Winkie's Blog

Traveling Sparrows Update, California

online@israelanderson.com — 2012-06-07T00:06:33-06:00

We've been having great time here in the States. Winkie began ministering the second day we got here, sharing with a discipleship group held in West Covina that was filled with musicians, music producers and ministers kids. There we also heard and got to meet Chris Web, a talented young black spoken word artist and performer. The following day Winkie shared with an urban street evangelism and missions training school from Dallas, Texas in downtown Hollywood. That night I went out on Hollywood Blvd and ministered a bit with them. Last Sunday Winkie ministered at a church in Brea called The Cause, Community Church. This week he's ministering at a ministry leadership development school at Youth With A Mission, Los Angeles. This coming weekend we visit His Way Church, Orange County, where Winkie will share at their evening service. The weekend following he'll be sharing at the morning service of The Connection Church in Poway (near San Diego). After that it's back to YWAM LA where he'll be sharing with a revivalist training school called Circuit Riders. On the 24th he's scheduled to speak at both morning services at Harvest Rock Church, in Pasadena.

It's been great catching up with old friends and making new ones. It feels like we've been so busy! There's hardly any down time. I hope to catch up with some friends while I'm here and look forwards to what God is going to do our lives.

God bless you!

Kind regards,

William D. Pratney

Help Us Bring the Pratneys Back to the US

online@israelanderson.com — 2012-04-19T17:29:52-06:00

A large part of our ministry here at Ministry of Helps (moh.org) is devoted to undergirding the ministry of Winkie Pratney. Not only do we provide administrative support and manage www.moh.org and www.winkiepratney.com, but we are also focused on preserving and making available Winkie’s body of work and helping the Pratneys as they continue in ministry.

Each year seems to have its own special flavor and though we thought last year would be hard to top, this year is already shaping up to be just as wonderful - if not more so. This year, with the incredibly wonderful help of a church in Sarasota, Florida called “The Barn”, (and the Holy Spirit) we will finish the Winkie Video Project we started almost 5 years ago. All 200 hrs of video donated by Last Days Ministries have been successfully captured and are now being edited and converted to usable formats for future use. Praise God! This is HUGE.

Now we are in the last 6 weeks of preparing for the Pratneys 2012 return to the US for 6 months of ministry. Doors have opened wide, with invitations and preparations being made for a full month of ministry in California as well as for ministry times in Minnesota, Michigan, Florida, Texas and elsewhere. It is obvious that the Lord wants the Pratneys in ministry here this year and we are excited to be able to be a part in the communications and coordination for that effort.

However, we need your help. Travel costs have risen sharply, even since last years trip, and the money that has come in so far to help pay for the Pratneys travel to the US and back to NZ is not sufficient to meet the need. As we are committed to helping them would you prayerfully consider helping us?

Pray earnestly that the Lord will meet this need fully and quickly. The need, as I write this, is more than $7,000.00. Visa requirements necessitate round-trip tickets and even though we are checking on rock bottom prices, we are hoping to make the trip as easy as possible for Winkie while he continues to regain strength and endurance. As we join together to lift up this need and, in fact, the entire trip and time of ministry - we know that our combined bombardment of heaven will produce wonderful and eternal results. Together we are stronger! (Eccl 4:9-12)

Here at MOH, we have turned all of our attention to this and, though we are few, are making it a matter of continual prayer. All other projects requiring funds have been set aside until the Pratneys have tickets in hand. Please also lift us up so we will know how to proceed with this and that God will provide the best value for all our efforts and His provision.

If you are able and your heart moves you to give, please prayerfully consider doing so. All US gifts are tax deductible if given through Ministry of Helps. (receipts are issued once a year). You can easily donate online by going to this page. http://www.moh.org/Support.html. Until this need is met all donations will go toward Pratney Travel unless otherwise specified. Mailing a check is also an option and our address is:

Ministry of Helps
PO Box 1835
Lindale TX 75771

If you have been considering making a donation to receive a Revival Study Bible now would be a GREAT time to do that. We do have some Bibles on hand and all the funds from our distribution (aside from the actual cost of the Bibles) will go toward this need. Links to get the RSB are found on www.winkiepratney.com (on the front page)

If you need to contact us feel free to email at deepatton [at] moh.org or call (903) 570-8859.

Many blessings and thank you so much for your partnership with us in our efforts to spark revival, go for souls and make disciples.

Dee Patton
deepatton [at] moh.org

THE REST OF THE STORY - 2011 Part Two

online@israelanderson.com — 2012-01-23T23:26:19-07:00

THE REST OF THE STORY - 2011 Part Two

One of the hardest things we ever had to do when we first began to return to New Zealand from overseas was to be asked to speak to a home gathering of friends at my parents place in Papakura. We were asked the embarrassing question: “So what did you do?”

With apologies for all of you who asked the same question. I have tried to do what has been really difficult every year; somehow fit into a short time, something of just how much adventure and visitation that keeps coming when we try to just do what He gives us in our travels.

Those who imagine the Christian life is somehow boring and dull need to get packed into our suitcase and see what you would say when it happens to you. As Barry McGuire said: “When you walk with the Lord you don’t get bored.”

In my previous blog I touched briefly on some key places spoken at. I am just short of three million miles on my Advantage frequent Flyer card, and I have friends who have millions more.

During our five months in the U.S. some of the places we ministered were:
YWAM - Mexico USA National Leaders, Wagner Leadership Institute, Harvest Rock (Che Ahn), Sunland SOE, Agape Force Reunion, Lindale TX, Family Night YWAM Garden Valley, YWAM Tyler SOTB (Larry Allen), Dave Buehring “Fathers of the Faith” (Dallas TX)

Friends ministry: Jill and Joy Dawson, Ron & Judy Radache (Sunland), Jimmy & Carol Owens, Jamie & Dan Collins, Phyllis Precious (Evening Youth Event), Tony & Kathy Salerno, Bob Maddux (Poway CA), Rob DeLuca (His Way), Buddy & Caroline Hicks (Humble TX), Doug Stringer, Peter Wagner, Jacob Aranza, Lou Engel, Tim Dilena (War Week Detroit), Richard Crisco, Bree Patton wedding (Bowling Green Ohio), Marick & Sheila who we saw in Houston.

Collegiate: Sam Houston, Rice University, 6 colleges week-end Chi Alpha Huntsville TX 23-26th September

Churches: Corpus Christi, TX AOG Huntsville TX

Meeting more music-makers: Both in the US and in New Zealand I have had a number of visits to my revival libraries loaded with history of their craft from gifted musicians and songwriters. It has been a privilege to spend time with many young worship leaders and singers, to pass on to them some things learned about the Lord’s work and gifting in their own callings over the past fifty years of my time with many who influenced multitudes musically. Discovering the depths of Spiritual Vocations like those of the Singer, Entrepreneur and Entertainer all rooted in God’s very own nature and character, assigns major significance to a musical life which may not at all be a specifically religious calling. Time with many hundreds of young talented and often deeply prophetic singers in more than five decades of outreaches, Jesus festivals, concerts and collective gatherings has been one of the great privileges I owe Jesus in my own calling and ministry. Keith and Melody Green, Barry McGuire, Second Chapter of Acts, Chuck Girad of Love Song and more recently both Danny and Natasha Bedingfield and Marc Scibilia - such long-term friends.

I have spent many scores of hours recently looking again at the record of God’s investment in musically-gifted lives. Those looked on as legends on their craft almost always had a genuine spiritual call to bless the world. Despite sometimes sad personal losses in their own lives that led to an early or untimely death. without question it was a gift given them by God. Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson and many others showed it before they moved out into eternity.

My own collection of core (music) that affected millions around the world is more than a thousand albums from the 1930-1970’s to multiplied many more modern records of CD and DVD that lead to the technology of our time. I believe as A.W. Tozer noted, that the Speaking Voice still affects multitudes, and that God still speaks to people through music, poetry, dance and song. People who come to visit the Revival Library are sometimes somewhat silently shocked to find there my collection of songs, plays, books, movies and games often functionally non-religious and sometimes non-Christian. I am used to some raised eyebrows. If they do ask, I tell them what John Wesley knew: “If you want to understand a nation, study its entertainment; it is the one thing that unlike food, shelter, clothing they do not need, but that they all spend money on.” What they are looking at in the midst of those thousands of classic church writings is a record of what was going on in the real world when the Lord stepped in again with revival. And through it all, God was often speaking.

Last year I went with my sister Lovonny to see Cliff Richard & his Shadows 50th year reunion in the Auckland waterfront Vector Arena. Long before we married, Fae ,during her early years in Elim Bible College, met some of the band during one of her British witnessing adventures to a London’s Soho area coffee-bar. They were impressed enough with her witness to invite her and her friend over with others, but she didn’t have time. She wrote me back in New Zealand and told me - “I met with some boys in a band; I don’t know who they were, but they were called the Shadows.” Years later in my early days with Youth For Christ, I spent an afternoon with Cliff during one of his many visits to New Zealand for concerts, and he even offered to play a part in a key movie I hoped to do in the future. Both he and Pat Boone, like I did, became real Christians during the sixties, and as my own band before my conversion to Christ modeled much of our kind of music on theirs, their conversion preceding mine by just a few years was a real inspiration to me also as a young Christian.

It was still a blessing to see again Sir Cliff and most of the original Shadows still packing out venues with overflow crowds and repeat performances five decades later. Cliff is not only a legend in music, but the only singer in chart history with a Number 1 hit for five successive decades. I appreciate so much, over the years, his faithful commitment to Christ as did Pat and Shirley Boone who I got to spend some time with in ministry when we first lived in California.

So few who remember other legends like Elvis, Johnny and more recently Michael all now viewed as undisputed “Kings” of their craft, know also that they all traced their huge global influence that touched millions of lives to the gift they were given. They themselves all knew it came from heaven. They affected their world. Listen long enough to the record of their songs and see. The gift and calling of God is without repentance.

In November last year, Will and I also went to our first live U2 360 Concert in Mt Smart Stadium. Again their initial meeting with Jesus during the Jesus Movement in the 70’s and decision not to become a church worship group but a voice to the world (in three areas the church had not dealt with well) has reaped year after year amazing rewards for them, despite whatever odd paths they had wandered to in their journey. Yes, Bono a true Irishman did swear like a trooper (like Martin Luther). True he smoked also (like C.H. Spurgeon.) True he has not always been, in his own words, a great example of a holy minister. But the God Who calls us in such a risky, dangerous field does not pass us by easily and U2 again with much reference to His Word, is the greatest band in the world.

In May after my speaking at his Connection church in Poway, my friend Bob Maddux took us up to a major reunion concert at the Greek Theatre with invited access backstage passes to meet with Brad, one of the three core members of Dispatch. Almost unknown, Dispatch in the 80‘s, bypassed regular marketing and using the new access of Napster developed a following of hundreds of thousands of college students without ever going through record companies, hired advertising or music stores. When another friend the legendary Christian guitarist Phil Keaggy was asked if he could come and help them open one of their early concerts, he had then never heard of them and at first turned them down. To finally join them and discover over 100,000 people at their concert blew his mind. Something like a modern three-man Simon & Garfunkel version from the 60’s but far more than acoustic folk, Chad "Chetro" Stokes - (lead vocals, backup vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass, percussions) Pete "Repete" Heimbold - (lead vocals, backup vocals, bass, banjo, dobro, acoustic guitar, electric guitar) and the Christian songwriter of them Brad "Braddigan" Corrigan - (lead vocals, backup vocals, drums, percussions, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, piano, organ, harmonica) still drew tens of thousands to their quietly net-only known concerts.

It is always a wonder to me how many major music groups in today’s world have some kind of spiritual connection regardless of their own background. This is many times not at all religious, but almost always tied into the special world that somehow refers to God. Bob Marley’s Family singing Rasta were the opening act for the Dispatch concert, and despite small references to grass and wine, managed to sound more like a church worship choir.The Greek Theatre was pretty packed out with an audience keen on their original and new music. Our breakfast with Brad the next morning as Bob and his doctor friend spent some time with him in using finances from their concerts to reach the poor, the hopeless and helpless in other nations spoke volumes to me about Brads creative life. I was impressed with the depth not only of his musical mastery and songwriting gifts, but his wisdom in Biblical commitment and his willingness to use his finances to help others in places of poverty, persecution or privation. A.W. Tozer used to call these other-world inspirational visitations The Speaking Voice; in ancient Greece they called it the Muse. What I am sure of is that God still speaks to mankind in many more places than churches, synagogues and worship centers. Stewart Hamblen’s wife reminded the Gaithers doing some of his global-nation loved songs like It Is No Secret translated into over forty languages that God speaks again and again even if we don’t know Him. God is continuing to raise up prophetic voices in the midst of a generation with little recognition of His righteousness.

Another couple we count as great friends over many years are David and Sherrill Palmquist. We have had the honor of spending time with them both in the U.S. and on two occasions here in Auckland. David has been a major help as both a pastor and servant to Benny Hinn in most of his meetings over the past two decades and David’s wife Sherrill has faithfully played at Benny’s every crusade and major ministry event since the early days. We have known each other from Agape Force times in the 70’s when they first met in their dedication to the Lord from those days they have deeply honored and supported us for my part investing in their encouragement through the faithfulness of God in their dedicated lives and major ministries. It was a great blessing to see them again in New Zealand and to be again publicly honored by Benny to other national pastors in his final meeting here in the Life Conference Center.

FAE 2011
Fae has also (like I was so generously given over the past few years) had some real dental help. Buddy & Caroline Hicks our friends (again from Agape Force days) have made major investment in our lives the last few years. One of their friends in Houston, a Christian dentist donated over a thousand dollars worth of time and work for some infected areas in her teeth needing major help. Though it involved three driving visits from Lindale to Houston with either Will or friends, their kindness and love to us as a family is marvelous. We spent time staying with them in their lovely home, also attending the Response, a major call to prayer by Governor Rick Perry that despite nearly a thousand media critics drew more than 30,000 to Houston’s major convention Center. We saw many of our friends active in revival-hearted ministry and later had some visit us that evening, including Doug Stringer and our young ballet-talented married couple Sheila and Marak who arrived at the end hearing we might be there amidst the tens of thousands, just as we had just finished farewelling Doug on stage.

Fae also traveled by car later to Arkansas with our Texas friend Margie Jaynes to spend time with Nancy Ravenhill, wife of David and second son of the late revivalist Leonard Ravenhill in their new home near their Dayspring and Bethany friends. Both also visited Christchurch during earthquake times again this year visiting family children. Fae’s long trip there was also a driving adventure. In both nations, Fae has spent many hours driving, especially helping me since my aneurism in 2009 which held up my own return to a driver license in both nations. Our birthday gift to Fae of an I-Pad2 July 5th in Texas has been a new blessing to her in long-distance map direction but especially in Skype phone calls. At only $14.00 a month for unlimited hours she used her I-Pad to call back home almost daily to her Dad Rees-Thomas in N.Z, now legally blind and living alone.

At 96, Dad RT has done very well and looks amazing. Despite his visual limits, he has gone through the whole Bible alone, listening to it more than five times since Will’s birthday gift of an Ear Bible to him two years ago. One of our favorite N.Z. home churches Harbourside in Takapuna on the North Shore of Auckland has faithfully provided him transport to and from Sunday morning services, as well as from time to time to its special Senior meetings. A new widowed lady friend Gil, a gifted artist and gardener member of the church has been a true blessing to Hedley in the past few years, helping him in some needed visits to stores and services. Other friends like David and Dale Garret of Scripture in Song, and Fiona, one of our Christchurch-born friends from Rob Delucas His Way church near him have helped with food and transport, especially when we, at ten thousand miles distance, are so very far away from daily help. Kingsley one of his Christchurch-based sons treated us all to Sky City our major multi-story sky-scraper and also spent some weeks with Dad.

WILL - 2011
As our Christmas/New Year newsletter briefly mentions, William, active again this year, has been both audio and video set-up engineer for me as well as a faithful PA and end-of-year summation book-keeper in Communication Foundation for our New Zealand Trust. He has so generously given his time without cost to his folks, often at cost of his own projects or friend visits. Will traveled by car many hours with his long-term best U.S. friend Jeff Rogers, Loren Cunningham’s nephew to Colorado Springs to hold teaching sessions with the YWAM base there and helped run the kids Movie Camp for Woodcrest Garden Valley. He also was loaned a car from his Kiwi engineer best friend James Howie who blessed us all.

Wills’ major project has been many hours each night: the Conclusions Personal Study; multiple writing and research on world-changers over the past 2,000 years, with some 600 hours so far invested in research including key areas involving the church in this New Millennium. I see him often at work up late as his Dad. He has also had his own costly physical battles with body damage hindering normally intense workout abilities he so enjoys but over past years has led to a number of expensive appointments for yet unresolved bone foot, root canal tooth and jumpers knee damage. His other great need; still awaiting help here is the rebuilding of our old little first home in the “bach” he lived in as a child to upgrade to his own proper apartment. I believe the Lord will also find people to help for this and financial provision.

IN “COURTS” OF PRAISE
Apart from a couple of sets in places of cooler California, over three months of 100 degree plus heat from July-September that Texas has suffered, made rehab for me there this time rare. Since our return to NZ, Fae and I have often been able to play two days a week. Wednesday night is Manurewa (my home town); I am the longest-lasting member of this recently-rebuilt club. When I knew I could never beat my Dad cycling at 12, I started playing for them shortly after!) This social evening slot is arranged by Christian club captain Pacific Islander friends. Terry Daniels and his wife, Turu, have their own family worship group and church meetings and have been very kind to me in my long journey back to strength. It was fun also to enter a local church tournament held there by Jim Shaw, our pastor friend, (from his church only a couple of blocks away) and with partnership by two club family members, like Gabriel, get into the finals. Friday morning we also aim to play others from another club in nearby Papakura - again, only a few miles away where my parents used to live.

Though now far from my high-school days of school and South Auckland champs to winning the Wiseman Champion of Champions plate for third place in our nation and finals in the Auckland champs after leaving school, I am still so thankful to God for providing me, in many nations, old or young friends willing to press me physically and mentally in some good competition. I count many tennis pros as friends over the years, some legendary like Margaret Court-Smith, now also a Perth major ministry church. All of our family shared blessings in such “courts of the Lord” even from our early years.

WAR WEEK - 6-MILE MEMORIES
Another great meet again in Highland Park, for years a major disaster area outside of Detroit City. This city was for decades the worst mile of sixteen others in a strip of long-term damage and social destruction. Over a century of faded income connected to the automobile industry left fallen there three areas once the finest in the nation. “Six-Mile” still has the original Ford Factory, long ago closed and abandoned, right off the first Freeway in America. 8-Mile, two miles up from there (an Eminem birthplace) now powerfully influenced by pastor Chile’s church was once the original Chevrolet plant.

I still remember one of my first visits there for our long-term friend Tim Dilena. In 1992, I was to speak on the first morning of a missions conference. The foyer was filled with frightened girl prostitutes from this town where the eleventh body of a local had just been discovered, yet another murder victim of one of America’s worst serial killers. For more than two decades, Tim, (with Gary Wilkerson, David’s Teen Challenge young ministering son) first opened the only alive church there. He also headed up the North American part of War Week, a yearly outreach drawing up to a thousand young people from upper USA and overseas. Tim not only prayed for the girls who came there for shelter, but called on God to expose and bring to justice the killer no-one ever saw or knew. It was so amazing that not only was Benjamin Atkins caught the next day “by accident” by one of 6-Miles few cops, but they kept visiting him in jail months later and later prayed to lead him to Christ!

War Week was based on Jacob Aranza’s Lafayette Louisiana adoption of our original Concentration Camp, a radical and intensive short street ministry training camp Tony Salerno and I began in the early 70’s of California. Agape Force later launched their Discipleship Training Institute (DTI) as a six-week extension of this. This idea also later became YWAM’s DTS and through Dennis Lindsay, the base of Christ For The Nations year-long CFNI Institute. Tim, Jacob and Dennis are now all contemporary contributors in the Revival Study Bible. Although the late David Wilkerson who sadly died this past year had long wanted Tim to move to New York and pastor of the church he founded. After nearly three decades of effective affection for the city, Tim now finally turned over the church and War Week to his great associate pastor - and with Cindy, his wife, and their children, and now will help the massive Broadway Tabernacle in New York City.

Another honor near War Week was as a Sunday guest of Richard Crisco, previous youth pastor in the Brownsville Revival. I was asked to come a few times but was previously unable to arrange it. The sense of God’s visitation years ago is still clear in the new pastorate he has, as it is also with John Kilpatrick, his former pastor in Brownsville AOG where fresh touches of the Lord in his new church also are still happening.

REVIVAL MESSAGES AND MINISTRIES
Seeing just how much revival-based training affected literally hundreds of thousands of young people in some key new ministries with a concern for the streets and un-reached young (as well as missions decade after decade) has brought to my heart a great gratitude for what God did in our lives in those original times. While I have had opportunity in some way to preach to multitudes over these past decades, the two kinds of ministry I feel have most affected kids even more have been first the key material the Lord gave me and visions of creative ways to train others.

Books like the classic Doorways To Discipleship, Youth Aflame! Handbook for Followers of Jesus and later The Daniel Files (first book we know of ever given away on the Net with more than a thousand hits a week for many months on its initial free release) as well as the scary Devil Take The Youngest (the war on children) and the challenging Fire On The Horizon (a take on the uniqueness of the new Millennium towards spiritual awakening) though all presently out of print continue to be of value today. Betty Elliot, widow of the martyred Jim Elliot (Shadow Of The Almighty, Through Gates of Splendor) wrote to me the best summary of Devil Take The Youngest I ever heard. “I just finished reading your book” she wrote. “I hated reading it. Thank you for writing it.”) The Thomas Factor, a summary look at our battle with doubt was adopted by Billy Graham as a giveaway for one of his crusades. The history Revival (in its two incarnations Principles and Personalities and Principles To Change The World) was carried around by thousands of young Bible College students and reprinted by both the 700 Club as a part of their homes series to match my audio set for them, and by one of the teachers connected to the Brownsville revival. We are on a Ministry of Helps project to Kindle/I-Pad/ Lulu these to update and restore them. Youth Aflame 2.0 will be released in a modern update as one of those most requested by youth pastors.

When I first got saved and began street ministry in what is now Aotea Square in Queen Street, my mother had a dream about me. She said I was much older, and almost bowed under a weight I seemed to be lifting before a huge crowd that surrounded me on all sides. What they came for was not me, but for something I was carrying, holding up as high as I could. She did not know what it was, but she said it was flaming, like huge bright flickering, burning light; sometimes it looked like a torch and sometimes it looked like a cross. Mother, now I think I know what it was you saw back then.

AGAPE FORCE REUNION
Another wonderful gathering in August was a great Agape Force Reunion. How many long-term ministries have been launched from helping design training and discipling schools! Santa Rosa’s Genesis put over 2,000 often street-rooted young men and women into the ministry, helmed by local youth minister friends like Jim Argue, Rich and Joe Ferante.
This reunion had to be moved back from its original late October for us (shortening our US visit by nearly a month) because of my delayed commitment to Promise Keepers in New Zealand when we had already planned and booked our return. Paul Subritsky a friend who is key director (and son of our long-time friend Bill who had prophesied God’s provision and care on us just before I left in 2009 for Korea) was kind enough not only to invite me to participate in the opening launch of this last P/K of the year, but later helped us as a family as well with the considerable extra costs it took us to redo our whole ticketing. More on this later.

Although the date change meant that a few could not now arrange to attend the reunion, many friends still made it and came from all over to spend those three days at a host local Lindale church together. They came to call to memory some of the great things God did for us all in those early years. Twenty-six major ministries came out of this awesome work. There have been few in a life-time that touched so many so widely and creatively in God like this. Largely arranged by Dee and Jim Patton, (best friends and our helpers for so many years in Texas ever since the early days when they moved from California to Lindale to be with us) they also led some singing of songs first written and recorded in A/F days. Others there still used their singing from the work to touch others for Jesus. So many once teenagers or collegiates were deeply involved with the Force before moving on to other works. Despite some trials or disappointments over the years since they left this ministry, many still count these the best years of their lives and loved hanging out again. What an incredible joy to see so many still going on with God in their own diverse and wonderful calls! Some are artists like Andy Davis who wood-carved the Patton’s first album cover, Jim Kuiper the ex-Marine who designed the first Agapeland children’s cover or Manny who as well as video shoots on my Revival Library sessions shot a number of my visual tours posted for a short time in YouTube. Some like Pete and Teresa Cawthorn held up Christ in missions to Mexico. Many of you who came again to those great days hold high place in our hearts. We appreciate so much your blessing to us. It was our privilege to serve you in such a ministry.

RETURN TO NEW ZEALAND - October 5th
Promise Keepers with some two thousand men in the Telstra Convention Centre was just a few minutes drive from our home. Although each major meeting was limited to only a thirty-minute message and I was asked to give an invitation exactly as asked at this opening launch, we had good response from many men who came to get right with God. It was also good to do another major evangelistic meeting after being unable to do much public ministry for almost two years.

When I asked the Lord what I should do for the short time available in this major outreach for New Zealand men, He gave me some key things I had never spoken of before. They now seem very significant. While I did not qualify like the four major N.Z. sports figures who formed the brief video introduction to my opening message to be in Game On, I did tell them my Dad was a legend in cycling, my great-grandfather a Maori king and that I grew up all within a few miles of that meeting.

My focus that night was what is one of the largest problems of modern times; an unforgiven sin that Jesus said would be the root of so much violent and murderous actions, even in family, in future times. So little is said of this, yet it is so prominent in the world and in us. While not forgiving others is a plague of multitudes, the chief folly of many is not our bitterness. Bitterness comes when someone does something hurtful or sinful to us. But Judas did not betray Jesus from bitterness. Jesus had done nothing to hurt him. It is not what someone does, but what someone does not do that creates the cursed conflict Jesus called offense. I also think such a sin often comes from the Devil’s voice in our mind given by him as if it is our own. Our fallen lives come from a stressed hurt heart damaged by a fallen mind. More of this in detail will be in the new Nature and Character of God (As Revealed In His Creation) aimed for publishing sometime by 2014.

WHY DID JUDAS BETRAY JESUS?
Jesus used the phrase “offenses will come” (Matthew 18:7) He warned us that it would be better to lose an eye or a limb or be drowned than to offend a child and go to hell. (Matt.18:6-9; Mark 9:42-47) What happened to Judas from the set-ups of the Devil?

Judas had expectations of who Jesus was and what He should do. When after more than three years as treasurer of the disciples, it became increasingly clear to him that Christ was not going to destroy Rome and put Israel back as ruler of the world in His time, he was offended. His betrayal was most probably done to force Jesus to do what Judas wanted Him to do and thought He would do - use His power and authority to take control over the world. And, of course, to give His faithful side-kick a major place in the new Kingdom for helping Him do what He seemed unwilling or un-wanting to do.

I mentioned in an earlier blog, discovery of a basic demonic ambition; that above all, the Devil does not just want to be like God, but to himself be God. And the one thing God can be, like no-one else in the created world, is the fact He has ultimate power and within truth and love, unlimited control. Hence for this great and good God not to use it always speaks first to our hearts, but the Devils’ push to seek power is aimed at our minds. So many men and women today hold a grudge against the Lord, because He did not act like their own fallen mind now says is better than what God says in His laws and word.

And when God does not do what you think He should, your offense can do far more than make you angry. Offense can make you not only disappointed with God who you think let you down, but with deep depression. It can lead to suicide.

That failure of Jesus to do for Judas what we wanted Him to do brought the sad end of the smartest and most trusted of all the disciples. It reveals how unexpected was Judas, that after Jesus told them all one of them would betray Him and it would be the one He gave the wine-dipped bread to. They still did not suspect Judas. They thought Jesus was no longer going to tell them, so He gave it to His friend, the one He trusted. It is also the unbearable hurt and final fall of some ex-church multitudes also disappointed with God. How many have walked out because He didn’t do what they wanted?

HOME - SWEET (SOMETIME) HOME
So here we are again back in our own home. It will be some weeks before we finalize new meetings. We’ve been busy with friends and fixing up things but I did have a Sunday visit one day for my friend Alex Larsen. I witnessed to him my last year at Papatoetoe High; he later got saved and became pastor of the church built just below Mount Zion on my Grandfather’s farm. Alex also hosted both funeral services for my Dad in 2001 and my Mother 18 months later. He has been a prophetic and passionate pastor now for many years and a pleasure to know and minister for. I also did a Saturday morning men’s meeting in Papakura attended even by friends from my teenage years. We also hosted quite a number of friends in other ministries both to and from planes at Auckland Airport. We watched the barely two-point win of New Zealand over France in the Rugby World Cup final. I knew then God gave us a very close victory to hold back any easy pride or arrogance. God defend New Zealand. We surely need it. Keep us alive with more than a great national anthem.

New Years Eve: I don’t go out with anyone to watch fireworks or cheer. The Lord and I have a long-term appointment kept those few minutes before a new year and after this past. It is one I keep without exception since I got saved so long ago. Out on a deserted wharf or hill under the stars with only the sound of an ocean and silent darkness to be lit soon with launched fire in lights to heaven from others celebrating in the nation, I spend that time with my Father. I thank Him for what He did in my life and family, ask His pardon again for anything not done right or finished well and renewing my trust and love for Him in the year to come.

One of the strangest and loveliest things that happened to me shortly before we left the U.S. for home was in a packed large Corpus Christi church meeting the week-end before the annual collegiate Breakaway conference. Over 14,000 collegiate and high-schoolers subscribed to the 21CR podcast series over the past five years. Some university students and student leaders like the two Elis in Sam Houston Chi Alpha with their team have gone through these over seven times. Around a thousand students from some six major Houston Universities come to these conferences; we have counted as one of the great years honors for us to share in these in the U.S. Will and I have been adopted by them now as family and love them greatly.

I received an e-mail from one of the students. He had a young Muslim friend who is committed to some five years of study in the U.S. Invited to come to Breakaway by this Christian friend in the same training classes, he sat with him high on the balcony. Will said my message that morning was one of the best he ever heard on this trip. With the front quite full, I sat down just on top of the platform stairs as the worship team came back to close. I felt the presence of God in great peace on that platform but the Muslim friend on the balcony saw something else. Looking down, he said he saw Jesus come up behind me, reach out His arms and hug me. He knew it was Jesus and knew he was seeing God, and it so shocked him, he fainted. Later his friend said it had so overwhelmed him that he felt the following morning it must have been some kind of jinn or the Devil to try and trick him away from his true long-term faith. But he came back again.

He is one of multiplied hundreds of thousands of sincere and devoted young people around the world with a spiritual hunger in their lives for reality and love that have in some way come face to face with a manifestation of the Living Christ. In many different places and towns and in some of the most surprising times or journeys, the Man in the white Robe has shown Himself to Islamic faithful in unmistakable Divine ways; dreams, visions, revelations, protection, provision and prophecy. Multitudes are meeting Him.

2011 was a year that carried the Biblical number of disorganization. This old, crackling chaotic time so filled with critical disasters in many nations as well as our own has now passed and gone from us forever. And now?

Another New Year begins; will it still tie in with such global unfinished business and uncontrolled, unanswerable or unleashed disaster in nature? God’s word calls us to not give away His reminders, nor reject His immutable and unchanging laws. Stay true. This will not be the end of the world, but it will mark the end of something. It is time to seek the Lord.

Winkie: 2012

FIVE GOLDEN MONTHS

online@israelanderson.com — 2011-10-09T14:57:24-06:00

Why would we take so long to let people know what we are up to?

It has been quite a launch for me returning after more than a year and half to the U.S. William and I did quite a number of ministry meetings that involved significant and extended teaching opportunities before we left New Zealand. I also created a number of new power-points to pass on to both churches and schools some of the new discoveries and materials that emerged in my rehabilitation months.

The massive aneurism December 2009 on Boxing Day that in a single stroke took away fifty years of names eliminated all the nouns from five decades each of the minimum 10,000-hour studies summed up in my doctorate; the arts, sciences, history, communications and youth culture. It is a strange thing to look at a device on your wrist and know what it is and what it does, but not know anymore it is called a watch. To see a friend you have known for decades and not know their name. Three things contributed to the sparing again of my life and the return of some 90% to some other place in the brain.

(1) Another huge round of prayer from friends all over the world. Those of you so faithful to Him for me and our family five years ago as I lay dying in Korea cried out again for me and asked after seeing me again how I felt. I felt loved and restored.

(2) The use of music to re-parent memories eliminated on the left-hand side of the brain. Re-recording about 30 songs from my conversion 1962 up to this year with the sister-acted lyrics sitting in front of me was something sacred for me; not only to restore my voice but also hundreds then thousands of memories erased on the left-hand side. That part of the brain that holds music on the right-hand not only remembers words; it recalls images from things seen, said and done when you first heard and loved those songs.

Thinking about Scriptures re-discovered in many months of going nowhere and doing nothing public for more than six months, the biggest book in the Bible with over 2,460+ verses, Psalms is not only about the spiritual and the religious; it is about life and death, peace and war, joy and sorrow all that makes life so diverse, sometimes sad and always perennially wonderful. The Book of Psalms from David and other contributors who truly loved the Lord is like His digital storage system for us on almost everything. Fearfully and wonderfully made. This is not a metaphor or a romantic image. It is utterly real.

(3) Physical exercise - enjoyable, challenging and ever-learning is for me a key part of the package. I think wherever possible everyone involved in the strenuous pressure of working with God towards winning back His world ought to have some kind of regular exercise. While walking like Jesus did everywhere is Biblical and not boring if each day is different and people either are looking for you to love you or are thinking of ways to kill you on the journeys, other things can stretch us. Short PACE climbs or a six-minute set of graduated sprints, longer times of cycling or swimming help build up or even rebuild our heart and lungs. Freedom to play my tennis again had great restorative power for me; not only on the body, but on the heart and mind.

