You can now order Walking the Emmaus Journey online through University Bookshop, Dunedin at http://unibooks.barcode.net.au/product_info.php?products_id=16484

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Walking the Emmaus Journey received a Highly Commended Award in the Binding & Finishing section of the New Zealand Print national annual Pride in Print Awards. You can see its entry on the first page of this PDF file.

Book reviews, Christian writing, Meditations, Other, Published Writing | No Comments »

Some years ago I heard the English preacher Charles Price preach at the Waikanae Easter Convention at El Rancho on Wellington’s Kapiti Coast. I heard him again a few years later. I found him to be an extraordinary bible teacher, an excellent communicator, and someone worth listening to.

In 2001, Price moved from England to Canada where he is now pastor of Living Truth Ministries. I was excited to find that his sermons are available to download to read, listen and watch (at the top of the page) at the Living Truth Ministries page. I’m listening through his sermon series on Abraham: fantastic, challenging, well worth listening to. The price is right.

Meditations, On Radio, Writers and Readers | No Comments »

Read a lecture I recently gave in Christchurch on why Asians should matter to Christchurch here

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Without them we may have never eaten our vegetables. We would never have had the story of Oedipus. Freud may never have been so popular. We never would have had someone pack our school lunches, or get up to us in the middle of the night when we were children and scared of the boogey-monster under the bed or in the wardrobe.

We never would have had someone to tell about our school day or get excited for us when we went on our first date. At weddings, there wouldn’t be any one proud, wearing a hat. At the cross, there would have been no-one at all watching their son die.

We wouldn’t have had someone to teach us how to cook and bake and boil an egg. We wouldn’t have had someone give us advice about girls or interpret for our father: ‘what your father meant to say’.

We wouldn’t have had someone to tie our shoe-laces or ferry us from music practice to swimming practice and home again. We wouldn’t have had someone who would worry if we were home late from school or stay up until we came home after an evening out. We wouldn’t have someone who would ring us several times a week once we’d left home and bring baking when she came to visit.

We simply wouldn’t be here without them, and today we salute them, whether they are with us still or passed away, near or far, we say ‘Thanks Mum. Happy Mother’s Day’.

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They’re eating up the footpath on Lambton Quay. Wellington’s main shopping street looks like a movie set for The Day After Tomorrow, except it looked this way yesterday, does today, will tomorrow and ever more. Amen. There are large diggers, men resting on shovels, great chasms in the ground, and lots of noise of loud machines breaking concrete and scaring the pigeons in the park.

Apparently, this is all in the cause of widening the footpath. Perhaps Wellingtonian’s have become fatter people? Perhaps we are breeding more? Perhaps more people are moving to live here? Because I’ve never thought that Wellington’s streets were crowded like, well, most other cities in the world. You can walk respectably down the street without either losing all sense of your personal space or standing so close to someone that if you stood any closer to them you should probably move in together or have a cold shower.

But, evidently, we need wider streets. And the price we pay for wider streets is long-term disruption. Crossing the road becomes a perilous task, dodging these diggers, workmen and especially the holes in the ground. It’s probably safer to walk down the airport runway – the worst that can happen there is you’ll be collected by a passing plane. On Lambton Quay you might get taken out by a giant digger.

And pity those who actually have to drive on these streets. There will be cars that will simply disappear, swallowed by the crevices that are now such a common feature on Wellington’s streets. Our streets are pock-marked as an adolescent’s face. If your car doesn’t have decent suspension you might be joining your friends who were picked up by the passing plane on the runway, flying through the sky. Not terribly helpful for one’s carbon footprint, but if you can’t fly, and you can’t drive and you can’t walk, because you might just fall down a hole, then what can you do? It really will be the end of the road.

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It started with a drip. Last night, Wellington experienced rains so heavy that people were calling out the name of Noah. My neighbour has started building an ark and everywhere I look I see animals in pairs. Even the national museum, Te Papa, recently acquired two squids. These are signs I tell you.

This morning I woke to find that my house had not leaked in the kitchen ceiling, as it usually does. No. The leak had moved into a new room, my dining room, and was cascading down my light fitting there. Images of The Towering Inferno meeting Titanic flashed through my mind as I turned off the light, got one bucket and then two buckets, a towel and dehumidifier, and moved the dining room table out of the way of the my new water feature. The water had been dripping onto my mail, but as I never actually open my mail all that got wet was its plastic wrapping, which is a small blessing at a time when you can see your furniture floating out your door.

In my state of frustration and annoyance, I shaved rather too quickly this morning and now look like I’ve walked out of a war zone. And then, to make matters worse, in sprinkling a spoonful of sugar onto my morning porridge I managed to tip the entire container of sugar into my plate. I couldn’t see the porridge for all the sugar on top of it. I scrapped off the excess and in the daylight could see a small bit of porridge, and ate the rest. I had a sugar high like you wouldn’t believe. Then, driving to work, I almost backed my car into the retaining wall on my driveway. Oh, happy day.

It has stopped raining now and the animals aren’t pairing up like they used to and my neighbour has put away his hammer. But there are still two squids in Te Papa and there’s still a leak in my dining room. The plumber will fix it, of course, when it’s dry, because, ironically, plumbers can’t work in water. And that’s the weather for today. Wet inside, with a sprinkling of showers. Outside, it’s all fine.

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