Today is Day 56—and on Day 57 we board a flight for home. There has been so much to absorb as Barby and I have encountered the people of God in different places.
el-christo, in bolivia
A few days before we left NZ, I discovered that I had five sessions to give in Pakistan. Yikes. So, rather than deleting my pre-breakfast work routine while we travelled, as I was hoping to do, I needed to keep it going. I camped-out at the end of Igor and Charo’s dining room table and watched the sunrise behind El-Christo for five consecutive mornings. What a treat!
Malachi was on my mind—”the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in his wings” (4.2)—thinking of both ‘sun’ and ‘son’, as the text probably intends, as I watched … while praying for healing in such a troubled country. Bolivia is the poorest country in Latin America, with the city of Cochabamba bearing the brunt of it when we visited, with supporters of a former leader blocking every road out of the city for 19 days. The move backfired, with the roads opening again on the day we left.

Seeing the Son each morning—with that welcome in his outstretched arms and that healing in his imaginary wings—was a compelling sight, even more so after our up-close-and-personal visit on the final evening. Remarkably, I could not find a photo, or even a reference, to El Christo on the Cochabamba wikipedia page. How is that possible? It is the most obvious feature of the city. Could the hope for their world be hidden in plain sight? Could the people have grown accustomed to his face, like breathing in and breathing out?

When we departed, our evening flight took us over the city, with its twinkling lights like a bejewelled blanket draped over its rolling hills. It was spectacular. While in our suitcases we carried two mugs with their own way of spurring us to keep praying for the beautiful people of this country…
Our purpose in visiting Bolivia was to spend time with two members of the Global Leadership Team for whom I am responsible, together with their families: Igor, seen here with Charo; and their son, Esteban, seen here with Alejandra and little Ariana.

elmina, in ghana
After two nights of travel we found ourselves in Accra, Ghana. On the itinerary was a visit to the Elmina Slave Castle. It was built by the Portugese 542 years ago and then used by both the Dutch and the British. It is situated on the Gold Coast, a four hour drive west from Accra. It did take eight hours coming back—but not because we were driving into the wind! ‘Traffic’ must rank second on the list of complaints I hear most often as I travel. And what is Numero Uno, I hear you ask? Corruption, by some distance.
But back to Elmina and, arguably, the biggest complaint of the last few hundred years.
Slavery.

Let me limit myself to one memory that I want to keep alive from this sobering place.
On an upper floor in the castle, there is a room with this glorious view. Like my father before me, I love the sight of a sandy beach mingling with a meandering estuary.

But let’s go back inside this room. Because it is not just a room, it is a chapel. A Dutch Reformed Church chapel. It is empty, except for a lectern. The placement of the lectern seems random, at an odd angle. If there was a preacher at work, they’d be facing the wall with most of their back to the congregation.

The only other feature of the room is a text on the wall, above the doorway leading out to that grand view. It is from Psalm 132. My Dutch is non-existent, but it says something like this: “The Lord has chosen Zion; he has desired it for his dwelling place: this is my resting place forever”. Essentially, it is affirming the presence of God in this place…

Meanwhile directly below the chapel lies the ‘dungeon’ in which 400 women were crammed for days, even weeks—living on stone floors, urinating and defecating and menstruating and vomiting together. There they remained, waiting to be led to The Room of No Return and then it was out the door to the waiting ships that took them across the Atlantic. Incredibly, we were told that the ships were worse than the castle and that the New World was worse than the ships.

Imagine the mingling of the singing and the screams, while that text remains on the wall and that lectern in the room. I hope that stray lectern haunts me for the rest of my days. Maybe being turned towards the wall and away from the congregation is its most appropriate placement, as a reminder of just how misguided and shame-full the preacher’s engagement with the world can become.

This generation is so quick to condemn the errors of the past. And it is right to do so! However could there be a little more humility and a little less self-righteousness when we do so? Afterall what side of the fence do we imagine ourselves occupying if we lived back then? If there is little evidence in our lives now of a courageous, strong-minded stance against the cultural flow, let’s not kid ourselves that we would have been on the right side of history back then.

Oh yes—our purpose in visiting Ghana was to spend time with Femi, together with Affy, who is also a member of our Global Leadership Team, as the Director in Africa—and their daughter, Kemi, who is involved in the ministry as well. What fine hosts they were for us!

