Giving wings to my Holy Spirit book
A group of my retired minister friends have been praying that God would give my Holy Spirit book wings.
Entitled, The Holy Spirit as Person and Power: Charismatic Renewal and Its Implications for Theology (Wipf & Stock, 2020), it had the misfortune to appear just before the Covid-19 pandemic shut down a lot of human interaction and publicity.
I did manage to hold a South Island book launch, at my former church in Hornby, Christchurch, on 9 March 2020. This church, now known as Hope Presbyterian and perhaps New Zealand’s leading multi-site Presbyterian community church, played a significant part in the book’s origins. It was there, in a time of suffering, that I and my wife Christene were baptised in the Holy Spirit and began the journey of wonder and discovery that is reflected in the book.
It was at a meeting of retired ministerial colleagues shortly after the pandemic began, that one of my friends suggested we pray that God would give wings to my newly-published book on the Holy Spirit.
I have been able to trace its progress by an international library database which I monitor. One of the first to get it was Princeton Theological Seminary – the premier school of American Presbyterianism. (May it touch the hearts of my fellow Presbyterians, many of whom appear to be as tone-deaf to the Spirit as I once was!) It has appeared in a number of state-level tertiary institutions in the United Sates. It has even appeared in prestigious continental theological libraries in Bremen, Frankfurt, Groningen, Kassel, and Marburg.
Among the more unexpected places where it has turned up are some international libraries that I have never heard of. These include the American University of Malta and Yildirim Beyazit University in Ankara, Turkey.
The opening part of my book presents the global Pentecostal-charismatic movement of the last hundred and twenty years as a series of divine surprises, successively breaking out where it was least expected. Clearly, the theme of surprises continues in the reception my book is getting.
This fortified me as I return to the task of planning a long-delayed North Island book launch for my new title. Crushingly, the first fell foul of Jacinda Ardern’s announcement of the initial Covid-19 lockdown by a mere thirty hours.
The abortive launch was held at St. Alban’s Presbyterian Church, Palmerston North, on 22 November 2020, with Nigel Dixon speaking in support.
Rob Yule
To learn more about Rob’s books or blogs, or to contact him, visit robyule.co.nz
