I was born in Tasmania Au, and gratefully brought up in a Christian home by my loving parents who had grown up under the teaching of the Plymouth Brethren. Dad and Mum met through that denomination, where they fellowshipped until around 1956.
I’m the 4th born of 5 sons and 1 daughter. During my early years (1-6), I think my parents changed from 1 or 2 fellowships before settling into a Pentecostal fellowship when I was about 6. Dad had always been involved in ministry in the PB congregation, street ministry as well as in the workplace and during his time of National Service, he was never backward in sharing and living his faith openly. He became an assistant Pastor of a Pentecostal denomination, and was later commissioned to be pastor in a church plant in a town of approx. 25,000 people, about 60 k’s to the east of where we lived at that time, so the family all moved to the new location. After about 5 years, the leadership of the congregation determined to operate independent from the Pentecostal denomination and that new entity continued at least until his death in March 2023. My Mother went to be with the Lord in March 2020 at the age of 83, she was a wonderful Godly woman and we miss her but are pleased to know we’ll see her again before too long.
Somewhere around my early teens or just before, God mercifully brought me to faith and repentance through Christ by revealing to me my depravity and the reality of possible eternal separation from Him. I later had responsibilities of service within the congregation from my mid teen’s through to leaving that congregation in Nov. 2018). My wife Deborah & I have been married since 1986, and have 4 sons and 1 daughter. Deb was the youngest born of 5 sisters and 1 brother in her parents Christian household (they all loved singing hymns and contemporary christian songs together).
For quite a few years up to 2018 in the congregation I’d fellowshipped in, then from different congregational associations to present, Deb and I had been substantially reconsidering our perspective on what we thought was a normal but sometimes stressful life (We’re still reconsidering and learning). But through all this, we’ve found that Heavenly Father’s love has patiently taught, providentially directed, provided and kept us throughout our lives, and regardless of the unsettling events associated with Christian congregations, family, work & responsibilities; which are events resultant of Adam’s, mankind’s and our sins, as well as other unseen beings actions; through Christ, God has allowed or sent these occasions and has used them to develop us to see more of the beauty of His love and the glory of His Kingdom. I find myself spending more time primarily studying and considering God’s Word, and secondly, others perspectives of It, and I thoroughly enjoy those occasions, and opportunities for Christian fellowship, learning more of God: The Father, The Son, and Holy Spirit.
Ephesians 3:10 His purpose was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, 11 according to the eternal purpose that He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.
It is not the church or the Jews that are to be glorified, but Christ Jesus by whom both the church and the Jewish remnant are and will be redeemed.
For as I walked around and examined your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Therefore what you worship as something unknown, I now proclaim to you.24 The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples made by human hands. 25 Nor is He served by human hands, as if He needed anything, because He Himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their lands. 27 God intended that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. 28 ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’ 29 Therefore, being offspring of God, we should not think that the Divine Being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by man’s skill and imagination. 30 Although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent. 31 For He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the Man He has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead.”
Acts 17:23
Study like a Berean! 