[NB: For more on Elmina, the ‘whitewashed hell’, see this detailed description of one person’s visit].
a monastery, in egypt
Given that I live in a country that received the gospel as recently as 1814, I stand in awe of those Christian communities that have maintained a continual witness for Jesus going all the way back to the early centuries. If you’ve not read Vince Bantu’s book which tells this story, including the Egyptian Coptic one, then you should do so! Methinks his opening sentences are destined to become something of a classic: “Christianity is and always has been a global religion. For this reason, it is important never to think of Christianity as becoming global” (1).
Initially, our visit to Cairo was not much more than a transit, but when Lebanon had to be canceled an extra day opened up. The primary purpose became to spend time with one of the newer members on our Global Leadership Team, Maggy, together with her husband Beshara. We were able to do so in the context of visiting monasteries of the Coptic Church, of which Beshara is a long-standing member.

Off we went to Wadi Al-Natrun, situated between Cairo and Alexandria. We lingered so long in the first three monasteries that we weren’t able to visit the fourth one! The architecture and the iconography was stunning, with these photos taken in the Monastery of St Macarius, built in the 4th century.

But if pressed for a highlight, it wouldn’t be the architecture or the iconography—but the visage of the monks we met that will remain the most vivid memory. Their faces conveyed such a warmth and welcome, a gentleness and peace. It was striking. I want to be more like them.
Sadly, I didn’t catch the name of the monk who showed us around, but here he is beside another lectern, this time intentionally situated facing the long table of people seated for their meals. They heard the word of God, with natural lighting provided by a hole in the roof, as they ate together. And yes, I do feel A Tale of Two Lecterns coming over me…

At another point in our tour, he read the Lord’s Prayer to us, in Aramaic—the spoken language of Jesus.
When we finished the tour, I bumbled and stumbled my way through a thank-you to him, especially for the long witness to the same Person demonstrated by the Coptic church. He looked me in the eye and quietly said—”…and thank-you for all that you are doing as well”.
One of Beshara’s longtime friends, Father Berty, extended the tour a little further for us. In fact he took us to his office (inside the auto mechanic’s garage‚ which I wasn’t expecting—but it is a work that he oversees). He poured us a cup of tea. It reminded me of a story John Dickson tells about two European scholars preparing cups of tea for his visiting Aussie video crew—and how such humble acts of service impact the way we see people and what it is that they represent.

a warehouse, in pakistan
We were in Pakistan for just three days, invited to participate in the 20th anniversary celebrations of our oldest work in Asia. On the Sunday I was invited to preach in a church whose building had been badly damaged recently by a fire. So they were meeting in a rickety, half-finished warehouse for a few weeks. We were seated on the stage, as is their custom, and this was our view.

No, No, No. Look a little closer. You rushed on too quickly…

It was quite a sight watching the floor slowly become crammed with all these (mostly) younger people—women overflowing from one side, with men on the other. And during the sermon, they were all so attentive, so hungry—with so many having Bibles that they pulled out from somewhere when I read from the text. What a privilege!
Earlier, on the Friday and Saturday, the celebrations had taken place. They did things by-the-book and arranged with the authorities to hire a building that could hold 400 people for this Christian celebration. However this meant, as Qaiser, the coordinator, expressed to me, that they could not publicise the event. If they had done so, he reckoned 3000 people would have wanted to participate and there simply is not a building in the land that could hold a Christian celebration of that size.

With one of my sessions I decided to play with the Apostle’s phrase, “Follow me, as I follow Christ”—recognising the aspirational value in having Christlike leaders up ahead of us in our journeys. I focused on humility, integrity and friendship as reflected in the life of John Stott, as he reflected the life of Christ in these areas—and there was a fair bit of those qualities in the team that leads the work in Pakistan as well! I hope we helped undermine, rather than underline, the soul-destroying question that one man asked Barby, “Will white people be dominant in heaven as well?”
a study center, in india
Reaching students while they are at university is a critical part of the mission of God. This is why I’ve been committed to the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES)—especially its Indian (UESI) and NZ (TSCF) expressions. In fact I would rate my annual training weeks with UESI staff and graduates, to be among the happiest times of my working life.
UESI and TSCF used to have a close relationship. In fact, two of my UESI friends—Billy and Jacob—both reckon they were sponsored through their theological training by TSCF. Amazing. For some time, I’ve wanted to be part of bringing the two more closely together again. In the end I played a small part in this happening. But I so enjoyed introducing Ben and Chris (TSCF) to India, especially with a visit to the UESI Study Center in South India. Here is a group of us outside the chapel—with the aforementioned Billy and Jacob (now, the UESI National Director!) on the far right. What a fun time we had together!


a room, in myanmar
Yes, a room, just a simple room. I tried to think of a way to enhance this description in some way, but I couldn’t. Because it was just a plain room on the fourth floor of the AOG office complex in Yangon. It had been one month short of ten years since I was last involved in the training in Myanmar.
We huffed and puffed our way up all those stairs, gasping by the end—only for there to be one more gasp as we entered the room. I recognised everyone in the room. They had all stayed-the-course, remaining faithfully committed to the work over all these years.


