Green but Keen was originally written as an overview of our lives for our children as an ever present encouragement to them of Gods Greatness and Goodness. However; since then God has released me to make this available to others as I feel lead to do so.
Trust this becomes a blessing to you also - as it is always to us.
We were green but keen as we responded to the call of GOD upon our lives to serve Him as missionaries to Papua New Guinea back in the early seventies.
Preaching The Gospel over the hilltops and sweeping people into the kingdom of GOD was what had energised our enthusiasm as we ventured out on this whole new experience in life.
The reality was that it was to become a whole different scenario than we had anticipated. Lumbering along in Fokker Friendship aircraft of those days was
certainly much different to the modem aircraft of today and when we did eventually touchdown at Port Moresby, the main entrance to Papua New Guinea, we were overwhelmed by the intense heat as we walked through the opened door of the aircraft and then made our way across the black bitumen tarmac.
This journey though really began as a result of an incredible transformation that had taken place in our lives at an earlier stage.
As for me, Roy, my whole life began to turn around for good in 1962 when following a challenge to go to church I decided then, at the age of 27 to invite
CHRIST into my life. Up to that point of time my life was really going nowhere. I had been institutionalized at a very early age due to family breakdown and my mothers inability to adequately care for me...and my sister.
These early years of foundationally framing my life within the institution did not in any way prepare me for a life outside but rather built into me a
resentment and tough protective exterior - devoid of any resemblance of love.
The unforgettable experiences of rejection at the tender age of six accompanied with the brutality of being beaten with a cane rod whilst under a cold shower and led to believe that no one wanted me or otherwise I with many others would not have been deposited here. Chased, caught and beaten with a stockwhip for childhood misdemeanours seemed to me, and was, a totally inappropriate measure of punishment for a young child which only worked to reinforce what a useless piece of meat or incorrigible child I must have been.
For six whole years during the tender and formative years of my life from six to twelve I with many others endured the verbal and physical brutality at the hands of our carer.
When I was eventually released from this cage I then had to try to adapt to the other world out there as my mother had remarried but to a drunken man who had little concern or ability to properly care for me.
Wow did I have a hate relationship toward my new daddy and he also though doing his best was in no way the measure of the man that I could hope to aspire to be. Hate, resentment, rejection, were a constant chip on my shoulder and were as literal to me as every breath I took and they accompanied me everywhere.
Whilst unbelievably I did have an academic mind but through resentment, hatred and rejection I belittled the opportunities that were before me and was a
constant truant from school instead, selling newspapers from hotel to hotel to make some money. Though lacking the educational qualifications desired or
required, my innate academic potential accompanied with broad general skills had and continues to serve me well in this journey through life.
Turbulent years were ahead of me as this useless piece of meat most probably created for himself much of the misfortune he suffered. Life became too much to bear with the constant load of carrying these three indictments of hate, resentment and rejection with me into every place I went or relationship I had so I decided to pull the plug and purchased a double barrel shotgun and shot myself. I had the last rites over my life but to the amazement of all and myself as well, I just wouldn't or couldn't die........ it was not my time to go.
In actual fact if I had been on Gods roll call of "come up here" there certainly were plenty of opportunities prior to my attempted suicide for Him to have brought it to pass.
As an extremely young child I nearly drowned in the natural spring baths of Moree but was saved by my sister and during the reckless years of life following my release from institutionalised living I had numerous situations that ought to have seen me escape, through the passage of death, from the seeming madness of this world.
As an amateur track cyclist during my teenage years much preparation and devotion was given to excellence through untiring and rigorous training regimes which on one occasion resulted in a near death situation that left me with a double fracture at the base of my skull and in a coma for two weeks and much to the amazement of my doctor who always maintained that I should be "pushing up daises"....but...I survived.
How about hitting a concrete bridge head on at sixty miles mph/hundred kph or over the edge of the mountainous road of Macquarie Pass or failing that a
critical smash at a busy intersection from which I suffered severe head injuries, brain damage and epileptic type seizures.
