spirituality
Just at the moment it might be better if you didn’t talk to me about how God’s timing is perfect. My much-loved father-in-law (hitherto known as ‘Dad’, as that is who he was for me) died on the first day of this week, the biggest week of the year in my Langham work. As today…
READ MOREMore than 1100 children were killed during the Siege of Sarajevo from 1992 to 1996. The city remembers the children in a couple of ways. Late one afternoon I trudged through the snow down Marshall Tito St from Pigeon Square for almost 2kms to find this memorial beside the road. It is a typical war…
READ MOREThe other night it was Brooklyn, an emotionally-charged movie about an Irish lass immigrating to the USA. After a long day I love relaxing with a movie with Barby, just the two of us. Midway through this movie, however, I glimpsed a notification on my phone. Billy Graham had died. I told Barby. Barely a minute…
READ MOREShe may live in LA. She may work with Hillsong Australia, but she is most definitely a Kiwi Brethren lass from the Hutt Valley. Her father was an All Black rugby player, for goodness sake. What better pedigree could there be?! I remember speaking at a conference where I was responsible for the adults in…
READ MOREI don’t like it when I see and hear the inner narcissist in me. A glimpse here. A sound-bite there. It disturbs me. After all these years, it shouldn’t still be hanging around. So when I sighted Wendy Behary’s Disarming the Narcissist, I thought I’d give it a go. Always happy to engage with wisdom…
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This is my final day of some consultancy work in Hyderabad with leaders at Ashirwad (Seva Bharat) – which means, literally, ‘Blessing (Serve India)’. What a place! As I enter the main gates, I am drawn into Genesis One: I walk a little further down to the left and find myself arrested by Genesis Three:…
READ MOREWith all the fire and fury, shock and shame, filling the headlines coming out of the USA these days, it is easy to forget that over there, in the footnotes, there are so many tender, inspirational stories. I’ve loved living in two of them in recent months – both related to the game of basketball…
READ MOREA verandah with a view. A lake in the foreground. A mountain in the background. It was perfect. For six consecutive mornings, I rose early at Lake Toba, opened my Bible and my books – and waited for the dawn to come. The transition from darkness to light is often used as a picture of…
READ MOREMartin Luther bobbleheads. Happy Reformation Day parties. The myriad of memes dealing with either hammers, or theses, or doors. A Halloween alternative? Goodness me, I’m glad we’ve got beyond this silly season. Don’t get me wrong. I’m so grateful to be living this side of the Reformation. I believe the sola-stuff with all that I…
READ MOREWhile it needs a bit of a haircut, it still retains its charm. This is often the case with botanical gardens established during the colonial era. Aburi, north of Accra (Ghana), is no exception. Among the many exotic highlights, two trees caught my eye. The first is ‘the strangler tree’. A tiny parasite settles into…
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.