Featured Posts
Recent Posts
The greatest and hardest achievement in writing a 64,000-word thesis is that I managed to do it without using a single superlative (although, it must be said, the thesis is not an alliteration-free zone). In breaking free from such restraint I thought I might nominate the two best books I encountered in my study. Peter Leithart’s Solomon…
READ MOREThe Rugby World Cup Final and now the National Election. Two sporting occasions in one month. I love it. I can’t wait to pull my chair a little closer to the screen on Saturday and watch the contest unravel. Some things have not surprised me. The surge in support for the Greens. The humbling of John Key…
READ MORESo I’ve been working on my DMin thesis most of the week. It is on The Role of Intrigue in Communicating with Contemporary Skeptics … which reminds me – for those of you skeptical about the wonders of cricket (particularly the Test match variety), here are a few intriguing happenings in recent days. Can you…
READ MOREThose of you familiar with the biographies of John Stott will remember that he once had a Kiwi curate at All Souls’ named Ted. Ted had the gall one day to criticise Stott about his preaching being beautifully biblical, but unconnected with the wider world. As the story goes, it was this interchange that became…
READ MORESuch is my life now that I can describe a book by how many boarding passes accumulate within its pages as I work my way through it. So, for example, that book on Pakistan in July was a “thirteen (international) boarding pass” book. It was long and slow and intense. Last week I read a…
READ MOREExactly one week ago the parade was making its way through Christchurch, with thousands turning out to celebrate the All Blacks’ victory in the Rugby World Cup. I’ve been thinking a lot about emotion in the intervening days. What an array of feelings surfaced during the tournament. From the opening ceremony when that lad came…
READ MOREI am always on the look-out for changes happening in the world around us… With a F1 Grand Prix in India today (who would have thought it possible?!), my mind started buzzing overtime. How has the list of countries hosting F1 races changed over the years? How might this reflect the shifts in power –…
READ MOREI don’t tend to buy books according to topic – but by author. And then each year I try to expand my list of favourite authors. 2011 has been the year of Craig Bartholomew. Earlier this year I reviewed his remarkable commentary on Ecclesiastes. On a recent trip to Cambodia I read Living at the…
READ MOREThere is plenty of wisdom in Ecclesiastes, nowhere more than in ch7.2: “you’ll learn more at a funeral than at a party” (paraphrase mine). I’ve been going to a few funerals recently and learning lots as I do so. Last week it was Dr John Allen, remembered from my teenage days at Mt Albert Baptist…
READ MOREEarlier this month I had the privilege of preaching the sermon at the John Stott Memorial Service in New Zealand. I closed my message from Jeremiah 23 by speaking of the sadness of Stott’s death – but also of a deeper sadness. The deeper sadness is that John Stott visited our country only three times…
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.