travel
It is great to be in the garden again. Whether it be horticultural, or human, I love watching growth. It is pretty much my favourite thing to do. I delight in nurturing plants, but also people, to completeness, to maturity, to fruitfulness and to all they are designed to be. The principles and the rhythms…
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“What do you bring back with you from the global church?” This was a question asked of me six months ago. I’ve been thinking about the answers ever since. What follows is a personal and a general response. I am not trying to defend a thesis, nor am I trying to gather all the exceptions. This is simply how…
READ MOREI’ve always loved my Uncle Jack. While, inadvertently, the world knew him as the one who invented the name ‘kiwifruit’ (NB: the fruit is called ‘kiwifruit’, not kiwi, because the ‘kiwi’ is a seriously unappetizing, inedible bird!), I knew him in a far more personal way. When I entered university, Uncle Jack gave me a…
READ MOREOur North Island road trip followed on immediately from the South Island one. In total, Barby and I shared about our life in India and work with Langham Preaching in 27 different Open Homes, travelling 6565kms over 35 days and sleeping in 23 different beds. We took a short break (to participate in Langham’s annual…
READ MOREAcross 51 days, Barby and I have set ourselves the goal of holding 34 Open Homes. With one eye on these covidian times, the idea is to share about our work in smaller, conversational settings. We want to thank and update those who have been standing with us over these 12 years, while welcoming others…
READ MOREIt is good to be home again in New Zealand. I enjoy being able to pop across to my mother’s home on Sunday evenings and watch the BBC’s Songs of Praise with her. But not today, as we are in covidian lockdown – again! With Songs of Praise I am not so keen on the choirs, the organs and…
READ MOREWhen it comes to TV dramas, nobody does it better than the Brits. Nobody. This is a law of the Medes and Persians that cannot be altered. And so it came to pass, with a nudge from our daughter and a shared Netflix account to help welcome us home, that Barby and I discovered Shetland. It…
READ MORENot sure I’ve ever felt so torn. The burden of so much suffering, so much death around the world, in the knowledge that the virus is yet to ‘hit’ many of the most vulnerable people. It takes me back to that 2004 tsunami. And yet as I listen to people, one-by-one, so often I hear…
READ MOREThe name ‘E. Stanley Jones’ will not mean much to most of the people reading this post. But hang in with me here, OK?! You’ll enjoy this one, I promise. E. Stanley Jones was a key figure in the church in India in the early twentieth century. My father’s own heart was drawn to giving his…
READ MOREWith a seminar to take in Delhi last Saturday, I decided on a (very) early Friday morning flight so that the afternoon could open up for a wander through Old Delhi. After dropping off my bag in Chhatarpur in the far south, I headed for the incomparable Yellow Line on the Metro and made my way…
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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.