Life for me was certainly on track for disaster and was repeatedly occurring up until I commenced to give at least a token consideration of God..
1962 how I remember it so clearly as I at last found some one who with their unconditional love accepted and embraced this rejected piece of humanity who for years upon years had carried the baggage of hate, resentment and rejection.
Home at last, found not lost, accepted not rejected, loved not resented.. wow, I had never ever in my whole life to this point ever conceived as
comprehensible that I could or would ever experience such a glorious emotion of release as JESUS CHRIST entered my life and gave me a whole new purpose for living. I think the greatest new challenge that I faced out of all of this was the challenge of LOVE. Love, what do you do with that, how do you handle it, how do you cope with it, how do you respond to it and how do you show/demonstrate it.
LOVE ..a totally foreign commodity to me and whilst I embraced it from GOD to the best of my ability I still struggled for a number of years of relating and
walking in this realm as I was being retrained by GOD to trust humanity, their love toward me and my love toward them.
WOW, what a wonderfully exciting journey I was embarking on in this New Life in CHRIST. It truly was as if I was born again, the old had changed and the new had commenced. The places I had visited, the hotels I drank at the profanities I uttered and the cigarettes I smoked were all losing their appeal and attractiveness and place in my life that they each held and instead were replaced with reality of life instead of these substitutes. Gods word, the little I knew of it was becoming reality.... things like where The Bible says in Revelation 21:5 Behold I make all things new was sure happening in my life. Yes even the epileptic seizures that resulted in me being medically unfit to drive, with loss of licence and placed on regular medication became a thing of the past as God delivered me from this and gave me a life of normality again, no medication and medically fit to obtain my drivers licence again.
WOW... what a great GOD. What an incredible mystery it all is...There was nothing, absolutely nothing in this world that I had tried or come across that
could fill the void and vacuum that apparently existed in my life. From dancing to dungeons can you imagine that, the dance hall of "happiness" to the dungeons of the police lockup and everything in between those spectrums of life there was nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing outside of CHRIST that could come anywhere near to meeting the apparent void I obviously had but was completely unaware of.
God being no respecter of persons can obviously meet the needs of all who will call on HIM.
GREEN but KEEN I surely was as I totally embraced the greatness and goodness of God toward me so much so that all I wanted to do was to please HIM and flow with whatever plans He had for my life. It was during these experiences of "settling in" to my new way of living that GOD placed within me the ability to give, after all HE did say in HIS word that HE would take away my heart of stone and give me a heart of flesh Ezekiel 11:19-20 which is so absolutely essential for a total turn around in life and for the essential equipping to respond in obedience, desire and love to the will of GOD.
By this time God had also as well provided me with the most glorious companion to walk with me for the rest of my life as I had informed and reminded
The LORD previously that having been a woman lover I certainly needed one of HIS choosing to which HE certainly chose wisely.
So here I am now with a beautiful wife at hand and plans for the future, previously no funds at hand but now saving madly to pay off a block of land we
had hoped to build on. It was during this critical stage of our lives in the early sixties that GOD impressed upon us to make a gift of 1000pounds/$2000
toward the costs of sending some missionaries to Papua New Guinea and little did we know in the years to follow we would be serving with them in the remote highlands region of that primitive country to our north.
WOW, what a journey I had travelled so quickly in such a short time compared to the former 27 years of my life and how radically different my perspective on life had become.
I had lived both sides of the fence and was now truly in the position to evaluate the merits of both and believe me that a new life in CHRIST is so incredibly exciting and fulfilling that anything else pales into insignificance totally. Remember, I had tried the spectrum of "things" for years on end and I thought that was it, and kept going back for more and more and more and more to meet my needs or to run with the crowd but as soon as I invited Christ into my life......I was home, how wonderful that was, I was now complete, the vacuum was filled the needs met and the journey began.. The miracle of giving came as a whole new experience for me as God took time out to have me understand that He would be my provider.
