travel
I have just returned from my first ever visit to Latin America. The 43hr trip included a touchdown in La Paz (remaining on the plane). Within 10min of the plane door being open I could tell we were at 14,000 feet. Then as we took off, just before dawn, I could see Lake Titicaca (look…
READ MOREThe Wakatipu Basin is where God did some of his finest work. To be in that setting last weekend for a wedding doubled the beauty to smorgasbord proportions. But alongside the beauty on display, there was the conversation… A winemaker from Waiheke I choose not to drink alcohol and so my knowledge of wine is…
READ MOREOff the train. Into a taxi. The long weekend in Mysore with our friends, Rod & Denise Edwards, had begun. Immediately, our chatty taxi-driver asked me, “Are you here for the illumination on Sunday?” “Yes, we are.” Every Sunday night, the Mysore Palace is illuminated with thousands and thousands of light bulbs. It lasts for…
READ MOREBarby and I are coming up to six months of living here in Bangalore. One of the first things I did was buy a smartphone. I’ve enjoyed clicking here and there as I see interesting things around where we live. Here are six of my favourites: good looking Paul
READ MOREI have a friend who has been to Myanmar more than sixty times. Another friend is pushing twenty. My sister and her husband are closing in on ten visits. As for me, it has been only three … But that is enough to be sobered by what I’ve seen. There is something particularly evil about…
READ MORESome conversations are for keeping. Dinner with Conrad… in England. It was a cold wet night in Sheffield. I was perched at the end of a long table in a restaurant on a night set aside to celebrate the contribution of Jonathan & Margaret Lamb to Langham Partnership. Next to me was a new member…
READ MOREI have often given the advice that the way to cope with big bureaucracy in India is to adopt the gait and manner of the big animals in India – elephant, camel and buffalo. Steady. Unruffled. Metronomic. Here was my chance to prove it. Our shipment of goods from New Zealand (mainly my books) are…
READ MORE29 November 1979 I’ve written about this date before. It is a huge date in my life. The morning after the Erebus disaster and I found myself at a shocked Auckland airport ready to fly to the USA. At 20 years of age I was heading to the USA both to attend Urbana ’79 (where I was…
READ MOREWhen I was little we lived at 707 New North Rd (Auckland). When I was 3 we moved to India (Chandigarh, Herbertpur…). When I was 7 we moved to 707 New North Rd (Auckland). When I was 8 we moved to India (Landour, Old Delhi …). When I was 12 we moved to 707 New…
READ MOREGood preaching engages both the Word and the world. It is about being faithful to a content, but also to a context. In our Langham training I like to develop this in an interactive way. Participants reflect on the big issues in personal/family life, local church life – and then life in their wider society. When…
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.