I picked five major areas of our body system even before the stroke to incorporate recent discoveries in the section of the coming second volume of The Nature And Character if God - (As Revealed in His Creation); the eyes, ears, heart, mind and lungs. Eye has not seen, ears have not heard, neither have entered into the heart of mankind the things God has prepared for those that love Him. More has been found out in the last ten to twenty years about these five gracious design gifts alone than the last two thousand studies of our human temples. If you are able to at all, make something a part of your weekly life you will enjoy that will work you well without boredom. Like John Wesley, E. Stanley Jones or Cliff Richard, mine is tennis. There are other “courts of the Lord”.

It has taken well over a year of a lot of work with five different nurses each with a different discipline, a free hospital-granted membership in our local gym with a near-Olympic-size pool and one night and a morning commitment a week in two different rival tennis clubs with some five-set matches to help me saddle up again for this last half of 2011. For those of you who have faithfully prayed for us wondered why there has not been more blogs or emails from me this year, it was not because I had forgotten you. I had forgotten everything that had a name or was a noun in over fifty years of ministry. It just took over a year to get back most of what was gone for good.

THE MID-MAY LAUNCH

The Pratneys headed out in faith again to Auckland airport, a little over twelve minutes away from our home in Down Under for the 13-hour plus trip to L.A. in the U.S.A. We have so many friends there in California and fond memories of what Jesus did in us for us and through us in cities and towns we count part of our heritage. Anaheim, Pasadena, Burbank, Fresno, Sebastopol and Santa Rosa are all filled with precious pictures for us of His grace and glory. Arriving before we left in the time machine that is Los Angeles International we hit the ground running the day after Fae’s brother Anthony came to transport us back to their home in Hollywood-Burbank.

Will and I are now a tag-team, his taking charge of so many of the areas that might still for me be missing from memory, playing chauffeur, PA, sound/video technician and general minder to make sure his Dad remembered what he was supposed to. What a constant blessing he has been in our lives, often sacrificing his own priorities to help us in areas we lack, putting aside his own pursuits to take care of things he could help in that were never his own calling. Those of you who have stayed in touch with us through him and seen him again this trip know how special his life is and how much we honor the touch of God on him. I have had many who watched us work together quietly pass on to me how impressive they found his life to be.

We stayed in five different homes with good friends, two different YWAM bases and a number of lovely hotels hosted by churches and traveled all over this time without a car rental. Some of the times we shared with others we have known for more than thirty or forty years of ministry; Tony and Kathy Salerno, Ron and Judy Radachy, Jimmy and Carol Owens, Bob and Claudia Maddux, Rob & Caroline DeLuca, visits from Dan and Jaime Collins, Phyllis Perfect and friends, and even with Joy Dawson for five wonderful hours at her daughter’s home after the honor of being introduced by her before my message at mid-week Staff Night in Sunland.

How many of these reconnections opened new doors of memory that caused a constant gratitude to the goodness of God in our lives! Joy told the audience about how she felt the Lord prompt her to call me one morning and meet a man who had been hosted by Jim and Joy on his first visit to New Zealand. At the end of giving up a major ministry I had been involved with up to that time, it was both a surprise and huge honor to be asked by this legendary prayer lady if I was free to come to visit. With an empty schedule for the rest of my life and the only thing left the completed but unpublished book I had been working on for five years, I was indeed “free”. That momentous visit with Loren Cunningham where I sat and listened for a whole day with tears in my eyes to hear a man that had already begun some of the things I had dreamed of, in what I had found about revival and its messages from heroes of the faith in the past.

At the end of that utterly future-shifting day, I asked Loren “What are you using to disciple these young people that will come from all over the world? What kind of training materials do you have?” He said that though they had some good stuff he felt they needed a book or manual of some kind, and that he had not yet had the time to do it. Shyly I said “I’ve got a book” and passed over the only thing left in nearly five years of ministry. “What do you call it?” he asked. When I said “Youth Aflame!” he got really quiet. “That’s the name the Lord gave me for the book. What are you doing with this?”
I told him I was going to Gestetner three hundred or so for the kids I had seen come to the Lord, an ancient technology then involving wax-paper cuts by a mechanical typewriter. “Oh no”, said Loren. “We need thousands of these. Tens of thousands. You must come over to the United States and I will help you print it.” Joy found that out this year.

So a year later, by the kind gift of a boat trip to America from my Grandfather who gave his life to Jesus in one of my meetings in Whangarei, I spent a year in California re-typing Youth Aflame! at night when the staff went home in a temporary YWAM office on an IBM Executive with proportional spacing and learning to do everything except burn negatives to strip templates, burn plates and print on a table-top A.B. Dick. And when Loren finally arrived to replace that worn machine and I went with him to the firm and I saw a serious 360 printer he bought it for me and 2,000 copies of the manual were born.

Collated in an empty for-sale church by a bunch of volunteer kids, two-hole punched for a folder where we used the paper dots for our wedding confetti, the first discipleship manual was ready as a present for Jesus by Christmas. Over a hundred thousand manuals later and in thousands of church champs, Jesus Festivals, teaching and training schools, high schools, universities and colleges across the country, the Lord has opened door after door for me starting in California to be able to bless others. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how Fae and I began again in America.

MINISTRY HIGHLIGHTS

So many memorable and marvelous visits and visitations it is embarrassing to be asked sometimes by family back in New Zealand: “And what did you do there?” Our special appreciation for many of our friends this year for setting up some significant meetings.

YWAM hosted us both in Mexico with many of their national leaders also meeting with some of the revivalist leaders of CircuitRiders from Kona; another annual staff meeting in Dallas with many of those core Christian family like Leland and Fran Paris, Chris and Debbie Laschelle, Larry Allen and his School of the Bible staff who have loved us, honored our family and made us so continuously welcomed, provided and cared for us over the years from the early days over thirty years ago when we moved to Texas.

Che Ahn and his staff again opened the door for us in ministry for the Wagner Institute where he has now been made International Chancellor for these training schools that provide credentialing for academically-qualified degrees related to ministry learning.
To return from Mexico with a sore throat (from a lot of nearly all-night conversations with major leaders and visitors) to do in two days an entire 21CR course of four hours Friday night and eight hours all day Saturday (drawing on what we did 2005 for four hundred pastors and leaders in New Zealand) was to say the least, a challenge. To be honored the next day Sunday to also share two new visual discoveries in their two morning services in Harvest Rock and then later away to Brea that night was a good test of memory, stamina and trusting God for wisdom. And that was only the first six days!

Next Blog: The Rest of the Story

Ten Years In Production: “The Revival Study Bible” Beats The Odds and Comes Forth

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-10-17T18:32:07-06:00

By PATRICK BUTLER
ResonateNews.com

The inescapable reality behind the concept of religious revival, said author and youth evangelist William “Winkie” Pratney is that when the love of God and needy men intersect, all heaven breaks loose. That subject is the focus of Armour Publishing's massive new Revival Study Bible, coming soon to the United States.

“When a revival comes to an area of the world, questions are inevitably asked by those wanting to know what's going on,” Pratney said in an interview from his New Zealand home on Tuesday. “They want to know why this is happening, why did God choose this place, these people and this time? After a revival, the question is asked by some, ‘How can we have this (a revival) happen where we live?’”

If a single word is needed to grasp the comprehensive nature of the hefty 1,973-page Revival Study Bible, it is “exhaustive.” Once immersed in its pages, revival not only seems, as Pratney said, “cyclical and repetitive” in history, it seems to be inevitable - if not somewhat elusive.

“Encouragement comes as people read the repetitive nature of revivals throughout the history of the church,” Pratney said. “God continues to move throughout time and in different areas of the world in a wide variety of circumstances. This Study Bible shows that he uses not always the biggest, best and most beautiful in a revival but the little, least and sometime the “losers” among us.”

Lest those from any theological persuasion misunderstand, however, Pratney cautions upfront and without hesitation that the subject of revival - or even experiencing a revival as result- is not the point of the Revival Study Bible.

“Revival is not the end or the focus of this ten-year-long work by hundreds of contributors, editors and behind-the-scenes workers,” Pratney said. “The end is the return and restoration of a new relationship with God. Seek revival and you won’t have a real answer. You seek God, and you may have a revival.”

But readers will certainly learn rare, formerly obscured, historical facets and character of revivals that may shed light or provide guidance for today. Hours could easily be spent studying and reflecting on the additional collective input of nearly a hundred contributors alone – contemporary or historical revival figures – who wrote articles, notes or are profiled in breakout boxes in the pages of the Study Bible.

The study tome's real bonus treasure, Pratney said, is found in a companion Bible Research Classical Theological Library DVD containing pdf files of more than 600 rare articles, essays and books – some written hundreds of years ago – by eyewitnesses and participants in revivals worldwide. The Study Bible includes the notes and study “chain” of Dr. Tamara Winslow, PhD, representing decades of painstaking research that accompanies the $100 price tag.

“Few people would have the time or money to go to the world's libraries to find these rare articles and books,” Pratney said. “This is like having a classical, rare, world library in a single place.”

The result is a Bible with companion helps literally packed with a lifetimes of spiritual, historical, eyewitness accounts of revivals, and the nature of them.

“The 100 contributors (alive or passed) are people – revivalists – the general editors thought had contributed to revival in some significant form,” said Pratney.

Historical contributors include Adoniram Judson (1788-1850), pioneer missionary to Burma, the Rev. Arthur Tappan Pierson (1837-1911) of the famed Keswick Conventions and William and Catherine Booth, co-founders of The Salvation Army. The familiar names of Whitefield, Finny, Muller, Studd, Spurgeon, Carey, Zinzendorf, Brainerd, Moody, Edwards, Taylor, Wesley, Seymour, Tozer, Singh and many more dot the list.

Contemporary or recently contemporary contributors include Billy Graham, Campbell McAlpline (2009), Loren Cunningham, Mike Bickel, Lou Engle, John Dawson, Keith Malcomson, Che Ahn, Barry Chant, Steve Hill, John Wimber (1997) and many more.

Some of the featured biographies or stories – such as the Rathfriland Revival in 1859 Ireland– may be so obscure as to cause wonderment how so much happening in the name of God has gone unnoticed, or chronicles “lost.” Enter Pratney’s love of collecting those chronicles of revival, bringing the Study Bible project to completion.

“Winkie is a unique, fatherly figure who has collected one of the rarest personal libraries on the subject of revival in the world,” said Dee Patton, administrator for Ministry of Helps where the Study Bible can presently be obtained. “His 40-year effort purchasing rare manuscripts and books is now available to anyone and is priceless.”

The exhaustive DVD contains many rare manuscripts such as the "Beginning of Modern Missions" first published in 1891 by the Rev. Arthur C. Chute is found, as is "The Imitation of Christ" written by Thomas A Kempis published in 1415.

Originally intended to be released during a late 20th century, years-long spiritual “awakening” in Brownsville, Texas, USA, led by the Rev. Steve Hill, Pratney said the Revival Study Bible seeks to answer some of the multi-layered questions, ramifications and implications of revival.

The concept itself is questioned in the opening pages with a short essay on “Revival: Is it a Biblical Concept?” and another, “What is a Revivalist?”

Hill was the original general editor of the Revival Study Bible when USA publishing efforts stalled and opportunities evaporated. The project was finally pushed through with the help of the Rev. Derek Hong of Singapore who contacted Amour and financial backers.

The Study Bible is easily the largest undertaking in the publishing House’s history, said Pratney, who served as the final general editor. He expressed gratitude for Asian supporters making the history of revival in the West, available.

“The history of revival and its study is important to them in Asia,” Pratney said. “Some of the world’s largest churches are there.”

In addition to the astonishing access to out-of-print essays, Pratney said, are vignettes of revival figures throughout Christian history and teachings on various aspects of what may cause, sustain – or kill – a revival. The inspirational , yet frank, discussion of spiritual insights and profound failures found in the study section on the ups and downs on revivals – and those who participate in them - are intentional, he said.

“We did that because God is that honest,” Pratney said. “He doesn’t avoid telling us about (King) David’s mistakes, or Solomon’s errors. Our discussion of who God uses in revival and what starts or stops a revival is in the actual study-chain part of this Bible. We come to grips, for instance, with ‘why did this (revival) fail? It’s quite detailed that way. People can study through the question ‘what creates a problem in revivals?’

So what person does God pick to be used in revival, why it succeeds and why it fails? Pratney laughed.

“We can only say what God, says. But whomever God uses,” or works through, Pratney said, “three things certain to happen.

“Everyone who attempts to do or participate in, something marvelous for God is going to encounter three obstacles similar to what Nehemiah did when he restored the walls of Jerusalem,” he said. “Three accusations or statements, “Who are you to do such a thing; you cannot do this, and you’ll never finish.”

The three obstacles are represented by the biblical characters – figures of resistance to Nehemiah – Sanballat, Tobiah and Gershon. That’s what happened when the Revival Study Bible was ready to be launched ten years ago, Pratney said.

“But thank God, now it’s here,” Pratney said. “Soon it will be available in the United States.

The Revival Study Bible is available worldwide through www.moh.org.

It's Here! The Revival Study Bible

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-07-18T14:41:41-06:00

The Revival Study Bible
New King James Version

The time has finally come!

The Revival Study Bible is available to order NOW. Thanks to EVERYONE who has been praying this dream into reality. I talked to Winkie a few nights ago (he has held one in his hands and says it is beautiful - please read his most recent blog post) and got an email from the publisher in Singapore as well. The first printing was 5,000 copies. Let's help make a dent in that and pray that God uses this labor of love to spark revival in our hearts, the hearts of others, the entire country and the world.

DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BLACK LEATHER
DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BURGUNDY LEATHER

The Revival Study Bible is now available to order. Ministry of Helps will give a copy of the Revival Study Bible as a Thank You to anyone who donates 100.00 or more while supplies last. If you would like to sponsor a bible for someone who cannot afford it, please send a donation and indicate the amount that you would like to designate toward a Bible for someone else.

We will collect checks and PayPal payments for several weeks before putting together each order and shipping from Singapore will take 5 or 6 days. So our first order will go out on July 30th then August 15th and so on. We will deliver or ship bibles as soon as they arrive at our location.

There is also a HARD COVER version of the Bible. If you want one of those instead of a soft cover, please indicate that in your PayPal notes or on a note put in with your check. Our cost on those will be slightly less so a donation of 80.00 to 99.00 to MOH will receive a Hardcover Revival Study Bible as a Thank You. We will work on a separate link for that but want to get this up without delay so bear with us on that.

DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BLACK LEATHER
DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BURGUNDY LEATHER

Please help us spread the word about the Revival Study Bible. We feel very strongly that the Lord has given us this tool for this time and that it has the potential to do great things for the Kingdom of God.

Every Revival Study Bible that you receive through MOH will bless Winkie and his ministry. It will help us take care of his ongoing expenses and get more of his books, tapes and videos out there and available as well. Recently we have been able to re-issue the books "Youth Aflame","Devil Take The Youngest" and "Daniel Files", the video sessions "Contract on Children"& "Leaving Egypt" and the teaching booklets (formerly tracts), "Counterfeit Conversion" and "Witnessing Like Jesus" - some on Amazon.com and some on Lulu.com. We are working on more titles, both books and video and will continue to make those available as time and resources permit.

If you are interested in hearing about our vision to create a complete catalogue of all Winkie's books and sessions give us call or email and we'll be happy to tell you how you can be a part of that mission and please do visit moh.org if you are not already aware of it.

DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BLACK LEATHER
DONATE $100 OR MORE NOW FOR BURGUNDY LEATHER

By way of Pratney news, it looks as if Winkie, Fae and William will be remaining in New Zealand until next Spring. He is still doing well in his recovery, and was thinking of coming in August for several teaching opportunities, but that doesn't look like it will be possible at this point. Please keep praying for him, his ministry and for the Lord to meet every need during this time.

Catch the Fire and Spread the Word,
Dee Patton
deepatton@moh.org

Update from Winkie

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-07-13T21:19:30-06:00

I watched, like hundreds of millions of others on a Sunday the climax of international competition as Spain beat the Netherlands in the World Cup final. I was thinking afterwards about how amazing it must be for a little nation once known long ago as adventurous and globally powerful to finally become the best not only in other European nations but even in all the world while watched by the largest crowd in sport history. I know for all of them it was worth the bruises, kicks and pain of the win, including the realization of an early loss that may pull us to new heights if we do not give up easily and pay the price. No wonder some wept and even prayed at the end with gratitude.

I was in Spain for my first visit early last year at the invitation of key young pastors there through the arrangements of my friend Mal Fletcher as part of ‘09.

How much I appreciate this man who has done so much in the Kingdom over the years! During his initial creative youth ministry working out of his homeland territory of Melbourne Australia, he helped helm with other friends from Brian Houston’s Hills church in Sydney the original Youth Alive, a work that exploded from a denominational youth group of some 80 kids to an inter-denominational national ministry involving large numbers of committed youth leaders from different church streams to some 80,000 in a single decade. Obeying a direction from the Lord to go out to Europe with his wife and family, for some years Mal ministered out of Denmark, pioneering in music, teaching and public television fresh and effective tools rooted in innovative youth pastor friendships and real relationships. After expanding these to include others from Eastern Europe, he moved to London. Using his grasp of significant trends and communication gifts to break new ground in hard places and innovate Gospel connections to touch many young people immersed in cynical and sophisticated Western cultures. Such are many of the nations that competed in the World Cup

When I was in my critical condition in Korea over three years ago, it was interesting to remember that the settings in my life to death other-world coma encounters were in and around London and that one of the key figures I knew was there who wanted to get together with me was Mal. The ‘09 trip involving two visits to London and the honor of meeting and sharing with some of the finest young global pastors and youth leaders in Europe as well as in both Spain and Portugal was in many ways one of the best of all my tours in ministry.

These past months I have not had the strength or ability to do much of what I would have aimed at normally. Many of you have asked what we are up to and what is happening since my stroke immediately after Christmas day. Three weeks ago I was given the six-month hospital testing to see how I was doing since my five days in Middlemore Hospital with a stroke that could have easily killed me. The fact that I am not only still alive but able to walk and talk and speak is to me another evidence of the great grace and mercy of God. In the hour-long examination that followed the past months of visits from five different therapists at our home, testing for damage in key areas that included blood tests, an ultrasound and MRI examination and various meds prescribed to keep me from what had already happened. I also got to see the first picture of my brain and what was the damage. William estimates the area affected to be around two inches long. No wonder when one of the surgeons saw me still alive he said “It’s a bloody miracle.” A Christian nurse said to Fae: “It is a miracle, and it's restoring my faith."

What had been affected was primarily my ability to remember the names of things. When you think that so much of what I do stores just that material, the consequence might have been fully destructive. I could not remember the names of people, events, places, books, music, tools, computers, foods … - you get the idea. I have been married to a wonderful girl for 42 years and I could not even remember her name. I knew who Fae was and that she was my wife and my friend, but I thought her name was Lovonny my sister! Anything looked at or listened to now is basically O.K. but what it was ever called before is something else. It made almost any kind of long communication difficult in the least, and as for clear conversation nearly impossible. Those kind enough to contribute help to support us in some way over these past months, we owe a debt of gratitude for your provision; I did not have the ability to do anything much more except to know you were caring. I also had clear memories of what friends looked like, even if I could not recall what I called you!

What I was able to do was just listen to music, read and watch visual things. One of the things I did before this was begin to collect research on our amazing physical and mental makeup for the second volume of Divinity II, the Nature and Character of God as revealed in Creation. Part of that research was not just the heart, the lungs and the sight; it was also on the brain. How it works, makes up its mind, stores facts and decides; so to have that area attacked is worth thinking about!

I have since spent many hours re-listening to and sometimes re-recording songs that we did as a band or that I loved growing up; I was still able to remember songs I heard in 1944 as a baby or ones that I had not heard again for more than sixty years. One of the things I found is that the brain is not limited to the area we think it must keep; while previous theory held that damage was irreparable, we know that that is not always the case. Especially is this so in memories like music; to hear the sound of songs even without the lyrics is to help the brain restructure another part to store them or to re-awaken what was forgotten. Although my poor family has had to put up with my nocturnal recordings, odd readings and repeated re-screenings, what has helped happen is the return of so much that should by damage have gone for good.

I have for many years now become convinced the Lord speaks not just through churches and Christians but leaders and entertainers in music, film and sport. He owns the world and He Who made us for His pleasure is at home in events that draw the cultures of the world. He is not hindered by young hungers to do something wonderful, to win against impossible odds, to surprise the world when those who are seen as the least, the littlest and the losers can suddenly triumph.

The World Cup was no exception. While there are many things we may not see in an ending, God is still surely speaking. Like all great and global significant things it has its own spiritual parallels; a not-forgotten cultural religious fear of God can be visited to become again the supernatural spiritual fear of the Lord, and regardless of how others can bring their best to the game, one single person can finalize the victory right at the end when all their other team efforts fail.

At its end we had a knock on our door very early as a courier had come to our house and brought us a special delivery package. William guessed it first; it is something I have worked for so long and waited for ten years; our copy of the first Revival Study Bible.

Some of you may know how big a battle all of us as General Editors have had in so many ways to see something as wonderful and powerful as this gift we wanted to finish for the Lord and His people finally completed. All of us had our share of trial and spiritual attacks and life-threatening situations; even near the end of the work I felt we faced a final attack to stop the last task; like last enemy of Nehemiah in his monumental task of rebuilding the city of God, to finish hanging the gates.

For those of you who faithfully and wonderfully took the time to help us all, pray for us and provide for us when we did not know how things could ever be done or even at times if we would ever live to complete what we felt He had put on our hearts; thank you.

Thank you so much for your kindness, spiritual protection and provision; both you and I will never know as much as He does, how much what you did contributed towards those hurt and broken places that stand still as illustration of what has happened to the beautiful city of God we have shared in seeking to see restored in our time.

An hour later, while preparing some material for a coming one-hour interview here with Shine Television here in a couple of weeks on my life and ministry over the decades, I was listening to some old songs done by my friends nearly three decades ago from the wonderful work of the Agape Force. Our close friends the Pattons who contributed such a core part of their early lives there, remember this well. How much I have appreciated what He did in the lives of so many of these young soldiers; some were church kids, some street kids; some came from other cities or states some came from other countries and nations; but so many experienced for the first time the visitation of God in the spiritual awakening of revival!

They too faced the battles; not all of them survived, not all of them emerged unscathed, not all of them were able to live out the dreams they carried. But so many to this day can never forget what happened to them when they came into the presence of the living God. I have seen it again and again in the privilege of watching His wonders touch generation after generation; this is the fifth I have had the honor to love, speak for and carry to His throne. Like David I can say “I have been young and now I am old; but I have never seen the righteous forsaken nor His seed begging for bread.”

Some of you have also been there, and you too remember. I long to see yet still another generation that will make the Lord proud of their lives, who will not give up when it hurts, sell out when it is hard or sadly fail to finish the race when they can be so close to seeing what He has in His heart. What does He think now of us? “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”

I listened again to one of the old songs that I have not heard for more than twenty years. One of the bloggers deeply touched by their music said, "Even if I didn't love their music, which I do, I would still be their biggest fan because of the way they lived out the love that they sang about. Where are they today?"

I know where they are today. Each one still walks with God, despite whatever hard and difficult times they have had to face over the years since they were new and young. Something happened to them then that was more than a chance to start over again, more than a set of great friendships, more than a mere movement of the moment. They for a time lived with others who really loved God and gave Him everything they had to see Him begin again to affect their world.

Some of you, I know, will never forget; and never should. I have had the marvelous privilege of knowing you, loving you and passing on to you some of the small things I had learned about His greatness and His glory and the honor to see how deeply lovely has been His dwelling in you.

So here I am, listening again to this old song -

“FATHER GOD - I FEEL YOUR HAND AGAIN
PRESSING ME - TO MOVE WITH YOUR PLAN AGAIN
LIFTING HIGH - ALL THAT’S WORTHWHILE AGAIN
HELPING ME TO RISE UP AND SEE
A NEW BEGINNING IS JUST BEGINNING
I FEEL A BREAKTHROUGH - TO WINNING
AND THERE’S A FRESH FLOW OF THE SPIRIT
A MIGHTY RIVER - CAN’T YOU HEAR IT?
I’M SINGING PRAISES LIKE A NEW SONG
THE CHANGES ARE LIFELONG
A NEW BEGINNING IS BEGINNING
TO TAKE HOLD IN MY LIFE
EVERY DAY’S ALIVE - GREAT EXPECTATION
DARKNESS TURNS TO LIGHT - LOVE’S TRANSFORMATION
DEEP INSIDE MY SOUL - I CAN SENSE THE CHANGE
GLORY TO GLORY ONCE AGAIN!"

My eyes start to fill with tears. I suddenly feel the prickle of His presence once again knowing that this is now a time when another visitation hangs in the balance -

Bless you all - keep us in your prayers Winkie, Fae and William

The Disciple Stuff store

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-06-25T23:13:00-06:00

Hi, this is Israel Anderson and I help out with the website here. I wanted to let you know that you can now order Winkie's 21st Century Reformation (21CR) video series, the most profound teaching series I believe Winkie has ever done. This 15 session video or MP3 teaching will give you the true message of the Gospel of the Kingdom like you've never heard. In very approachable language, Winkie reveals the total purpose of the relationship between God and man and how it functions. As far as I know, nothing like this has ever been done before. This is Seminary in a box. Or digital download.

This great work is available in the new disciple resource store I have created called Disciple Stuff http://DiscipleStuff.com. This is something that I have put together personally, and it's just a small one-man operation. I created this online store in order to allow people with smaller ministries, but powerful messages, to get online and make their teachings available to all. I was also inspired by someone that's had a lasting impression on my life, the late Keith Green. Keith had a policy on his music sales that he would allow anyone to buy them for whatever they could afford. Most people paid the full price. Some took it free. And some paid many times more than full price. It comes back to a saying I heard long ago, "the Gospel is free, not cheap." So any digital item, that is, a non-physical downloadable item on Disciple Stuff may be had for whatever you can afford. And I'd like you, if you produce Christian content of any kind that can be downloaded (and I can help you with production), I'd like you to come be a part of this way of doing business in the way of the Kingdom. And our sales already show that people do not abuse this way. It really works!

So please, come and get this amazing teaching by Winkie Pratney, for free even if that's all you can afford. In personally giving it to people from all walks of life, I can tell you that it's the most powerful evangelism tool I've ever encountered. The unsaved lap this up like sweet honey. The mastery with which Winkie communicates to people has such a powerful anointing, that I think it's impossible to not have the scales fall from your eyes while watching this. Please come and get it. It's available on DVD or an immediate download in either video or audio.

If you'd like to talk to me about getting your own products into the store, then please email me: israel@disciplestuff.com

You can visit the store here: http://DiscipleStuff.com

And just to be clear, this communication should not be taken as a personal endorsement of the Disciple Stuff store by Winkie Pratney.

New info on the Revival Study Bible!

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-04-06T19:46:47-06:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

New info on the Revival Study Bible! (Current as of April 7, 2010)

Good news! Last minute necessary changes aside (as there almost always are), I've just found out today that the Revival Study Bible is finally being sent off to the publishers.

The current Singapore launch date is still scheduled for September 2010.

The RSB will be using the New King James Version.
It will incorporate a unique revival chain reference system, which uses scripture study chains categorized by:
1. Type of Revival (8 main types listed)
2. Most Common Topics Associated With Revival (32 types listed)

Besides this chain reference system, the notes and articles from 100+ contributors, spanning many centuries scattered throughout the bible is worth its weight in gold.

The Bible will also feature a concordance, and several indexes (one especially for finding notes and articles written by or relating to a particular contributor).

It will be at least 1973 pages long, and available in:
- Black Leather
- Maroon Leather
- Hardcase (hardback?)

Okay, that's all for now.

PLEASE DON'T SEND ANY REQUESTS FOR A COPY OF THE RSB TO US AT THIS TIME!

Three Strange Dreams

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-03-31T12:04:58-06:00

(From Winkie Pratney)

What a great blessing you have been to me and my family over the past few months! Some of you have sent very lovely notes or e-mails to encourage me or help provide for us in practical and gracious ways during this second strange bout with life-threatening illness. It is amazing to me to see that such an unexpected attack could come right after a simple time with loved relatives in the heart of Christmas. Three years ago I came out of hovering death right after Easter and now right in the middle of a time we most think about Jesus not dying for the sin of the world but entering it to save it strikes again. The haemorrhagic stroke that blew open an access point deep in my brain could have killed me in days; the hope for repair will be supposedly more than the two whole months endured in Korea, and the year that followed at home in New Zealand to patch up my body. Yet in both of these, God’s grace has been strong and wonderful. As one of the doctors said after seeing the walnut-size of the torn connection that bled into my brain yet my rapid path to recovery even in hospital in so many areas: “It’s a bloody miracle.”

Special thanks also to both my dear beloved Fae who has again endured the day after day broken attempts to restore my lost perceptions and my special son William who has done all he could to both help me put right what can be repaired and to let others know as he did in Korea what is going on in our situation. There were many who wrote or sent invitations these past few months and he has been the guardian to try to make sure I did not try to recover more than I could or was required to respond for safely. Our friends the Pattons, though themselves facing some trying problems with friends and family also under life-challenging situations have been faithful to collect funds people sent to us.

All in a couple of weeks, though not every night, I have had three strange dreams. Though I do not know what they all mean and perhaps some of you may have a better clue than I do, I think they all were of the Lord, and share them with you.

In the first I was in a very large camp. It was as loaded as a major Festival with hundreds and hundreds of small groups of young people everywhere, perhaps thousands. Most of them seemed utterly uninvolved with anything Christian and though there was no obvious evidence of them doing wrong, most of them were just having fun in different activities unconnected with anyone else there and none showed any sign of spiritual purpose. The place I had been put was right in the center of the camp. Three things became obvious to me; first, although it was sponsored by a well-known major denomination and put on for the aim of facing the young crowd with the claims of Christ, there was no sign of spiritual activities I could see there anywhere. Second, though I had been invited specifically to share Jesus to them and was left by the leaders in some place of preparation, there was no known face or person near me or with me in the camp or in that place at all. No-one was there somehow to give me any sort of direction. Third, although I was also to speak very soon, it became increasingly difficult for me to properly prepare for that time, know where my participation was supposed to be held and even what it was they wanted.

The second was somewhat similar, but with a different group and different base. Here I was in a large, windowed building something like a holiday motel somewhere in the middle of the convention site. It was unusual in that it had two lots of open doors on each end with free and easy access by anyone to the place I was staying. The wide glass window looking out onto the area also had no blinds or curtains and it was almost impossible to have any privacy. I was also about to speak soon and wanting to take a shower and change for the meeting. Yet from each door repeatedly came in one or two of a large number of both friends and casual visitors specifically to greet me and say hello. I knew some of them as long-term acquaintances perhaps from many years ago those and recognized them as people who had been part of my life and ministry in the past. There were also those who knew of me; some individuals who just wanted to talk a bit and meet to say hello. Though all of them wanted to spend a short while there together and were looking forwards to some acquaintance, none seemed to have any sense of the time or how much I still had to do to carry out what I was invited there in that camp for. Although I finally tried to explain the situation to some friends and even asked one to shepherd some kind of halt at the doors, others continued to come in from both sides making it almost impossible to get ready or spend time alone for what was needed.

The third dream was not at either a camp or convention, but an invitation to eat out at a nice restaurant from an older well-dressed church group of people who wanted to bless and join with me for a couple of hours. It seemed from the first decision to do this that more and more began to cram into the car headed there, though we all finally fitted in. Then just before we left, another pastor friend arrived with his family and so I asked if it was alright for them to join with us. The place decided on was a newer restaurant that had just been opened and seemed large enough to set up a table for all of us. Yet as we went inside, there were two other families or groups of friends that had also arrived! Now we had four large parties all looking forwards to spending time together and made a single table situation impossible. While the waiters and managers were delighted to have such a huge group there all at once, all the groups had to divide into separate tables to fit, so I had to say to each group that were somewhat sad we could not all mix, that the restaurant were experiencing their own version of revival with so many guests all at once.

I am deeply grateful to both the Lord and to those of you who have stood with us in so many ways for what you have done for us all. It is difficult for me to put off some places and visits that have been for us the mainstream of personal ministry and provision by my commitments to those both known and new in the calling of God but I trust I will do what I can within the constraints placed on me. Thank you so much for all you have done -

Your brother in Jesus love -

Winkie

Trip to Fiji - still recovering well

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-03-18T10:42:01-06:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Four days ago (Monday) we had a memorial service for my mother's mother's passing. She died at age 90, and had been married to my grandfather for 70 years. At age 94, he is still alive and still lives in his own home. It was good seeing friends and relatives come out. It's amazing what people remember us for when we're gone. The service was an honest, happy remembrance of what this woman was like. Praise God she's with Jesus now! Even the pastor of the church that hosted the service (Martin Steel, Harbourside, Takapuna - www.harboursidechurch.org) commented on how often he had been personally prayed for by Eileen Rees-Thomas. She often prayed, often encouraged, always loved. She will be remembered.

About a month ago, now I was in Adelaide Australia, speaking at Christian Life Center (church), an Italian/English speaking church. I was able to input to their youth some and they gave me the English speaking Wednesday night, Friday night, and Sunday morning services. We also met specially on Saturday morning for a few hours and were able to do a type of round-table question/answer time. The subjects I spoke on during my time there included the armor of God, the Word of God, spiritual warfare, discipleship, and the Holy Ghost. On Sunday morning I used a modified version of a sermon my father gave me on 2 Kings 6:24-7:1-24. I was also able to do a little sight-seeing while I was down there, including looking around downtown. I was also able to pick up some new clothes.

Less than a week after that, I headed out to Fiji, to meet up with Mom, Dad, and the Armishaws, some friends of ours that had planned the vacation many months ago, to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary.

We were invited, along with many others to celebrate it. They had been doing well in business, and, out of their generosity basically covered our costs to go as a family. All we had to do was chip in for food and utilities at the shared vacation home a little. We also helped them to get a hot-stone massage - a real treat, I'm sure, for any that care to indulge in some of the luxuries this island has to offer.