With the background I came from and the insecurities I carried I was in no way certain of ever having sufficient to meet my needs and certainly up to this
point had nothing of substance to fall back on though I did have a car. Well, it was by means of this car, the only possession I had that God proved His desire to be a blessing to me financially. You see this car finally had to have major repairs done to its gearbox and being gifted mechanically I was able to strip the gearbox down, isolate its problem then leave it as such because I had no funds to fix it. Even as I think of it now, many, many, many years later I am still amazed when I suddenly exclaimed, "the cars going on the road, the cars going on the road." I just knew somehow that it was going to be repaired but certainly had no idea what was to follow. The next Sunday a dear lady from the church drove me to the railway station so I could catch the train and as I was leaving she pressed an envelope into my hand which later I found to contain 50pounds/$100.
This was a most awkward and embarrassing moment for me as no one had ever just slipped money into my hand and I could hardly wait to return her gift to her. This dear lady politely refused to accept her gift back saying to me that The Lord had told her to give it to me and after some mind searching God made it clear that this money was directly related to that awareness I had of "the car was going on the road" the car was going on the road.
What a valuable lesson God so graciously provided for me of His desire and ability to bless. Gloria and I during our courtship commenced a strict saving
policy which enabled us to purchase a block of land on which we were to build our first dream home. What an incredible turn around our lives were taking from the impossibilities of previous poverty to the preparedness of purchasing our own home
It was at this critical and adventurous time in our lives that God placed a call on our lives to serve Him as missionaries to the primitive people of Papua New Guinea. In our eagerness and anticipation we immediately placed a For Sale sign on the land and I quit my job but the land did not sell and we didn't take off to New Guinea as quickly as anticipated....Yes we were KEEN but GREEN and God also was letting us build a security base for when we returned. During this delay we began to understand that it was OK with God for us to go ahead and build and as I had quit my job I then contracted myself to large companies working out of home on a cash on quote basis.
Papua New Guinea was to be for us the highlight of our lives and an experience that will never be forgotten and we feel SO PRIVILEGED to have been
called of The Lord to serve Him there prior to their self government and we remained there following their independence.
Eight glorious years of privilege and opportunity.
The first 4 years we were sent out from our local church but the second 4 years God told us to take a step of faith and go unsupported which opened up for us another amazing adventure of faith as God led and provided which is another story of its own. Whilst I was given a blank cheque by a business friend and the offer of a job upon arriving in Papua New Guinea I was instructed by The Lord not to accept either one but to trust wholly on Him for the welfare of our family. My self, my wife and our two young children....yes God came through..Hallelujah.
We had read about it in books and now God was giving us the opportunity of experiencing it for ourselves. Like I said, another story of itself.
It was these years of trust, challenge, belief and faith that we saw the miraculous hand of God in so many incredible situations, from his hand of provision and healing and wholeness upon the lives of our own two children to the raising from the dead of another two children whom the natives had believed
God for .God also proved His faithfulness to us in teaching us to trust Him in hardship and watching the miraculous provision from His hand in seemingly
impossible situations.
Even here in PNG after being hit by a truck life was about to be snatched away from me again. Following the most major surgery ever conducted in the
Goroka Hospital I was eventually given up for dead until one morning at 3am God woke a missionary friend to intercede for me at which time I awoke out of a dying state, sat up in bed and exclaimed 3 times...I'm a new man, I'm a new man, I'm a new man, then immediately lapsed back into
unconsciousness.
The next morning the medical team were amazed at my recovery and began to unharness me from all the paraphernalia they had attached to my body. As if that wasn’t enough, as a family whilst in Madang we all finished up in crocodile infested waters after having to jump out of a dugout canoe that was taking on water. Praise God for His covering over our lives in that situation also.
