In June/July I undertook six weeks of ministry in Australia. This took me right across that vast continent and I must confess that I found it to be most exacting — getting older, I guess. In future I must schedule some off time and allow for travel. We are grateful to those who pray for us as we do these ministry tours of which there have been four during 1999.

1 Corinthians 16:9: "For a great door and effectual is opened to me, and there are many adversaries."

Mostly I dealt with the theme "WHAT IS THE GOSPEL?" We plan to list these messages in the next CWM Catalogue, God Willing.

NZ — South Island: When we arrived in NZ from Australia in 1992, I did a mini tour of the South Island under the auspices of AoG. Since then I had not attempted another until my 3 weeks earlier this year, when I visited Nelson (2ce), Christchurch, Timaru (2ce), Roxburgh, Alexandra, Te Anau and Invercargill.

Distances are considerable and population is sparse, which has advantages and disadvantages. On the plus side the roads are never "crowded" as in some other countries and even, to some degree, in the North Island of NZ. On the down side towns and cities are far apart and attendance at meetings less, on average, than most other parts. At one remote place there were only six people present.

The tour was worthwhile. We built bridges and secured a number of additional names and addresses for our mailing list. Of the 1904 New Zealand addresses listed on our database 345 are from the South Island.

NZ — North Island: Between the South and North island tours I was invited to preach at an Easter Convention in Melbourne. I took the opportunity to do three weeks of meetings in Victoria, after which, with a short break in between, it was all go for the three weeks travel over what has become for me familiar territory in the North Island. I took meetings in Lower Hutt, Palmerston North, Wairoa, Napier, Hastings, Gisborne, Tauranga, Rotorua, Auckland, Taupo and Wanganui before returning to Blenheim. This was probably the most productive visit that I have made in as much as such can be gauged. Generally meetings were reasonably well attended.

AUSTRALIA: In April I held meetings in Glen Waverley, Shepparton, Ballarat, Warrnambool, Lilydale and Melbourne, leaving the major part of Australia to the later visit in June/July of which the following is a high-light report:

PHILIP'S MINISTRY TOUR OF AUSTRALIA June 17-July 27, 1999

I had a worthwhile, though somewhat gruelling, ministry tour of Australia, starting in Sydney with a meeting the very night that I arrived. This was small in attendance but encouraging to the local folks, who are led by a brother who resigned from AoG over the "funny stuff" and are now supporting each other in their stand. The leader is very supportive of CWM and Moriel.

The next day I made my way to an Anglican Chaplain of a University, who has a very challenging ministry in the western suburbs. The night meeting was good with a number of university students listening and asking interesting questions. The chaplain is an excellent man and I think we forged a friendship which could augur well for the future. As most will know Sydney is a stronghold of Evangelical Anglicanism.

The main event in Sydney and one of the more significant for the entire tour was the weekend at the Baulkham Hills CMA (Christian and Missionary Alliance) Church. It's a strong and strategic church being situated close to Baulkham Hills AoG which "churns out" Hill Song etc.

I am quite sure that many of the current anomalies, heresies, perversions and plain seductions of Christianity stem from the music mania and the false preaching and teaching of churches such as CLC at Baulkham Hills, Sydney, Australia. Unfortunately Senior Pastor Brian Houston, who is a talented and very popular young man, has been influenced too much by the apparently successful preachers of the false Faith and Prosperity school of thought from America. Now that he is Superintendent of the largest Pentecostal denomination in Australasia, unless he very soon sees the error of his ways, the already widespread perversions and seductions will spread like cancer.

It saddens me a great deal that the movement of which my forebears were pioneers in the British expression of it, is now seen in the Australasian counterpart, to be leading the drift into apostasy.

In contrast the man who pastors the Baulkham Hills CMA and who was himself an AoG pastor has seen through what's happening. It is rewarding to sense a genuine expression of the Christian gospel through this CMA church being so closely situated to the deceived AoG one.
In Sydney I hired a car and drove up the coast of NSW to Brisbane calling off each day to visit Presbyterian and Anglican Church contacts and minister to their leaders and/or congregations. It was an interesting "ice-breaking" exercise, meeting unique leaders who have much to offer.

One was a true academic who after hearing me suggested that may be I could have some in-put next time in their denominational bible college, something which would appeal to me a great deal. All of the Anglican and Presbyterian ministers that I met are true Bible believers.

Interestingly one told me that they no longer automatically recognise their counterparts from other countries. For example they consider those who use their denominational name in New Zealand to be in heresy and have recently taken a stand not to endorse ministers from New Zealand who carry the Presbyterian tag.

I participated in a conference in Brisbane organised by Pastor Kerry Angilley. This was not well attended but it was a start and may be something will be built on the foundation or maybe the Lord will use it to launch something quite different.

I held two public meetings in Brisbane. These were organised on an ad-hoc basis and at short notice and were better attended and more encouraging than those in South Queensland that had been projected further ahead. In all, I spoke some nine times in 10 days including travel in the NSW coast and Brisbane sector of the tour, which was followed by meetings at Cairns, Darwin, Geraldton, Perth, Tasmania and Victoria.