We weren't completely sure, up until near the time, whether or not Winkie would be able to go or not. But he found no disapproval from the doctors, and the flight was short enough (about 3hrs 30 min) to not be significantly detrimental to his health (anything over 5 hours is probably not a good idea at this time). But he took his meds and other than being a bit slow and having the continuing memory and pronoun recall difficulties he seemed to do fine. While we were there, we also recognized/celebrated Winkie and Fae's wedding anniversary. They have been married for 42 years.

I am continuing to try to encourage my dad to rest, exercise and recover. His sleep (or lack thereof) pattern means he is usually up long before the birds care to sing, and his continuing cough often wakes me up before the the sun dares shine his face. Coupling that with night-owl tendencies and you have a mandatory late-morning or afternoon nap. It's not easy on Mom and I (who like to sleep in), but my concern is really for him. Please pray that God would give him adequate sleep and rest. According to the doctors, it is one of the primary tools to aid in his recovery.

He and Mom play tennis on occasion (she told me her knee has been getting better), and he was able to play a number of times while in Fiji. I'm thankful for any exercise he can get.

Thanks again for your prayers. Right now, one of the problems we face as a family is simply support for the next few months as he recovers. I am looking at getting a part-time job, and yet still have in mind the bach renovations, clearing the garage (selling stuff), and my ultimate conclusions church history study. Thanks to the kind, thoughtful and generous donations that have come in for us, we have been sustained until now.

However, one of the major medical areas of financial concern at the moment is Winkie's much needed dental work. He finally has a chance to take care of some things that in the past have largely only received temporary solutions, or not been integrated with any overall dental plan. His sessions will be spread out over the next few months, as he recovers from his stroke. We take him in for 2 CT scans today (1 for upper, 1 for lower jaw). Upon the results of those tests, he is supposed to have 3 teeth removed, titanium screws inserted in their places, and new, artificial replacements for all of them. Apparently, there is actually a whole lot more work that really should be done, but these three are like bare-minimum. This all goes back to last autumn in the States, when he accidentally knocked one of his front teeth out while playing table tennis with a Brazilian girl. Got to watch out for those Brazilian girls! ( :

But this is one area of financial concern for him at this time.

We are hoping to create a good system, whereby people will be able to obtain Winkie's materials (many more than are currently readily available). Theoretically, a steady stream of income for his ministry could be provided in this way, and he would be more financially free stay at home, rather than worrying about going from meeting to meeting (much as he loves this), and thus paycheck to paycheck (as it were), traveling.

There are at least 5 books that he would like to see finished before he dies. These books are: Nature and Character of God Part 2, Nature and Character of God Part 3, Honest Questions (100 common questions Winkie has received over the course of his 40+ years in the ministry and his answers to those questions), Quantum Guidance, Fractal Prophets and Chaos Maths (1 book), and Youth Aflame 2.0 (a more modern, updated version of his best-selling book). There's also a sci-fi book he's been working on for over 15 years (The Coming of the Dreamer), but hasn't wanted to release it (in times past) until 3-D movie technology is advanced enough to adequately portrait what he wants to do with it on film.

Tonight we go to the Garratt's for dinner, on the North Shore. They've been such wonderful friends and helpers to us during this time. Comments were made at my grandmother's memorial service on how they have been a real help to my grandfather (who is blind, lives at home alone and is basically unable to cook for himself now). Thanks Garratts! It was good, also to catch up with relatives at the memorial service. Some I had never met before. It's interesting to see how much genes play a part in our interests and natural inclinations in life!

One more thing: Winkie said he would do the next blog update. So you'll finally be hearing from the man himself.

Until next time,

William

Fae's mom died

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-02-13T20:56:50-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Fae's mom died.

Hi everyone. My mom asked me to let everyone know that her mum (Eileen Rees-Thomas) passed away just a few days ago, at her nursing home in Wairau Park, New Zealand. She was a blessing to hundreds of people, and shared Christ's love everywhere she went. She died at around 7:00AM, on Friday, February 12.

Fae thought it important to let the world know about her mother's passing to both let people know what she's going through and so that those whose lives had been affected by Eileen/blessed by her would be informed. Grandma, you will be missed!

The following are a couple of email send-outs from some of Fae's brothers:

From David Rees-Thomas, Fae's oldest brother and founding pastor of Calvary Community Church in Kona, Hawaii (www.lighthouse4kona.org):

Aloha!

Just to let you know that my Mother passed away this morning in Auckland, New Zealand! Joyous moment for Heaven and blessed release for our father and family. It had been a long seven years as she progressively battled the darkening shadows of dementia.

Eileen Rees-Thomas was indeed a woman of faith that touched the lives of literally thousands of people. It was in the common place of life that she ministered the most effectively. The fear of man was not a part of her vocabulary. She loved God with a passion and walked with Him simply but devotedly.

She never went to high school but learned the realities of life through her pursuit of God which impacted her in everything that she did. Like all of us she was a flawed and broken woman but somehow through her limitations flowed the life changing power of her Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Her single passion in life was to introduce people to her Lord. She was a woman of prayer that loved the scriptures and translated them into ministering the healing power of Christ wherever she went.

Her love for Christ did not confine her to a rigid mode of dull christianity. She loved color. She dressed smartly with matching accessories which highlighted her effervescing personality. You could not miss my mother!!

Mom always had an open hand and heart. Only heaven itself will tell the full story of all that she did for her Master that she dearly loved in giving to others.

Thanking the Lord for a mother that was "sold out" for God in everything that she did.

Thankful for a God of hope!

David Rees-Thomas
Hawaii.

I include my brother's letter for further insight as to this remarkable woman-my/our mother!!!!!!

Details concerning the memorial service are still pending

From Anthony Rees-Thomas:

Hi everone!

My mother passed away peacefully this morning at 7:00 AM Auckland (New Zealand) time. Yesterday my Dad and my sister Fae visited her for the last time in the nursing home, prayed over her, sang hymns to her and encouraged her to let go, to release herself into the arms of Jesus. Fae said she really felt led to pray certain things over mom. Mom couldn't speak really, but her eyes glistened with light as she listened. At one point she became alert, looked at my dad and whispered,
"I love you," after which she drifted into partial consciousness.

Eileen Croft Rees-Thomas was a real woman of prayer and she listened intently to the voice of the Lord daily as she sought him on her knees with her Bible laid out before her. Every day before she lost her memory she prayed for each member of her family, each child, each grandchild. I am deeply grateful for the legacy of the simple and abiding faith she had in the Savior and the impartation of that gift she left with the thousands of people she ministered to everywhere she went and that same example she left to each of her children. Thank you, Mom. We're missing you already.

Today Dad sounds very weak and bewildered. When I talked to Dad and Fae a little while ago, we both prayed for the out-pouring of God's peace on him through the comfort of the Holy Spirit and ... the Lord will do just that.

Blessings,

Anthony Rees-Thomas
Burbank, CA

Dad is doing well

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-02-12T18:57:19-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Dad is doing well. His cough seems to be improving, now that we've found some stuff at a local health food store that he's started to take. His blood tests came back negative for infection, both viral and bacterial, so that is good news. The doctor thought that one of the blood pressure medications may have been the cause for the cough. His blood pressure was low, very much within deemed safe levels, so that particular medication was removed from his regime. One of his tests revealed slightly high-cholesterol levels and a cholesterol lowing medication was prescribed.

He hates the cholesterol lowering medication however (one of the "statin" drugs; something he had previously researched and deemed harmful), and has opted for natural, non-pharmacetical cholesterol lowering solutions instead. Among these are high doses of Clinician's Cholesterol Lo, combined with Clinician's Pure Neptune Krill Oil, neither of which is considered a blood thinner to our knowledge. Normally he would probably use grapefruit or one of it's derivatives, but since he is absolutely forbidden to use grapefruit at this time, especially in conjunction with his medication, he is forced to turn to other natural solutions. We have also switched him to a rice-bran oil based butter substitute (which he likes), and a lower-fat type of milk. We are also now trying harder than ever to keep him mostly on fish and fowl, lessening his intake of red, fatty meats. He is also working towards to losing some weight. I still don't have any tennis players lined up for him (sorry - my fault...been busy), but he's keen to start getting out there more often and hitting in the sun.

In other news, my grandmother, (Mom's Mum) now 90 years old, is on her way soon to Jesus. We think she will probably die very soon - any day now. I am writing this on Thursday, February 11th, at about 11:00PM Wellington, New Zealand time. By the time you get this, she may have already passed. She has been in a nursing home for the last year, having suffered a stroke which affected both her long and short-term memory. Mom and Grandpa are finding this time especially difficult. Grandma has been refusing food and fluids, and they are keeping her alive on an IV, using morphine to help alleviate any possible pain she might be facing. Her mind is all but gone right now, and the nursing home has suggested "pulling the plug" (which we are not inclined to do). So we are praying for God's mercy in this situation, and are hoping that she will pass sometime in her sleep.

Winkie is keen to get back into preaching, but I can tell from the trouble he is still having with word recall that he's definitely got some healing to go, and isn't there yet.

He has been working diligently to get some of his old sermons photocopied and typed up for me to (possibly) use in Australia. In the future I'd like to see all his sermons archived like this and (possibly) made available for download for others to use. Goodness knows how many sermons he's taken from other preachers - I don't think he's going to have much of a problem with others using his. ( :

Winkie is well on his way to recovery

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-02-04T09:32:58-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

I took Winkie in for an MRI a few days ago. They took pictures of his brain. We're still waiting to hear the results. Winkie met with his physical therapist today. She took him through all kinds of tests. She will return again next week. He has also played some tennis, and table tennis recently. Actually, they've recommended 30 minutes of exercise a day for him. People that talk to him are impressed by how much progress he has made. It seems like most if not all of his long-term memory has been regained. (He is much more conversationally fluent, now) What we notice still eludes him are the pronouns - the everyday use and descriptor words. But they're coming...as far as I'm concerned it's only a matter of time.

We don't want him thrust back into the preaching world immediately. He still needs time to fully regain his use of pronouns and full communication skills. He also needs time to heal. I also would like to make sure he is remembering things correctly - as they are. But he seems to be doing really well. A little rehab is going to be good for him also.

In the meantime, we're trying to take advantage of a gracious offer that our friend, Dr. (dental prosthodondist) Gilbert Watson has extended to Winkie. Winkie knocked a top front tooth out last year while playing table tennis with someone at a youth camp. He kept the tooth and they temporarily glued it back in. On Christmas Day, that same tooth came out again, after Winkie violently sneezed. We kept the tooth. That same night, Winkie had a stroke. So he was toothless for quite a while, while recovering from the stroke. We saw another dentist, who also temporarily glued the tooth in. At the moment, that's what Winkie is using. But he can't bite down on stake for example, with that tooth. Dr. Watson is going to help us to fix all that. The other thing is just helping him to have a more presentable smile. He has for years "gotten by" with short-term dental solutions. For most, that's fine (and it's fine with him). But Mom and I would like to see him have a much more presentable smile, especially for all the public speaking, television and video recordings, etc. he does.

Dr. Watson is regarded as an expert in his field, and has an amazingly wise and practical approach to denstistry. He took not only X-rays of Winkie's teeth (individually, I think) but also many digital pictures (using a nice, Canon camera) of his teeth! He was able to explain to us and Winkie what's going on, not only with each tooth, individually, but as they relate to each other and his dental situation as a whole. We couldn't be in better hands, and are very lucky to be able to see him. I'm happy because this is something I have really wanted for Dad for many years, now. It seems that now we finally have a chance to get some of this stuff done.

Thanks everybody for your prayers. It looks like the crisis is abated. Winkie is well on his way to recovery. Just don't (for those of you who are ministers or ministry administrators) send him any invites for anything anytime soon. We want to give him at least until June/July to really rest, rehabilitate and recover. (He may be up to the task of preaching sooner, but we don't him or anyone else counting on it - it's just too much pressure on him) Even the very invite itself can carry with it a weight of responsibility and a pressure that we don't want him having to carry at this time. He can't stress or his blood-pressure will elevate. And we can't afford for his blood pressure to elevate anywhere near where it was at, before.
Also, any air travel over 3 hours at a time for him has been recommended against. We really don't think it wise to risk his health by long, overseas flights at this time. Please be advised.

Regards,

William Pratney

Soon we hope to get Winkie on to the tennis court

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-30T13:09:42-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

We took Winkie to the Dentist today. We went to see a specialist, a friend he had known for many years. The man really knew what he was talking about. Never seen his equal in dentistry in the South Pacific. So we've lined Winkie up for some basics over the next couple of months. There is a top front tooth that needs to be completely replaced. In time, he'll be getting that one done. But there are some other dental needs of his that need to be addressed first. We're glad to have him in such fine hands.

Yesterday we took Winkie to see his current local doctor. He removed one blood pressure med from his regime, and said it would be alright for him to start playing some tennis again. Not a lot, no "5 setters" or anything, but a little bit to get him out into the sun, moving and breathing, etc. We also had some blood work done (about 12 tests) and are still waiting on the the results from that.

Winkie's been watching the Australian (tennis) Open, and loving it. So many good players on the line-up; many of his favorite current players.

I continue to look into what can be done for our beach-flat (batch). It's looking like a lot more work and money than we had originally anticipated (isn't that always the case!). But we have good people working with us on it, ready and eager to help. I'm still trying to find a decent plumber and electrician in the South Auckland area.

Mom is concerned for her father, now 94, who lives about 40 minutes drive from us on the North Shore. One of his main pillars of help, Dr. Jenny Newport, along with her husband (former pastor) Duane and son are moving as missionaries to the Philippines. So Grandpa, who had relied so heavily on Jenny in the past, will be in need of greater help both now and in the future. This is a big concern to Mom. She wants to make sure that he receives the help that he needs (obviously), so that is something to add to the equation now in helping to care for Winkie. We'll probably try to start making regular trips to the North Shore (as we did today) each week.

Soon we hope to get Winkie on to the tennis court. Mom and I still suffer from right knee problems (Mom 1 year+, myself 2 years+), so neither of us is really able to do much with him on the tennis court right now without further aggravating our own injuries. We can do a little. Hopefully God will give us someone local (a player) that is patient enough to hit with him.

Thank you again to everyone that has been praying for us. Blessings! Blessings! Blessing! We really appreciate it.

- William

Winkie has made some progress since last week

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-24T22:19:34-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

We just got back from Dale and David Garratt's double 70th birthday celebration, and it was great. What a privilege!

Winkie has made some progress since last week, as commented on by both his speech therapist and our herbalist friend Noel Maxwell. A lot more of his long-term memory has come back (I thought all, but just in talking with him tonight realized that he still has a ways to go), and he is making regular improvement on his use of pronouns.

Winkie saw a lot of people he has known for 30 years or more at the party, and they seemed to be very happy to see him. We were so blessed to be able to witness the celebration. John Dawson (among others) shared a word or two, and Dad was able to connect with him. I made some new connections, and was able to catch up with others that I hadn't seen for a while. Mom had a great time. She was looking good. People commented that Winkie was looking good, too.

One thing that we don't understand, is a nasty cough that Winkie has been fighting. It seems to be getting worse, so that is definitely an area for prayer. But we plan to take him to the doctor again this coming week, and hopefully can see it resolved soon. Normally we would just use herbs on something like this, but the ones that we use and have access to usually contain natural blood thinners, which we can't give him. So I'm not sure what the best way is, to fight this. I suppose the doctor will probably prescribe some sort of antibiotic. It's scary for me, some nights, waking up to the sound of a hacking cough. You never like to see the ones you love in pain or sick. And this thing sounds bad. But not to alarm anyone, I just thought I'd mention it as an area for prayer. We need wisdom in helping him with this.

We saw some other ministry friends of ours over the last few days, some visiting, others we went to see. Julian Batchelor, a friend from days gone by came out and visited us. It was great to see him again. We also met up with Steve Goode, a tennis playing minister friend of ours who's known Dad for over 30 years. Dad remarked (and it shows how much of his long-term memory has come back) on Steve's ability to play tennis with either hand. I've played with Steve, and I didn't remember that fact! So praise God! Winkie is definitely remembering people and associations - he's even growing more proficiently conversational.

The Revival Bible is still a pertinent area of prayer right now. I know it weighs heavily on Winkie's mind. He should be resting, but 2 nights ago I heard him get up, and we talked till about 3:30AM about issues surrounding it's production. I can't disclose much, but just to say that if you think to, please pray that God's grace would be on and surrounding this project. It's so close to completion, but there are a couple of building blocks that need to be inserted before the roof can go on (to use a building metaphor).

Speaking of building, I have been working hard to try to help organize the renovation of our downstairs batch (beach flat). We have people from His Way helping us on it, and a friend from Australia plans to come out and help us more on it in March. It will serve as a place for me to stay while I am here in New Zealand, as well as a place for special guests, ministers and friends to stay while I am gone. Mom and Dad are kicking me out from upstairs, as it's a small, two-bedroom place, and my room is just next door to theirs.

Soon I must prepare for a trip to Adelaide, Australia, at the invitation of a dear friend of ours where I will be speaking a number of times. Please pray that God would help me to prepare for it in every way necessary. I really want to be personally ready, and be able to share those things that God wants to use to help these precious people. I haven't preached since 2007, and apart from the loving persistence of Dennis Slape (www.life-church.com.au/about/leadership-team) most likely would not be until my return to the States (planned mid-August).

Please continue to pray for our partners in the ministry–Ministry of Helps–as they continue to help us from the States. Making Winkie's printed, audio and video materials readily available is a huge task, and we need God's wisdom for the right way to make that happen.

Thank you to all praying for your godly prayers of faith!

God bless you,

William

Winkie's started to play table-tennis again

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-17T16:14:20-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

We were visited by YWAM founder Loren and Darlene Cunningham yesterday.

It was great for Winkie, going over some of the Revival Study Bible material with them. He and they went over a long list of people they knew from years gone by. So I'm sure that was good for Dad, not only for the fellowship, but in helping to re-spark his memory of people, places and days gone by. It was a real blessing to see them.

Winkie's started to play table-tennis again.
Today we took Winkie to some long-time friends of ours for lunch, and he played some table tennis there with me. This was recommend to us by Winkie's assigned occupational therapist (who he met with 2 days prior). At first, he was slow, but once he started to warm-up, it all started to come back to him. Amazing! So that was good. His energy levels are not what they used to be, and we stopped sooner than he normally would have, but it was really good for him. He got quite a few points off of me!

As far as memory, his long-term has been coming back, but it seems apparent now that the short-term word-associations he's been struggling with are going to be a major area of rehabilitation. We continue to trust God in this, and are still hopeful for full rehabilitation.

Some have commented that (normally) he just goes and goes and goes. It seems like these hospital visits and time-outs may be the only way of getting him to sleep and rest. So, I'm glad he's sleeping and resting, but I wish it wouldn't take a trip to hospital every time he needs it!

God has been providing for us.
Earlier today a neighbor friend of ours came over bearing gifts of fresh herbs and vegetables. So many have been good to us at this time. It seems like when we need food or help, an offer to help comes, or someone comes over, and at just the right time (most of the time). In this way, we are seeing God's provision for us daily.

Winkie is meeting with three different therapists now (starting this week).
He's meeting with an occupational therapist, a speech therapist, and will be meeting with a physiotherapist (starting this week). All three of these therapists are being provided for us under the New Zealand commonwealth social healthcare system. Had this happened in the States, I cannot imagine the amount it would cost to cover all of these expenses. Thank God we're in New Zealand at this time!

Revival Study Bible
Some of you have been asking what's happening with the Revival Study Bible. I am only in the loop, temporarily helping out and am not a part of the actual presentation team, so please bear that in mind as you read this.

The proposed launch date (I have on good authority) for the Revival Study Bible has been moved back to September (at least for Singapore), 2010. So those of you that have been promised 1st edition prints (limited number) should receive those before the end of the year. For everyone else, you may have to wait until the second printing (date?). Sorry! = ( And no, I have no idea when that might be. But for those privileged few that have already been added to the 1st edition list, you may receive your copy as soon as June/July. However, there are still some things that need to come into place before the RSB can even go to print. Sorry, to all of you that have been waiting for a copy of this much coveted after study Bible. Without going into detail, there have been quite a few "hick-ups" along the way, and if you think of it, this project could do with quite a bit of prayer, both for the general editors (pastor Steve Hill, Dr. Tamara Winslow, and Winkie) and the publishers (Amour Publishing Pte Ltd). Steve Hill, who Thomas Nelson had originally asked to do the project has been battling cancer. Many of you probably remember him from the Brownsville Assemblies of God revival, that literally touched over a million lives. Please pray for his full recovery. Dr. Tamara Winslow, the amazing Bible scholar/researcher and teacher that actually contributed the revival study-chain (over 300,000 words) to the RSB has recently lost some valuable ministry team (staff) members. As I understand it they were the ones helping her with the RSB project. Please pray for God's provision for her during this time in the area of new ministry team (staff) members.

Thanks again for your prayers for Winkie and for us. And thank you to all those that have been sending in encouraging emails.

Pray God would help us make Winkie's materials more readily available!
One other area of prayer (for those of you inquiring how you can pray) is for our Ministry of Helps (MOH) team. We need to see some breakthroughs in the area of making Winkie's materials (both written and in audio/video form) readily available. We have over 150 videos of Winkie teaching that need to be converted and put into useable format for modern viewers. This takes both time and man-power. We also have the desire to make available once again Winkie's books (as I understand it all of them are currently out of print). We would like to see them made available online, which also means time and man-power (scanning, uploading, etc.).

In order to do this, we either need extra, self-supported willing and able persons helping us who can commit to these projects, and see them through to their completion, or, for those who are already working with us, to be financially able to commit full-time to these projects. Simply working to pay the bills could be the greatest roadblock to completing projects such as these which would otherwise benefit hundreds of thousands of lives.

Dee, Dad's administrative assistant in particular needs prayer at this time. She has been facing enormous pressure on many different fronts - prayer for her and her family would be especially appreciated.

Alright, that's all I have to say for now. Thanks for taking the time to read.

William

THANK YOU for all the encouraging words, prayers of faith, and donations

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-13T17:19:44-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Okay, so much has happened since my last post!

On Saturday, a whole crew of about 14 people came out from His Way Church and helped us with the house and property - water blasting, vacuuming, cleaning, gardening, clearing out trash they were truly a force to be reckoned with! We haven't had the time to really clean the place up since we got back, and the His Way crew was just truly the Church in action.

Mom and I are still trying to work out ways to cut back on the work time in caring for Dad. We don't want to leave him at home alone, for one because if someone calls they probably for the most part won't understand him, and two, if anything bad should happen...so we're kind of wearing ourselves out a bit (I feel) by doing double-duty so to speak. Mom also hasn't felt confident driving on her own, which means every time she goes somewhere, we all have had to go. Money has been coming in (praise God!) and we were finally able to get some car insurance today. I've also bee helping Mom get back in the drivers seat, so hopefully she'll be confident enough to drive on her own (especially now that we have that insurance), giving me more down time and allowing us to divvy up the day better.

Also, Rob and Caroline Deluca (His Way), as well as others have been bringing/sending food over, so (praise God!) we haven't been in want - we've had an abundance, and I really see not only God's provision but Christ's Church in action towards us in this. We've had a super-abundance - God's not allowing us to be in want. In fact, we were even able to help a few others out a little from the abundance that we ourselves had received.

So what about Winkie?

Okay, so most of you probably just want to know, "How is Winkie doing?" He's doing alright. Not awesome. But alright. Sometimes it appears his progress is digressing. At other times it amazes us how in-tune he is with subject matter and conversation. He still struggles with getting the right words out trying to say what he wants to say. His long-term memory seems to be coming back alright. It's the everyday words like, "fork", "pencil" etc. that he really seems to struggle with. He's far from where he needs to be (in my opinion). But some good news is there will be both an occupational therapist and a speech therapist coming to see him here at home once a week. They are being sent from Middlemore hospital, and it's provided courtesy of the New Zealand government. The occupational therapist will (hopefully) help him to structure his day better, organizing things like getting up in the morning, having a shave and shower, getting dressed, making breakfast, etc. The speech therapist (who we met with yesterday) will be working with him on his speech. There's probably more to it than that (forgive me speech therapists!) but she'll basically be trying to help him effectively say what he wants to say.

I want to say again a loud THANK YOU for all the encouraging words, prayers of faith, and donations being sent in for us at this time.

We've still got a long way to go in terms of Winkie's recovery, but God can turn things around in an instant. Thanks for believing with us for Winkie's full recovery.

God bless, and thank you for your prayers.

William

Winkie isn't doing very well. Please keep praying.

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-05T21:01:07-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Not a lot to share on the update front at the moment. We've had a fairly steady stream of visitors - some friends came over this evening and made dinner for us. While they were here another friend from His Way came and visited for a while. She prayed for Mom and Dad before she left.

Winkie isn't doing very well. Don't get me wrong. He's not doing poorly, comparative to how he was earlier on in hospital. But he doesn't seem to have improved that much in the last 3 or 4 days. He doesn't seem to be making much progress, compared to the leaps and bounds he made earlier.

We took him over to see our friend Noel Maxwell, naturopath/nutritionist/herbalist the other day. He gave us a wonderful (herbal) copper/iron supplement, which, we are told supports arterial health by strengthening the artery walls. The idea is to strengthen the arteries so that they won't leak or hemorrhage further.

We also met with a local doctor. Winkie is under his care. He lessened some of the medication that Winkie's been prescribed, and we were thankful for that.

Soon (this week, apparently) Middlemore hospital should be sending out someone to work with Winkie on his speech (a speech therapist). Now, Winkie's speaking is not slurred, he articulates quite well. But the main way this stroke seems to have affected him is by hindering his ability to connect the word(s) he is searching for to the thought he's trying to communicate. His default word is still, "Computer." He'll be speaking a normal sentence and then suddenly he'll say, "computer" in the middle of it for the word that he can't think of.

It can be discouraging for me, sometimes. I want him to make progress, and quick, but he's definitely not acting like all the man I know him to be. Part of him has been lost. Part of him has died. And that part (that part of his brain or that part of his functioning) is what we need to see revived. The doctor said he would "never fully recover." And, from a medical standpoint, apart from some kind of miracle, he is right. But we believe in miracles... they're part of a realm that's outside of so-called medical expertise. "So-called" I say, because God alone is the Great Physician. He designed our bodies, knows them better than any, and can save and destroy, hurt and heal, put down and raise up, kill and make alive. We serve an awesome God, and I believe that He gets the last word, the final say...

One of the things Dad said today made us laugh, because he perfectly described what was going on concerning his own condition, but attributed it to Mom. They were completely true of him, but he said that those things were true of Mom. I don't know if this was a word association thing or what, but it was pretty funny, in an odd, sort of way.

It seems that part of his short-term memory may have been affected. He doesn't always remember what pills he has and hasn't taken. We can't ask him if he took some particular pills or not, because he always says that he took them, regardless of whether it was earlier that day or the day before. So we (Mom and I) have to ask each other in order to make sure he gets the meds he needs each day.

Some small financial donations have come in. Thanks, everybody for those! (= We appreciate the love and generosity being shown to Winkie and us his family at this time. It's been good also to hear from friends, both newly made and long-time loved.

Well, I had better sign off for now. It's late. BBFN.

Every day, God provides for us in new ways

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-01T17:51:26-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

I'm writing this early Saturday morning (Jan. 2), but wanted to say that we had a good day yesterday. Every day, it seems, God provides for us in new ways. Yesterday Dwane and Jenny Newport (and their son) from His Way Church came, bringing my 94-year-old grandfather (who they have helped take care of for the past few years) with them. Jenny made lunch for us all, and after eating we all went for a walk to the beach (about 3 blocks down the road).

Winkie is sleeping a lot - I think its the medication. But it's probably good. Rest is the primary thing the doctors have prescribed. He isn't supposed play any tennis for a while. Each day he writes in notepads, trying to put the various peices of his affected memory back together again. Each day he asks questions, trying to sort through all the names and places he has forgotten.

I have received many emails from people mentioning the use of the hormone progesterone for Winkie's recovery, and am investigating possible product options in that field.

Again, thank you for your prayers. We can't say enough how grateful we are for all the saints of God rallying together to lift up this servant of the Lord that he might recover (fully), rise, and once again go out to bring light and truth to the nations.

Blessings,

William

I must be about my Fathers business

online@israelanderson.com — 2010-01-01T14:01:05-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Hi everyone. I just thought I'd post something Winkie had written prior to Christmas, last year. It was written and given to me, so it is personal, but due to its rich content, I think some of you may be able to appreciate it as well, and see that the bulk of it could be used outside of the context in which it was originally given.

On the front, the card reads, ..."I must be about my Fathers business" Luke 2:49

(Inside)
To William my beloved son
One Day After Thirty -

He was thirty when he laid aside
The tools a fathers' trade had taught him
The chisels, saws and adzes
That caught the rough and un-hewn wood
To plane it straight and true
He was thirty when he put them up forever
Those things he learned to make the crooked good
Those disciplines to fashion something new

Ahead of him was time uncharted
Ahead of him were things unknown
He was thirty when He went into the wilderness
He was thirty when He left his home
I sometimes wonder what He thought then
If He would ever get to do
The things that others talked about Him
The things the Book brought into view

He gathered friends who likewise dreamed dreams
And left their little lives to pledge with Him
Their hearts, their honor and their sacred fortunes
To take a chance that came but once to save a world
To change it all for unseen crowds to come in time
To walk their steps and likewise love
The things His flag unfurled

His life, they say, was all too short
If only He had had more days!
What might He otherwise have wrought
With chairs and tables, useful things
The practical made beautiful, the ordinary made lovely
Why lay aside the hammer and the nails
When he could have changed the world
With what he knew and how he could
Work wonders when he cut the wood?

He left it all behind at thirty but in the not-far future
He would see it all come back one day to Him
When someone else would cut the wood He carried
And lay it straight and Him along its planed and naked length
Waiting for the hammer and the nails and the board
To finish the work and leave with the world forever
The mark of His hands and what we understand
Now will never be forgotten -
What He wrought with a tree
When the world knew that He
Had laid it aside.

From Dad: December 17, 2009

Winkie is at home!

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-31T08:59:38-07:00

Happy New Years!

It's New Years Eve here in South Auckland, New Zealand.
Winkie was discharged from Middlemore hospital late this afternoon. He is at home with us now, sleeping as I type.

He is expected to be on medication for at least three months, something normally a natural health advocate such as he would never want to be. But he hasn't put up a fight on that front. The only things we've had to fight him for, have been putting his socks on, brushing his teeth...silly little things.

We are so thankful for all the prayers that went out for him. I just want to say, that just because he is with us at home, he by no means is recovered. He has made progress, but is still quite impaired. He is in no condition to be giving any kind of teaching, or answering any kind of complicated theological question right now.
We're also planning on keeping him off his computer for a while. So if you've sent him facebook, myspace, or email messages, I wouldn't expect any kind of response from Winkie, at least not at this time.

Special thanks go out to David, Dale and Melinda Garratt (www.davidanddalegarratt.com), for their help during this time. Everyday they've been bringing Winkie and us delicious homemade meals, some of which are probably straight out of Dale's hospitality/cookbook. Special thanks go out also to the Ministry of Helps team (www.moh.org), including Dee Patton and Israel Anderson for posting these blogs and keeping you guys informed. His Way Church International (www.hiswaychurch.com) have also been a big blessing to us during this time, helping (along with David Garratt) get the word out to various churches, keeping us in prayer, and sending flowers. We appreciate you His Way! Thanks also to all the other churches and individuals that have been praying for Winkie and us, his family, at this time. May God bless you!

Winkie will be on meds to maintain his blood pressure (too much could cause another bleed), pain (he still gets headaches - something he was having right before the incident; too much pain apparently increases blood pressure), and to guard him against seizures (doctors told us one seizure could kill him). Most of the natural health remedies we would normally use, we have been told, would actually have the opposite effect on someone with his condition, a hemmorhagic stroke. (See "hemmorhagic stroke" in the Merck Manuals Online Library: http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec06/ch086/ch086d.html?qt=stroke&alt=sh) So no cayenne pepper! ): Nothing to thin his blood. Not even Winkie's advocated nattokinase, which he usually uses in place of aspirin when he travels.

Please pray first of all for us (Mom and I, and those doctors that will be working with him), that we would give him exactly what he needs in order to give his body the best fighting chance to effectively (and quickly) deal with the blood clot sitting in his brain, and also for Winkie, that God would bring him to the point of full functionality again, utilizing that amazing brain of his!

Winkie's memory is still slowly coming back (the morning this all happened he couldn't remember our names, his own date of birth, or even tell where he was, so he's made vast improvement...). It looks like it could take a while though (at least from a medical standpoint - God can do anything). We covet your prayers at this time.
Good to hear, also, from so many of you. Love and greetings back at ya!

With regards,

William

If you would like to give to the Pratneys at this time...

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-29T10:31:10-07:00

If you would like to give to the Pratneys at this time...

There are 2 buttons you can use to give, depending on if you need a receipt or not. This first button send the funds directly to William Pratney who is with Winkie and Fae in New Zealand. This is the best way to give, but we are unable to issue a receipt. All persons outside of the US should also use this button as we can not issue receipts to people outside the US.

If you need a receipt, then use this button. The funds will go to Winkie’s ministry in Texas and they will issue you a receipt.

Sending checks.
If you need a receipt, make checks out to Ministry of Helps and send to this address:
Winkie Pratney Family Fund
PO Box 876
Lindale, TX 75771

If you are outside the US, or do not need a receipt, please make the check out to William Pratney (please note, NOT Winkie) and send to this address:
Winkie Pratney Family Fund
PO Box 215
Manurewa, Auckland
New Zealand

(Yes, foreign checks can be deposited in New Zealand)

If you would like bank account details to make a wire transfer or Direct Deposit, please email us through our contact page.

Already we have seen miraculous improvement

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-29T08:28:30-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Hi all!

Thanks goes out to all the faithful in Christ Jesus that have been praying for Winkie at this time. After seeing some of the many emails that have been pouring in, I don't doubt that there are more than a few.