Leaving Papua New Guinea, its people and our years of service was extremely difficult and took quite a number of years before we were released from the deep emotional significance it had played in our lives. In actual fact we felt more like aliens in our own country and were treated as such it seemed as we
endeavoured to embrace again this Ozzie culture that we had left behind.
Times were tough, but God was faithful as I became the untouchable in my own country because I refused to bow to union pressures. I was ostracized by
workmates and employers, taken before the courts, hounded by all sections of the media ,for whatever front page, TV and radio sensationalist story they could make right across Australia of my predicament and stance against union pressure. Australia’s most famous radio personality John Laws took a stand for me and the then Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser offered me the option of Federal Award coverage to override the unions assault on me, which Ideclined to compromise with.
None of this seemed like a fair reward for us haven given the most productive years of our lives on minimal support in Papua New Guinea yet it was but another opportunity for the goodness of God to be demonstrated toward us again.
Now I reckon that I must have one of the greatest mother in laws ever, but having to live in cramped quarters with each other was something that would not prove beneficial in the long run. As much as we appreciated the loving kindness of Gloria's mum we just knew that we had to move on and get into a place of our own.
I recall ever so clearly that the foundation for this move was established in a small home group prayer meeting of people who were genuinely concerned for appropriate housing for Gloria, myself and our two children. What an awesome evening as we were encouraged to push the boundaries of faith and lay before The Lord the "specifics of what we desired" which came down to a 4 bedroom home at least and plenty of room so we could provide hospitality to others all of which was for us a big ask. In the eager excitement and genuine plea to The Lord that evening I dropped the baton when I heard one dear soul say to the Lord, and Lord, throw in a swimming pool. Yes the outcome of that evening together was that we finished up with a 5 bedroom home, 2 bathrooms, a downstairs rumpus room, undercover parking for 2 vehicles and yes you guessed it...a swimming pool.
It was one thing to believe for a house, another to find the house and then another to get finance to purchase the house.
REMEMBER we had been out of the country for the best part of 10 years, had no credit rating to call on and no reserves that the Bank of New South Wales, now Westpac would consider credible but God set up a relief manager in a small suburban bank to handle our application. During this interview I was compelled ever so eagerly to minister to this manager which I though was or would be to the detriment of the financial assistance we were seeking. Some weeks later the approval came through, we made the purchase, however the bank did not request or follow up for repayments which gave us additional time to become more financially secure. After 2 months had passed I notified the bank of their oversight and we were not required of them to make up for their error.
From an unemployable living under the roof of his mother in law we became a self employed family of extended individuals as we embraced into our lives and home another 3 additional young ladies in need of covering and caring as they journeyed on in life and their walk with The Lord.
These young girls, all now married with their own adult families remain so very close and grateful for being family with us during their younger years.
WOW isn't God great. Following this exciting experience and with the addition of these three extra lovely young ladies into our family we were prepared for the next exciting move of God in our lives. How much we enjoyed and were privileged to also invest our parenting into the lives of these three lovely
young ladies who have gone on to be lifelong precious gems who are now raising families of their own.
In the midst of all the growth strategies and faith journeys that we were experiencing we were challenged to move to an elite area of the North Shore of
Sydney and our extended family of three chose to move with us. We look back on this experience with incredulous amazement as we, the previous poverty conscious ones were now living amongst the more affluent of society and were even offered a second attractive residence with its own bomb shelter, swimming pool and exclusive setting with all transfer removal expenses paid. GOD surely must have a sense of humour to do something like this.
From here with our own two children we moved to Canada where we had an exciting and new cultural experience as we attended a full time Seniors Advanced Bible & Training College.
This period for us like any previous faith venture we responded to on a "word from The Lord" was a constant reliance on Gods ability and willingness to supply all our needs and it was during this time that I was tempted to increase the possibilities for our financial comfort by investing in an arbitrage arrangement that many of our colleagues were receiving handsome returns from.
