Apologies for late appearance of this Newsletter.  It used to be six per year, but life is so busy that I am currently producing just three per year!

July 20th - 23rd  Ellel Pierrepont, Surrey, England   The Father heart of God This is my eleventh year teaching at Ellel Pierrepont and I count it a privilege to do so. The Father heart of God is still the most asked for teaching wherever I go, and I plan to have the book finished by December for publication by Sovereign World in April. It was meant to be finished in January, then April, then the summer, so I really want to get there by the end of this year. I also taught the term four students for one day on God's testings, and taught for half an hour at the joint staff and student weekly communion (100+ people)  You can listen to that teaching here.

Reclaiming the ground I taught this at last years visit to Ellel Gilbulla near Sydney and it proved to be very popular.  I am grateful to Ellel for being able to teach these rather 'meaty' subjects that would not normally be available to Christians. 

During our one week stay we enjoyed a great fun day out with the staff, complete of course with Aussie barbeque.  (We are the sane ones on the right!) Playing badminton I forgot that I was no longer 35 years old and competitive old me ended up taking a rather heavy tumble in the grit which I confess, 'stung a bit'  

August 13 - 15 Ellel Gilbulla, Near Sydney,

Men of God. One of my favourite weekend courses and again well attended by men who were serious about doing business with God.  The testimonies at the end were amongst the best I can remember hearing for a long time. God did a great work amongst them.  Thank you men for being brave enough to come!

August 19th Ellel Gilbulla,

Associate Counsellors training day. This year I was asked to do a ministry training day and chose to teach on 'ministering into abuse'  Many were shocked at the first session when I showed twenty minutes of segments from the film 'Song for a raggy boy' - dealing with physical and sexual abuse in Ireland - but it was important as when the teaching sessions followed there was be a greater empathy and a sharpened understanding of what issues, obvious and not so obvious, that would need to be dealt with, and how we might bring the finished work of the cross to bring healing. 

August 20 - 22 Ellel Gilbulla,

The Father heart of God. I have taught this every year that I have visited Australia (that was our seventh visit) and every year it is a full house or close to it.  The need for healing of what is sometimes called 'the father wound' is immense, and year after year I see God heal that wound left by earthly fathers who were unable or unwilling to be 'a dad' to their children.  And yes, it is down for next year's visit as well. If you live in Australia and have not sat under this gentle teaching, packed with revelations about your Heavenly Father, then I would urge you to try and attend.

  Here we are all gathering for the one hour 'father heart walk' around the 35 acres of bush land.

During our time here, two great friends of ours took us for a two night break to their beautiful 1100 acre farm, a first for us in Australia. We had a wonderful time with them, yet again.  I love the outdoors, so staying at a ranch with beautifully mixed terrain was such a blessing.  Here we have stopped at the highest point on the farm.  What a country!

New Zealand

With teaching finished, Linda and I met up with the former directors of Ellel Springhill, Paul and Barbs, who are also our in-laws (Their son married our daughter) for a camper-van adventure in New Zealand's South island. This had been a dream of mine for many years, especially from a photographic point of view. We drove some 2000 kms over the two weeks.  Paul is also a keen photographer

For some reason I thought New Zealand's winter would be like the Australian winter (warm) but how wrong I was. The nights were cold, and on several occasions we were driving through torrential rain and snow storms, finally being rocked to and fro in the middle of the night by an earthquake! The night after the 7.2 earthquake we survived the worst storm I have ever experienced.  We had to move the two camper-vans several times in the dark for safety. Frightening and yet exciting!

We wanted an adventure and we certainly got an adventure! But in between these interesting and challenging blips in the graph there were beautiful days, and as we expected, stunning landscapes.  New Zealand's South Island did not disappoint.  There are many photos on my photographic web site, but here are a few (including the one at the very top of the page) to whet your appetite. 

Thank you Jesus!

Finally, we travelled back to Australia to spend a week with our daughter and her family. 

We were treated again to wonderful interaction with the local wild birds. King parrots would gradually trust us enough to come and feed out of our hands. As did Mynahs, Rainbow Lorikeets and Kookaburras.

In western thinking, Australia was the last continent to be 'discovered' but it seems that God kept the best wine until the last.  It truly is an amazing country. How anyone could live in, or visit Australia and not see The Creator's Hand is beyond me. 

Sadly, like all countries, they have their problems. Fallen man continues to behave like fallen man, and it is sad to see the seemingly increasing levels of alcohol and drug addiction and the street violence - especially among young people - that so often results from that lifestyle.  Oh for a great revival there!