Where Are You?

About the Book

In our postmodern world where the individual ‘self’ is the centre of the universe and God seems at best to be weak and irrelevant, have you ever wondered where you are? Often when I ponder what’s going on in the world around me and in the relationships between me and others and then go deeper inside of myself than what is going on at the surface of my life, I get a sense of something significant deep within me, but it’s not me, so I wonder what it is. Do you have that sense? By the way, if I am the centre of the universe, where does that leave you—off centre? As a hydrographic surveyor in the Australian navy for nearly thirty years, I often found myself in uncharted waters searching for the unknown so as to make it known. What really gave me a sense of confidence was being able to know exactly where I was at all times, founded on three known measuring marks, each accurately fixed according to an established datum. Since I am now searching in a different way, yet often still in ‘uncharted waters’ and at a really deep level, like C. S. Lewis and others before me, I want to find the ‘something’ that I just know is there because I know that when I do, I will know more about who I am and where I am in this life. But I will need known marks and an established datum because without them, I am unreferenced. You see, there’s more to me than you can see—and I know that is true about you too. If you want to go on a search for ‘something’, come surveying with me. Maybe this book will help you understand where you are.

About the Author

John is a son, husband, father, grandfather, brother, and friend. He describes himself as an ordinary bloke but knows there is no such thing. He grew up as a country boy in coastal Whitsunday area of North Queensland, Australia where he gained his love for the ocean. At seventeen he ran away to sea. Closer to the truth he says that he joined the Navy to escape the confusion, anger and lostness he felt as a teenager. In the navy he specialised in hydrographic surveying and enjoyed a thirty year career carrying out surveys in mostly uncharted waters. In 2001 he believes he heard God calling him out from his security blanket and he left the Navy a year later to take up a new vocation as a counsellor. Now he is sailing in a very different ship'- civilianship - and he is a self-confessed `struggler', and pilgrim trying to navigate a different journey these last 17 years, re-learning life again, endeavouring to understand what it means to be a Christian man in our times. It's been a hard, messy, and sometimes lonely journey, he says. But he hasn't been alone, because he has been an avid searcher committed to his pilgrim journey alongside others as a counsellor and guide. With an inbuilt desire to know where he is on the journey, along the way he has read the spiritual classics, walked with, observed, witnessed, shared with, and learned from others who are an inspiration and encouragement for his own walk. Well, let's face it; we are never alone John says, yet each of us has our own journey to go on, and, since it is our journey, no one is going to walk it for us, though they may walk some of it with us.