God in His great mercy ever so clearly suggested to me not to go ahead with my plans as He ever so "silently" dropped...Prov 20:21 in my ear when paraphrased suggests that money easily gained is hastily lost, but oh no not on this one as I was witnessing with my own eyes the returns others were receiving and the lifestyle they were enjoying. Needless to say our $20,000 went down the drain as did the investments of others as the arbitrage junket collapsed in a heap under a fraudulent conspiracy. Sensitivity to the Holy spirit was and continues to be an exercise in process to be learned and trusted regardless of the naturalness and observation of seeming realities.
Thank God for His ever willing desire to bless, love and cherish us in spite of the far too frequent blunders that we tend to make.
It wasn't long after returning from Canada to Australia and settling back into the normality of life again that God provided us with another challenge,
opportunity or option to step out again into the "unknown" which took us on a journey to Queensland where we now reside.
The challenge and vision related to this move was that we were to become a ministry to ministers breaking new ground in this area. This journey into the
"unknown" both in the natural and spiritual saw us with no home to occupy and having to live in a caravan park for the first three months. We existed
financially at this time on the interest we were receiving from our house sale funds that we had invested in Rothwells Merchant Bank that was providing 17.5% returns at the time. Our housing needs were becoming critical and The lord made available for us the residence of a local doctor who wanted to move onto acreage for his children. Thankfully the Lord enabled us to purchase this home outright at a well below market value and shortly after we withdrew our finances from Rothwells Merchant Bank it also collapsed due to fraudulent management practices.
We continue to live a life of expectancy and anticipation in God for the new and exciting adventures in our lives.
Our children are happily married, on fire for God and raising their own families as are the three young ladies God allowed us to care for and parent in
Him.
God has privileged us from the poor and insecure foundations of our lives to journey with Him on constant adventures of excitement that we could have never ever imagined possible. Japan - Hong Kong - Fiji - New Zealand - Pago Pago - Noumea - Indonesia - Philippines - Vietnam - Hawaii and America numerous times where we travelled over 33 States of the USA and Alberta and British Columbia as well. We also have visited every State in Australia including Tasmania as well as numerous Motorhoming trips.
Since 1985 we have always been totally debt free owning our own house, cars and a reasonably luxurious Motorhome. God has enable us to give
a number of cars to folk in need and enabled us to contribute many, many, many many, thousands of dollars to assist others in their times of need or just to bless them regardless, which we still are able to do and as mentioned on the previous page have even financially assisted a couple of Christian business men who were facing financial difficulties..... Praise GOD.... Just like 1Kings17:12-16 & 2Kings 4:2-6
Nothing much to start with but with Gods enabling sufficiency beyond measure.
Rescuing eight families from poverty in India by providing them with Rickshaws for an enduring economic wealth uplift.
Assisting in providing sanitation by way of toilet facilities and fresh water tanks to Missionaries in remote regions of Cambodia with the possible purchase also for them of a New TukTuk to provide transport and income assistance. The list goes on and on and on and on and with aid to the Philippines and the like.
Sounds like a brag session doesn't it...but it's not.
NONE of this would be possible at all without THE BLESSING OF GOD......It is ALL ABOUT HIM.
We ALL have a story, this is just ours, but it is HE - our great GOD Yaweh who gets ALL the Glory......Amen.
WOW...Isn’t GOD GREAT.
It isn’t how much you have it is how much you are willing to give.
This is but a very brief overview of hope, possibility and encouragement of what God can do for anyone that will put their trust in
HIM.
This truly is not about ourselves --------- it is all about the goodness and greatness of GOD to whom we give glory and whom we love and appreciate intensely
Our walk with God has never been a walk of sacrifice but rather an opportunity and privilege He has provided, in which we have been blessed by Him.
CHRIST IS LIFE
Everything else is but a substitute for reality.
Believe in HIM trust HIM and worship HIM
HE IS WORTHY.
Roy
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