When you step into what Christ made you and onto the path he set before you, the joy is deep and the adventure real. In a sentence that describes the adventure of my life and my ministry. One big, long adventure where joy has been deep and the adventure real. I grew up in the […]

When you step into what Christ made you and onto the path he set before you, the joy is deep and the adventure real.

In a sentence that describes the adventure of my life and my ministry. One big, long adventure where joy has been deep and the adventure real.

I grew up in the Adelaide Hills at Mt Barker, the second of five children. Faith and church were always part of the rhythm of family life; so was serving. Whether it was worshipping, family devotions, playing with the other kids while the parents did LifeGroup, fixing things up for elderly members of the congregation or inviting a widow “Aunt Martha” over for Thursday dinner, mending broken pipes at the manse or church, usually at 5pm on a Saturday night, spending every Saturday for nine months sanding and painting classrooms or building internal walls with dad so the new Lutheran primary school could start, that’s what we did. Then there was the Saturday night running the bulletin or Church magazine through the “Gestetner” and getting ink all over our hands as all the kids formed an assembly line to collate them, or cleaning the church ready for Sunday, or sitting in the back of the car holding the incredible flower arrangements that mum had spent hours making perfect and still thinking she could do better! Church, ministry, getting our hands dirty was part of our family DNA. I was surrounded by an extended family and church culture of generosity and mission mindedness that has shaped my life and ministry.

My teenage years were spent getting my hands dirty picking worms before and after school to earn income, pumping petrol on a Saturday, and then working behind a bar at a restaurant in the evening. I did fruit picking and chicken catching before spending the year before I started at Luther Seminary (now ALC) working in a Hire firm, getting dirt and grease under my fingernails, servicing brush cutters, chainsaws, other small engines– which I still do in my local community to help people out!

The call to ministry came early for me. I was four years old when I woke up, walked into mum and dad’s room and said, “when I grow up, I am going to be a Pastor.”  It’s a calling from which I never wavered, and which, by the grace of God, I have had the privilege of living that adventure for thirty years. It has taken my wife, Jo-Anne, and me to Perth, where we vicared for a year, back to Adelaide for final year where I continued to pump petrol and work as a volunteer maintenance person at Golden Grove Lutheran School where Jo-Anne was teaching. Then on to an adventure in the land of the Long White Cloud where we served in Auckland for six years, followed by St. Peter’s Loxton, South Australia for five years before having absolute fun over the last 18 years getting my hands dirty in ministry in Sydney. The Sydney adventure started with one church and grew to six, and took us on mission adventures to Germany, Singapore, Thailand and Cambodia. Along the way, our journey has been blessed with four children (all now adults and on their own adventures) and enriched as others from across the globe intersected with our lives and became part of our adventure story. I really should not have been surprised that God has now led me to continue that adventure in this new role, where I will continue to generously serve and get my hands dirty in mission and ministry!! I can’t do otherwise!

I look forward to meeting you as our adventures intersect in the coming years and sharing with you the stories of lives transformed because of your love for Jesus, your hearts of service and generosity. May it fill you with a joy that is deep and an adventure that is real. Please continue to pray for LCA International Mission and our partnerships. I would love it if you could pray this prayer daily with us:God, prepare our hearts for what you have for us next and give us a heart of faith to go where you call us to go.  Amen.

Many of our partner churches are working in new territory for the kingdom of God; therefore, spiritual attack is their everyday reality. As a member of a congregation, school, or family, or a couple or individual, you are invited to commit to praying for our partners in mission. For regular prayer point updates, go to www.lca.org.au/international-mission/act-now/pray