leadership
When we had a little book written on my father’s life, we called it Surprised by Obedience. That title seemed to catch the twists and turns of his life and the way God kept calling him away from areas of proven skill and gifting. [NB: I’ve posted some tributes to my Dad here and here and here].…
READ MOREIt seems to be the season for a binge on NZ history, particularly Maori history. After the exhilaration of Fairness & Freedom and then Keith Newman’s eye-opening Bible & Treaty – I thought I’d read Newman’s earlier book, Ratana: the prophet. This is the story of a Maori leader who experienced an extraordinary encounter with God which led, initially,…
READ MOREAs I travel overseas training preachers, there is a Maori word that so often slips from my lips. Before I know it, out it comes – and then I have to explain what I mean. That is when things get complicated. I stumble away and invariably the conversation shifts to another topic, as I am…
READ MOREIt is no great surprise that TIME magazine’s Person of the Year is Barack Obama. The cynic in me recognises that about once every four years the President of the USA is predestined to win the award. I don’t read TIME anymore, but picked up a copy on the plane and found the article by…
READ MOREOver Christmas I spent time getting to know Aung San Suu Kyi. I started with Justin Wintle’s book, Perfect Hostage, picked up at the bookshop in the departure area of Phnom Penh airport. Given the recent developments in the story, it is a bit dated (2007). However I found it valuable to begin my pilgrimage with…
READ MOREIt is not every day that the eye falls upon a book on leadership where the case studies, so charming in their sycophancy, include the likes of Mao Tse-Tung, Tito, Ceausescu, Chou En-Lai, Hodja (Albania), and Khrushchev. But such was the case when I wandered through one of my favourite bookshops – in the departure…
READ MOREIt has been a long time coming. The final frontier. Through these 29 years in New Zealand, it is the only part of the country in which we have never holidayed. The East Cape. Not any more. Barby and I – together with our daughter Bethany – have just returned from a week travelling around the…
READ MOREDoing serious research has taught be a significant life-skill. If I want my own argument to be robust, then as I encounter those views which I oppose it is wise to paint them in their best light, not their worst light. It is about taking time to find the finest exponents of the views with…
READ MOREIt is a consistent theme. In the churches, mission organisations, and employers with whom I have been associated over the past twenty years, (almost) without exception they have tackled the same issue: identifying what good governance looks like and trying to make the changes to embrace it. I am at San Francisco airport on my…
READ MOREAbout 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.