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 

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.

(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!

(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