And Myanmar is not an easy setting, something the global media easily forgets. In Yangon at the moment there is this sham of normality going on. Because I had 12+ end-of-year Zooms during the visit, we upgraded our hotel to one near Inya Lake in the pursuit of better WiFi. A very nice part of town…! There was this massive mall nearby, as flash as anything you’ll find anywhere. You would not know—you could not know—that just 30 miles a way, a civil war is raging.
Against this backdrop, it is the Myanmar work that is our most active preaching movement, usually running 20+ seminars every year. Back in 2023, in a presentation to donors in the USA, I chose to focus on Myanmar and identified the previous year’s seminars on a map (see below). It is quite the story! The photos from this work are so striking, while I’ve written more blogs about visits to Myanmar than any other country except India.


We had such a good time together. Two full days. One day was given completely to the 25 Learning Outcomes (LOs) in the training. The idea was to help them assess how they were progressing with each one.
We split people into pairs. If a specific LO was being covered in the training, then their little container of cooked rice was pushed to front of their tables; while if it was not yet covered in the training, their container of uncooked rice was pushed forward. They loved it.
There is lots of work still to be done—but it was so much fun to have a final meal together with these friends before making our way, slowly, back home.

“Thy kingdom come. They will be done, (in all these countries) on earth as it is in heaven.”
nice chatting
Paul
About Me

the art of unpacking
After a childhood in India, a theological training in the USA and a pastoral ministry in Southland (New Zealand), I spent twenty years in theological education in New Zealand — first at Laidlaw College and then at Carey Baptist College, where I served as principal. In 2009 I began working with Langham Partnership and since 2013 I have been the Programme Director (Langham Preaching). Through it all I've cherished the experience of the 'gracious hand of God upon me' and I've relished the opportunity to 'unpack', or exegete, all that I encounter in my walk through life with Jesus.
Recent Posts
Just when I thought that it could not be possible to have another first-hand account of the impact of John Stott’s life (d. 2011), along comes this book by his close friend, John Wyatt. I am always ready to learn more about John Stott, but also about friendship. It fascinates me. It keeps coming up…
Reading stories to grandchildren over Christmas reminded me again of how powerful they can be. They are so compact and simple in presentation, and yet so clever in construction. There are just so many features at work in an effective story. It is some years since I taught narrative preaching, but when I did I’d…
Apart from the eight years in which we were based overseas, Barby has been working at the Refugee Resettlement Center in Auckland since 2002. This year she is a ‘release teacher’, spending one day each week in three different classrooms, with three different age groups. Impressive—and demanding. One day is spent with 11-13 year olds—from…
What an amazing trip, almost worthy of Jules Verne!
Seeing Elmina again reminded me of our visit a few years ago. I’ve never gotten it out of my mind since. What an infernal place. But have been thinking about it a lot recently as I’ve just finished Adam Hochschild’s masterpiece Bury The Chains about (mainly) British Abolitionism. He pulls no punches and shows how mixed and compromised even the most vociferous slavery opponents were – but still they prevailed and that is extraordinary. As he frequently notes, it is extraordinary that the world’s biggest slavery economy at the time suddenly (or rather over about 40 years) decided to use its might (ie the Royal Navy) to end slavery (albeit without ending discrimination, oppression and exploitation). His point is that clear – at least they did what they did do, and thus inspired all kinds of other battles for justice since. Amazing.
Jules Verne?! — Now, there is a novel idea, Mark.
I’ll definitely track down Hochschild’s book. Thank-you. That is quite a thesis to be arguing—and not what would be expected.
A bit like the latest William Dalrymple book where he traces the unacknowledged influence of India in the very early centuries. At times it was a bit like listening to the father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding :).
Happy Christmas to you and yours
Paul
ALSO—just a note to subscribers to this blog…
The ‘subscriber’ facility, enabling posts to arrive in your in-box, does not seem to be happening at the moment — and we’ve hit summer holidays in New Zealand. So, please be patient and we’ll get that fixed as soon as possible.
thanks again
Paul