I arrived back in Blenheim rather tired after six weeks with some 40 plus preaching engagements. If I do it again I must schedule some rest time. One morning I felt right at the end of my tether and had a two-stage flight plus a meeting that night. I was in Darwin where it's always hot and mostly humid though not quite as bad as it can be at other times of the year. They know only "dry" and "wet" in so far as seasons are concerned — no summer, winter, spring, autumn etc. Fortunately it was dry when we were there.
My wife, Kathleen and our son Jonathan were leaving early — about 6am — to spend their final week with our second son, David and his family, at Canberra. I planned to see them off at the Darwin airport but was too ill to make it. After a bit of a sleep in and a dose of vitamins which my son-in-law gave me on his mother-in-law's instructions plus some headache tablets, I managed to get the flight and as it turned out we had quite a good meeting at the Geraldton Baptist Church. That was just one incident which I tell to evoke a bit of sympathy.

In Darwin we were delighted to welcome some Aboriginal people who had come from Arnhem Land especially for the meetings. They attended all four nights and were a great encouragement to us all. They say some of their people have embraced the "nonsense" revival, but others see right through it.. They invited me to preach in their territory as did another leader from Ayre in Northern Queensland. This is something that we need to pray earnestly about.

The tour took me all around Australia so I had different sorts of weather to endure. I found the weather and everything about Cairns under the expert organisation of Hughie and Colleen Seaborn very pleasant indeed. After Geraldton and Perth, where hospitality and accommodation were provided by our good friends John and Joan Phillips, I flew to Tasmania and into winter with a vengeance as far as temperature is concerned. It was perishing and I almost did. This was new territory for me and real pioneer stuff with small congregations at all the meetings, but I sensed we broke through and next time will be much better, God willing. We met good new friends.

The Perth folks came up with an idea to help us in financing the increasing mailing bill that we face world-wide. They call it OPERATION POSTAGE STAMP.

The idea is that folks set aside say a dollar a week and send the accumulated amount collected from the group at regular intervals to the nearest CWM Office. Thanks John and Joan for the idea. May be others will follow suit and it will become something really productive in the things of the Kingdom.

I finished up in country Victoria and Melbourne where I was able to spend some time with our eldest son, Stephen and where, apart from one new contact, the Italian independent Pentecostal Church, I was among old friends. The visit to the new Italian Church extended the net so to speak and brought in some new contacts as did Cairns and most other places. We now have 2023 names and addresses on our Australia database.

I am grateful to all friends — new and old — who contributed to the success of all four tours. Particular thanks to those who helped to co-ordinate the meetings — Peter Lewis, Jan Tweedie and James Jit in New Zealand and Maureen O'Brien and the CWM team in Australia.

MATTERS FOR PRAYER

VOLUNTEERS:

The Lord has added so many to CWM that it would be foolish to try to mention them all by name. So I'll list them in teams:
• NAPIER, NZ — Soon after launching CETF a group of people from the Hawkes Bay area started to support us practically and have remained loyal throughout. Some of these form the team that maintains our New Zealand and overseas database and handles the bulk mailing and some of the resource dispatch of the NZ operation. Please remember them all in your prayers.

• Loch Sport, AU — Location of CWM Australia and the place from which many ideas emanate and the publications and resource material circulates. The team includes our Australian printers who are currently putting my messages in book form. Please pray for them and for this new venture — that the necessary finance will be forthcoming to launch the project; and that it will proceed smoothly and with speed.

• LONDON, UK — Since launching the ministry in Great Britain the administration has been split between Preston in the north and London in the south. This will now come together as explained elsewhere in this CETF. We are very thankful for the past help of our friends Paul and Ruth Nuttall from Lancashire. They have been a real blessing to the work. Please pray for the progress of VANGUARD & CETF and the establishment of a CWM Resource base in Great Britain, where, due to the larger population base, the potential is considerable.

EMAIL AND INTERNET:

I have discovered that email is a mixed blessing. Correspondence is easy and rapid, but it tends to generate a communications "bottle-neck". Being involved, at editorial level, with two international publications requires that we receive, monitor and file lots of information documents. It is impossible for one person to do this efficiently, so mail has to be filtered. I am grateful for past assistance, which has been carried out by Dean Flanders in USA, who offered to help me. The task has now been taken over by a person who is based in Brisbane, Australia and who will be gradually establishing a team of researchers and mail assistants to work with him so as to spread the load.

As long as I am able I will continue to deal with most if not all personal mail myself. If you have written and have not received a response then please forgive me. At times I have had up to 200 emails in my IN BOX awaiting attention and action. Hopefully things will change in this regard shortly. We are always keen to hear from you, so don't give up writing. Email is better than what is now called snail-mail!

WEB SITES:

CWM now has its own domain web site

We are keen to establish a small team of workers to help in this work. It will require a certain amount of expertise. If you are interested you can contact our NZ based web site manager from our site.

TRANSCRIBING, TYPING, etc:

For some time friends from Auckland and more recently from Alexandra have helped with my typing load. We are grateful. Now as the work of publishing books, etc looms it is likely that more help will be required. Access to a transcriber and being on email would certainly be bonuses. Once more we look to the Lord and His people. Thank you for praying!

Finally... Finance and That Lap top Computer:

Please pray that the right unit will be acquired at reasonable cost, so as to avoid extra pressure on our limited finance.

We are grateful to all those who have helped us financially. Some do this by sending occasional donations through the post; others do it on a regular basis. A few have decided to do it by bank transfer.

Please remember us in your prayers. Thank you.

Please also Pray for future Ministry Tours:

• An Invitation to Malaysia and Singapore;

• Ministry to the Aborigines in Queensland and NT;

• Other Countries that have expressed interest in CWM and a ministry visit.

Appeared in Volume 5.2 September 1999