Good news!
Winkie seems to be making progress daily. Each day we've noticed marked improvement, and his recall seems to be deepening. He has began writing in a notepad we got him, attempting to remember things like peoples names, books he has written, sermon topics he has spoken on, computer operating systems he has used, as well as the categories of the honorary doctorate ("doctor of letters") he received from Ecclesia College in the United States before returning to New Zealand, among others. We are still learning how much of his memory was lost, and how much of his speech & vocabulary were affected. But like I said, each day he gets a little better, showing his ability to recall things he could not the day previous.

This morning I talked with the visiting neurologist/stroke specialist from Auckland hospital. (They decided not to transfer him many days ago - Winkie is still in Middlemore hospital in Otahuhu) They decided against any kind of head surgery. The grounds for this decision (from what I could deduce) were twofold:
1. They do not believe that a pressure relief needle aspiration (piercing the skull to let the blood out) will be helpful, because
a. in cases such as his, both aspirations and non-aspirations have shown similar outcomes, i.e. letting the blood out won't help. Why? Because (I am told) after having tried both aspirations and foregoing them for over 40 years, aspirations have proven no more effective and yet more dangerous - fluid will simply accumulate to take the place of the blood that was relieved...and any kind of head surgery is dangerous.
2. There is far greater danger in doing any kind of head surgery (including the risk of infection) in comparison to the safer alternative (if viable) of allowing the blood to reabsorb into the body and for the body to heal itself.

The neurologist also told me that they have foregone the MRI, and neither an MRI or a CT scan will be helpful at this time because neither (apparently) can see beyond the blood that has spilled in his brain. Another CT scan could be helpful (apparently) AFTER the blood that spilled in his brain has been reabsorbed.

Winkie met with a speech therapist this afternoon. She ran him through a series of tests designed to assess what parts of his brain were affected by the stroke, and how this practically affected his recall and communication skills. He did quite well, but the tests revealed that he is unable, on his own, to recall many basic words in his vocabulary. Words like, "comb", "coin", and "cup" were quite gone from him. Once reminded of the word used to describe a given object, he could usually recall it and continue to use it from that point on, having reintroduced it into his vocabulary (or memorized it). Other words, however, seemed foreign to him, as if he had never learned them before.

When the artery in his brain burst, part of his brain died. The information contained therein (if it was solely contained therein) will probably have to be re-introduced in order for him to function as he once did. The clot of blood we saw on the CT scan was about the size of a walnut. Normally something that large, in the area it is (just over and perhaps a little behind the left ear) impairs motor function on the right side of the body (i.e. right arm, right leg, etc). But Winkie does not seem affected like that at all.

Winkie met with a physical therapist recently for a full evaluation on his motor skills. This included an evaluation on his coordination, balance, and strength. As far as I could deduce, he passed all of the tests they gave him. (I want to say with flying colors, but in truth it was nothing that glorious...his mind was struggling to keep up with directions a little, sort of like what one might expect with someone taking directions in a second language...they speak it, they understand it, but they struggle to keep up with the pace in which it is given at times)

Because of the amazing brain which Winkie has (and we all have amazing brains, but as a child doctors apparently told his mother that he had unusually high brain-wave activity, recommending an especially dark room for him in order to allow him to sleep properly), he is able to comprehend large amounts of data at an impressive pace. This means, that the rehabilitation process involving his relearning of object-word associations should be faster than average. (Sorry if you think this is bragging about my dad...I'm just trying to say we have high hopes for him, because we know how he tends to operate)

I should mention as well: I have been getting phone calls, txts and emails from various people with the resounding sense that God is going to completely restore Winkie's mind to him, 100%. I tend to agree. Already we have seen miraculous improvement. Praise the LORD! Hallelujah!

Please keep believing with us for this wonderful work of God. And thank you again, for your prayers of faith for Winkie.

God bless,

William

"Yes. It IS a miracle, and it is restoring my faith"

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-28T12:58:31-07:00

(From Dee Patton)

Fae (Winkie’s wife) just called me...

She is tired. Sounds REALLY tired.

Yet! There is great victory happening there right now. Winkie is having another CAT scan today even though he was supposed to have to wait for some time since he is not considered in a life threatening situation now. A Doctor was overheard saying as he left the room "It's a bloody miracle". A nurse then poked her head in and said "Yes. It IS a miracle and it is restoring my faith." Apparently the miracle is that Winkie is coming back from this a LOT faster than anyone thought he could. He is reading again and writing things down and remembering things - slowly, but fast according to the Docs.

David and Dale Garrett came by and Rob DeLuca and others....and there has been much praying in that room and a lot of speaking in tongues, from what Fae says - so much so that she was afraid they would be asked to stop by hospital staff. And the word that keeps coming seems to be that this is an attack on Winkie's gifting - his brain - and on the Revival Bible project too.

dee

Winkie is making progress - keep praying

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-28T08:31:38-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

The doctor said that Winkie's making progress. I actually noticed it last night, as well. He referred to me as, "William" today, and Mom as Fae...a marked improvement to a few days ago.

Tomorrow, we are told, he will be visited by a stroke specialist team. The doctor indicated that I should direct more specific questions to them. I am typing these at night. Mom takes the 10:00AM-8:00PM shifts, I take the 8:00PM-10:00AM shifts. I should know more tomorrow as to what has happened this afternoon with him. We were visited by someone gathering information for a possible MRI. Don't know if he's had it or not. Tomorrow, I am told, he will be put on a waiting list for another CT scan. It could be a while, seeing he is out of critical (life or death), and there could be many on the list this holiday season.

Please continue to pray for him. What we are needing is for the swelling to go down in his brain, and for all the blood to be completely reabsorbed into his body. Some, in prayer, have felt this whole ordeal to be a Satanic attack on him. I tend to agree.

Please pray for his and our protection. Specifically for him, for his mind. For us, for our hearts.

God bless,

William

What we know so far about Winkie Pratney

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-27T06:05:20-07:00

(From William Pratney, Winkie’s son)

Hi all.

Winkie has been transferred to the general ward. I stayed with him last night. They shifted him out of the adult day ward (next to emergency) around 3:00AM last night. Because he has a "superbug" i.e. ESBL, he has been given a room to himself, with two beds. However, because the bathroom is shared between his and the next room, and he has the superbug, he isn't allowed to use the in-room toilet, meaning only the portable cammode and urinal, which makes things a little more difficult, but not impossible. If you google ESBL, you'll see that it's an antibiotic-resistant enzyme, commonly produced by the bacteria E. Coli and K. pneumoniae. After I sent out the last report, however, I learned from the doctor that they have ruled out ESBL as the cause of Winkie's stroke, and that he isn't technically "infected," only "colonized." This means that although he has the superbug, it isn't affecting him.
So no worry on the superbug.

The doctor took us to see the ct scan last night - the blood could be seen the in his left temple area, about a 1.5" diameter round. We are told the damage has been done to his left parietal lobe, which has affected his language processing.

What we know...

At about 1:30AM (Boxing Day) Winkie was complaining of upperback pain and a headache. I thought he was acting strange, but chalked it up to extreme tiredness and Winkie weirdness. He had had a headache for about two days prior.

By this time, Mom was already in bed asleep. After giving him a neck/backrub, and some Panadol for the headache, I made him go to bed. I also went to bed. I heard, in the middle of the night something frightening, but thought it to be my mother, having a nightmare. After we brought him in to hospital, we learned from him that he had gotten up in the middle of the night (after I had sent him to bed, apparently) and taken a diluted form of pharmaceutical grade (pure) hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). He apparently had called out in the middle of the night for help, but Mom was fast asleep next to him, and I was in the next room, having waiting for a second sound after the first and heard none. He had had swollen feet (puffy ankles and a puffy right foot) for the last 2 months or so. I now believe that the H202 he took flushed his arteries, because all of the swelling has left his feet - they are back to normal in size. The following morning we received a phone call from the son of a family we were going to be having Boxing Day dinner with- he was asking for a computer recommendation from Dad. Dad was unable to clearly articulate anything to him, and we realized something was quite wrong. We called for an ambulance, and they brought him to Middlemore hospital around 11:00AM. We now know that his stroke was caused not by a clot blockage in his brain, but by a ruptured artery. We don't know if the H202 he took induced it, but the doctors think it very unlikely. Right now, the doctors are basically just trying to control his blood pressure and pain, waiting for his body to reabsorb the blood, and for the swelling to go down.

How is Winkie doing?
We can mostly make sense of what he is saying most of the time, but to try to get him to answer the most basic of questions, Where are you? What is your date of birth? What is my name? these things are severely affected. He is not in a lot of pain. The doctor asked him to give a pain rating for his headache, 1 being the lowest, and 10 being the highest, he finally was able to answer with about a 2-3. He's comfortable, but frustrated. He realizes that he cannot remember certain things, and he has been trying to process using pen and paper as well as by speaking.

I am hoping to gain further clarity from the doctor the next time he visits as to why they have opted out of sending him to the neurosurgeons in Auckland hospital. I think the neuro-surgeons looked at his ct scans, but just need to confirm that.
They have decided against surgery (for pressure relief), ruling it too dangerous. But this, too, I want to ask about.

Thanks for your prayers of faith for Winkie! We are hopeful, and are believing with others that are praying for him that he will think and talk and write normally once again.

Blessings,

William

Winkie Pratney doing well after aneurysm!

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-25T23:15:23-07:00

Update from William Pratney, Winkie’s son.
Doctors have decided not to take him to Auckland hospital.
No surgery seems to be needed.

He has just eaten a meal and they said his brain will probably fix itself.
He will be kept in observation for 3 days.
He contracted a superbug, so has been moved to a private room.
Praise God and thank you everyone for your prayers and messages.

Your prayers are coveted at this time.
Please share this with all your prayer networks as urgently as possible.
Updates will be posted to this blog http://winkiepratney.com/winkie_pratney_blog/ as we know more.

Winkie Pratney hospitalized with aneurysm on the brain

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-25T21:21:35-07:00

Update from William Pratney, Winkie’s son.
CT scan results have confirmed an aneurysm on the brain.
Part of the brain has bled and affected his memory.
He is being transferred to Auckland Hospital neurophyiology unit.

Your prayers are coveted at this time.
Please share this with all your prayer networks as urgently as possible.
Updates will be posted to this blog http://winkiepratney.com/winkie_pratney_blog/ as we know more.

Winkie Pratney in Hospital - Dec 25th 2009

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-25T20:28:36-07:00

Winkie Pratney is in hospital in NZ.
And we're not sure what the problem is.
Possibly a stroke or spinal infection.
He is in a bad way.
Your prayers are coveted at this time.

Please share this with all your prayer networks as urgently as possible.

Updates will be posted to this blog http://winkiepratney.com/winkie_pratney_blog/ as we know more.

09 Odyssey Part 1

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-12-22T21:36:30-07:00

2009 - US Odyssey Part 1 - California Roaming

Our visit to the U.S. this year began when we entered Los Angeles in June at Harvest Rock, with many friends in this great church. I was embarrassed but deeply honored when visiting as a family to be asked by our friend Che Ahn if I would speak for them that morning. A sad event had taken place in Hollywood, and many of Che’s congregation are in some way involved in the music, film and theatre industry.

ON THE DEATH OFA KNIGHT, A KING AND AN ANGEL:

That Thursday the 25th began reports of the deaths of two of three major figures, each icons in the media world. Michael Jackson, the ”King of Pop” at 50, died after suffering a heart attack. While people will remember his Thriller as the highest-selling album of all time, Michael’s hit single We Are The World co-written with Quincy Jones raised hundreds of millions for the starving in Africa. Before him was Farrah Fawcett, the gorgeous Charlie’s Angel of the 70’s and 85 million best-selling poster child of all time who battled cancer for three years before succumbing to it at 62. Farrah’s dramatic stint in TV-movies drew attention to real-life situations like the plight of the battered wife in The Burning Bed. Ed McMahon who died two days before them lived most of his adult life in commercials and late-night television as Johnny Carson’s sidekick, was 86. Each of these much-loved personalities lived his or her life in limelight. Each of them affected the world and each of them lived as some of the best-known entertainers of all time.

What can you say about the death of legends? Heath Ledger, the fast-rising new young star of blockbuster hits like A Knights Tale and The Dark Knight had sent the media world into shock by his accidental overdose death only the year before. When someone has become world-renown in any field, their deaths may affect millions. When it happens in the field of entertainment it may become remarkable.

Some still remember where they were and what they were doing when they first heard the news of the princely President John F. Kennedy’s shocking assassination. His last speech, written but never delivered, ends like this “We, in this country, in this generation, are -- by destiny rather than by choice -- the watchmen on the walls of world freedom. We ask, therefore, that we may be worthy of our power and responsibility, that we may exercise our strength with wisdom and restraint, and that we may achieve in our time and for all time the ancient vision of "peace on earth, good will toward men." That must always be our goal, and the righteousness of our cause must always underlie our strength. For as was written long ago: "except the Lord keep the city, the watchmen wakes but in vain."

Few may remember that the best-loved Christian apologetics writer of the last century, C.S. Lewis of Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters and the Narnia series died on the very same day. When two celebrities die in one day, the passing of one less known may be overshadowed by the death of one who made more headlines before their deadline. Yet the significance of a major celebrity in our newspapers are not necessarily the same as those published in the other worlds. Remember this however; celebrity death is always significant, and always has spiritual implications. While God comes to the funeral of every little sparrow, when Kings, Angels and Knights and Princesses die, something is being said also in heaven.

Decades later the jaded world was shocked again by the terrible car crash death of the beautiful British princess Diana who used her royalty, her wealth and status to go to places where people were hurting; to visit orphaned children and AIDS victims. The massive national and international mourning that followed her death for weeks overshadowed the quiet passing of a wrinkled old Albanian nun at the same time who lived with the starving, the poor and the dying in Calcutta to bring to their funerals a lovely shred of dignity and love for those tabbed as truly unlovely. Malcolm Muggeridge, the famed British journalist and television celebrity who met Christ in his seventies and so shocked his fellow-cynics of the world by his bold and penetrating witness wrote a book about her life; he called it “Something Beautiful For God.” She was no stunning model. She was not young. She did not live at all in the life-style of the rich and famous. Almost nobody even knew her last name. Most simply called her “Mother Teresa” Few knew that the nation she came from was one in which claiming Christian conversion was an automatic death sentence. When a young man wrote her to ask what he might do to also affect the world, he waited months before he got her four-word reply: “Find your own Calcutta.”

Paul Bruton, a friend of mine who helped me so much by asking me to speak in my early days as an almost unknown young evangelist in his Northern and Southern California Assembly of God youth camps from the late 60’s on into the 70’s, told me a story. I think it was probably about him as a little boy when he and his missionary parents returned on furlough after many years serving in Africa. With them on the boat was a celebrity porn star? returning from a cruise to the accolade of many fans and press gathered to welcome her dockside. Through some mix-up those who were supposed to be there to greet and to pick up their little family did not even arrive. They stood forlorn in the trash aftermath of the celebrity welcome with their so few belongings in cardboard boxes, unknown, un-welcomed and alone.

“It isn’t fair” said young Paul. “It just isn’t fair. We have spent all these years serving Jesus and helping people. She didn’t. She had this great welcome. But when we come home there isn’t even anybody here to pick us up.” He said: “I can never forget my Dad’s reply. He looked at me with tears in his eyes and he said: “Son. We’re not home yet.”

What do you think is on God’s heart when someone loved, sometimes worshipped and mourned by millions passes into eternity? We know that people who loved Christ are now finally home at last. We know that their relatively short life on earth, whether known or unknown by the multitudes however beautifully or terribly they died is only the beginning of a grand adventure with their Maker that will never end. As Ray Hildebrand sung in the seventies - “Good news! Children of God never die” and followed with a second song, the happy abandonment of “If I live, well praise the Lord - If I die, well praise the Lord - If I live or die, my only cry will be - Jesus in me, Praise the Lord.”

What we may not know about the Lord is His often hidden and usually private dealings with people that while you knew them as celebrity you would never know or suspect had from their very birth a Divine calling to do something special for Him in His world. We all know, for it is obvious, that they were gifted. We also may know there was something special about them, right from their very early days.

We all now know that whatever happened to them along their journey, they did indeed affect their world. What we may forget is where that gifting came from and Who it was that gave them those gifts. And what we may not know or realize is that there are sacred callings rooted in the very nature and character of God that are not in the slightest bit religious, but as utterly needed and wanted in our world as those with a Levitical callings of evangelists, pastors, prophets and teachers with apostolic, prophetic, wisdom and knowledge or healing gifts.

This, as previously mentioned, has been for me one of the most surprising discoveries in the beauty and wonder of God that I have ever seen. Working on the second volume of Divinity, the focus here will be on His nature and character as revealed in Creation. What He makes and does, what He created and called to live and flourish on Earth are evidences of His wise, loving and caring Reality. I found so far, that there are in the Bible at least 35 major vocations that find their genesis in Who He really is. And the same God Who calls people to professional religious ministry can and does also call people to a sacred vocation that may not be religious at all.

This is not just what we now call “market-place ministry” where we have recently seen more and more evidences of God working in the business world with men and women who have dedicated their lives and fortunes to the advancement of His Kingdom. This is not just God offering to help out some earnest Christians who want to use their skills or talents to influence those who don’t really come to church. This is deeper, even more basic. Martin Luther found out four hundred years ago that you don’t have to be a monk or a nun to be a real Christian. I found out for the first time for me, that you don’t have to be called to a religious work to have a genuine sacred calling, and you don’t have to be a religious person to have real Divine call on your life to do something of destiny.

I think God can call people long before they become Christians to do something for Him. I believe He can and does call people, even from the very womb to be His representative in some way in the world. I also believe the “gifts and callings of God are without repentance”. I believe these gifts and callings are quite distinct from salvation and do not in themselves guarantee an entrance to heaven. But they are real gifts from God, and carry with them glories and dangers, as deep and serious as any religious vocation will.

The one most surprising to me of all these “sacred vocations” is by far the largest Biblically-documented non-religious calling. It reflects what John Wesley, founder of the Methodists said in effect more than three hundred years ago: “If you want to understand a nation, study its entertainment. It is the one thing they pay money for that they don’t need.” What almost shocked me is that the greatest amount of space is given to it.

When Harvest Rock asked me what I was going to speak on that morning of mourning, I told them my topic was going to be called “The God Of The Entertainment World.” I simply shared condolences with them on the loss of two wonderfully gifted icons and how much they affected the world before they were side-swiped by the mortality we all have to face, expected or unexpected. Death wears a T-Shirt: Coming ready or not.

Then I shared with them what God’s calling is for the Entertainer. Here is a small part:

“The entertainer is always caught between two currents in a culture; the desire to do what is right, and be both real before God and true to ones own calling; and the desire to please others by the performance of their gift. In such a sea it is easy to drown. Many who diligently train to shape their ship to carry them on the crest of the wave do not take the time to forge the steel of a character strong enough to sustain them in that rushing tide.

There is no “balance” to this; the very calling itself implies a dynamic tension that can only be sustained, like the prophet’s calling, in truth and love. To understand that this gift represents the very purpose of the Maker ought to bring a reverential fear to the performer, and that the trust involved in the carrying out of such a mission is great. He or she who is called to the ministry of entertainment is to represent God’s own heart.

The sacred calling of an entertainer then is to live a life that brings genuine pleasure to others by the constant reminder of the reality of what life ought to be as it was designed in its original fullness. To do this by humor, drama, dress, parable, song and story or some form of grand celebration, demonstration or loving provision is the province of the actor, model, comedian, athlete, host or hostess, M.C. or festivities director. We were designed to bring pleasure to God and to the rest of His creation. To help celebrate that truth is Divine” (Divinity II - The Nature & Character of God As Revealed in Creation © 2012 W.A. Pratney)

The response to this message was a profound stillness; a large portion of Che’s congregation in that beautiful building with its proximity to Hollywood and itself a landmark in the area are in that very industry. I believe God has something deeply significant to say to those who are involved in such a calling and yet have to struggle with the legitimacy of their own lives and ministries to a field become so very fallen. We must not abandon as hopeless and worthless those areas first given by God to glorify His Son that have become in so many ways degraded, defiled and sometimes even demonized. The arts were once the voice of the Church to the culture; we must not stop speaking even if we did long ago give these platforms of worship over to darkness. While the voice of the tempter whispers “All of this can be yours” we don’t have to listen. If the world is laid before me as I reach the top of the mountain, when we are shown by the devil all the kingdoms of the world, we can remember Who first gave us them to bring glory to His Son. And as Bono said in U2’s blockbuster Vertigo = “I can kneel”.

FINALLY ONE OF THE FATHERS

online@israelanderson.com — 2009-01-03T16:48:49-07:00

FINALLY ONE OF THE FATHERS

Two days in June – 16-18, 2008 - will remain special to me for the rest of my life. I was deeply honored to be part of a historical gathering of seven spiritual leaders assembled for the first time together to capture some of the combined investment the Lord has made in our lives over the course of our ministries. Though all of us may have previously met or known of each other over the years, this was a rare opportunity to spend time with some of the men God has greatly used over decades to see people come to Jesus and to encourage and build the Body of Christ in many places of the world, both in person and through extended media. I felt somewhat out of place amidst such a gallery of giants as the only one without a title of Doctor or Reverend, the only one who had never started or run a major ministry, as well as being the “baby” of the team, with all others over 70. I bravely carried my title of Worlds Oldest Teenager, with the subsets of Most Unlikely Levite and Most Internationally Unknown Evangelist to the gathering and was received with grace in the meeting set up and sponsored by Lionshare Leadership Group.

We were earlier sent a summary of a comprehensive study of leaders in the Scriptures done by Dr. Robert Clinton, professor of leadership at Fuller Theological Seminary. According to Dr. Clinton, "there are approximately 1000 leaders mentioned by name in the Bible. Most of these leaders are mentioned by name only or are mentioned in connection with a role. Some of the leaders receive a bit more attention but not very much information is given about their lives. There are about 100 prominent leaders described in the Scriptures. Of the 100 or so prominent leaders, only 49 have enough information given about them to ascertain how they finished their life and ministry."

As he analyzed the lives of these leaders he discovered four types of finishes:

1) Those cut off early:
These leaders were taken out of leadership by assassination, killed in battle, prophetically denounced, or overthrown. Some of this activity was directly attributed to God. Some of these were positive, some negative. • Examples: Abimelech, Samson, Absalom, Josiah, John the Baptist, James

2) Those that finished poorly:
Leaders going down-hill in the latter part of their ministry. This might be
reflected in their personal relationship with God or in terms of their competency in
ministry. • Examples: Gideon, Samson, Eli, Saul, Solomon

3) Those that finished so-so:
These leaders did well but were limited in some areas of their ministries because of sin. They had some negative ramifications surrounding their lives and ministries even though they personally were walking with God. • Examples: David, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah

4) Those that finished well:
These leaders were walking with God at the end of their lives. They contributed to God's purposes at a high level. They fulfilled what God had for them to do.
• Examples: Abraham, Job, Joseph, Joshua, Caleb, Samuel, Daniel, Jesus, Peter, Paul

Thanks to the hard work of Dave and Tom Buehring http://www.lionshare.org for over five years to help arrange this DVD shoot by coordinating incredibly busy schedules of these brothers in arms. We all met in Pine Cove, the Billy Graham training center in North Carolina with a hand-picked audience of some two hundred business and church leaders, pastors and youth pastors. While the actual recording was done in an intimate fireside set in one of the conference lounges, the audience was linked live in an adjacent auditorium to the conversations. The team later joined the audience for further questions, feedback and some lively interaction after the taping with some of us also having a chance to share with them. It was not until we came out from the first taped sessions that we saw what an astonishing impact this simple sharing had on those who were watching next door; people wept, laughed for sheer joy, shared with passionate hearts and sometimes trembling lips what God had done in their lives while watching.

Imagine what it was like to learn from some of the most godly and influential spiritual leaders in the nation, all freely hitchhiking on each others experiences and walk with the Lord in four categories of questions on such subjects as these:

Restoring Ancient Paths – “In light of your many decades of service - what areas of ministry, of faith do you see core areas where have we strayed from God’s compass? – You have been around for a long time – what do you see as the present strong suits of the church and what we still need?” I shared a little on my favorite themes: the Nature and Character of God; Revival History; the Message of Gospel and Healing the Land

Personal Life Priorities for Finishing Well – “There is much we can glean from those finishing well. How have you come to this place? How are your hearts still clean? How did you tend to your own marriage and family? How did you learn to listen from your own inner compass to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit? –What would you say were major pitfalls to avoid? What personal godly habits can we learn from your life?”
Second/Third (Early) Watch; A Short Itinerary w/o Family; Come Ye Apart or Ye Will Come Apart (Sabbath Rest); Willingness to Change/Ways of Wind (Staying open both in vision and learning); and a motto from my Dad – It’s How You Finish That Counts

Leadership Wisdom & Insights – “You are among those that have lived the longest, led the longest. What are the key things you based your entire ministries on? What are the significant compass points you might desire to pass on?” I drew from my investment in the lives of young musicians and youth leaders in national and international Ministries
Focus on Kids; Root in His Works– in His Word – in His-story (Spirit/Water/Blood); Arts & Technology; Yesterdays’ Radical Today’s Conservative; Gain to Give It Away.

Commissioning Words for Next Generation – We were cut loose on our own greatest personal passions, insights. “If you had to do it over, what would you do instead? –What do you admire most of the emerging generation? What opportunities they have - What are the passion points in you?” Can you imagine the value of what was shared by Loren Cunningham on World Missions; Jack Hayford (leading out of Word and Spirit) – Bob Schuller – (Holding out Hope and Faith), Lloyd Ogilvie (Preaching to influence kings of industry and government), John Perkins – (Bringing Justice and Reconciliation in God’s Kingdom)? From my own calling to win and train the young, I drew from core themes like Kingdom of God Built on Friendship – Trust God or Die – and the importance of of both reading to gain Biblical, historical and social perspective: Readers Are Leaders, Weeders (discerning) and Breeders (creative) and “brailling” the culture.

One of the key meanings of doxa – “glory” is “enhancing reputation of God in the eyes of others” said Leith Anderson. Each of these leaders in both the ministry and marketplace arena learned to live and lead out of the ways of God. Two others also invited died before the conference – Bill Bright of Campus Crusade and Adrian Rogers of the Southern Baptists, One other was unable to attend then, Henry Blackaby of the Experiencing God Study Bible whose schedule conflicts required a rescheduled taping. Although these men all came from different backgrounds, educations, theological streams and had differing ministries, they were all at heart evangelists, loving God and people.

The one other person invited but not able to attend, (though all of us would have dearly loved to have had opportunity to learn from in some of these things) was one of the most dearly loved and honored of all the evangelists of our time, the man who lived just a few minutes from Pine Cove. His growing ill-health had prevented him from being a part of this, but still Tuesday morning he sent our little team a message: come up and visit me in my study at home. We all piled into a van and had the immense privilege of a short visit with the man who has spoken to more people about Christ than any other person in human history. We got to meet with Billy Graham.

All of us got to share with him just how much his life and ministry had affected us over the years. He has been without doubt the single most influential and respected ministry of the 20th century. Here he was, in the last season of his marvelous life, with his daughter Ruth (Bunny) and his dog, sitting in his study, someone God has used so wonderfully to bless His world. We all felt the sacredness of the moment; he was in his own words “going to see Jesus very soon.” Though he was obviously deeply missing his lovely wife whose funeral was exactly a year before on that day, there on the edge of Fathers Day weekend, six other “fathers in the faith” gathered around this man of God like little kids to share with him what his example and inspiration had done for all of us. It was a rare honor that will never come again, and one we will treasure for the rest of our own lives. Billy spoke and listened as one of us, in a prayer laced with humility and dependence of the Holy Spirit and I quietly recorded this, his prayer for us:

BILLY’S PRAYER

Our Father we are very grateful for the fellowship that we have in Christ –
And the only reason we are together right now
is because of Jesus
He has brought us together –
We pray that this group that will be doing different things –
in the next two weeks or the next two days
will have the blessing of the Holy Spirit –
may the Holy Spirit lead each of us –

May we be filled with love and joy and peace and long-suffering
and all the gifts that You have given us as individuals and as a group –
bless our families we pray Thee
bless the people we minister to –

We thank you Lord for all that you have meant to all of us –
and all of us are getting older and we need you more than ever –

Now we commit this day and the days to come
and the ministries that we all represent –
We commit them all to You in Jesus name.

(Fireside Chats With the Fathers Visit July 2008)

My eyes filled with tears at times when I remembered how much of a model his life had and example been to me as well as for all of us. When I won Decision magazines international tract contest in 1970 on the theme “Why I Believe In God” Billy’s ministry flew Fae and I up to their headquarters in Minneapolis to read this for all their staff at their annual Christmas party. We were honored also by a complete tour through their HQ building, multiple stories of ministry-related services, where sometimes up to 30,000 letters a day would come to their offices following a TV-linked crusade. Each letter was tagged for what was needed; follow-up material, free literature or subscriptions to Decision. And finally, the tag for a prayer request. I will never forget the impact made on my life by seeing what few see; those many requests taken just a few at a time to the little chapel in the basement of the building and faithfully personally prayed over one by one. I cannot tell you how much of an impression that loving attention in such a huge context made on me. I thought: “No wonder God has so signally honored Billy. I have never seen such care in such a large ministry.”

All I can tell you is this. I thought, there near the start of my own journey with Jesus: “If you go on in this, and you don’t steal the collection or run off with someone’s secretary, your own ministry will probably grow. Would you have the gifting and calling to pastor or administrate any sort of work like this?” And the short obvious answer was “No.” It was then I made a vow. “I will not build a ministry myself. I will instead look for those who are called and gifted to do this and help them build theirs.” And for the past decades since then, that has been the calling of my life for His Church; to help others “make God famous.” As John, (the youngest of the disciples of Jesus) was also able to say at the evening of his long, lovely and useful life “I have no greater joy than this; to hear of my children walk in the truth.” (3 John 4). I believe that will summarize what I loved for His people. I have had two goals; to see the street saved, and the Church saved. Some call the first evangelism and the second revival. To me they are two sides of the same miracle; that the life of God in Christ by the Holy Spirit will bring resurrection power, purity and Presence to that which is dead or dying and restore relationship with the Living God.

Billy, we love you. All of us owe you a debt of gratitude for your faithfulness both to the Call and to our Captain. You have been for us a true brother in the battle, and an example to all of us in our own journey with Jesus. Thank you, and may your final farewell with us all be as honorable and fragrant as the long and fruitful life you have led for Him.

Winkie

END OF YEAR - THE GRATITUDE TOUR

online@israelanderson.com — 2008-12-24T12:39:37-07:00

A time comes to many who like us realize just how much has happened in our lives and must acknowledge again just how truly great is our God. This time for us is back again.

While it is surely true that no man who having set his hand to the plough begins wistfully looking back to former days is really fit for God’s Kingdom, the gift of remembrance is a constant companion for those who love the King. How grateful we are again for what the Lord has done for us! His ways are past finding out and all His paths are peace.

November 17th marked for me an anniversary – exactly a year since my final surgery was completed in New Zealand, opening the doorway to a new lease on life. Again how honored we have been as a family to have so many friends both old and new that have joined in some way with us to help us toward the triumph of His grace and goodness.

The past six months of travel again in the U.S. were marked by some precious reunions with many who have loved us and prayed for us for decades, and what times of joy they were! Though never billed or announced as such, it was our Gratitude Tour.

We began two weeks in Southern California spending time first with our long-time friends, the Maddux family in San Diego. Bob and Claudia had their own miracle earlier this year, as terrible fires raged up the very road they lived in, with temperatures hot enough to break down brick and reduce almost anything to ashes and rubble. Warned to evacuate their home just a few hours before, they saved what few precious things they could and left with just enough time to sprinkle a little water on their roof. Once before such a fire had come to their area, and threatened their church. God spared them then, and did so again in an amazing way. When they were finally allowed back in, all around them was desolation; homes right across from them gone, the ones on either side razed to the ground. Yet there stood their house, still intact! On examination, the fire had come up to the wall of the bedroom Claudia’s Mom lived in, burned through the pile of wood outside the wall, burned into and right through the wall – then stopped at the inside wallpaper! You could see the light through the paper from the inside, but it had gone no further. On top of that, insurance replaced their carpet and curtains, dry-cleaned their clothes and put them up in a beautiful ocean-view home while repairs were going on. We were able to relax with them and I got to share again in their church as well as film some six hours of video interview to source a script for the new movie of our late friend Keith Greens’ life. This will be a full acted professional production for commercial theatrical release in the order of Walk the Line and Amazing Grace. We trust that like the last recorded concert Keith and Melodys story will bless the world even further though he has been gone for more than a decade.

We also spent a couple of days with Che and Sue Ahn in Pasadena. How much God has blessed and increased their lives and ministries from the first time I met Che as a 17-year old with a passion for seeing people come to Jesus. From his first involvement in the awakening among over 2,000 young people during the Jesus movement in Washington D.C. I have watched the hand of the Lord on Che and his family, who have also become some of our nearest and dearest friends. I was privileged to be able to input into his early life some of the great themes and truths of revival we outline in the 21CR podcasts now have used by thousands of high school and college students. I see now just how greatly God has blessed him with his team at Harvest Rock and a global fellowship of more than 2,000 churches linked to H.I.M around the world. More than a decade ago an initial tiny home meeting with Lou Engle and a few Asian Christians for prayer blossomed into the Call, and the evident blessing of the Lord. Che was the one who asked me to go to Korea under the auspices of the Wagner Institute, and he and the valiant Korean Christians (who have yet to have me share personally what God put on my heart for them!) stood so solidly behind us both in prayer and support that only eternity will tell how much my life depended on their faithful ministry to us. I was treated like a President or Billy Graham by these lovely saints who vowed against my certain death “Not on my watch!” Thanks again, dear ones both in the U.S. and in our ordeal in hospital for all you did for us.

