politics
When I first saw the billboards from the Green Party I thought immediately of worms. Two NZ-elections ago the ‘worm’ was the difference-maker. The leaders of all the political parties participated in debates and the audience responded as they listened and this response took the form of worms crawling across our screens. The main beneficiary…
READ MOREPolitical elections are in the air. Both in the USA & here in NZ. I am wrestling with what I always wrestle in these seasons. Ethics. Neither the Right nor the Left is ever totally compelling for me. This is frustrating. Four documents are open in front of me to help guide me. (a) One…
READ MOREI have a fair amount of Americana in me – having been educated at an American boarding school (Woodstock School, India) and then at an American theological college(Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Chicago). So when the presidential elections come around I struggle to shrug off compulsive behavioural patterns! 2008 has proved the biggest struggle of all.…
READ MOREHere are some reflections on the 5th New Zealand Christian Leaders’ Congress held last week in Waikanae. I had mixed feelings, with question marks living alongside exclamation marks. Four Exclamation Marks: 1. We have some remarkable leaders in New Zealand. Kim Workman, soon to retire as Director of Prison Fellowship (NZ), is one of my…
READ MOREI need to keep things vague with this one, OK? This week I was filling in a reference of a kind for a friend. He is a committed follower of Jesus. I was asked to respond to the following question: “Has the applicant ever belonged to or been associated with any ethnic, religious, or political…
READ MOREI confess that I am struggling with why seeing New Zealand as a Christian nation in past, present, and future is such a big deal. Under the threat of today’s new-religions and ‘no-religion’s (as is so popular in our census forms), it smacks of Christianity trying to preserve some sort of home-field advantage in the…
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.