2019 update from Peter

I’ve been out of my bed (and therefore home) for over 20 weeks this year. Wonderfully, four of those weeks included Julie and me celebrating our 60th birthdays together.

Mostly, however, those 20 weeks involved me sharing Father’s heart in one way or another with people at conferences, seminars, small groups, or one-on-one, both in Australia and overseas.
We’re increasingly convicted that unless people know and live out of their identity, nothing changes.

It doesn’t matter what shaped expression of Kingdom-life they participate in, or how many house churches they’ve planted, or how many people they mentor, or what language they use, or what
songs they sing, or even if they don’t sing at all … if it’s not grounded in the magnificence of Father’s love for them, then it’s bound to go belly-up sooner or later. Or they get jaded and burn out. Or they
become disillusioned and opt out. Or they start comparing, grow judgemental, and blurt out.

The only thing that lasts is knowing you are a son, a daughter, that in heaven you’re called beloved, that you have a personal Papa-God as the ruler of the universe, and that he is completely besotted
with you.

That’s why I write. Holy Spirit started it a few years ago with ‘Suddenly’. Then followed ‘Favoured’, and now ‘Spirited’. I don’t write a thing without surrendering it all to Father first, and I only proceed
when I get a clear yes from him. I write so that the message that’s on my heart can get out to everyone. I promote what I write so that more and more can get into the heart of what Father has
scribed through me.

I’m so grateful for how ‘Spirited’ turned out because I know the struggle that was against some of that being written. It’s proving a real blessing. I’m currently writing about the freedom journey: out of whatever it is that enslaves us, and into the land of freedom, but all via the wilderness.

This year marked ten years since we left Good Shepherd Para Vista and church-as-we-knew-it. The funny thing is that we probably now spend 70% of our time in denominational and organised constructs. What Father delivered me from, sometimes as a source of false identity, he now entrusts me enough to send me back into, to speak life to his many orphans, busying themselves with systems and procedures, events and programs, but many times not knowing his heart and not living loved.

Ten years! Without a fixed and predictable income. Ten years of Father’s generosity in so many ways. We’ve been to the wire many times, down on our knees and crying out, but He is so faithful. He called us, and he sustains us. We regularly check in with him as to whether he wants us to continue living this way, and so far, we’ve heard the same thing.

We sense we’re a prophetic picture to God’s people everywhere that when he calls, he provides. You get on with what he’s called, leave the support to him.

In Southern Asia this year I had both of my three-day workshops cut short due to police raids. I was followed at the first one a number of times. At the last one, we were raided, mid-teaching! I was interrogated by the immigration police for an hour before the workshop was shut down. Holy Spirit gave me such an opportunity to lift up the name of Jesus and share love and hope with those interrogating me. Such is the nature of what I’d been teaching that day, that if I’d taught for three months, it couldn’t have had more impact than it did by being interrupted and closed in the manner it was. The Lordship of Jesus proves triumphant again.

This is true for you and every area of your life. Father God is in control. You and I have the amazing privilege of partnering with him every step of the way.

Wherever we are, wherever we go, this is the heart of what we share:

The mature children of God are those who are moved by the impulses of the Holy Spirit. And you did not receive the “spirit of religious duty,” leading you back into the fear of never being good enough. But you have received the “Spirit of full acceptance,” enfolding you into the family of God. And you will never feel orphaned, for as he rises up within us, our spirits join him in saying the words of tender affection, “Beloved Father!” For the Holy Spirit makes God’s fatherhood real to us as he whispers into our innermost being, “You are God’s beloved child!” And since we are his true children, we qualify to share all his treasures, for indeed, we are heirs of God himself. And since we are joined to Christ, we also inherit all that he is and all that he has. We will experience being co-glorified with him provided that we accept his sufferings as our own. (Romans 8:14-17, TPT)