Another wonderful reunion also in Southern Cal. was with Tony and Kathy Salerno, founders of the Agape Force, one of the most amazingly creative street ministries of the Jesus Movement. They also have been some of our closest friends in the world, and we have shared many a battle and victory with them and their wonderful work over the past four decades. From the time I saw Tony first dedicate his life to Jesus as a young youth pastor in Glengrove California to the revival in Reedley that touched not only the town but cities around it and eventually through Agape Force, millions in the nation and the world, he has been a true blessing to our family and my ministry. “Adopted” by them first as friends and co-laborers we moved house with them from different places in California eventually to Texas where we still hang our hats in the U.S. We owe so much to their kindness and hospitality over the years; many young lives we were able to share with and rejoice with first met in the Force are a backbone of our friendship networks right through to the present time. Our closest friends in Texas, Jim and Dee Patton and their children, Sonny and Margie Jaynes, Charlie and Shelley Moore, Buddy and Caroline Hicks and many others who minister in music or in marketplace, even the area where we live in America all had their genesis in the Force. Ministering now in a second generation through Semperternity headed up by Tony’s son, Anthony, we were honored to be able to spend time again with both them and the band before they left on another tour.

I have in previous posts mentioned two real ’08 highlights for me in the North Carolina Fireside Fathers DVD conference meet with Billy Graham and my surprise 64th birthday in August written up in a two-page section of the local paper. Shortly after these my son William and I co-shared in a youth advance near the Virginia Beach area. As well as my being able to sit up through ungodly hours of the night again (a great test of regenerated stamina), William and I later both got the privilege of having a personal lunch with Pat and Dede Robertson of CBN. Pat has likewise been a blessing to me in the early years of this significant ministry. I did two major multi-camera film set teaching series in the 70s with CBN for the Rock and Manna when these weekly one-hour slots were integral to the program, on the Nature and Character of God and the Parable of the Soils.

I was also honored to be part of the literature side of the TV outreach in the former Soviet Union where the nation literally ran out of envelopes over the responses to their targeted cities with special evangelistic broadcasts. This culminated for me being able to spend more than sixty hours with a Russian interpreter helping train some 400 newly converted young men and women who gave two months of their time to learn to help restructure a nation through the principles and precepts of the Kingdom of God. To be able to share with Pat and his wife some of our story was a signal blessing. The generosity of CBN and partners helped Fae and I financially both in our own emergency medical crises and Pat’s contribution was both in international calls to prayer and financial aid during what happened to me. How much we appreciate him and the work God raised up through him.

September proved yet another adventure and a brush with what might have been disaster averted by miracle. I was invited to speak at a great church in Houston by Randy Harvey a friend with whom I have shared some great times in the past, as part of a week-end Missions convention. Both Fae and William decided to come also, and as it was close enough to drive to, I rented a car for us instead of my usual short flight there. I called both the pastor, his church secretary and the hotel to O.K. this change, but none of were aware that I was actually on a different schedule. Checking into the hotel I had even called during the trip down one more time to make sure our reservation was in, the desk manager told me that he couldn’t find it now! Calling pastor Randy at 10:30 Friday night, the conversation went something like this: “Randy? I’m here.” “Here?” Yes. Here. “Here now?” Yes. They can’t find our reservation. “You’re in Houston now?” Yes. At the hotel. Long silence. Then his voice: “The meetings aren’t this week. They are next week.”

After a few hurried phone calls, it became obvious that we couldn’t now change the coming meetings. Though the church services might have been moved earlier for the Sunday, the scheduled Saturday Youth night was already area-wide advertised. We with apologies settled for a Saturday morning meet instead with his leadership and I got to spend a pleasant few hours sharing with them. We decided then for the rest of the now free week-end to drive up to meet with some other Houston long-term friends: Buddy and Caroline Hicks who gave up pastoring a large well-off suburban church to run a kids skate park and cyber-café in Humble Texas as an outreach to this oil-town. Dave Kirschke is another friend in the area who runs Straightway one of the most effective drug rehabilitation ministries in the nation. Dave helped me also in Korea as did the President of the company by supplying me in hospital the Mannatech supplement that had saved his little boys life, which was also instrumental within the grace of God in helping heal the massive damage to my system. We had some great meetings both with them and their ministries, and then headed back tired but happy Monday to Lindale.

Within a few days, it became obvious that one of the deadliest hurricanes in American history was headed right for our East Texas area. Ike was a category four when it struck the coastline and had barely slowed to a three on the eve of arriving in our region. Even a category three is enough to turn a trailer home like ours into matchsticks and blow those matchsticks away. All the prediction strands showed it striking us squarely in its path. You can imagine that much prayer went on in our local YWAM base ranch. Again mercifully and miraculously its path both moved suddenly away and had dropped in intensity by the time it hit us to a tropical storm. But in Houston, where we had been just a few days before, over a million people had to be evacuated, including our friends! The airports were all closed, and though there was much less damage than might have been, it took another two or three weeks for power and lights in some places to return. We even got to host our hosts’ daughter and son as refugees from Houston in our area, and help them get food and supplies loaded up for their family back in the city.

Jesus said “The wind blows where it wants to. You can hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it came from or where it is going. So is every one that is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8). So here is a curious question: Did I arrive in Houston at the wrong time or not?” Later I was able to return and do the meetings originally scheduled for that earlier time.

Near the end of our six month U.S visit, after a great conference in San Jose I traveled up to a Northern California town that remains an enclave to some of the spirit of the sixties. A hippie commune once populated by young freedom seekers of those times, acres of redwood forest had been turned into a refuge for those longing for a back to nature reality. Some still live there. A revival broke out during that time that transformed the German lady who set it up and it became a Christian community, now offered to YWAM to run a school. After some days of teaching a class reminiscent of those early days, on my return drive to San Jose airport I got to meet with two more sets of long-term friends, Chip and Linda Worthington and their son Chris, and Mario & Mechelle Murillo.

Chip was one of the original practics teachers in the Agape Force and also in Genesis the discipleship training school in Santa Rosa I helped Jim Argue found in the early 70s. Genesis put nearly two thousand young people from the turbulent sixties and seventies into the ministry. Chip also was youth pastor at Bill Johnson’s Bethel church in Redding, teaching my Youth Aflame! material to some of the foundational young people in this lovely work, now seeing daily practical revival in that city. Chip and his family have been close friends for more than three decades now. It was fun to have lunch there and journey down with him to San Francisco to meet again with a mutual friend who for me over the years was more like a soul brother, ministry twins accidentally separated at birth.

Mario Murillo is arguably one of the best and articulate street ministers of all time, whose chosen home region of the Bay Area was touched at different times by his Resurrection City from street and college outreaches in the radical sixties to city-wide crusades drawing thousands in ways no-one has ever seen before. We first met in the Carousel restaurant in Anaheim; me, a young punk preacher from New Zealand in a white polyester suit and Mario a newly saved and called teenager with a look in his eyes like Moses come down from the mountain. There, over a two-hour lunch, we two unknown nobodies with visions much larger than our lives schemed and dreamed together of changing the world. We shared in youth camps in Northern and Southern California in the 60s and 70s, I was photographer at his wedding, helped host him in New Zealand and Australia in his first overseas ministry travels, and encouraged him to put some of his preaching into print. Over the forty years we have known and loved each other’s work and calling, it has been one of the great privileges of my life to count Mario as my friend. We got to spend an evening together with him, Mechelle and their son Michael and swap miracle stories of the goodness of God in redeeming our lives from destruction.

So here we are now at home again. Our son William is with us for a few special weeks; now 30, the age that Jesus began His ministry. He will serve out a few more months back in Texas as a missionary with YWAM and then begin his own new journey with God.

Fae has been catching up with many friends and besides reorganizing and re-beautifying the whole house and garden, ministering each week when possible to her parents on the North Shore. We have a new project to replace our old batch roof and refurbish it inside to provide a place where our friends from abroad can stay that visit from time to time.

In just the past few weeks my tennis is getting some strength back both in serve and baseline play, and while both Fae and William presently have knee problems that are somewhat painful and limiting so we cannot all go crazy together on court, we are otherwise enjoying good health by His grace. Your prayers still carry the weight of power that took me to the throne from you on our behalf. Keep us in the shelter of those arms as He brings us to your remembrance. We need Him still as much as ever.

I have a Christmas card I read here in N.Z on our major national radio broadcast a few years ago around this time when this commercial station turned over its broadcast to friends. It says of the shepherds: “They said they saw a star moving in the sky. They said they saw lights, and heard angels singing and fell on the ground. What were they on?”

What are we on, indeed. We are those brought out of darkness into His marvelous light. We are the children who know what it is to walk in darkness and despite such history may still have times when we see no signs and hear no songs but know still He cannot fail. And though the world sings its carols now many times without reason or reality, we still celebrate. Peace may not be yet on earth, but it reigns nevertheless in our hearts. The winds may blow, storms may rage, but we are sheltered by and grounded on a Rock. The One Who made the worlds is our friend and our Savior, and this year again, we are glad.

Our love and affection to all of you with whom we share Him –

Winkie, Fae and William.

When I'm Sixty Four

online@israelanderson.com — 2008-08-12T23:10:46-06:00

For a now ancient group called The Beatles, this was the date of true old age, and it was one of the nostalgia songs sung by our friends and near-family Jim and Dee Patton with two of their children for my surprise Birthday Party, Saturday 2nd (August 3rd in N.Z.)

Surprise it was too! I should have concluded something was up from whispered conversations between my wife and son, and much talking on the phone to friends in other rooms. Still, it is a known characteristic of old age that you may miss things, and I plead guilty to blissful ignorance of a carefully-planned and schemed secret scenario that culminated in an amazing gathering of friends from far and near held in our church hall in Lindale. I was surprised at seeing two old friends from Agape Force days join Jim at the airport when I flew in from War Week in Detroit Friday evening; I did suspect that we might go out and eat with them the following day sometime. I didn’t know when we “dropped by the church on the way to going out to eat” that it would be with over a hundred others some driving or flying from thousands of miles away to honor me.

The previous week I spent over six hours being interviewed both in Tyler and in the Revival Library in the YWAM ranch on my life and work by Patrick Butler, a friend who is now the Religion Editor of the main Tyler newspaper. Patrick was the one who made the area aware of what was happening to me when I was in critical condition in Korea, and I looked on this lengthy interview and photo shoot as some kind of follow-up on that story last year. The spread came out Saturday on two pages with some great pictures, his birthday gift to me, with copies for people that came.

Dee, our faithful servant companion, gifted with administration skills carried out with great kindness and care, somehow perpetrated much of this planning of amazing effort in secret. E-mails sent to hundreds of friends, replies turned into cards that could be read aloud, coordinating places to stay at and hide out in until the evening of the event all had to be done under my nose. She said that as she was working on sending out the E-mail invites from our kitchen table (their internet service is presently untenable) that I looked right at what she had done and even asked – “What is this?” I cannot remember this at all, so perhaps as God’s Smuggler used to pray, I was “blinded by God” from seeing what I was looking directly at. Either that, or from being near to sixty-four.

Besides the music ministry to open the party from the Pattons (known now in their performances as “Bongo And The Point” for reasons once explained to me that I can’t now remember (64?) long-term friends from other parts of the country also shared. Buddy and Caroline Hicks, now pastoring both street and church kids in Houston who played such a large part in our lives during the early days of the Agape Force and were largely responsible for our initial move to Texas came down with their adult children, helping hugely providing the food for the 14 tables crammed into the room. Jim Barrier, now in the Austin area as both a radio talk show host and pastor, played M.C. (without the Hammer). Ribena Burton made a massive and scrumptious chocolate cake large enough to hold enough candles that I couldn’t blow them all out. (64).

Jim & Jannie Rogers from the early days of our marriage and Sonny and Margie Jaynes shared a table with us also, recalling the early days when they were in charge of the rehabilitation ministry of Gates of Life. He even did an impromptu solo dance during one of the early songs which I of course, could not and did not join in on. (64 for sure. And besides, “white guys can’t dance”. There are of course, exceptions, but I am sure l am not one of them). One of the special blessings also was a first-time meeting with Shawn Carey, the trial lawyer who gave his life to the Lord in New York two years ago when Marc Scibilia set up a meeting there (Can God Be Trusted?) with me. I mentioned his wonderful story in a previous Christmas blog as an example of the blessing of still being alive to serve the Lord. Shawn came down with his wife and three of his boys from New York to share his testimony again live with the whole audience. His description of the work of the Holy Spirit in personal conviction is still of the best I have ever heard. Marc, who also sacrificed a long drive to come down also with Julian his videographer shared in song. As Buddy pointed out, young musicians discipled from generation to generation.

My dear wife, beloved of my heart for all of these years, who so successfully carried out deep deception of her unsuspecting husband, is also greatly to blame for the bombshell. When she asked, after I walked into what I thought was an empty hall to find an overwhelming explosion of light, noise and mass of people - “Was it a surprise?” my initial answer was “No. It was more like a shock heart-attack”. (64) My innocent-looking son, smiling all the while as he chauffeured his dear old Dad to the place of party, played it straight and cool during the entire time he was party to the subterfuge of silence. Oh the depths! That I could live so long and not notice. I can only blame it on being sixty-four. For all of you who were also “party” to this, thank you so much. Your kind comments and encouragements have been overwhelming.

The part amongst so many other small and significant scenarios on that wonderful night that touched me deeply to tears was another song by Jim and his family. I know and love it, but heard it then anew in a context that helped me see again how much we owe to those God has moved on to help us on our journey with Jesus.

The road is long
With many a winding turn
That leads us to who knows where?
Who knows where?
But I'm strong
Strong enough to carry him
He ain't heavy, he's my brother

So love shows in the little things and the large, the unselfish giving of what we have also been given, the innumerable and sometimes unnoticed random acts of kindness and care. Such is the transformation of a heart from darkness to light, from the power of the Matrix to the arms of the Master and Maker, the great commandment in majestic summary so long ago given and as powerful and practical today as when uttered so long ago –

“So on we go
His welfare is of my concern
No burden is he to bear
We'll get there ... “

For the rest of the journey -
thanks again for you all

In Jesus love –
Winkie, Fae and William

New Beginnings 2008

online@israelanderson.com — 2008-03-26T12:12:42-06:00

New Beginnings 2008
HAPPY RESURRECTION!

Apologies to those of you who have looked in vain for some recent update on the blogs since December last year. Your gentle urging to keep you abreast of what we were up to these past few months was appreciated. This entry will cover January through to March.

WELL, we just finished Easter week here in Down/Under New Zealand. Well. A glad and happy Easter it was too. Palm Sunday is the only one in our lifetime that fell on March 16th - a 3:16! With eight the number of resurrection and new beginnings in Scripture it was appropriate this month to tell afresh of God’s great love for His world.

I was honored to share Good Friday on one of New Zealand’s largest commercial radio networks (ZB) broadcasting nation-wide, as part of a team put together for the whole of the day by friends from Christian Broadcasting. I joined with a long-term friend John Cooney, editor in chief of our nations largest free magazine the Grapevine. John and I had a late afternoon hour slot together on an open talk-back covering a number of topics beginning with my own miraculous return from the edge of death, and finishing with some evidences of the Lord’s greatness in creation around us. Later on the show was John’s interview with Barry McGuire, our good mate with a resurrection testimony having been revived from a fatal heart arrest a few years ago, now going on strong again with Jesus. Barry and his Kiwi wife Marie (once my short-term secretary) were with us at lunch hosted by our friends Lindsay and Lynn Armishaw two weeks ago.

The talk-back turnover to CBA by commercial radio over Easter and Christmas for our own programs is something quite unique and wonderful for our nation. Over a period of a decade they have had such good feedback from the creative programming many culturally aware Christians have contributed that this has been an annual event now. It gives the station personnel a welcome break to enjoy the holidays themselves with their family and friends, and gives us a chance to share with others that what makes the time special is not really about bunnies and eggs. After all, history is His-story.

It is also for me a wondrous reminder of just how much the Resurrected Lord has done for us over the past year. As I mentioned previously, a year full of both trial and triumph, white-knuckled trust and overwhelming wonder at His greatness and goodness. I thought again of knowing the day I stood at the edge of death, with one last breath left in my body. Knowing that when that was exhausted, my battered body that had been strapped to a hospital bed with almost everything but my heart closed down inside me, would simply resign my spirit to my Maker and Master. No sense of fear, just a quiet and simple surrender with perhaps a hint of wishing I had had more time or could have done more..

And then that last breath was gone I had no more to give, and I was dying.

And He was there. Not at all where I expected He might be in such a situation. Not in front of me, to welcome me home or to turn me over to some carrying angel. Not beside me or even behind me, His hand on my shoulder to strengthen me for the last journey. He was inside me, looking out through my eyes at His world, closer than a brother, closer than breathing. I saw through His eyes not heaven, but His world, as He sees it in all its beauty and fallenness, wonder and ugliness, violence and tranquility, terror and peace. He was there, where He had been all the time since the day I first put my uncertain hand in the hand of the One Who holds the worlds, the One Who has promised to never leave us or forsake us, the One Who keeps all of His promises to the end and beyond it. And on the Monday following Easter week, where we remember again with gratefulness and love His death and resurrection, I had my own.

Fae reminded me of what it was like for her on what she called Miracle Monday, when arriving to keep the morning vigil beside me as I lay in a coma from which even the Christian doctors had little hope or expectation of my recovery. They not only gave me only a tiny tithe of possible survival; they also had no expectation that if I did recover I would have all of my facilities function again. We had received a prayer cloth from a ministry that had intensely prayed for us, and Fae had the night before laid this all over my body adding again her faith to those who had already earnestly interceded for us,

And without fanfare I opened my eyes and sat up alert, aware and alive. My own resurrection. Not anywhere near as spectacular as my Master, but to me and my family and friends in a small way just as miraculous and wonderful. On this anniversary, a year later, I remember not only what did for our world, but what He did in mine.

Some of you who have written me or sent some kind of encouragement over the past twelve months to us whether as a card, check or a creative blessing and prayer have taken the time to share with me the tough road that you have also walked recently. More than ever now I am able to identify with the unbelievable maelstrom of pressure and stress that strikes like a whirlwind to the core of your life when such things happen to you, your close family or your friends. But while Good Fridays are only good in retrospect of the Resurrection, the gift of grace that may come in the storm is evidence that faith is not something you hold, but Someone Who holds you.

I am now “back in the saddle” again having ministered for at least a month and being fourteen weeks now from the final closure of my surgery. The titanium tummy mesh is holding up well, and apart from a little tightness in deep forward bends is doing its job well in helping keep the deeper stitches holding the healing wound that was stitched with dissolving sutures. We are also playing some tennis again which I hope to increase a couple of days weekly to help rebuild both my strength and stamina.

My first ministry in New Zealand was a few days at the Great Barrier Island January with a Sojourner YWAM school under the leadership of Jay Lucas. Besides the students many of the staff also came to these very laid back sessions many of them with me sitting by the computer and dialing up power points, notes and music to a projector. We also got to touch base again with visiting friends who came to the Island for holidays. Apart from the small airplane flying us to the wrong drop-off point on arrival and a broken front tooth the week was uneventful but blessed and touched by Him.

We also had two small visits out of the country; flown to Fiji at the invitation of friends for a weeks vacation in a new development of the island area called Demerau. We were given a weeks free stay in a lovely condominium with three other couples and I learned to ride a bike again after 20 years of not following in my fathers footpedals. The other trip was to Tasmania Australia on an unused old ticket from last year where Dr. Andrew Corbett set up three night meetings for me over the weekend and a morning church service. He also did a great Matrixed version of my Digital Generation power-point presentation and restrung our racquets for us as well as kicking my rear end in tennis.

Other areas of ministry followed; on my return addressing the LIFE churches annual staff meeting thirty minutes after the return plane from Tasmania touched down. I thought staff meeting was going to be an informal chat with some 10-20 people and found there were some 500-600 in attendance! The next two weeks involved two nights at a Massey University Lecture room to a new School of Revival on that subject, and helping open a new church meeting place for His Way on the North Shore called The Upper Room. Two young men from the work volunteered their time and talents to repaint the ceilings and walls in our home when we were in Australia. The following week their generous gift was blessed of the Lord by them being offered to fill the role of a firms’ master painter who had left for overseas, a contract for five-figure major projects. God is good.

Also Easter week I did a new five-day series on the Nature and Character of God in the Arts for two combined DTS YWAM schools locally, digitally recorded for later podcast. I filled in for a defaulting guest speaker for our friends Craig and Sonia Monroe at Kings Way, a local ministry with outreaches to gangs and prostitutes in our area. Still to come are two more church services on 20th century revivals, a business-mans’ breakfast outreach on the North Shore for our friends at Harbourside that helped us put in our concrete driveway last year and as much time as we can here serving the churches and pastors before we leave for overseas next month.

Our departure date for the U.S. is now set for April 22nd, and we plan to be in California (hopefully joined by William) for the first two weekends to meet with and thank some of our friends there who prayed and cared for us over this over this past year before returning to Texas again by the second week in May. Fae has been ministering to her elderly parents her Dad, who will be 93 in a few months and though legally blind is still the chief caregiver at their home to her mother now with major memory lapses. Again we want to thank you for your faithfulness in prayer; the Lord has been our constant provision and protection and we have been so conscious that much of the blessing of these past months has been due to His grace and the constant way we have been held before His throne. You are all loved and appreciated so much.

Blessings in the Beloved –
Winkie, Fae and William.

PS. A much-requested feature is now available. You can now receive my blog direct to your email. Sign up here:

Final Stretch

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-12-12T11:20:16-07:00

This then is final stretch, heading to year end for us. It is the end to a most amazing year – full of trials and miracles, danger and shelter, crisis and care. Going through some of my old recordings of music ministry in the 60s and 70s in my Revival Reclamation Project, I was touched again by the words of our friend Andre Crouch, the man who brought church to the street and the charts during the Jesus Movement.

“I’ve had many tears and sorrows
I’ve had questions about tomorrow
There's been times when I didn’t know right from wrong
But in every situation God gave blessed consolation
That my trials only come to make me strong

Through it all – Through it all
I’ve learned to trust in Jesus – I’ve learned to trust in God
Through it all – Through it all
I’ve learned just to depend upon His Word.”

I remember coming out of my two and a half week coma to the first song in English we heard since my arrival in South Korea. A nurse had left a little portable radio tuned to the only English station they had there; a station playing 60’s and 70’s hits.

On that beautiful morning in Easter week of April, the song playing was sung by another friend of ours, Pat Boone who also prayed for us and wonderfully supported us during the crisis. He asked me “What was the song I was singing when you recovered?” I told him how great God’s timing and encouragement was to us hearing a familiar favorite voice on my own resurrection day – it was his great chart hit “April Love.”

Such are the ways of the Lord. His infinite care in all the little details as well as the major battles of life are unmatched by any mere religion. He is the scariest, friendliest, funniest Person in the Universe. We want a world where nothing can go wrong, where good things happen only to good people, and bad things only come to bad people. We think a world like that where there was only safety, security and shelter would be the best of all possible worlds. And we would be wrong. Within a few weeks we would not want to live in that world. We would be bored out of our minds.

The God Who made it all hard-wired risk into His Universe. All the things that make life great always carry that element of alternative possibilities. I have recently been meditating on the works of God, and that of His being the Entrepreneur is one of the most fascinating in Scripture. The old casting of lots, the Urim and Thummim and other odd practices incorporated into the direction and guidance of God are pointers to His willingness to let us take risks. All the great triumphs as well as the tragedies of life revolve around risk. It is the element that breathes into the regulation of His Universe all its random fractal color and variety. After all what are the great sins of mankind but simply risks taken outside of His direction and apportion? Without faith it is impossible to please Him. Without such “luck of the Lord” it would be impossible to please us.

I have wondered what might be the most fitting way to share with you just how grateful we are as a family for what you have done in helping us as His extended heart and hands “through it all”, giving me another opportunity to serve Him and serve His world. Words cannot convey what it is like to come to the edge of death and be given another chance to get back into the battle, patched, scarred and mended as we may be.

A week ago I received a wonderful story from someone who came to a meeting put together by another young musician friend of mine as a community fundraiser for a tragedy that took place in a small town that left parents and friends devastated by death and destruction. What happened to him that night is one of the clearest accounts I have ever been given of the dealings of the Lord in all of our lives. With his permission, I share his story with you. It is encounters like this with Christ that makes serving Him such an honor. It is why all the long weary miles and multitudes of faces and places are so worth it in His service. I am spared for stories like this to happen again for others.

November 30, 2007

“On September 9, 2006, I went to Whitehaven Road Baptist Church with my wife and four school age sons for a fundraiser concert to benefit two young Grand Island men, one of whom had been killed and the other badly injured in the same car crash a few weeks earlier.

While I lived less than a mile away, a Baptist church was one of the least likely places anyone who knew me would expect to find me that night, or any night, for that matter. It wasn’t simply because I was born and raised Catholic. My mother had been raised in a Baptist home in rural Maine before she converted to Catholicism in order to marry my father, a Catholic for many generations before he was even born. So, I had nothing more against the Baptist church than I had against the Catholic churches I had attended my entire life. I simply didn’t consider any church very relevant to my life, particularly on a Saturday night.

Yes, my life at that time was, on paper and from a comfortable distance, fabulous. I had married the most beautiful and enchanting woman I had ever met and, to most casual observers, we had remained relatively happily married for 18 years. We had four sons who were born healthy and had stayed that way, excelling at both sports and academics. Neither my wife nor I had come from “money”, but after some lean years, my hard-earned law degree and even harder-earned law practice had produced material wealth beyond our expectations. We lived in a house that we had, literally, been calling our “dream home” for two years before it went on the market at precisely the time I won a big case and could afford to buy it. By 2006, all four of our sons attended private schools and my wife had been able to stop working, outside the home anyhow, when our youngest boy was born in 1999.

And as for me personally, well back before September 9, 2006, anyone who had ever been introduced to me knew within seconds of meeting me that I was – drum roll, please -- a trial lawyer. And not just a run-of-the-mill trial attorney, I assured you. I was thunder & lightning and fire & ice rolled into one. I would, modestly of course, remind all prospective clients (i.e. everyone I met and everyone they had ever met) that if you hired any other attorney to take your case to court, well, God help you. I, on the other, did not need God’s help, and neither, I believed, would my clients. As proof, I could point to a decade of “success,” particularly since opening my own law firm in April 2006. Things, I insisted without visible hesitation, could not have been better.

Of course, I guess you could say I was a bit prideful. Prideful enough to think that my wife and children should have been praising me more for my courtroom triumphs and the paychecks and purchases they produced, and complaining less about my absence from their life. And as for the drinking? Well, I had always liked “my beer” and it had never been a problem in my life before. Not really. Not as far as I was concerned, anyhow. Besides I had a very stressful career and I was entitled to a little enjoyment in life. I had new clients to drum up. I had crushing workloads and opposing counsel to deal with. I had great victories and large settlements to celebrate with my fellow attorneys. I had plenty of reasons to drink, and, hey, it went with the territory. My world and my obligations outside of my house were so big and important and pressing, that a little disappointment from the people inside my home would just have to be tolerated.

So, if it hadn’t been for Marc Scibilia and a terrible tragedy involving two of his former classmates, I never would have been at Whitehaven Road Baptist Church that Saturday night last September. My sons were fans of Marc’s music. I was -- despite my preoccupation with “my” life -- still a fan of my sons and their interest in music. As a shrewd attorney in the often cutthroat world of lawyer advertising and marketing, I was also keenly aware that the setting of a fundraiser for young men badly injured in a motor vehicle accident might prove fertile soil for me to sprinkle seeds of my renown as a personal injury trial attorney. I had previously represented a family member of one of the young men in the collision and I thought it would prove useful to be introduced around as a lawyer who knew his way around a courtroom. I was also very proud, of course, to be hand-delivering a sizable donation with my name and address on the check, in case anyone wanted to know from whom it was from..

It was a good crowd, very receptive it seemed to the concept of pain and suffering which was so often such a hard sell with jaded jurors that had not been touched by personal tragedy. So, I made my rounds for a few minutes, settled in next to my wife and sons to catch Marc Scibilia’s act and prepared to leave promptly after he finished. Now, even a fool had to admit Marc’s performance was terrific and my sons and wife were also very impressed. Out of courtesy for Marc’s preacher friend, who had come from so far away for God knows what, I decided I would listen politely for a few minutes before my family and I made a discreet and appropriately solemn exit. I thought longingly for a moment about the cold beer I would enjoy within the next half hour at the local pizzeria.

After a few minutes, however, I realized the pizza and beer would have to wait. At first, I think it was simply the New Zealand accent. It sounded kind of cool, hip and irreverent -- just like I fancied myself. And the guy was funny, you had to give him that.

But then, it got kind of weird and uncomfortable. I probably would have left except it seemed this New Zealand preacher was speaking directly to me. He was talking about people getting “lost” and how sin wasn’t something that you could turn on and off whenever you felt like it. Sin was something that didn’t get better, it just got bigger. And as it got bigger and bigger, the sinner’s world got smaller and smaller. I started to look around me, sort of nervously, wondering if anyone else seemed to think the guy was talking directly to them and describing exactly what was going on in their lives. He continued to be funny and likable, but what he was saying was not funny and I definitely did not like it.

I wanted to leave, but I couldn’t stop listening. My wife and kids were deeply puzzled by this. My wife assumed I had some harebrained marketing angle for staying. I couldn’t blame her and at the same time I would have been more comfortable if that was what I was actually doing.

Then, the guy did the unthinkable. He calls out to the men in the audience to actually stand up in front of everyone and admit they were completely “lost” and needed to be found by…..by God, of all things. By God, indeed.!

My first thought was dismissive. “Okay fella, nice show and have a safe trip back to New Zealand, but it’s time for me get off this bus. All these other guys can stay on this nutso trip to the end but I was just being polite. As a matter of fact, I should have gotten off several stops ago. It’s not like I needed this ride in the first place, I mean I am a self-made man and doing very well for myself, thank you. I have full control over my life and everything in it, and…” My own voice trailed off in my head – drowned out by the annoying Kiwi, who was now not only talking, but counting. Counting out a minute and daring a hall full of men to stand up in front of their wives and children and friends and admit they were “lost” and needed to be….what exactly I wasn’t sure. It had something to do with God, but not the one I knew. This one went by the proper name of Jesus Christ and this Winkie character made it seem somehow that the Son of God was standing at the front of the room with the speaker while at the same time slipping into the seats next to and behind me. It was definitely freaking me out. By the time the count reached 30 seconds it seemed God Himself was calling me out, challenging my manhood in front of my family. “So, you want to be a real man. A real father. A real husband. Then why don’t you just stand up, and start being the real thing instead of the big phony you’ve been pretending to be for so long.”

In my professional life, I was trained to, and completely comfortable with, leaping to my feet in front of judges, juries and rooms full of other attorneys and assorted spectators and making long, impassioned arguments without a moment’s thought or hesitation. But this was completely different. I was frozen. Terrified. My knees seemed locked in a seated position. A prideful, mocking voice snapped at me inside my head. “Are you crazy? Don’t even think about standing up. You came here to market yourself as a fearless lawyer, a guy with all the answers. Now, you’re going to stand up in front of all these prospective clients and announce to the whole room that you are ‘Completely lost!’ You will be the butt of the biggest lawyer joke of all time. You will be finished on Grand Island, if not all of Western New York. Besides, your wife and kids will see it, too..”

Yes, thankfully my wife and kids were there, too, that night. Perhaps the Tough Love God that called me out that night knew there was one sliver of living tissue left in a heart turned almost entirely to stone, and He found it by revealing to me in that instant that the fate of my children, my marriage, my life and my soul would be decided by whether I chose to stand up or stay seated when God called one last time in a New Zealand accent that advised I had “30 seconds.”

I closed my eyes, gripped the chair back in front of me and wrenched myself to my feet. Suddenly, I could see, which was remarkable because my eyes were still shut tight, out of fear that I would open them and see everyone staring at me. I couldn’t blame them if they were. I have testified to the sensation I felt that night several times in the past year, always in the same way and in the best words I can think of to describe it.

When I stood up from my chair it was like standing up from a long underwater swim in a sewer. It was no longer murky and dark. I could see everything. My wife. My children. All of my life’s true blessings seemed to shine so bright so suddenly. They were sights I had not truly seen in years and had almost completely forgotten. It was incredibly good.. But I could also see myself clearly, and I was filthy. I didn’t know how I was ever going to get clean again.

Thankfully, Jesus Christ, the Lord and Savior I never knew I had, has proven to me and my family that He can clean up any mess, heal any wound, restore any life, marriage or family, and replace the hardest heart of stone with one of reborn flesh, blood and life. Over the past 15 months, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have introduced me to an alternative universe that I never knew existed and could not have imagined. Using His grace, the Bible, my wife’s faith and gift of mercy, and at least three different Christian church congregations -- most notably the people of Whitehaven Road Baptist Church and St. Stephen’s Roman Catholic Church for their annual Alpha course -- God has given me a real life, a real marriage, a real family, a real purpose, and a real salvation. It has not been easy and it has often been very painful, but neither I, nor my family would trade the change that God has worked for anything in the world.

After much soul-searching and prayer, I still practice law, but not at all like I used to. I realize we are all here to serve God’s purpose, and God has one for everyone, even lawyers. I am far richer for it, and, of course, I am referring to anything but money. My old prideful and selfish purposes seem foolish, trivial and embarrassing.

I believe I am, finally, on the true great journey of life, and while I am still constantly in need of God’s guidance and mercy, I know I will never be lost again so long as I keep my sights set on Him.

In ways that are truly “so God”, my family’s path has re-crossed with Marc Scibilia and his family. Through Marc, I learned that the past year has brought incredible health trials to your life. I was very sorry to hear that and greatly relieved to hear that you are recovering. I look forward to seeing you speak again someday soon.

For what it’s worth, I wanted you to have my testimony because it is also very much yours. I truly cannot thank you enough for your obedience in God’s service and the passion with which you use your considerable gifts of teaching and communication to shine God’s light into the darkest, neediest places in the human heart. – particularly mine.” - End

So, thank you all again. Your sacrificial investment of time, prayer and encouragement in our lives and ministry is something we deeply treasure. May He bless you and open new doors of opportunity in this coming Year of New Beginnings for us all –

Love in the Beloved of our souls –

Winkie, Fae and William.

SAFE RETURN!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-11-12T11:45:25-07:00

Thank you Lord.

