backyardmissionary

Ellie was the phone to Danelle last night.
“Mum - I’m living in a house of boys. Every time I go to the toilet the seat is up!”
Is this toilet seat thing genetic or what?…
She’s 7.

I sold my boat today…
A bloody big decision I can tell you, but one that had been festering for quite a while.
One of the things about boats is - if you don’t use them often enough they stuff up - so that when you do use them they cost you big $$$ to fix […]

If we genuinely believe that the church is actually the primary unit of the ‘Christian life’, (rather than the individual) then this has massive implications for how we live our lives and how we follow Jesus.
The ‘I’ always becomes secondary to the ‘we’.
In our individualised western world this is abhorrent. And to be sure, this […]

I have been chewing on this for a while as the language of ’selling out’ has been used around the place quite a bit lately and I am not sure its always used appropriately.
There have been (quite legitimate) questions raised about whether Forge is selling out by having a national conference, or by working with […]

UWA are offering this as a course between July & September. You couldn’t offer a topic I am much more interested in!
So I imagine I will be back to my old University for 12 weeks auditing a course that looks like it will be very interesting indeed.

There are some things in life that I both love and hate.
Preaching is one of them.
I love the intense rigor of preparing, of researching, of learning and of listening to God for what he wants me to say, but I hate that it rarely comes together as easily as I would like. I hate that […]

Life feels like this at the moment and probably explains the absence of blogging around here.
This time last week we were supposed to be launching into a week of activity with some visitors from Bali, but they didn’t arrive. They have arrived today but there is little to do, so it will be several days […]

I am preaching this Sunday night at North Beach Baptist on Revelation chapter 2, so I have been doing some reflection on who we are as the church.
I’m thinking that if the church is really the bride of Christ… then logically that would make God my father-in-law rather than my father… right?…
Maybe this would […]

“For the working class world, Christ seems to be settled with the church and middle class society.”
Bonhoeffer (Christology)

In years gone by I would have had many answers for these people, but today I feel inspiration at their story.
I guess we all change.
Thanks Simon

Every single week in Perth the fuel prices follow a predictable cycle.
They gradually drop a little each day thru to Tuesday (which is almost always the cheapest day to buy fuel) and then on Wednesday they jump back up by 10 c/litre.
Its a cycle that repeats every week without fail.
Maybe I’m missing something but […]

That’s kind of an understatement for what happened on Friday.
Over the last year Danelle has been very involved with raising funds for a Bali orphanage and has been working her butt off to try and help them. Many have got involved and it has been a successful venture thus far.
The directors of the orphanage as […]

A little while ago Danelle and I decided we would make 2009 a year when we take an extended break from the things we have been involved with over the last 6 or 7 years to rest, refresh and come back recharged.
I will be taking a year’s leave without pay from directing Forge WA, we […]