our gifts, style, and passion. I discovered my passion for building communities, something I have done through Low End Mac.

In April 1998, we severed our relationship with Immanuel Reformed Church. We consider that parting of the ways the result of spiritual abuse.

After a summer of church shopping, we found a church to call home. Thornapple Evangelical Covenant Church has a worship style we all appreciate, thoughtful preaching, friendly people, and a great youth program. Best of all, we have an automatic "in" with the long term members: The best man and maid of honor at our wedding were the first couple married at TECC.

It was good to have a church home again, although my chemical sensitivities rarely allowed me to make it through a worship service for several years (a problem that has almost disappeared from my life since recovering from the stress of divorce).

Abandonment

The "tipping point" leading to the most traumatic event of my life was a migraine. Linda's cousin died in August 2003, and I attended the funeral with her. The scents were overwhelming, even while seated at the very back of the room, and I eventually had to leave to take an Imitrex, put on my sunglasses, and get some fresh air.

Little did I suspect that would be the catalyst for Linda's decision to end our 22-year marriage. She'd never told me she was unhappy with the marriage, hadn't made any attempt to change the status quo, and had rebuffed my attempts to put a new spark in our relationship that had been going on for months.

As far as I knew, neither of us believed divorce was an option.

Boy was I wrong, although it would be another six weeks before she told me that she no longer loved me and considered the marriage dead. Six weeks during which I kept trying to reach out to her. Six weeks during which she looked at apartments and worked up her own budget. Six weeks to plot her exit strategy.

To say it hit me like a ton of bricks would be an understatement. I felt like I'd been dropped in the middle of an ocean when she dropped this on me - and then she left on a two-week trip, attending a conference in St. Louis and visiting online friends in St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, New York, and Toronto. Leaving me home alone with our four sons to deal with her bombshell.

I spent a lot of time dealing with her betrayal and cowardice. I had trusted her, and I've learned that she wasn't worthy of that trust. My identity had been wrapped up in my marriage, and when she pulled out, I didn't know who I was without her. I was more dependent that I ever would have imagined, and when my therapist used the word abandonment, I had the label I needed to face it.

It hurt down to the core of my being. I was lost, alone, unable to do anything to bridge the gap between us. Although she said she wanted to try to work things out, her actions proved otherwise. She has built her walls high and thick. She even told me that she refused to allow herself to care about me while making the pretense of trying to work on our relationship.

I was angry, confused, frustrated, depressed, frantic, and powerless. She only told me she was unhappy after she had made up her mind to end the marriage, and she only told me why she was unhappy when it no longer mattered what I might do to address those issues. The woman I loved had become a selfish coward who manipulated everything toward her own ends - and I desperately played into it in my attempts to grasp for any sign of hope.

At the time, all I knew was that my world had been destroyed.

Recovery

At the same time that she abandoned me, we began working through The Purpose Driven Life at church. The early lessons - God planned you and made you and knows everything about you and loves you anyhow - were my lifeline. I had lost myself, hit rock bottom, and bound that there was a bedrock to support me. I was not alone - God was with me, loved me, and would never forsake me.

That became more real to me over time. My broken life was an open book, and I stopped hiding from myself and my God. And my wife. But becoming the man she claimed she had wanted me to be only caused her to build stronger defenses. The same opening up brought me closer to God and his people. God, church, and The Purpose Driven life were parts of building a new life.

Two other books helped a lot. Anger was one of them. Written by a Buddhist monk, it taught me to face the anger seething within me, the anger that was destroying me and holding me back. I had to embrace my anger, not let it explode. I had to explore it, understand it, learn from it, and heal my wounded self. I learned that my anger didn't hurt anyone but me. It was a long, slow lesson, but the whole point of anger is to lead you to action so you can learn from the experience. Anything else is destructive.

The other book was The Journey from Abandonment to Healing by Susan Anderson. It helped me understand what I was facing. It helped me see that my big problem was allowing others to define me. I had to love and nurture myself. I had to find a new basis for healthy living. My wife had become destructive, an abandoner, someone who did unto others in a preemptive strike rather than as she would have them do to her. She was bad for me, and I had to learn to live without her and without wanting her back in my life.

Through it all, it all came back to God. God planned me, made me, and knew me intimately. More than that, God loved me and would never abandon me. I could love, nurture, and heal myself because God judged me (the meaning of Daniel) through the eyes of love. I could be open, I could face my anger, I could nurture myself, I could stop depending on others to find my worth.

It was a long, slow, difficult path of recovery. There were setbacks. There were surprises. That was joy. And there were traveling companions, others who had faced and were facing abandonment who no longer need to do so alone.

There was hope. There was healing. There is health. I have found them all in abandoning my fears, facing reality, and walking humbly with my God. It's a fresh new path for me, but others have gone before and others will follow. It's the path of freedom and joy, and it's not without pain and suffering. However, they are no longer the enemy; they have become my teachers.

This is the new life Jesus offered - an offer I never understood until I came to the end of myself. And that has made all the difference.

Since Then

It's now four years since that fateful October 2003, and life has never been better. I've dated several woman and discovered what a pack of lies my ex told me. And what a bunch of lies I'd believed about myself for most of my life. I've fallen in love, discovered deep friendships, and built a new life.

I'm married to a wonderful woman and regularly attend Orchard Hill Reformed Church with her. I have my own house and don't miss apartment living in the least. And life is very, very good.

Go to the Reformed.net home page.