As of yesterday I was discharged from the Manukau Surgical Centre, held together with a combination of self-dissolving stitches, a large thin titanium-based mesh reinforcing me inside like some kind of internal body armor and fifty-one tiny staples holding my skin together until it heals. I have had something akin to the equivalent of a free makeover $100,000 Hollywood tummy-tuck to the envy here of my dear sister Lovonny. I was released Monday afternoon, infection-free, blood clots never developing, with a clean bill of health to finally return in a mere ten-minute trip to our little home.

Although we have been in phone contact with our dear son William and our friends Jim and Dee in Texas to let them know I was alright and the surgery was wonderfully successful, our hospital was not net-wired and I was unable to send this to post earlier.

It was gently raining as Fae drove me carefully home, with the sky an odd New Zealand island mixture of grey and blue loaded with dark and white clouds. I felt a little like Noah about to embark again from the Ark that had carried him and his family safely through the raging storm that had killed a world. The rain washed gently down the windows, helping again to make all things new and I looked out in great thankfulness to Him Who does all things well. Exit was almost the diametric opposite of the original overseas situation we found ourselves in. We had been fully filled in as to what we would need to do in recovery, the exit papers were already signed for us, and we walked out at our leisure when we were packed without desk queues, payment lines or legal drama on our own. This for me is the final surgical chapter in a six-month long odyssey that you have so graciously tracked and shared with us since mid-March of this year. To all of those friends who have faithfully prayed for us, shared with us, encouraged us and invested in this recovery, our very deepest gratitude. You have been so wonderful.

MSC is the newest, most beautiful hospital in our area and also the closest to us. James, a NZ civic engineer who is also one of Williams friends who has been with us in Texas and visited here was the one who drew up some of the plans for the adjoining Super-Clinic. It feels so unlike a hospital, with an atmosphere of light, life and help and I understand the conceptual founding of it involved also the work of a Christian.

Surgery began Tuesday morning shortly after 8:30 a.m. Our “God’s choice” surgeon, Dr. Andrew Hill had put us on his priority list, something in itself special as there have been some in our region who have had to wait more than a year for necessary operations. Andrew himself has been such a blessing to us with his down-to-earth wisdom and self-effacing humor, the very opposite of what often has come to be the mark of a genuinely distinguished and gifted surgeon, the aloof and impersonal professional like a House on steroids. During my six-day stay in recovery, I met a cheery male nurse called Paul who was currently carrying two twenty-hour a week shifts at two different hospitals. I said to him on learning of his long load “You could be a doctor in a couple of years.” He said “I wanted to be a doctor, but I passed the personality test and they wouldn’t let me.”

The one area in my operation that was a particular concern to me was this relatively rare phenomenon of ossification I mentioned in a previous blog – where stray bone cells attach to the edges of the cut tissue and begin turning that strong flexible fascia muscle into bone. It is as if the body was so keen to get healed it begins to build its own bridge across the gap. There is apparently not a large body of material on removing this. In our initial consultations, surgeons said that it would have to be looked at when the operation site was open, and decisions made then about the feasibility of its removal. Normally with unusual situations like this, you consult books about what has been done before, but what if there are no books? It was the thought behind the prayer I prayed for Andrew and his surgical team on the 7:00 am short trip from our home to the hospital; “Lord, if there is anything needing to be done outside the experience of the surgeon, give him wisdom.”

I was asked also what was for me an odd question from one of the attendants just before the surgery: “Is there any tissue from the operation you would like to save?” (Apparently a religious preference for some patients.) I said “Well yes. If they are able to remove the bone I’d like to see that.” We now have in our freezer something much bigger than I imagined that looks something like a large chicken bone and rattles solidly with thuds in the jar they delivered to us.

I noticed in the surgeons report under the procedure he had put “Creative Surgery.”

The operation took three hours, as expected despite the “creative” expedition needed. I was delivered to a nice private room with its own shower and toilet, an unexpected side-benefit for having been previously in an overseas hospital with a mandatory need for isolation procedures. I was able to keep my own odd hours without disturbing any other recovering patients and with total freedom to lay any reading and writing stuff without concern for space or security. Our marathon overseas struggle was occasion for witness once more to visiting nurses and doctors who had to review patient logs, and the quiet room became a daily procession of friends, relatives and ministries who came to see what the Lord had done for us. What would normally be an expensive or unavailable option was not only free, but necessary. Good are the strange preparatory paths of God.

Ahead now for us is a follow-up consultation tomorrow with Andrew, and then six weeks of nothing but rest to give time for the tissues to heal and join well – no weight-lifting, gymnastics, tri-athlete iron man marathons or workouts on the ab machine. (I never did these anyway.) Christmas coming then has already brought to us our greatest gift other than His Son. I have my life back, and my temple back in order, ready to recover over the next six months for the new beginnings He has for me. Thanks again all you who have loved us and thought about us over this long journey. You are special to us in His eyes.

Love in Him Who loves us utterly and amazingly –

Winkie and Fae

Posted by Israel Anderson

Countdown Has Begun

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-10-31T18:28:19-06:00

You know we have waited so long for some closure to this constant dealing with the consequence of the critical surgeries done in emergency situations to save my life; the continual battle to avoid system infection from an open wound more than 2-3 inches (6-8 cm) wide and over 8 ½ inches (22 cm) long, the risk of re-rupture or growing weakness

These past six months have also been an ongoing display of miracles. I am a walking, talking, singing, speaking miracle fresh from the regenerating hand of God. You who have helped us so much in both warm little ways and sometimes huge and generous gifts of encouragement and blessing; you have invested so much in our lives to make this passage so much kinder than it might otherwise have been, thank you. He has been so good to us, and often through the hearts and hands of His friends, been our benefactor.

We embark now on the final operation. As of last week, we met with the team who we believe is the one who is going to help us in this last stage of preparation for recovery.
From the beginning, I have had three criteria in mind for this last surgery that involves stitching back together the large fascia tissue that holds the muscle groups together to repair what amounts to a huge hernia running down my middle like a missing tissue tie.

The operation though not critical, and could be counted as cosmetic is not without risk. When piercing the outer shell of the body in any situation there is always the danger of admitting infection to the inner systems, and with any traumatic wound the possibility of a hematoma, or subsequent blood clots that can in turn bring on stroke, heat failure or lung embolism. Professor John Windsor the first surgeon who so generously made time for us to discuss in detail what was involved and also took the trouble to re-state simply what actually happened to me and the steps to save my life taken in Korea from the translated surgical notes they supplied said it best: “It’s not a haircut”.

In undertaking this, we are already aware of and reminded again of the risks by these great consultants we have had, but the alternative for me was hardly livable. To spend the rest of my useful life without the freedom to run, preach strongly, or even play tennis well, requiring constant extra care and clothing restraints is of course possible. I could still function and there would be no critical risks living like that. I, for one, am glad and thankful that through the prayers of the saints, the dedication and skill of those who first undertook to save me, and over it all, the grace of God, that I am still here. There are many who would perhaps be content of course, to just be alive. But I have never lived, nor ever wanted to live contented to be “just alive”. I want to be fully alive, as great as I can be for God and for His Kingdom with what He gives and graces, and until I see Him face to face, want to go to the very edge of what He wills. “Whatsoever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might.”

My Dads’ book finally came out a few weeks ago for national release here as one of the three cycling legends of our nation that span the key generations of championship competition in this world sport. Titled “Bill Pratney - Never Say Die” it is a wonderful compilation of some of the career highlights of this great and good man I had the privilege of living with and loving for more than sixty years. I have written sometimes about him, spoken often about him both in public and private and certainly missed him many times now since his death in 2001 aged ninety-two. We gave our lives to Jesus together, my Daddy and I, in a little Auckland street mission where I got in the same night a new Dad as well as new Father. He was more than a champion to me, more than a icon who was the first to be called the original “Iron Man” more than the man George Bernard Shaw on seeing him compete called him “one of the three greatest natural athletes of our time.” He also was my brother.

I never was or would be able to even come close to what he did on a bike, this man who would think nothing of getting up at 4:00 am and riding a hundred miles before breakfast on a daily training run, who won almost every major event in our nation in both speed and stamina, whose career nearly ended at 16 after a near-fatal road crash but who recovered from a coma and was still competing on an Olympic level at the Masters Games in Brisbane at 86. I probably never will, even if they have bike races in heaven.

But as I told the cyclists in attendance at the book launch, when I was in critical condition on Korea and all the major systems of my body begin to shut down and die, though I had nine tubes and thirteen drips in me to keep me alive, one thing kept on going – my heart. And I told them; “I got my heart from my Dad.”

As I mentioned in my previous blog I have thought about and prayed about what we would need for this completing surgery. I was looking to the Lord for three threads to come together for whoever might head up the surgical team. (1) A real Christian, a real child of God that genuinely knew Christ so that there would be more than one hand on the scalpel and the scissors; (2) someone who really knew their stuff, with a wide and deep knowledge of what they were doing (3) if at all possible, the operation performed as a public service instead of the somewhat costly ($8-10,000) private alternative. Both men we consulted with first met all these conditions for me; both John Windsor and Ian Bisset were part of the same team of specialists in Auckland Hospital, both with missionary backgrounds, both teaching professors, both willing to undertake this operation in the public or private sector. We learned so much from them both, and appreciated both their wisdom and personal interest in my situation.

I also had as I last mentioned, an unspoken wish; more like an unvoiced trust; that if it was really God, there would be no need to push for things, to attempt to manipulate or have to try to pull strings. While there must always be our own choices and personal responsibility for our actions, especially for those that affect our whole life and future, I believe as I have said before that living by faith is living without scheming. I believe, and have lived like this, that if it is really God, He will make it plain and put it all together for His children. He did after all say” “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.” There is always the possibility of demonic and human resistance, but the life of faith does not require striving, but trusting. We fight from a place of utter rest.

What is interesting with these godly men, is that when we first asked for some contact with those recommended to us by friends who visited me in Korea, we were unable to reach them for various reasons. Two of them were actually out of the country. The first contact was eventually made by one of these surgeons himself to us by phone, and all subsequent connections were then done on a personal and relational level. The Kingdom of God is built on friendships. We have found these men who invested time and concern in us not only to be of the highest medical standards, but with genuine personal commitment and convictions wrapped in a wisdom that transcends mere practice and professionalism. They really cared, and we are truly grateful for their help and advice.

The surgeon who will head up my operation on the 6th of November is the culmination of all these consultations and recommendations. Like his fellow-surgeons, he also has a missionary background with three years in Africa. He is likewise an experienced teaching professor who heads up his division of the surgical department. The hospital (Manukau Counties) is not only one of the newest in the country with top equipment and facilities, it is literally ten minutes away from our home, making it the closest hospital to us. And because of its location, I qualify for a public operation there, not needing a private undertaking. And because it is in a public hospital, there is at-hand an entire backup in case of complications, rather than the smaller assembled team of a private surgery.

We had our preliminary meeting last Tuesday. On that day he scheduled the surgery, another small miracle when there can be a waiting list for public surgery sometimes literally longer than a year or more. Yesterday we spent a couple of hours of preliminary operation preparations, in discussions, asked and answered questions with nice nurses and doctors. I had my height measured (no doubt in case I shrunk from this commitment) was weighed (in the balances and hopefully, not found wanting). I had my blood pressure measured (good), blood taken for tests from a highly trained phlebotamist (you ask? –from the veins), my lungs listened to (still breathing)

And oh yes – I also had an EKG. The verdict? My heart is also still good.

Thanks Dad..

We value your prayers. Surgery is scheduled the morning of November 6th Manukau Counties Hospital. Lord willing, I will spend only 3-4 days in the hospital for initial post-op recovery, and then be free to return home for the longer task of healing all over again. Remember us now, that all the time, love and gifts invested us over these past six months will be brought to a great close in this. As Dad also said “Son, its not how you begin the race that matters. It’s how you finish that counts.”

Blessings in the Beloved –

Winkie and Fae

Posted by Israel Anderson

The Adventure Continues

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-10-02T11:29:26-06:00

Well here we are again on another new adventure with God! These past three weeks have been simply a blur of great blessing. We have seen overwhelming generosity from the saints in this nation in helping us with everything from broken household items to major projects on our property. It seems as if heaven opened up on us from different avenues in wholly unexpected ways and we are deeply grateful to the Lord for what He is doing.

Early in August, we were made honored guests of a great local church I had spoken in briefly before leaving for Korea that fateful March. Fae’s parents have already been recipients of their kindness for some time now, in their providing a ride for them to church every Sunday. This blessing was set up for them over a year ago by our friends Duane and Jenny Newport, when Dad Rees-Thomas became legally blind and could no longer drive. Although the church has since had a major change of leadership, the new team likewise continued this kindness and now have committed themselaves to helping us also.

This one work has been so wonderful with their time and expertise, sending out a small resource team to see how they could help us. From their investment in our lives we have a new clothes dryer, a friend from thirty years in the past who has given us time every two weeks to bring our jungle into the Divine order called a garden, a man from a Wellington team of professionals who donate time and materials to repair and fix things for a ministry who came out to help us with our leaky conservatory roof. As I look out our side window, there is now a beautiful concrete driveway stretched all the way to the footpath instead of two muddy ruts carved out by cars.

They asked Fae and I if we would like to attend a major conference they hold each year as their guests, and were accommodated by them at a beautiful new hotel overlooking the bay for the week-long duration of the ministry.

We had opportunity to meet with three of their guest speakers, Don Thomas, a worship leader from Atlanta, Ian Green, a friend of mine from Whales formerly with Youth Alive! in England, and now active in planting many churches in Eastern Europe. The third ministry guest was Bill Johnston, the revival pastor from Redding California where the Lord has been doing so many great things in their city and through his ministry. Though this was the longest time I have ever been in meetings since the surgeries in Korea, the Lord sustained me and we deeply enjoyed the ministry and fellowship of that week. To cap it off, we were signally honored by a special offering taken up for us from the convention towards providing support for us during these many months of restricted travel and sharing until I am fit and well enough again for battle. This was the largest single gift we have ever had in our ministry, taken up from among the over 200 pastors there and both national and international attendees to honor us for the many years of ministry we have spent in His service both home and abroad. Thank you so much Martin Steel, pastor of Harborside Church, as well as those attending Manifest Presence who so marvelously gave of your love, prayers and precious substance to help us so deeply in keeping our calling. We are so touched.

Following the convention, we hosted some of the speakers and international visitors at our home over the next two weeks, showing them some of the other part of the Revival Library in my New Zealand study. There are some gems of historical greatness in God on these shelves, some books more than three hundred years old and sets that show in every generation He has raised up those who listen to His voice and do what He bids.

Other internationals followed, friends and fellow-ministries coming by to see us and to encourage us together. First was a small team from the Philippines, where Fae and I originally sent 200 copies of the first Youth Aflame manual in the sixties that were able to help disciple and train three generations of young Christians. They in turn have been used of the Lord to win thousands of people to Jesus and raised up hundreds of new churches both there and abroad. I never fail to marvel at the power of the Word of God when it is put in the hands of the hungry, and what He can do when their hearts are set on a holy life-long romance with Jesus. Kelvin and Ribena Burton came from Lindale Texas for a three week stay here making our home their first port of call and bringing us a suitcase full of Texas goodies.

Last week our good friend Che Ahn from Pasadena specially altered his international ticket to spend a day with us on his way to Australia and then on to Korea. He has been a friend of many years starting from our first time with him when he was 19 and being able to help direct him to the work and ministries of some of the great saints of the past who saw revival in their time. God has signally honored Che and his friend Lou Engle in not only launching the Call prayer movement that has involved literally millions of young people in a “nameless, faceless” call to seek God for their nations, but also to raise up a wonderful church both in Harvest Rock and the H.I.M network across the globe now involving more than 2,000 churches.

Looking at him again last week I remembered how much of a risk he and his young family took in laying down a previous work they founded to pursue God 24/7. They dared believe that He could bring literally hundreds of thousands of young people together without advertised bands or speakers, just to seek His face and pray. Undaunted by the best paid financial advice they were given to not do this, that all the odds were against them, that they were wholly unknowns and unless some 80,000 kids could come to support such an event that was “just prayer” they would probably lose both their homes and church in trying to pay off such a massive undertaking as renting the Washington Mall for it. Heart in mouth, Che and Lou sought the Lord yet again, heard His clear word to “Just do it” and went ahead in faith to see one of the two largest gatherings of young people in the history of America, where more than 400,000 youth stood together hour after hour even in the rain. to worship God and seek Him.

Last week we caught up also with David McCracken and his wife Margaret, who I first met in my little office decades ago, where he as a young pastor with great dreams shared something of his passion with me. Surviving the loss of his church and Christian school where our son Billy once attended during his time in New Zealand and a major life-threatening heart attack, David has not only been a survivor, but has since been used of the Lord to encourage hundreds of churches both in Australia and other parts of the world. The Kingdom of God is built on friendship. In these and so many other wonderful weavings of love, I see the truth of the Scripture that calls us to cast our bread upon many waters, to see it come back to us having touched so many lives.

Reflecting again with gratitude on the unbelievable volume of prayer launched on our behalf during the crisis, I was reminded of how great a legacy God has given us in permitting the technologies of the time to link us instantly. We know a true revival affects our neighbors. Love restored to Christ will call also on those within reach of our influence. But the neighbor of the new Millennium is no longer just the person geophysically next door to you. We are rather, as my friend John Dawson says, linked by “lateral villages of relational communication” so that which happens to us can instantly be shared with hundreds, even thousands of “neighbors”.

Yesterday morning, I went again early to the airport to see off yet another friend returning to Australia who I have known since his teenage years. He now has a wonderful ministry helping other churches join together to bless the marketplaces of the city with righteous renovations, and is doing a new book :”Where Does God Go On Mondays?” Danny told me that when I was critically ill, our dear friend Dennis Slape of Adelaide called him immediately on his cell – and he was in Sweden in a conference with 200 pastors! He immediately called them also to prayer and did the same in the next conference with some 2,000 pastors. Scores of others simultaneously did the same thing. Thus, in just a few days, an exponentially expanding torrent of prayer was released for me, where we estimate that there must have been literally tens of thousands of people holding my fragile life up to the throne. No wonder I was spared for another round. By God’s grace, you can call my movie Winkie Balboa.

So where are we physically with this operation? The wound has finally healed. I have been discharged from the weekly visits of the District Nurse checking it, and on our last visit with Dr. Ian Bisset he pronounced me good to go. It seems as if the final operation will be done by his friend Andrew in our district and we will meet with him to discuss a date when he returns from his three weeks away from our newest hospital – Manukau Counties Hospital, the “Super-Clinic”.

Andrew seems to ably fulfill my three expectations from God on this final surgery – (1) a genuine Christian, so that more than one hand will be on the knife (he was a missionary in Africa for three years before taking up this post) – (2) a highly-trained professional who really knows what he is doing (a teaching professor, whose specialty is this sort of operation) so I don’t have someone who is just a “practicing” surgeon and (3) a public, rather than a private operation, saving some $8.000-10,000 of Kingdom funds.

It also is a fulfillment of an unspoken wish that has guided most of my faith life – that the final selection would not have to be somehow manipulated, pushed or prodded from our end but become in itself a testimony to the flowing faithfulness and care of God. I believe that living by faith is living without scheming. Scary, but always great. We trust Him with our lives, and rest on His promises that He that feeds the sparrows can even more wonderfully take care of His children. (Matt. 6:33)

Blessings, dear ones. Your continued prayer is a life-line for us to His throne.

You are loved and deeply appreciated. We are thankful for all you have done for me and our little family. We look to see the story of His love grow wider.

Winkie and Fae

Posted by Israel Anderson

Worlds Oldest Teenager Birthday Blog

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-08-16T07:39:56-06:00

Hi friends and prayer support saints around the world –

I am now officially another year older with my 63rd birthday the first week of this month.

The wonder for which we thank God is that I would have this birthday at all. As one of my cards comments: “Happy Birthday. It is Better Being Over the Hill than Under the Hill.” We have hosted my brother-in law from Hawaii and his son in Australia – (both Davids) – at our home last week, and also had some great calls from some of our closest friends in Australia and America this past fortnight. Thanks so much for the birthday communication and encouragement. I have a T-Shirt that says “I’m Not Old. I’m a Recycled Teenager”.

The last two weeks have brought more interesting changes. I have entered a regimen of physiotherapy in our local Middlemore hospital for two one-hour sessions a week over the next six weeks. The workouts basically involve machine training – cycle, rowing, hill-climbing, grinding and leg-lifts as well as a cycle of weight and cardio training at home; all designed to help increase my strength and stamina. As I mentioned in the last post I was told I need to get back at least to the level of fitness I had before the first three operations before undertaking this last one. Although quote: “not a haircut” – the operation may take up to 3+ hours to complete – with good fitness, recovery time on this is supposed to be much shorter – it may be as early as three days out of the hospital.

Some of you know that part of the procedure to save my life in Korea from the system-wide infection killing me was to flood my body with antibiotics and saline/glucose fluid where my entire body looked almost double in size. Our friend Trevor Yaxley of Lifeway ministries (who kindly traveled with Fae from New Zealand to help her on the trip to join me in that critical time) stayed on with us in Korea a couple more days until William arrived from the Sudan. This was in the initial stages when I was under anesthesia. My fingers then were apparently so swollen that there was no longer any spaces between them, and when Trevor touched them they had no give; they felt like hard pieces of wood. I am told I looked like the Michelin Man. I had up to 9 tubes and 13 drip feeds connecting me to life-support machinery, as almost everything began to shut down except my heart.

After I had my miraculous recovery some weeks later, the long bout under coma had sapped more than two-thirds of my muscle strength. At first I could not stand, let alone walk, could scarcely whisper and there was even some doubt about my memory and thinking returning to full function. The torrent of prayer let loose around the world was a wonderful support for us all then, as also were the calls of other dear friends like Steve Hill and Bob Weiner who waited in the wings in the US ready to drop everything and join us for additional support if needed – all a tremendous blessing to us. These faith-building phone calls and words of encouragement contributed massively to my eventual emergence for which we are still deeply thankful. Thus began the road towards return to full strength, the journey which I am now engaged in for the long haul.

I have some five weeks left before the next consultation with our new Christian surgeon friend September 14th. During this time I ask for your prayers that the cut down the centre of my abdomen will fully close up and that my strength from these workouts and walks will come up to a new level in preparation for this final surgery, date yet to be determined.

It was good to touch base also by phone with friends who I have ministered with for more than a decade usually during this time in the US summer. Larry Andes of Fishnet Ministries, one of the longest-running Jesus Festivals in America and Tim Dilena at War Week in Detroit both have continued to publicly pray for us and been a wonderful source of support, honor and blessing through their ministries. I was able to convey my thanks at these events again this year through them to friends who have loved and appreciated us. My “Six-Mile” spoof video from a previous War Week with the “Directors Commentary” is now featured on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMiVGEqzua4 and showcases the creativity of Steve Andes and the talented team from NXTOnline in Illinois that contribute ministry also to this event, with youth and senior pastors training young people for school and street ministries in a city known as one of the worst in America for single-parent or no-parent homes.

During this time of convalescence, the previously-mentioned work on the second volume of Divinity, the Nature and Character of God in Creation is also progressing well. Every week I marvel at how rich and deep is God’s Word and how comprehensive His love and practical wisdom for us. Such topics in the Spiritual Roots of Vocation as His work as a Maker, Teacher, Singer, Sculptor, Leader and scores of others are full of challenge and insight, and simply sitting down with hundreds of these verses I have felt some of the added commentary almost write itself. Despite the challenges of this recuperation year and missing so many loved friends and events I have been involved with yearly, one of the things we have been thankful for is the time to write. Perhaps God let Paul go to prison because it was the only way he would have had time to finish his part of the New Testament. In my own small form of prison, the gems of His instruction and care shine.

Blessings to you all

The World’s Oldest Living Teenager

The Adventure Continues

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-07-23T08:24:54-06:00

Meeting with another great Auckland surgeon this past Friday, introduced to us by our friends the Garrets. We appreciate so much both the Garrets and their massive investment in our lives, especially in the early days when I first went into hospital. David helped arrange Faes’ ticket to Korea, sent numerous emails to friends alerting them to my situation and even did things like man the phone at our home to help free her up to get ready. Mindy their daughter had had a similar emergency situation to mine. Although technically done for the night, on finding out she was their daughter this surgeon had stepped in to help her. Both his surgery and post-op care was wonderful and Mindy felt strongly that we should meet with him for consultation on my proposed fourth operation.

Ian has a missionary background himself with ten years in Nepal. He still returns each year to help out with an organization in that nation. As another believer, he also knew of my ministry and freed up some consultation time so Fae and I were able to spend a valuable guest forty minutes with him. He also went through the translated notes of the three operations and showed us what he thought had happened to precipitate the crises.

He also seems keen to take on my case personally, and we have set up another visit in two months time to perhaps decide on an operation time and venue. It turns out that there is another experienced head surgeon in a new local hospital also a believer and Ian believes it will be possible for me to have the surgery done as public-funded rather than private operation. This of course would be a wonderful answer to prayer.

I have wanted three things for this operation; that it would be headed up by someone of high competence and experience, so that the huge expense of all the previous surgeries will not be annulled by having the wrong person on the final job; that they would be a real believer, so that the Lord will have someone who listens to Him at the helm; and that we would be good stewards of the gifts of love, time and finance that friends have invested in our lives for this time. We have waited on Him for His peace in this.

One of the great blessings we have seen through all of this is the constant and unwavering care of God and the surprising little arrangements to encourage us He has sent our way. I have always believed that living by faith is living without scheming. Even when we are not traveling or ministering, His faithfulness is ever new and amazing to us.

This past week has been such an example. A district nurse pays us a visit once a week to check on the progress of my wound, still stubbornly holding somehow back on healing. (There remains a small patch about the size of a quarter near the bottom of the wound where the final skin has not yet closed up.) We got a visit from a new nurse a couple of days before the consultation. On talking to her about the possibilities of a public operation, it turns out she served as a nurse under this local surgeon for a year, She said he was the only one she would trust her own body to for this operation. Consultations have been initiated by others who contacted these surgeons for us. We have not had to beat paths to their doors to gain an audience with these skilled and busy men who have helped us get a perspective on what has happened, what is going on now and what is possible. Knowing how difficult it is to set this up, we so appreciate Gods’ hand in this.

Here is the update so far on where I am. No operation can be attempted until I am fully fit and my wound has been completely closed up. I am told I need to be as fit for this last surgery as I was when I went into the first ones. John said that while the operation was “no haircut” and could take up to three hours or more to complete, that recovery under these circumstances is faster and I could be out of hospital in three or four days.

The option to forgo the surgery does not look preferable, although technically the wound allows the body to still be fully functional. Any surgery then would not come under emergency or critical parameters, but be treated as cosmetic. To leave things as they are however, would be learning to live with a 22-cm hernia. At any future time the bowel could protrude out and retract at will, though not be at any great risk for strangulation.

One strange thing about this band that needs somehow to be rejoined to bring my abs back into line, is what is happening to those two internal cut edges. My body seems so keen on being healed that the ends of the cut band are turning into bone. In effect, I have at present two breastbones. Ian says this ossification is rare and they only see one or two cases of this a year. I suggested perhaps that these bone ends might be joined by a titanium chain and I would henceforth have a built-in bullet-proof vest. Fit for future dangerous ministry areas? I don’t think they will take that option. but a mesh is possible.

Thanks again for your faithful prayers and encouragement. I had opportunity Thursday to go on Radio Rhema, our major Christian station here to thank them and their nation-wide audience. They carried my story (read aloud from our blog for weeks to the nation) and made many aware of my need. Many friends continue to pray for us, some still daily and I hope to be able to contact those I usually minister with around this time to thank them for their support. I have also begun work on Divinity II, the second volume of the Nature and Character of God that focuses on the character of God as seen in His creation. It will cover aspects of our uniqueness as a universe, solar system, planet and as an ecosystem, the wonder of mankind and new areas like the spiritual roots of vocation. It will also contrast the beauty of His making with the ugliness and sadness of the Fall. Volume 1 which has had many appreciative readers, took some 15 years to compile. Hopefully while retaining the usefulness and resource riches of Vol. I with new tools of technology and research, Volume II should be completed in far less time. Volume III, last of the set will deal with the Nature and Character of God in the reconciliation of His creation.

Blessings in the Beloved –

Winkie and Fae: P.O. Box 215 Manurewa, South Auckland New Zealand.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Thank you son

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-07-04T02:32:34-06:00

It has been a special privilege to have had our son William with us these past two months to help in my recovery process. He has been a signal example of the loving servant heart of Christ to both Fae and I in all that he has contributed to our family. From the time he first made his way to Korea from the Sudan mission-field where he was working with a YWAM Mercy Works medical team, his life and ministry has been a constant source of joy and inspiration to all who met him.

For me, William's gift of service to his Dad was genuinely a God-send. Beginning with his part on his initial arrival in helping the medical team restore a critical function for me as I lay in a coma, he brought a strength and resilient encouragement to us that helped us endure what sometimes seemed a nightmare. His cheerful caring commitment to my welfare in the long night and early morning watches of the lonely hospital ward, and unwavering strength - despite times of great stress and demand far beyond the daily duty of the extra mile - to help oversee my physical rehabilitation have been amazing. Bringing to bear what he has learned in the regimen of physical exercise, his was the thankless task of helping coax my dormant muscles back to function and bringing my protesting failed frame in its weakness and pain back into working order. He has helped me keep up my prescribed nutrition daily, served us every day here at home as a driver and gofer for appointments and commitments, been a strong shoulder and servant minister to his mother, and encouraged me in every needed discipline. Besides all of this he has taken time in the early hours of the morning to post progress reports on the blog to keep you, our friends informed of my condition.

William, you are a true champion and faithful friend, a son who, like the radical Irishman in Braveheart in so many situations proved indeed what you pledged to me: "I got your back." We love you and appreciate more than we can say your godly sacrifice and service. As you return to your chosen field of ministry and your own familiar friends in the US this week, we also thank YWAM Tyler for the sacrificial loan back to us of our most treasured and special loved one. We honor you, not only for all you have done, but for being to the core who you are in Him. Thank you, dear brother in the battle, our son.

Winkie Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-07-02T23:59:12-06:00

Well, the time has come for me to depart for the United States. I have a wedding to attend in California on route to Texas (no, it's not my wedding!), and then it's back to Youth With A Mission Tyler, where I work full time in the video department. Future updates will probably be done by my dad (which I'm sure most of you will be glad to hear). I leave him to the grace of God and in the hands of my mother. It's been over three months since I left the Sudan to visit Winkie in Korea. I won't be back here in New Zealand again until December (provided no future emergencies beckon my attention). Thanks, everyone for your prayers for us and for me in particular. Goodbye, and God bless.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-07-01T00:54:13-06:00

Winkie and I met with Dr. John Winsor, recommended gastro-intestinal surgeon and professor of surgery at Auckland University Medical Center. He gave us some interesting news. The first thing he said, is that Winkie is at this time able to use his abdominal muscles! True, they are still separated, and only surgery will correct that, but he said that the actual muscles are usable! Winkie practically got a new lease on life! Of course, with any strenuous use of that area, he will get a bulge, but since the open space is so large, there's no risk of hernia strangulation. When the bowel goes through a small opening in the muscle wall layer and gets stuck, that is where the danger comes in. But since Winkie has a large space, there's nothing really for the bowel to get stuck on.

Winkie is free now to exercise (he is of course, still quite weak, and far from being able to get back out on the tennis court- we're not even letting him drive yet), get well and basically get back into life. You can imagine what mentally, being told by a speciallist that all those things you were told before that you shouldn't or couldn't or wouldn't be able to do you actually can do would do.

Winsor also encouraged him to take time to heal up, get well, and think about all the different surgical possibilities that lie before him. It seems that he has a number of options, but needs to decide if he wants to go through the public system (is free, but takes time, and particular surgeon is not guaranteed) or go private (you can pick your surgeon, but it costs you). If he were to go private, he could pick what type of surgery he wanted (aparently, the same basic purpose can be attained through many different ways- Winsor laid out several- with or without mesh, if with, which kind of mesh and where it's put, if without, which muscle layer is brought together- there are so many options). Winsor told us, however, if we want private, it will cost us about $10,000NZ.

Dad has a lot of time to think about it, and mull things over in his mind. He also will have time to work on written material, and, as I've found out today, is planning to do at least 4 more books- Volumes 2 & 3 of Divinity (The Nature and Character of God), an updated version of Youth Aflame, and a small counselling-type book.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-06-19T07:04:45-06:00

Hi everyone. Winkie is doing a little better. David Hannaford, a fellow minister and naturopath from Australia has been visiting us for a few days. He brought all sorts of supplements and natural healing products for Winkie, giving him a month's supply of things to take. David had prophetic words for all of us, and was an encouragement and a blessing. Winkie's voice has improved- he can talk all day now without it giving out (going hoarse), and his wound is looking better. ...still not fully healed yet but it's getting there.

Over the weekend we were able to visit with Dale, Dave and Melinda Garrett (Scripture and Song) and do some catching up. They've just recorded a new album, and it's scheduled to come out later on this year. It's great having friends and family in the form of the extended body of Christ, all around the world.

Thanks again to everyone who has sent in cards, letters, flowers, money, etc. We are so blessed!!! May God bless you for your love and generosity.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Thanks for YOUR continued prayers!!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-06-15T10:19:28-06:00

We all (Winkie, Fae, William, Israel, Jim & Myself) really appreciate your ongoing faithfulness in continuing to pray for Winkie even though the immediate danger seems to be passed. We are trusting God, not only for complete healing, but for real direction - to make sure the Lord is in control of what Winkie's ministry looks like for the future. Our hearts are laid out before Him, and we are asking that He will do more than just heal - but give rise to new dimensions, new anointing, new power, and new areas for effective service for Winkie as well as the rest of our little team.

Thanks so much,
Dee Patton

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-06-11T10:07:14-06:00

Dad's doing alright. He's still recovering. At the moment, he's still regaining the use of his left hand. His wound is still healing, and it hurts him to stand or walk completely upright. He's also on antibiotics as they've recently found fluid around his left lung and that his wound wasn't doing so well- apparently it was gaping and the top layer of skin had come off. What happened is, a relative that's been helping us came to visit. She checked his wound and found it wasn't in such a good state. I was out at the time and had the car, but she was able to take him in and have someone look at him. They did an X-ray and found fluid near his left lung. The person who saw him has recommended no lifting, no exercising and has prescribed a broad-spectrum heavy sulphar drug that is supposed to clear up both the infection and the fluid near his lung.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Speaks...

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-06-07T08:28:36-06:00

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him… (Psalm 37:7a) So often in Scripture, growth in God is directly related to patience. One of the great cards I got among the hundreds of other wonderful missives you sent in to me and my family said "God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. I'm sure He wouldn't mind if you took a few more days off."

My rehabilitation sometimes seems to me to be so agonizingly slow, but it is still encouraging to see small signs of healing progress each week. My left hand (writing) somehow damaged as an after-effect of the operations, which shook uncontrollably at any even small attempt to make some kind of legible mark (printing, signature) is slowly responding again. Nerves apparently may regenerate at a rate of a millimeter a day. It is a joy to know I will be able to freely type again as well as do such a simple thing as sign my name. A simple legible shopping list is a real achievement. For those of you waiting to see more personal posts from me will be glad to know these are becoming possible, without having to slowly dictate what has been happening for William to send on my behalf. My apologies for not doing more; it has been an effort to do even simple things.

My voice is still around half-mast in volume, but it was also encouraging to find I can still quietly hold a tune. Singing has been such a key part in ministry over the years in both personal worship and the ability to communicate challenge and encouragement to others, especially among the music communities I have fellowshipped with and sometimes been privileged to mentor. I work on this from time to time when no-one is around and trust this too will be restored to normal.

We have still not finalized a surgeon or date here for the fourth and final operation, to restore the use of my abs. We are trusting the Lord for this to be guided by one of His own children with the expertise to literally close up this very painful chapter of my life in the best possible way. After over $100,000 dollars worth of critical surgery and other medical expenses the relative simplicity of rejoining the band holding these frontal muscles seems a given, but we have learned to take nothing for granted and a mistake here could undo a massive amount of care and work. We value your prayers.

We have been blessed with the visit of friends here at home to continue to encourage pray for and support us as we hold the Lord's hand in the unglamorous walk of faith where daily little miracles are not the subject of headlines and articles. We love you very much.

Winkie Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

How to thank the others!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-06-02T15:46:47-06:00

Several people have asked about how they can express their thanks to Dr Lim, who took such wonderful care of Winkie while he was in South Korea and his home church, Harvest Shalom Church, who have given so much to help save his life and give him back to the world. Here is an address for the church below. If you would like to send a thank you card to Harvest Shalom and Dr. Lim please feel free.

Harvest Shalom Church
42 Boorimdong
Gwancheon, Gyunggido
South Korea

Dee Patton

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-27T11:18:28-06:00

Hi guys. Winkie is doing okay. His old GP (now specializing and no longer in general practice) visited today. Winkie has been battling some blood clots in his legs and upper thighs. Refusing drugs, and using the natural means he has the doctor (through use of an ultra-sound machine) determined that the products he had been using have been working. I repeat, the doctor determined that his natural products have been working, because he could see two clots broken up in the blood vessel. However, the clots are still there, and though we're not overly concerned obviously it's a battle that isn't over yet. Winkie faced blood clots years earlier and was treated with the usual- Luvenox, Wafarin... but he doesn't want to go that route anymore. The natural means he has have the ability to break up blood clots in the blood vessel, and thin the blood, but unfortunately, he's running out of the one that does the first job. Fortunately, one of our friends has just ordered him more.

Winkie is resting a lot, and I think eating NZ food has been nice for him. (He's very particular as to his food! Such a gourmet palate!) Consequently, I've been learning some of the secrets he has for good food. Even though his palate has returned, his appetite really hasn't. A bowl's worth of food seems to be as much as he can manage at the moment (we try to encourage him- believe me). Also, even though he's able to walk (it's more like a stagger still) and talk, his voice still isn't doing so well.

I'm hoping to get him connected with a physiotherapist this week, as Mom and I don't seem to be doing a great job helping him get into shape. He gets tired so quickly, there don't seem to be many exercises I can actually do with him before he wants to sit or lie down. This is just a little about him, and how he is doing.

I'm doing well. It's tiring being here, but I'm in it for the long hall. There's nothing else more valuable that I could be doing at the moment than helping taking care of my dad. He needs help, and as soon as he doesn't, that's my cue to leave- I can return to the States after that. We watched a movie tonight- some of my second cousins were over as well. Winkie's doing normal things again, he just isn't doing all of them in normal ways- Please pray for him, that his voice will return to normal, that he will be able to walk straight and tall, and that he will get fit again.

Mom is also doing well- it's a full time job taking care of Dad, and she gets tired as well, but with relief from friends and family I think we're doing pretty good. Mom was able to see her parents recently. She's also been able to catch up with various friends that have visited. (She also has been enjoying eating fruit from our garden here ...I think she wants you to guess as to what kind of fruit trees) Well, that's all I have for now.

Grace and peace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in the truth.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-22T01:52:35-06:00

Winkie's out of hospital. They discharged him this afternoon. So, those of you in NZ that wanted to visit him there, you'll have to catch up with him elsewhere. Winkie was discharged around 3:00pm from Middlemore Hospital. He had all of his stitches removed, his wound freshly cleaned and bandaged, and (we're told) can shower now. Yea! The doctors were in agreement with what the Korean doctors said: he can have his 4th operation sometime later, after he's had time to recover. His wound seems to have sealed up nicely (it's definitely got a long way to go in the healing process yet), and he's been put on oral antibiotics to fight off a mild infection they found through a blood test.

Winkie made pancakes after he got home. True to taste, his incredible pancake skills don't seem to have diminished one iota. I loaded them up with sugar, lemon juice, passion fruit and banana. Awesome pancakes! Anyway, it's the first thing he's really done since coming out of the coma. An accomplishment for him, and a treat for me, he was able to see his son enjoying the work of his hands...one more step towards his completed recovery.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-21T13:25:52-06:00

Winkie got referred by his old family doctor to a more local GP- Dr. Greg Judkins, who operates out of a nearby family practice. We understand Dr. Judkins is a believer, and are happy to have someone like him so close by. Winkie was having some care via certain nurses that were changing his dressing regularly, but the district nurse who came by was unhappy with Winkie not being directly under any doctor. Our old family doctor (who is no longer a GP) referred Winkie to Dr. Judkins, and Dr. Judkins, after examining Winkie referred us to Middlemore Hospital, where Winkie could undergo some more thorough examinations and get some more specialized care. So Winkie is currently in Middlemore hospital (if you are in the area and want to stop by, or send flowers, etc. go ahead!) and the doctors are supposed to decide today what they believe is the best thing for his wound. Winkie met with two doctors last night, who examined him and asked him questions. We were told that after discussion, the head doctors would make a decision Tuesday morning, as to what they believed was best for his situation. Mom and I will go in and see him this morning, and hopefully be there for the main evaluation and to hear their decision.

Two days ago we had various people coming by, bringing us food- God is still in control and it is abundantly clear that he is providing for us and taking care of us. Former Agape Force Friends John and Jewel Stephanie and Murry and Lois Evans came by- bringing us all sorts of wonderful food. It was good to see them again, and also Susanna Pennington (a relative) who came by bringing us food and has been a good help to us over the last few days. Noel Maxwell, our non-medical health specialist friend here has also been coming by, bringing various supplements and things to help.

As I said before, if you're in NZ and you'd like to visit Winkie at Middlemore Hospital, he's in ward eight, fourth floor.

Thank you for your prayers.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Pratney Family Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-18T13:39:02-06:00

Pratney Family Update

Well, it's good to be in New Zealand, have the Korean hospital bill fully and finally paid off (praise God!) and be eating food with which we are more accustomed. We had some guests today- at least three former Agape Force members- John and Jewel Stephanie and Anne Mclean. Then there was Anne's daughter, who I was helping with some video stuff, my father's sister (who by-the-way stocked our fridge full of some wonderful food [which we've been enjoying]), and the nurse we've temporarily managed to secure to dress Winkie's wound.

Mom is loving being back in her home country- eating the food and breathing the fresh air. I too am glad to be here. I'm mostly glad for Dad. He's home! Hallalujah! One of the comments he got today was that he looked so young (it's the weight loss from the hospital stay). I'm keen to get various specialists lined up to both inspect (don't know if that's the right word but it's all I can think of for now) and work on Winkie. I want the full monty for him- massage, nutrition, medical care, skin care... whatever he needs. And we have a good team of people here who are helping us line that up. And, thanks to the generous contributions given in light of Winkie's situation, we can secure that special care for him. I can't thank everyone enough who's sent money in. God really is in control, and it's evident through the contributions, through the people who have helped us along the way, and through the abundant blessings that keep being poured out on us. Honestly, besides the times when I was doing ministry with my father, I haven't known such abudant blessings as now. The people who come are just the right people at the right times. And they seem to bring just what we need when we need it. It's like this divine guidance/provision thing- kind of like Elija by the brook Cherish, being fed with bread and meat by the birds each day. God is definitely taking care of his servant, and I'm lucky enough to reap the benefits of being included in that care (not that He doesn't take care of me- but normally I don't get such constant, special care). Bless you all for your prayers and abundant generosity. May God reward you in full for the way you've helped us.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie is back home in New Zealand!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-17T09:41:16-06:00

We're home at last!!!

Finally, we've made it back home (South Auckland, New Zealand). The trip went okay- several times I saw Dad walking past me on the plane, so I know he was exercising a bit. At the airport friends Keith Wagener and Trevor and Jan Yaxley, and relatives Tony and Lovonny Gray were there to meet and greet us. We have a wheelchair from the days when my father's father needed one, which is collapsible, which means we will be able to take Winkie out more easily. It's good to be here. I know that it is only a temporary stay for me, and don't know exactly what will be happening in the coming days, but am pretty sure that I have my work cut out for me- Mom too. Right now, we're trying to arrange for connecting him with the right doctor, and making sure things like getting his wound dressed every 1-2 days are taken care of. According to Dr. Lim, he should be able to get his stitches removed by June 5.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

From Winkie Pratney

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-16T13:04:20-06:00

We're getting ready to depart soon for Auckland, New Zealand. Winkie is doing well, and is just awaiting his discharge from here the hospital. Here is a word from him:

"We're finally on our way back to New Zealand. Though we appreciate all the care we've been given here by the church and hospital we're looking forwards to being back in our home land. You have been more than generous in helping us with your prayers and gifts and love. We'll update you as soon as we get back home."

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Update from Dee Patton in Texas

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-12T11:53:41-06:00

Hi. Dee Patton here. I'm in Texas with Israel Anderson and my hubby, Jim, holding down the fort and doing the various and sundry things that need doing each day to help support Winkie's recovery and ongoing ministry. Israel is at the revival library each day ministering to those who come through, setting up some incredible ways to access Winkie's archived messages, and communicating as best he can with many of those who are hungry for news about Wink. I've been doing lots of communicating too, trying to keep people informed and working on this and that - trying hard not to be overwhelmed by it all.

Just last night I worked out the details for William's flight back to New Zealand and today succeeded in confirming a ticket for Winkie on the same flight. Fae is there too, of course, and will be going back home with her boys. She has an open ended return ticket. Our goal was to make sure they were all on the same flight home and it looks like we've accomplished that. If all goes as planned that home going will happen next Wednesday, May 16 and they will arrive in Auckland on the 17th. As you're praying for the Pratneys, pray that all the little things that need to happen to make the trip home a smooth and comfortable one will occur. We're so very thankful to have come this far and are ready for some celebration!

Another thing I've been working at is taking care of the gifts that have been coming in from so many of you, both through the mail and from Paypal via this web site. I've also been sending weekly payments to the hospital in Korea. Each time I pay for a flight or send a wire tranfser to pay the hospital I am almost overcome with gratitude to our God and to all of you who have been with us on this journey from the very first step. It's not over by a long shot, but it is just amazing how much love has been poured out in the form of prayer and gifts and letters, cards, flowers (to the hospital all the way in Korea) and emails. Those of you who are waiting for receipts for your gifts, please bear with me just a little longer. I should be able to do that soon.

Please don't believe the rumors that fly about millions of dollars being given. That would be great, but you know, it's even more wonderful that God has opened the hearts of so many regular people - the body of Christ - to give just the right amount to meet the ongoing need. So far about $125,000 has been given in one form or another and roughly $75,000 has gone out to cover the expenses of just the last six weeks.

Israel has been collecting encouraging email messages to give to Winkie and I've been doing the same with the cards and notes people have been sending through the mail. I'm sure Winkie will enjoy reading each and every one as he recovers at home in NZ. I was able to send one packet of notes and cards to Korea with Dr Leland Paris, who visited Winkie at the hospital, but there are MANY more that I'll send along after they get home and settled. We've been trying to think of a way to acknowledge and bless as many of you as possible. There have been so many wonderful ongoing contributions to the recovery fund and so many who have been praying unceasingly that we just had to do something.

So, we decided to do a web page here on the site that was like a "Wall of Blessing". There is no way we could acknowledge EVERYONE who has prayed and given and prayed some more, but we'll sure try.

Thanks and Hugs from all of us here in Texas and from the Pratneys as they prepare for the next phase of Winkie's recovery.

Dee Patton

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Korean Insights from Fae Pratney

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-11T20:35:54-06:00

Korean Insights from Fae Pratney

On the humorous side of life.

How many visitors can you squeeze into a hospital elevator ?

I don't know but I've been flattened more than once
Don't know - even more when patients join their relatives
Don't know. It depends how many kids are on adult shoulders.
Don't know. It depends if you leave your gear at ground level.
Don't know but you learn to recognize the local fragrances.
Don't know but I'm the only blonde I've ever seen.
Don't know but I'm familiar now with foods they bring their relatives.
Don't know but more Koreans if I manage to exit at the right level. (scratch that; I've lost weight on this healthy Korean food and their hot kimchee)

Some simple challenges to friends and relatives.
1. How long could you sit cross-legged on the floor of a Korean restaurant?
2. How often have you eaten with chopsticks?
3. When did you last try to learn an unguessable language?
4. Could you sleep Korean style on a floor mat or opt for a bed?
5. Would you remember to remove your shoes at the door?
6. Would you put the plastic shoes on to enter the bathroom? (Why? Because the whole floor stays wet after using the shower hose.)

Fae Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-09T09:58:59-06:00

Winkie has met with several neurologists now, in regards to the shakiness in his left hand. They did a number of coordination tests with him. He has also had a series of electrical shock tests, which revealed an impairment in his left ulnar nerve (nerve running along the outside of his left arm from elbow to wrist). They are prescribing pills for it.

Winkie continues to give counsel to all who come to see him.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-06T22:30:05-06:00

We finally got a rough estimate on when we might be able to leave. Dr. Lim came by this morning and said he thinks Winkie should be able to leave on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week (May 15th or 16th). Assuming Winkie is able to and well enough, we should be in New Zealand by May 18th.

His condition? Well, he'll have to travel with his stitches, but he's okay with that (ready to go home, I think). He's had a rash or something that's developed on his lower legs- red dots all over - don't know what it is - but Dr. Lim's arranging for a dermatologist to see him (he believes it's something other than a rash or allergic reaction). Also, Winkie's left hand continues to be a concern for him, as he still cannot write well yet, and experiences quite noticeable shaking in it when attempting to use it. We showed this to Dr. Lim and he said he would also arrange for a neurologist to see him. Winkie is still under observation. He is still getting X-rays, blood tests, and they're still trying to monitor his temperature and blood pressure. Dr. Lim is concerned (nothing to be alarmed at, just trying to be prudent) with Winkie's bowel condition. We found out that this is the reason for the continuing X-rays.

Winkie sleeps now as I write this. Mom and I are about to take him out for a walk. I look forwards to walking the shore of our beach in New Zealand.

Thanks to everyone who prayed prayers of faith for him. He is alive! And he's making a marvelous recovery. I never could have guessed that leaving with a medical outreach missions team for Africa over a month ago (as a videographer and A/V technician) would have resulted in me having to come to South Korea, Asia, to attend the bedside of a father in serious condition. And now I go to New Zealand, also a place that wasn't on my schedule- but I guess it was on God's. Good thing I came prepared!

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-05T11:19:52-06:00

Winkie has had yet another restitch job on his lateral wound. They made it even tighter this time. So, this is (on his main wound) stitch job #3, I believe. There is still some seepage and we're told it may be another 2 weeks. He has been ministering from his bedside to everyone who comes to visit him, from national Church leaders and ministry leaders (including youth and worship leaders), to international visitors and military personal. If anything I would say he has become even more em passioned about his 16 principles to change the world, as laid out in his 21st Century Reformation Manifesto teachings. Stressing the importance and value of these, he has been exhorting everyone from YWAM leaders, to business people, worship leaders, international military personal, pastors, and the list continues. I am a little reminded of the apostle Paul, who at the end of his life simply received people at his home, and ministered to all who came to him.

Winkie had a lot of visitors yesterday. We were visited by a YWAM/ex-Last Days Ministries team who prayed for us and had prophetic words for Fae and I. We also received a visit from some American Air force officers, who brought us some toiletries and food. Dad also had a visit from professor Kim (the physiotherapist who has been graciously helping us) and her husband. They brought us some delicious Asian food.

Mom and I have been helping Dad exercise. Mom's been making sure he goes on daily walks and professor Kim's asked me to help him do isometric exercises and help increase his range of motion. Winkie is able to brush his own teeth now, and shave (with some assistance). Dr. Lim has stressed the importance of his eating protein foods at this time, and I continue to give him supernutritional drinks and smoothies with ingredients from all over the world.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-02T21:07:45-06:00

Winkie is looking well. We took him for a walk outside yesterday. We wheelchaired him down the elevator and across the road to a kind of field next to a soccer field inside the University grounds. I took his shoes off and he walked around barefoot, and did some exercises. His wound is still healing. There is one main place where the wound hasn't completely closed yet, so he basically has a hole in his abdomen where pusish fluid is leaking out of. It's supposed to have closed already, so his hospital stay may be prolonged just a little longer than we had originally thought. In fact, Dr. Han said this morning, if we could keep him on like another week, he could get his stitches removed before leaving- a good thing for us. He still can't walk or stand for long periods of time, his appetite has diminished some and he's lost a lot of weight. I've been trying to get him to eat more. His arms are thin- like a child's. His legs also need a lot of work. His muscles, Dr. Lim said had actually atrophied, so we're in the process of helping him build them again.

Winkie underwent another series of tests this morning- both blood and X-ray. We weren't given a reason, but believe it could have been as a result of a slightly high thermometer read out, and the fact that Dr. Han might be relinquishing authority over Winkie to Dr. Lim soon, thus ensuring his patient's health status before the transfer. Winkie will be allowed to keep his same hospital room (doesn't have to move), but he will now be transfered to Dr. Lim's care.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Fae Pratney speaks...

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-05-01T19:10:32-06:00

Dear family and friends from across the world, this is Fae here. With a heart full of gratitude, deep affection, and great thankfulness to God for His ongoing provision in one of the most difficult situations I've ever faced... It's been a real learning curve to try to handle the stress and culture shock coupled with the most difficult experience I've ever had in my married life. William and I have been given responsibility in the medical system here for Winkie's care 24-7 since he moved from ICU. I have relied on God daily for His help and strength and have seen amazing answers to prayer. And the mail, emails, scriptures and gifts both small and great have been a constant encouragement to my heart. But not all the trials went away.

When you've just come from the hospital and you're feeling nothing but fear, and you're walking alone at 1:00AM back to the apartment, and the lonely elevator looks extremely dismal, everything can become so overwhelming.

My walk with God...you feel a bit like Job. God is righteous. God knows all things. You're being tested as to what you feel about God. And whatever you're going through you're trying to see how much is of God...

You're feeling numb. You're reaching out to God without feeling anything. You're relying on God when sometimes you're not seeing any immediate result. I am purely in faith resting on the word of God. I didn't think Winkie's life was over. I didn't think God's purposes for his life were over. I had to face the reality of what would happen if he did die. The financial thing was heavy to me, but I didn't worry about that at all because God had said not to.

Reading and re-reading the scriptures that some of you sent served to confirm my own faith for his miraculous restoration. The combined weight of your continued prayers and intercession finally turned into the day I now call "Miracle Monday"- the day he came out of his coma. To see him now sitting up in bed, talking, remembering and smiling into my face seemed like a resurrection.

Love to everyone,

Fae

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-29T22:20:19-06:00

I just finished a video conference with Winkie and Fae from his hospital bed in South Korea. Winkie was able to talk, although it's a bit tiring for him right now. The Doctors there are simply amazed at his recovery, though Winkie gets in trouble because they say he talks to much and never sleeps. That's our Winkie :)

Winkie has confirmed that he is not likely to be back in the USA until this time next year. They will be going to New Zealand directly from South Korea. If you have any bookings that fall within the next 12 months, please contact me to make alternative arrangements.

He really is looking great though, and full of faith and praise for how God has brought him back. He also is very very thankful for all the faithful people who have prayed and continue to pray for him.

Israel Anderson

END.

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-29T12:22:53-06:00

Thank you all for praying!

Winkie is still making progress here, but has run into a few minor bumps on the road. The first one is, the last IV they tried to give him didn't take- his veins were giving them too many problems (we think) and they finally gave up (we believe) on trying to administer the IV (hurray!) We saw it as a breakthrough when they took it out, but the hand they tried to put the last one in has suffered. Fluid was leaking out everywhere, and when they came to it found his hand had swollen. They have removed the IV, but now he has lost feeling along one side and in the pinkie and ring fingers of that hand. His hand also trembles when he tries to write (it's his writing hand). He had some fears as to not being able to write properly again but has been assured by a physiotherapist/physiotherapy professor that these symptoms are only temporary. The physiotherapist also gave us some great exercises for him to aid in his recovery. The second bump in the road was that after his new stiches were put in he bled after getting up. His dressing was changed later on that night, and we were hoping that the next time he got up he'd be okay. Unfortunately when he got up the next day, after walking around some again his clothes were again stained with blood. Tomorrow Dr. Lim comes to visit. He has assured me that this sort of seepage after new stiches is common- nothing to worry about. I mentioned to him my quick clotting agent that I brought with me from Africa (stops the bleeding of a gun shot wound in 2 minutes or less). If need be we could apply that to his wound. (It would be under a doctor's care here, of course)

If you are still praying, please pray
-for his hand to make a full recovery
-for the continued healing of his wound

Thank you. And God bless you for your prayers of faith!

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-28T12:12:59-06:00

Winkie has had his last tube removed now. His heavy stitches were also removed, and some lighter ones put in instead. So, 9 abdominal drainage tubes and 1 pleural cavity drainage tube later, he is free to walk about the hospital without the worry of tubes coming out of him. His abdominal muscles are still severed vertically, of course, and it's not easy for him to sit up on his own. But at least he doesn't have the tubes to worry about when getting up or moving about. His voice is also coming back. He's not quite able to write properly again, yet. His hands are a little shaky, and his legs tremble if he stands for too long. But we are encouraging his excercise, and it's good to see him eating some solid food again. Step by step, he's coming closer to being able to leave the hospital and return to his home in New Zealand.

A word from Winkie "Think of what it means to discover you can't talk, or walk, or sing, or write or move without having people hold you, connected to up to 10 tubes. One by one, those faculties, have to be brought back into full use. Today the last tube came out. Enough skin had to heal for them to be able to set up the final operation, which ought to take place in the next six months, where the layers of muscle across the front of the abdomen have to be sewn back together. In such a long battle, people often lose heart. But I am confident from your prayer, words of encouragement, the scripture you have sent and other support that this last hurdle will be overcome to bring great glory to Him."

Winkie also wanted me to add, that the reason (again, in case you didn't catch it earlier in the blog) he needs a 4th surgery later on down the road is, during his post-3rd surgery, the doctors were draining the infection out of his abdominal cavity. Resewing the muscles would necessitate a removal of the drainage tubes, and seeing as he almost died, getting rid of the infection was priority #1. Therefore his muscles were left severed and only the skin was sewn back up. He has asked me not to post any pictures of the post-surgical wound, but I can tell you that it runs about the full length of his abdomen- about 12 inches. When I showed him a picture (before he could easily look down and see it for himself) of the stitching job, he said, "Football." Sadly, folks, that is what his abdomen looked like. And it is still healing. He's not allowed to lift anything heavy until this 4th surgery is performed. And he'll have to get it later because his body simply isn't up for the battle necessary to recover from such an operation at this time- if done now it could possibly kill him.

Please pray for God's guidance as to the where and when of this 4th surgery. We want to avoid as much trama and drama as possible. I plan to go to New Zealand with Mom and Dad and help with Dad's recovery for at least 3 weeks.

Thank you again for your prayers. The prayers of God's saints have really been felt. And we can tell God has been listening.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-25T10:50:33-06:00

Well, Winkie had a visit from Dr. Dwight Leland Paris, along with Dr. Daniel Moon today. They came and prayed for Winkie, and gave us some money for food. Winkie is finally off of all of his drips! He now has only the drainage tube from his pleural cavity on his left side and two drainage tubes at the bottom of his abdomen (where the incision for the surgery was made) to come out. They've taken him completely off of the antibiotics, which means the majority of his infection is gone (actually I think they said it was all gone, except for along the cut which is still healing [which they are applying iodine to every day]- this healing is probably the main thing that they are waiting for). He's making progress and people here are just amazed at how fast it is. Day by day he's regaining muscle control and strength. He's able to pretty much feed himself now, and was able to brush his own teeth this evening. Building back his sitting/standing/walking strength is a process, and standing up for 5 minutes for him is probably something like going for a 30 minute run for someone of average fitness.

Winkie had a lot of visitors today. Besides the visit from Dr. Paris and Dr. Moon this morning, pastor Hong from Harvest Shalom also visited, along with one of his youth pastors and various others from the church. I can't wait to take him out to a meal in a restaurant, but I know we're still a little ways off from that.

Until next time

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

A Message from Winkie Pratney!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-24T09:51:26-06:00

You never know how much you're loved until you have stood at the line of death and watched heaven trigger hundreds and hundreds of astonishing intercessory prayers. From all around the world they came- Israel, Australia, Korea, New Zealand, The United States, Canada, Romania, Malaysia, in fact all over the world - standing in the gap for my family and I. We have been absolutely overwhelmed by your love, generosity, passion, and prayer. More to come when this saga has been brought to the conclusion. God has it in His heart for us all.

Bless you, bless you, bless you so very much!

Winkie.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-24T09:47:32-06:00

Well, Winkie seems to be making progress each day. He is walking now (either with someone's aid or a wheeled-walker). The drainage tube coming from his pleural cavity is still in place, and he's still on some sort of fluid drip, so walking to the bathroom or doing anything out of bed can be a bit of an ordeal, but we're managing. The private room is nice to have. I'd dare to say that Winkie had the best night's sleep he's had since coming out of the coma last night in that room- probably 5 or 5 1/2 hours. I was able to sleep more as well. Soon I must return to him to swap shifts with Mom.

Thanks for your prayers of faith. Blessings to all of our friends all around the world. We love you.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-23T11:55:23-06:00

Winkie Update

More good news! Pastor Hong has paid for Winkie to get a private room in the hospital! He was just moved today, and has his own refrigerator, flat screen TV and bathroom with shower and toilet. Mom is really happy. He's also getting more attention now and thus better care. Pastor Hong visited him last week, and I think that after seeing Winkie, and the living conditions he was in, must have had pity on us and arranged for it. Now Winkie (and us) will be able to sleep better (provided he doesn't stay up all night watching television!)

Winkie continues to heal. One of the doctors said that they expected him to be another 2 or 3 weeks, but it looks like he might be discharged now in a week (hopefully less!). Thanks everybody that were part of organizing and getting to us the Mannatech Ambrotose. Special thanks too to Dee Patton for doing a lot of running around for us and helping organize the finances on that side (Texas) of the world, as well as Israel Anderson for posting these updates.

We want to thank at this time, first of all the Lord Who has been faithful to hear the prayers of His saints, and heal his servant. He has been so faithful to provide through His people for us as a family, and Winkie in particular. God has so obviously been in control. And His provision has been apparent. We also want to thank all the many who have been faithful to pray for Winkie during this time, as well as the many who have sent in letters, emails, flowers and cards during this difficult ordeal. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
I don't at this time have a complete list of all the people who have contributed to covering Winkie's medical and recovery expenses, but want to post a list at a latter time.

One more thing...
I should probably mention again that according to the doctors, Winkie WILL NEED ANOTHER SURGERY! Although the infection has been stopped and he is healing well, the muscle walls between his bowel and skin were never resewn together! This I think, was due to the need to drain the area of infected fluid and pus. So he will need another abdominal surgery somewhere down the line to sew those muscles back together. Until then, he cannot lift heavy objects on his own, and thus cannot travel by himself. Dr. Han mentioned him maybe getting the surgery in another 2 months or so. He could get it in New Zealand or in the United States... it doesn't matter so much where, but he will (according to Dr. Han) need the surgery.

Thanks again for your prayers of faith. Mom and I are doing much better now that we've had some time to rest/recoop. I was able to work out last night (something I've been needing to do for a while) and I got some real good sleep today. Special thanks to YWAM Korea for loaning us Eun-Ji Song, who helped me get my passport extension, as well as took us shopping and has been a translator to us. She has been helping more directly with Winkie's care in recent days, and has been a relief, I think, to my mother.

I will continue posting updates for a while. We're going to need some specific prayer for the right place to move Winkie after he is discharged from hospital. Somewhere we can easily access him and attend to him, as well as a place where he can recover and heal.

Thank you again to all you who have been praying for us as a family, and for Winkie in particular.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-22T13:05:15-06:00

Winkie stood on his own after the earlier post.
Dr. Lim said he would visit us tomorrow and update us as to Winkie's condition.
The test results, etc. he will inform us of. He also said that Pastor Hong of Harvest Shalom Church was paying to have Winkie transferred to a private room tomorrow. Winkie has probably only been sleeping 2 hours at a time max. It's just very hard to sleep in a room with 9 other people, not to mention the incessant nurses visits. Also, Winkie has been taken fully off of the antibiotics, something we are glad for. With only the drainage tube and 1 nutritional type drip remaining, it looks like Winkie could be out of here pretty soon! (Can't say for sure, though, of course)

I am starting to get sick. Mom has already been feeling ill. Please pray for our strength, health, and for us to find a temporary helper for Winkie.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-20T22:28:29-06:00

Pratney Family Update

Things have been crazy.

When Winkie was transferred to general ward, no one told us of the Korean Medical system here - where family members are expected to care for patients. To make matters worse, Winkie was found to have a high temperature and they suspected an infection somewhere in his body.

Just when things for us seemed to be settling down, it got crazy really quickly. We learned (around 10:30pm) that we were expected to clean and change him. On top of that, they had already asked us to be with him for the next 48 hours around the clock.

Winkie has been undergoing extensive testing- X-rays, CT scans, blood tests AND they have asked us to stop feeding him. He hasn't been allowed any food OR water all day (it is around 5:00pm).

They have him on an IV to maintain his fluid intake. They found a lot of fluid in the space between his rib cage and his left lung. Dr. Han said there was danger of his lung collapsing. They have inserted a drainage tube to remove the fluid and already they've drained many cups of fluid out. They also found fluid in his abdominal cavity near his spleen.

I slept off and on in the small, Korean style bed next to him last night. I was right on call if he needed anything. One time I woke to hear him coughing, and lept out of bed to his side. He said, "Ninja." and I realized I was, indeed, wearing black. lol.

It's hard to sleep where he is. Every hour someone had to check his urine output, and every two hours a nurse would come in to check either his body temperature, blood pressure or something, sometimes turning on the lights. So sleeping where he is at right now is sort of like trying to sleep on an airplane, only the lights off until morning rule is NOT followed by the flight attendants. Poor guy. He did NOT sleep well last night at all. I was with him all night, and Mom came in around 7:00am.

We found out more about the system here this morning- where to pick up clean clothes, where to put the dirty ones. That we have to BUY diapers and various other things necessary for his care. I have put in a request with the hospital to hire some private nurse aids, that will be able to help change him, exercise him, etc. The cost, I'm told, is only about 50,000 Won per person, per day (about $50US).

I'm taking the late shift again tonight, it looks like, so please pray for me that I will be able to maintain my health while surrounded by so many sick people! Mom also needs prayer. It is very tiring not only being with someone day and night, but also caring for them. We were unprepared for the mountainous work load that would be placed upon us during this time in his recovery.

So please pray for grace and wisdom for both of us, and for the strength to see this through.

Also, please continue to pray for Winkie's healing- he's not walking and fully well, yet.

Thanks

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-19T11:06:22-06:00

Winkie has finally moved to the general ward this afternoon. He still remains on 1 drip and is receiving antibiotics 3x daily through his IV.

He's eating solid food now, but his wound (incision) still looks really bad.

They are going to depend a lot more on Mom and I from here onwards for Dad's care and monitoring and have asked us to be there from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. over the next two days.

Coming out of ICU means that the hospital costs will not mount so quickly now. We expect to have an idea of where we stand with the hospital in terms of finances in the next few days. Many thanks to those who have been praying and giving so sacrificially. We are amazed at all that God is doing.

At some point we think that Dad will need to go back to New Zealand for further care and recovery, but we don't know yet when any of that will happen.

So many people are praying, helping and giving. We can't even find words to express our deep thanks to everyone. Thank you all so much! We are tired, but our hearts are full.

Prayer Points

Please pray for strength for Mom and I as we assume more responsibility for Winkie's care and that God protects our health during this time.
Please pray that Winkie's healing will continue to progress quickly and be complete and especially that his incisions will heal properly.
Please pray that God will provide wisdom for us and that we will be able to point the way to Jesus while we are here.
Please pray that God will help us as we work to understand and communicate in this culture. The Koreans are such a wonderful people and we are so thankful for all the care and love we have received from them.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-17T12:25:41-06:00

Winkie is still in ICU. Apparently, Dr. Han (the doctor directly responsible for him) hasn't given the order yet, for him to be moved. We were told by a different doctor that he would be moved today. So, slight communication error there (or lack of communication), but no big deal. Anyway, we're actually liking the fact that he's got a room to himself. In the general ward he probably won't have the same special care that he's receiving where he's at. I've been talking with him, feeding him, and even helping him exercise a little. He's still only on liquid foods, but he's loving being able to eat again. When we got there this morning, he said he was thirsty, and wanted orange juice. We've been feeding him on and off all day. I've been able to ask him many questions, and his eyes are looking sharp. He is regaining range of motion and looks forwards (I think I can say) to eating more real foods.

Bless you for your prayers.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-16T10:39:04-06:00

Winkie Update

Praise God!
It seems the majority of the battle is finally over!

The majority of his infection, it seems has been taken care of, and he has come off of both the dialysis machine and the ventilator.
I think he's been taken off a few drips and his pain medication has been lowered.
He is talking now (albeit, with a bit of a raspy voice), and is drinking (with some assistance) liquids.
His abdomen has now been sown up, and his kidney function continues to improve. His bowel is working properly, now (it seems), and they plan to move him out of ICU tomorrow! Praise God! Thank you for all your prayers of faith for him!

The only two health concerns, now are:
1. The slit where he was opened for abdominal surgery has been sown shut, but it (the actual line) is infected (they are using a topical antiseptic cream).
2. They did NOT resow his abdominal muscles back together before sowing up his skin, so he will (I'm told) need another surgery for that (further along down the line). Dr. Han says he will be able to travel home (with the aid of an abdominal bandage), but will need to get the muscle layers they cut through sown back together eventually.

Mom and I are taking turns spending time with him, and are able to speak with him and ask him questions. I told him, "The world is waiting to hear from you. What would you like to say to everybody?" He said, "I love Jesus and I love my son." (Mom wasn't in the room at the time) He looks well. I was able to feed him some water and Barley tea (something the hospital provided).

Dr. Han said that his recovery was, "miraculous"... I can only smile.

William Pratney.

END.

I am sure that today the throne will hear the sound of the saints rejoicing in the victorious power of our God. May all glory go to Him. Continue to hold WInkie up in your prayers. Thank you all!

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-15T12:08:41-06:00

Pratney Family Update

Winkie is still on 4 drips, being fed intravenously as well as orally 5 times a day (through a tube). He's still on pain medication, but since they've taken him off the sedative, seems to be coming more and more into consciousness each day. He's still connected to the ventilator, but only receiving CPAP (as mentioned in the previous post). He's able to interact with us more and more each day, via head nods and with his eyes, but is still fading in and out of consciousness constantly. He seems to be tracking with us more, but fades out about every minute.

It seems that every day he's getting a little better. Dr. Lee said today that his kidney function had improved, and also he had his first bowel movement (either yesterday or today, can't remember).

Thanks for your prayers of faith for him. Mom and I are doing well. I spoke to the Harvest Shalom youth group today. They are receiving me well. Afterwards, some of the youth group took me out for pizza. I've just come from visiting with Dad. He can't write or talk yet, in fact he only seems to retain consciousness for maybe 20 seconds at a time. But during that time, we can ask him yes or no questions. When he comes to, however, he looks as if everything is new for him. I'm also not sure how much he remembers when he comes to again.

Please keep praying. He can't see quite right yet, and his muscle control is still returning. But praise God he's doing better than he was! Praise God the Lord kept him! Praise God he's still with us! Thank you... thank you for your prayers of faith!

Please pray for Mom and I. We need to maintain good health if we ourselves are to minister to him.

Thank you to all who have been sending notes and encouragement. Thank you to all who having been joining in on the fight. Bless you.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-14T10:47:01-06:00

Pratney Family Update

Winkie continues in his new room adjoined to the rest of the ICU.
He has been taken off of dialysis. Previously, his blood was being purified 24 hours a day to remove high levels of impurity in his blood.
The nurses continue to care for him, and encouraged us to spend the day with him. Mom and I spent quite a bit of time with him today, and we are hoping for some basic motor function skills to return soon. So far he seems to be able to, at times respond to verbal commands and questions with blinks or shows his alertness by raising his eye browes, but at other times remains unresponsive.

Mom and I continue to try to adapt to the culture, and God has been sending us many new friends.

Thank you all for your prayers.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

More Good News!!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-13T09:36:46-06:00

More good news! Winkie is breathing on his own now. He's only on what they call CPAP (he's still connected to the ventilator, but it's only providing some air pressure, NOT breathing for him). The swelling continues to come down, and he's looking more and more like himself. Dr. Lee says that his kidneys are functioning better, and has arranged for him to be moved to a room within the ICU on his own where (we are told) we will be allowed visit him anytime, day or night. I've just come from visiting him in that room. Since we were allowed to stay so long, we were able to see him fed and tended to. Actually, I told him that Mom and I were leaving, and that I had to post this to Israel Anderson and Dee Patton so that we could put this on his blog on his website. But he squeezed my hand like he really didn't want me to go. Mom agreed to stay, and I was able to leave. She is there now with him as I write this.

Dr. Lee consented to feed him (for those of you who are savvy to these things) Cell Food, a product recommended to us by a friend and health specialist in Australia. He is also still on Ambrotose and Chlorophyll (again, for those of you savvy to these things).

Winkie's probably in a lot of pain right now. His skin has actually split in certain places. He also has some sort of rash that covers parts of his legs and arms.

Please pray specifically for:

1. Winkie's continuing bowel function to normalize
2. Winkie's continuing kidney function to normalize
3. Winkie's immune system, and for him to adequately fight off the infection
4. Winkie's skin to heal quickly
5. Winkie to be able to cope with the pain he faces

Love and God bless. Thank you all for your prayers of faith.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update - Good news!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-11T21:23:40-06:00

Good news! We spoke with Dr. Lee (the anesthesiologist) this morning. Winkie has been taken completely off of the sedative (sleep inducing drug) now. He is still only on antibiotics and a pain killer. Which means that slowly, he is becoming more fully conscious. Kidney function continues to increase and already they have begun to feed him some water (down his throat). He was even more responsive today, and with his head actually tracked at least some of our movements. He still has quite a high heart rate, and it would be good to see that come down. But things are looking up, and with a continued IV fluid reduction alot more of the swelling is coming down.

Truly the Lord, He is God. There is no one greater. Hallelujah! Thank you for your continued prayers of faith.

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health and finances update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-11T10:01:46-06:00

Pratney family update:

Winkie continues to have a fever and high heart rate. They had him on ice packs when we were with him. From what I was able to determine from the doctor, his intravenously fed fluid intake is being gradually reduced, allowing (at least some) of the swelling in his body to come down. Obviously some of the swelling was due to infection, but also some of it due to the massive fluid intake they had him on. This, from what I was able to determine was for the cause of maintaining his blood pressure. From what I was also able to determine from one of the nurses, the coma-inducing drug that they have kept him on is also being reduced, a little at a time, allowing him to slowly come out of the coma. Yea! This, I believe explains why he has been at times responsive to us. He was again responsive to at least physical touch multiple times tonight. It's just encouraging, you know, even though he is in a "coma", to think that he can or might be able to hear and understand us.

Mom and I continue to adjust to this culture. I have started a growing list of Korean words and phrases. Thank God, almost every day we have someone with us that can help us with things like shopping, buying a meal, or going somewhere in a taxi. We have been getting offers from other Christians who live in Korea, who have heard of Winkie's condition to help us. Today, YWAM helped us. Other days it might be someone from the church, or someone from a military base, or a stranger we meet in a cafe. Every day God is providing for us, and it is wonderful to see his sovereign invisible hand at work.

All those who have helped us so far, THANK YOU! so much.

Now, as to Winkie's medical expenses: we got our first bill today (the church took care of the first one, so this is technically the 2nd, but it is the 1st one that we've seen). Both bills, combined, in total BEFORE any insurance discounts come into play come to around $70,000US. The good news? Winkie has been placed on a Christian foreign workers insurance that allows him a 40-60% discount- we are thrilled. Very special thanks to our new friends Harvest Shalom Church (in association with HIM ministries and WLI) for "taking care of" the first 20,000,000 Won (about $21,420US)! (If you were a part of this and I didn't include you I apologize) That 20,000,000 Won was payment one. BIG THANKS to YWAM Korea for "taking care of" 5,000,000 Won worth of payment two. (That's pretty impressive, YWAM!) Winkie's remaining bill, thanks to the incredible discount available through the foreign workers insurance, comes to 8,426,140 Won (about $9,025US) thus far. That is, next Wednesday we will receive our next bill, which I can at this time only guestimate. Other monies have been coming from different sources which I won't mention at this time, but we are told that his hospital stay is costing approximately $3,000US per day. I'm guessing what they mean by that is actually 3,000,000 Won per day. That's around $3,213US per day. $3,213US x 7 (days) = $22,491US per week divided by 50% discount = approximately $11,246US. So we're looking at needing to pay around that every week until dad gets out of ICU.

Please continue praying. We believe God is answering prayers already.

Love and God bless,

William Pratney.

END.

Let's not also forget that on top of Winkie's medical expenses there is just so much more. Winkie is unlikely to be speaking for a good 6 months after he gets out of hospital, and perhaps Winkie will decide to take an even longer break. He will need our financial support for this time as well. He has no regular income, only what people gift to him when he speaks. As you consider the self-sacrificial investment Winkie has made in your life and ministry, please consider how you can be a blessing to him now.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-10T09:11:23-06:00

Update

From William Pratney: Winkie has a fever, and elevated heart rate once again. It's not too bad, but keep praying. He was again responsive when we rubbed his feet tonight. Thank you for your continued prayers of faith.

From Fae Pratney: We're still getting used to taking our shoes off every two seconds. Koreans even have plastic shoes you're supposed to put on for the bathrooms. We appreciate sleeping on cot beds, because most Koreans sleep on the heated floors. Everybody drinks bottled water, and we've just bought a couple of crates. We're drinking Ginsing tea, which Koreans say is their coffee. We're well acquainted with their famous Kim Chee now- their hot peppered cabbage, the ingredients of which appear similar to Winkie's "Master Tonic". We have been taken out for some Korean meals, and are improving our ability with chopsticks. The Koreans are very polite- they're always bowing incessantly. They have been gracious and kind to us. The money scared us at first because the Won has such large figures- whereas $10,000 Won is roughly $10 US. We are praising God for this room we have (courtesy of Dr. Lim) and all we have to pay are the utilities. It takes us about 5 minutes if we run to get from our apartment to the hospital entrance. Onyong hi sayo! Goodbye! and God bless you all!

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update - GOOD NEWS

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-09T21:51:40-06:00

Good news!

We met with the three doctors today and they said the Dr. Schulze Intestinal Formula #1 is working! His bowel is working! Praise God! They are up to 3 or 4 pills a day. Due to this breakthrough, they have consented to the administration of Mannatech's Ambrotose, something many of you have recommended. Special thanks to Janice Rogers for the 10 canisters of Ambrotose she had sent to us. Because the product was shipped within the country, the label was in Korean. I prayed as Dr. Lim and Dr. Lee looked over the product. I prayed for grace. As I was praying, and as they were looking it over, they began to get excited and talk amongst themselves. They consented not only to the use of the Ambrotose, but also to the use of liquid chlorophyll, a supernutritional supplement that was recommended to us early on. Thanks to Noel Maxwell of Papakura, New Zealand for the Chlorophyll.

Praise God for your prayers!

END.

Sometimes we have a tendency to back off our prayers once we hear some good news, but let's use this good news to stir us to redouble our prayers and thanks to our awesome God. We have great improvement, and your prayers rising before the throne will see Winkie come into complete restoration. Praise Yeshua!

Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-09T11:20:27-06:00

Mom (Fae) and I (William) visited Winkie tonight. Mom really wanted to rub some Miracle II Gel on his feet, along with some cayenne tincture. A health specialist friend of ours in New Zealand recommended rubbing a little cayenne on his feet. As she was doing this, I was simply watching him, talking to him, etc. All of a sudden, he sort of jerked a bit, and his one eye that was partly open, opened wider. Believing him to be partly conscious, I asked him to blink for me one time if he could understand me. In the count of about 2 he slowly blinked his eye one time. Now you must understand he never blinks. Since I've arrived I haven't ever seen him blink. So, excited by this I began to talk more to him, believing him to be more cognizant of what I was saying.

There were no doctors around to ask of any change in his condition. However, glad to say his heart rate was at a more normal rate, which leads me to believe the fever he was fighting has subsided.

Bless you all for praying.

William Pratney

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-08T12:14:52-06:00

Pratney family update:

Thankyou first off to all who are standing with us for Winkie. Your emails, donations, prayers and cards show us the great love that is out there for Winkie, and how much he and his family mean to the Body of Christ. For cards and letters of sympathy, I am still in the process of verifying the correct address for the place where we are staying.

Winkie's condition is at the moment, stable. He is neither digressing nor progressing. Praise God that he's not digressing, but progress at this time is crucial. Please continue to pray.

Mom (Fae) and I (William) spoke at Harvest Shalom Church this morning. They gave us the service. Mom preached on hope, and I followed her with a message emphasizing the ascension of Christ to heaven and His inevitable return. I closed with an altar call for first time commitments to Christ Quite a few responded (although, not all, I am quite sure, were first time responders). Later, Mom and I went to the college and career age group BBQ where I spent time with the youth group and she spent time with our new friend Young Shin Kim (a YWAMer) and others there. The BBQ was held at the home of one of the elders in the church. This church has been amazing. They have helped us in every way. The youth pastor invited me to speak to the youth group (ages 18-30, roughly) the following Sunday. Praise God! Even in the midst of this pain, He is opening up ministry oportunities and providing for us. Hallelujah!

Mom and I are doing quite well. Thank you for your prayers of faith.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-07T11:09:18-06:00

Pratney family update.

Winkie is still currently in a drug induced coma. The lowdown thus far: He went in originally for a hernia operation. That's when part of the bowel pushes out through the muscle wall. The hernia operation was a success. However, after the surgery they found blockage in his transverse colon. They opened him up and found leakage in his gut, abrasions on it, and a transverse colon that was literally sagging like a pinched water hose. It was also swollen. They operated immediately, removing 10cm of his bowel, rejoining the sections. However, the gut hadn't been cleaned internally before surgery (it takes days to properly clean a bowel) and the doctors saw it as an immediate need situation. So, coupled with an apparent incomplete colon section rejoining (there was apparent seepage at the point of rejoining evident after the surgery, which meant the stiching didn't tightly hold) the waste in his gut began to seep out, spreading infection throughout his entire abdominal cavity. Since that second surgery, infections were found in his lungs, bowel and kidneys. His appendix was also found to be leaking. They operated a third time, removing another 10cm of bowel, making sure this time that the rejoining would hold.

At the moment, he is in his second drug-induced coma, on anti-biotics and basic intravenously fed nutrition. He is also on a ventilator (breathing machine). His bowel function had completely ceased for a time, and so now, the two main things he faces are the restoration of proper bowel function and fighting off the infection that rages throughout his body. Dr. Lim has consented (at least, for the time being) to the administration of Dr. Richard Schulze's Intestinal Formula #1, a formula guaranteed to cause peristaltic action (the movement the bowel makes to move food within itself). We started him on the first dosage today. Hopefully, within the next 4 days, we should begin to see good results.

Please pray specifically:
1. For the restoration of his bowel function
2. and for his body to win the war against the infection it faces

The sooner his proper bowel function is restored, the sooner the Dr. and nurses will allow us to give him supernutrional and/or cellular nutritional products that will we believe will greatly speed his recovery and help him to fight off the infection (and yes, even Super tonic [Winkie juice] too, once he's conscious).

Mom and I (Fae and William) are fine. We are slowly adjusting to Korean life. It is alot like New Zealand here, and God has sent us many helpers since I got here. We have been asked to speak tomorrow at the church (Harvest Shalom) that has been taking care of Dad. We ate dinner tonight with the pastor, a gracious man, and a few of his staff.

Thank you all for your prayers of faith. Thank you also so very much to those who have been contributing financially in this hour of desparation. God bless you very much!

Love,

William Pratney.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie's having another surgery - Keep praying

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-06T10:07:25-06:00

From William (Billy) Pratney:

Mom and I are moving from the hotel we are currently staying at to a guest room located at the University right next to the hospital soon today. So hopefully an internet connection there won't be a problem. Trevor's been wonderful. He's flying back tonight.

Dad is undergoing another surgery today: he will have the fluid drained out which they found was surrounding his lungs (not actually in his lungs). They will insert two tubes to drain the fluid out. Complications can include a hemotoma (blood clot). And I don't have to tell you, we don't need any complications right now. Dr. Lim says, if there's one more complication, he doesn't have a great chance of survival. Please ask everyone to keep praying. He is in another drug-induced coma at the moment, with a fever and high heart rate. Mom, Trevor and I met with Dr. Lim and Dr. Han (the doctor that performed the transverse colon operation). Winkie has thus far had 20cm of bowel removed.

END.

Winkie needs our prayers like never before. There has been improvement, yes, but there's still more surgery required, and he's still in a critical condition. I am sure though that you can feel this rising-up of faith stirring your spirit to intercede. Keep praying. Fast if you are able. We love you and thank you for your devotion and your prayers.

And THANK YOU Trevor Yaxley! You saw the need and leapt into action without anyone asking anything of you. Your servant heart is undeniable.

Israel Anderson

Update on finances

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-06T09:56:41-06:00

From Trevor and others...

Over the past few days many people have both asked about contributing to Winkie's expenses and offered to do whatever they can towards meeting them. This is a great encouragement to the Pratney family.

We have been endeavouring to ascertain what these expenses are likely to be and quite frankly there are many unknowns. One thing we can say is that they will be considerable. Five weeks of hospital stay could easily total in excess of $US100,000 and we have no idea what to expect for the three surgeries Winkie has already had.

It is amazing that a months free accommodation for Fae and William has been offered which will certainly be a great help and the church Winkie was to teach in together with YWAM Korea are both giving sacrificially. Considering that this is the first time Winkie has gone to minister in that nation, this is incredible.

We have two major areas of financial need. Firstly, as mentioned here, the whole medical and living needs in Korea and secondly what we would expect to be a considerable period of time for recovery and redirection for Winkie. This will include provision for adequate administrative needs which to date have not been available.

We do believe that God has something in mind that none of us fully understand. We also want to give God's people the opportunity to become partners with whatever is on His heart for Winkie's healing, restoration and future ministry. Whatever we suggest we only want to co-operate with what the Holy Spirit is leading.

Considering the thousands of churches worldwide that have benefited from Winkie's ministry we suggest that this is a good time and opportunity for the Body of Christ to join together in this giving.

Here are a few suggestions.

* Church Pastors, can you take up a special offering for Winkie's

healing and recovery during a Sunday service?

* Conference organisers especially those who have been recipients of Winkie's ministry and books. Include an offering from those who participate many of whom would want to show support.

* Festival leaders.. Winkie has been so faithful at so many of these festivals for years in the USA, UK and Australia. Can a special offering be taken at the festival or can you email concerning these financial needs to your em-lists now...

The "How To Give" tab gives information concerning where and how to give.

Please join with God's people now and see His plan unfold for this man of God for the future.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Keep Winkie in your prayers! Believe!!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-05T22:14:26-06:00

From Trevor:

Winkie's vital signs are still all OK. He has an infection but it is NOT in the operating area so that is good and they are treating this now. They are inserting two drains to take away a small amount of fluid between his lungs and his ribs.

We met with Dr. Lim and Dr. Han this morning and they had a new CAT scan completed this morning that shows all is well in the operating area.

However Dr.Lim has said that there is still a 10-20% danger factor if all goes well. He says the main thing to pray now is that there are NO unexpected things take place as ANY complication would NOT be good at all.

Billy and Fae move to the unit at 4pm today. Dr Lim is going with them Just to make sure all goes well.

OK that's my last update. Sorry I haven't got more to report this morning but our dear friend still needs MUCH prayer.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Billy with Fae in South Korea. Winkie stable.

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-05T14:29:06-06:00

From Trevor:

Some good news. Dr. Lim has arranged for Fae and Billy to stay in the Hospital accommodation used for its international lecturers. It has phone and free broadband internet. They will be able to stay there for 1 month at no charge. So that is an answer to prayer. It is just across the road from the hospital so there will be no need for Taxi's each day. They will be able to move in tomorrow later afternoon.

Billy arrived safe and sound although a couple of hours late. We took him straight to see his dad and then back to the hotel to catch up with Mum. We have all been out for dinner and they have gone back for a good nights sleep.

Winkie is holding stable tonight. The nurse told us that he hasn't changed since this morning. Just holding steady at the moment.

END.

Let us rejoice in God our Savior that He is hearing the prayers of His people and Winkie is not getting any worse. As we lift up our voices together calling on God for a miracle of miracles, we know we serve a God with ears to hear and a strong right hand to heal. We thank you Lord our God for your display of power. We glorify you today. Lord continue to heal our friend, your servant, in this time of need.

Israel Anderson

Winkie doing better - Please keep praying

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-05T09:51:30-06:00

From Trevor Yaxley.

We have just arrived back at the hotel from the Hospital. We will leave to pick up Billy in a few minutes. But I didn't want to hold back Good news. (I am in tears, God is so amazing) His condition has improved again from yesterday. Swelling going down visibly. All vital signs are holding well. He has once again better color. I would say almost normal.

Main prayer need is still for the bowel to start to function. He is now down to 7 drips. We are believing God that this will soon drop 5. He is now helping the respirator more. About double of yesterday.

Fae is doing well and sleeping.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Giving to the Winkie Pratney Recovery Fund

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-04T11:52:53-06:00

Thank you for those asking how you can give of your finances. The costs are very very high right now, and as Winkie will also need time to recover and will not be able to minister for some months, he will need your support for this time also. We are receiving quite wonderful gifts in the mail already and we do thank you for that, but many have asked how they give more quickly or with a credit card, and we're providing that for you today. If you wish to make an instant donation to Winkie Pratney via Credit Card or PayPal, click the button below. All donations are Tax Deductible if required.

If you wish to send a check, click here for instructions.

Health Update - Moving forward in FAITH!

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-04T10:51:51-06:00

Message from Trevor Yaxley, who is with Fae Pratney in South Korea.

We were able to spend two hours today with Mr. Lim the Christian heart surgeon who is heading up the team here. He has been overseeing all that is going on with Winkie and seems to be directing everything. He has been present at the surgeries and said that he has felt Gods presence continually. His prayer has been "God cover Winkie with the blood of Jesus and carry him through this" He said whilst they were operating on Sunday he was there and was very stressed, but then the presence of God came and he felt" VERY happy" were his words. "All the stress lifted".

We have been with Winkie and prayed three times today adding our prayers to ALL those around the world at this time who are standing together for Winkie's miracle and once again felt the presence of God very strongly. There is such an amazing peace in the ICU.

Now for the detail...firstly the fever he had yesterday has now subsided, (Wonderful) our prayers are working. I know we all will keep praying too. Both his Kidneys and liver are functioning normally now, however he is still on the dialysis machine. He remains on the respirator but every now and again helps the machine with some of his own breathing. He is still in the drug induced coma, but is looking much more peaceful and has some colour back in his face. He is also VERY swollen but Mr. Lim says that is OK they can deal with that later. He has 4 drains from his bowel (two from each side) and what is now draining is clear without infection. Another big step forward.YES!!

Mr. Lim said that Winkie is still in a dangerous condition until they can get his bowel working on its own and then start to take him off the respirator. He said this is the next BIG prayer need. Once he is off this machine the healing will start to progress much better as there will be far less drugs going into his system.

They have stopped all the drugs that were keeping his blood pressure up and we are thrilled to report that he is now maintaining almost normal blood pressure on his own. But Mr. Lim was careful to say that he is still not out of the woods and has a long way to go. So we need to keep the prayers of the saints going strong. He said yesterday morning was "very dangerous' and although he has today moved forward there is still many things to consider. His says, "He is still in a dangerous position" . However, he was in faith for God to provide all that is necessary for his full and complete recovery. This man is a God sent inspiration, his pastor told me this afternoon that he (Mr. Lim) has the gift of healing through his hands. We are praying. "God strengthen the works of his hands".

One noticeable change today was that there is a tangible lift in the faith of all those who are around him both Christian and non Christian. I know this sounds unusual but that is what is happening.

The Church have found a great Hotel not too far away from the hospital for Fae and Billy- who we are picking up at the airport tomorrow at 4.45 p.m. I am going up with one of the YWAM guys who doesn't speak English but knows the way fine.

Well that's it for today. Catch up tomorrow again with more good news for us all I am sure. God is surely on the move.

END.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Christian publications - before you publish

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-03T19:36:14-06:00

"We are so grateful for the outpouring of love, prayer and publicity that has been circling the globe for our brother Winkie.

If you know of publications that have featured Winkie during this time, please feel free to forward them to us here so we can show Fae and Winkie (when he is better). If you know of someone who plans to feature Winkie in an article our hope is that you will check here often to see if there is new intel. This situation is VERY fluid and we want to make sure the world gets information that is as accurate and up to date as possible. Please check with Israel before going to press.

You have permission to use any content from this site in NEWS articles.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update - Critical

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-03T15:31:31-06:00

We have had an update from our friend Trevor Yaxley who flew with Fae Pratney to Korea. They arrived in Seoul last evening.

Winkie is in a very critical state, on life support in an induced coma and on dialysis to allow his infected organs to start recovery.

The Surgeon (reputedly the best in Korea) has told Trevor it will be three days before they know how things are progressing.

These three days are critical.

Please hold on to God especially during these days not only for Winkie but also Fae who is under considerable pressure.

William Pratney's flight to Korea has him arriving at 4:45pm Thursday Korea time. Both he and Fae are having to deal with Winkie's state which is naturally very painful for them.

Trevor is an absolute God send for the family who will keep us up-to date day by day. We will pass this on his reports as we receive them.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-02T14:18:17-06:00

Winkie is now in septic shock, it is life threatening complication.
Please pray day and night. Today it is most critical.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septic_shock

Israel Anderson

Another surgery, now in critical condition

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-01T19:39:10-06:00

Our brother in Winkie is now in critical conditional after having another surgery.

His blood pressure continues to drop.
They are keeping him stable artificially, but his organs are shutting down.

Right now, we need a miracle. Please intercede.

Israel Anderson

Sending Gifts

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-01T15:17:05-06:00

For those wanting to send a gift.

If you need a receipt, make checks out to Ministry of Helps.
If you do not need a receipt, please make the check out to Winkie Pratney.

Send them to:
Winkie Pratney Recovery Fund
PO Box 876
Lindale, TX 75771

Or donate with a credit card here:

We will have PayPal facilities soon that will let you pay via a credit card through a secure web page.

Flowers and get well cards can be sent to:
Winkie Pratney
43 Boorimdong
Gwacheon, Gyunggido
South Korea

Posted by Israel Anderson

Health Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-04-01T14:20:49-06:00

Winkie is still in ICU but is now off the respirator and has spoken briefly with his wife Fae. He has an infection somewhere in his body, but they are not sure where. There is also some seepage from his bowel into his abdominal-cavity still.

Your prayers are so powerful, we are seeing results, please keep praying. Our brother is not over the worst of it just yet, but things are looking better than 24 hours ago.

Fae is flying out to South Korea tomorrow, and their son William should be there soon also.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Update on Winkie - Recovery Fund

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-31T17:43:00-06:00

Winkie is not getting better. He is getting worse. His carer has said that without serious prayer, it does not look good.

Winkie is not improving and they are keeping him in ICU. He is now conscious, but now has pneumonia and his bowels are not operating correctly. They have just performed a CAT scan and are looking at that right now.

He has been taken off the respirator, but he is not really able to talk. Fae's only communication with Winkie is via a 3rd party. They are not allowed to use telephones in ICU.

Now we have the issue of finances. As those of you who have had Winkie come and speak know all too well, Winkie has never in 44 years of ministry ever asked for money. He has no fee to come and speak, and replies solely on whatever he is given. Winkie also has no health or travel insurance. He lives completely on faith. If you feel lead to send Winkie some money, please do so. We also want to fly Fae out to South Korea to be with her husband right now, and we want to do that ASAP.

Posted by Israel Anderson

All speaking engagements cancelled

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-30T00:02:01-06:00

If you are expecting Winkie for ministry between now and July, would you please make alternative arrangements. Much thanks.

Israel Anderson

Update on Winkie

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-29T21:40:44-06:00

I have just received an email from Winkie's carer in South Korea. Unfortunately things are quite serious, and this is why I have asked people not to take reports other than from Fae or I first hand. I will post on this blog immediately I have any word. An email was going around saying that Winkie was "ok". My concern is that if reports like that are believed, people may cease their prayers. Our brother needs our prayers like never before. The situation is very serious. Winkie is NOT "ok".

Right now Winkie is still in ICU and is being kept unconscious through sedation until the doctors feel he has healed enough. I have more detailed reports on his surgeries. His first surgery was on the 26th and was a herniotomy. The next day it was clear there was more at play than a hernia, so on the 27th Winkie underwent major surgery on his whole abdominal cavity. They found sever adhesion of his bowel which was causing intestinal obstruction. The condition of his transverse colon was very severe, so they performed a segmental resection where portions of his colon were removed entirely. In addition to this, he suffered micro ruptures at certain points that have been repaired.

He is being kept sedated as his kidney function has stopped and they are waiting for that to recover. He is also having complications with his lungs that are not ventilating correctly, and they have him on a ventilator until he can breath on his own.

This all said, he is progressing through all this thank to your prayers from all over the globe, and from the skillful hands of Dr Lim, a Christian surgeon and member of the ministry that had invited Winkie to speak. He is in excellent hands in a first grade hospital in South Korea.

I know we will get through this and Winkie will be back on his feet before we know it. Do continue to pray earnestly for his miraculous recovery.

Thank you all so much!

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney Update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-28T17:57:38-06:00

I have just spoken with South Korea.

Winkie is still in ICU and will be for the next 2 days. His conditional is no longer critical, but serious enough that he will remain in ICU for at least the next 48 hours. Portions of his bowel were removed and it is now a wait to make sure they are now functioning normally again.

Winkie's Dr is Dr Lin.

Please continue to pray for Winkie and his Dr. Also remember Winkie's wife Fae in your prayers. Winkie's son is currently in the Sudan and is unaware of his fathers condition.

There have been other people posting reports about Winkie's situation. It would be best to disregard anything you hear unless it is from Fae Pratney or myself.

Thank you so much for your prayers. It is beautiful to see the Body fall to it's knees in intercession at this time.

Shalom.
Israel Anderson

Winkie Pratney update

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-28T13:46:07-06:00

Winkie is still in ICU. He has had his appendix and some of his bowel removed. His condition is stable.

Posted by Israel Anderson

Winkie is in intensive care in South Korea

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-27T20:03:38-06:00

My friends, our brother Winkie is not doing well at all and he needs our intercessory prayers at this time.

Winkie chose to go to Korea to do a conference. He was admitted to hospital and underwent surgery 2 days ago for a hernia. His condition has unfortunately only gotten worse. He has just come out of surgery on a second operation, and they have placed him in ICU. In this second operation his intestines were removed and examined and possibly operated on. His digestive system has completely shut down at this time.

The LORD has brought Winkie a teaching surgeon who is a believer and is performing the operations himself, so Winkie is in good hands.

I will keep you updated. I know you will pray, thank you.

Israel Anderson

6Mile video now online

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-06T19:49:02-07:00

The very much asked for 6Mile video is now online. If you've ever seen 8Mile, you're going to laugh yourself silly when you see this. Watch 6Mile here.

Winkie's Tracts and more video added

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-03T00:55:20-07:00

Well it's 2am in the morning and I think I ought to get to bed.

I have put many of Winkie's tracts online as PDF files. I have also put them all into a .zip archive if you want to just download them all. You can view these tracts in your browser or download them. You can also print them and distribute as you wish.

Also fresh today is Session 2 of the 21st Century Reformation Manifesto (21CR) in video. I also improved the navigation, making it more obvious. As will always be the case, it is iPod ready. Just download, add to iTunes and it will sync to your iPod video for viewing anywhere. The quality is very very good and I'm surprised the file size came out at only 112MB. I plugged my iPod into the TV here and the quality onscreen and in audio was just superb. Give it a go!

Ok, Shalom!
Israel

21CR video and The Daniel Files book online

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-01T21:40:30-07:00

Well I managed to do a lot today. I have the first of the 21st Century Reformation Manifesto videos online. I can put 2 more up for free as well. The rest may be purchased on DVD, and perhaps a download for iPod. I will have to see about that, because the video files will be huge. All the video I am putting on this site will be in iPod-ready format. Just add it to iTunes, sync your iPod, and it's on your iPod. Heres the direct link to the video of the 21CR Intro.

Also online tonight is the book Winkie wrote with his son Billy, The Daniel Files. It was available on the old site, but as numerous individual PDFs broken by each section of the book. Now it's all in one convenient PDF for free download. This book has a wealth of practical information for living daily life, and is a must read for anyone in missions. Here's the direct link to that.

I can't promise daily updates to this site, but I should be getting new content up on here at least twice per week. I would sure appreciate your feedback too.

Shalom.
Israel Anderson.

The new WinkiePratney.com

online@israelanderson.com — 2007-03-01T11:41:19-07:00

Well this website has been a long time in the making. We have wanted to make a central repository for all of Winkie's material for a long time. I have the job of weekly adding more content, and we hope you'll keep coming back and tell your friends about this site.

I should introduce myself, in case you think I am Winkie Pratney. I am not the legend himself, I am just his friend and bodyguard :P My name is Israel Anderson, and I'm the creator of God's iPod, the Christian podcast site. I've been working with Winkie for several years now, and I am based on the YWAM Tyler base. I will be sharing news with you here and collecting material from Winkie that I'll post on this site. I'll let you know through this blog whenever we add something, so bookmark this blog now, or subscribe to the RSS feed if your browser supports it.

Hey, you can leave comments here too, so let me know what you think of the new site design and anything else you want to say.

Ok, bye for now.
Israel Anderson