My name is Peter Kirk. I live in Woodstock, Virginia, USA, but I am British. For many years I lived in Chelmsford in the south east of England.
I started in life by studying Physics at the University of Cambridge, and worked for several years in the electronics and software industry in Chelmsford, Essex. I left this work and studied theology to MA level at London Bible College, now London School of Theology. Then I joined Wycliffe Bible Translators, and after training in linguistics I served for seven years in the Caucasus region, coordinating a Bible translation project. In 2002 I left WBT, but until 2008 I continued to work part time as an exegetical adviser to the same translation project, based at home in the UK with occasional visits to the Caucasus. I am a member of Meadgate Church, Great Baddow, in the Church of England diocese of Chelmsford.
In 2009 I was married to Lorenza, who is from Italy. In 2010 we temporarily moved north from Chelmsford to Warrington, where we attended Oasis Church, Warrington. In 2011 we moved back to Chelmsford. In 2012 Lorenza and I moved to Virginia, USA, to open a dance studio business, Italia Performing Arts.
If you have ever wondered where my former domain name qaya.org comes from, see this page.
Please note that I am not a pastor (although I effectively trained to be one at London Bible College), and I am not a counsellor. If you have personal issues to be resolved, please ask your pastor or minister or find an appropriate counselling service.
To contact me please use my contact form.
Peter Kirk, Woodstock, Virginia, USA
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Dear Peter. I recently saw your website advertised on a t-shirt a chap was wearing in a pub. Very interesting. I hope one day to get round to reading your blog.
Tom, thanks for confirming that the slogan was a despicable lie!
Peter, I’ve been meaning to tell you, your hand in hand header pic blew me away. One day recently, all in a flash, I saw it as a response to the sistine chapel’s disconnected hands, where man won’t quite reach out to God. Here, the positions of father and child are inverted (left to right) and so is the situation. An infant’s level of need is what motivates us to reach up and cling to His finger. Beautiful.
I feel silly saying so much, if you intended all that. (?) Anyway, it moved me briefly to tears. Thanks very much.
Thanks, Bill. This was partly deliberate. I didn’t have in mind the Sistine Chapel picture but it certainly does fit. I was thinking in terms of the father reaching out to the child, and allowing the child to hold on to him even if rather tentatively.
Trying to link to Tim Chesterton. I am interesting in reading more about the anabaptist/anglican connections. I can’t seem to find Tim’s blog, and it says I must be invited. Any ideas.
Thanks.
The Rev. Ann Whitaker
USA
Ann, Tim’s main blog is now at http://toseeandtofollow.blogspot.com/. He closed down Anabaptist Anglican (so I’m sorry my links don’t work) but he copied at least some of the material on to the new one – see the 2007 archives.
Hello there!
I really liked your blog. Perhaps we don’t share much of the same theological views, but I really like your style. There a few blogs out there where you can find good posts without the rants. Thank you.
Diego, thank you for the encouraging words.
Hi Peter,
Hope married life is going ok.
If your in the place of carrying on blogging I wondered if you could shed some light on the aspect of Jesus as Carpenter/Rabbi. (if not thats ok and all the best to you).
I heard the view that the carpenter aspect of Jesus was out of the ordinary in that he served in rebuilding the temple and so would have to train to be a proper Rabbi / teacher to be able to do it. I also wondered how Jesus could just walk into the temple and preach without approval to do so. I had previously heard that he was a carpenter and no more but am thinking that he must have been more as he was more if you see what I mean. He did grow in wisdom and stature before man and God and was seen and viewed as a teacher so that when he called people to be his disciples their was no question of him being a carpenter … Whats your thoughts … kind regards Mick
Mick, thanks for asking. This is certainly an interesting topic. Do you have any evidence for what you say that he “would have to train to be a proper Rabbi / teacher to be able to do” his work? This seems improbable to me, but I am willing to be convinced. As for the temple, it was an open area and anyone could start preaching in it, presumably until they upset the guards, i.e. the local police or security.
Just at the moment I don’t have time to blog about this, or anything else, but I will bear it in mind for the future.
Peter,
Hello. I just stumbled across you blog and really like it. I appreciate the spirit of “humble wisdom” in your words. Thanks!
Hope you don’t mind, but I wanted to tell you about my own blog. I’m an aspiring clergy-writer who’s new to the Anglican tradition, and am trying to find Anglican readers. The title of my blog is “Musings of a Hard-Lining Moderate: The assorted thoughts of an evangelical Anglican.”
I write about theology, history, culture, politics, movie/book reviews, pet theories… anything that’s on my mind. Right now I’m doing a series on the doctrine of Scripture, which was prompted by the crisis in the global communion. I also recently wrote a post on the value of the christian calendar.
Anyway, I don’t know if you’d be interested, but here’s the link: http://bit.ly/dXh2qd. Have a great day.
Grace & Peace,
Carson
Carson, thank you for your comment and link. Your blog looks interesting, especially what you have to say about 19th century foundationalism, but I don’t have time to get too involved at the moment.
Hi Peter,
Now that you have moved up to Warrington (somebody had to) should you not bring your “About” piece up-to-date?
How are you finding Warrington, why are you there and how are you both getting along in the Oasis Church?
Concerning which, Tess seems a nice girl but why does such a pretty face need metallic piercings? Surely there must be some biblical prohibition against the practice. And if not, why not?
Yes, John, you are right, this page needs updating. I’ll try to explain a bit when I do the update.
As for Jess’s body piercings, I think that is a matter between her and the Lord, on which her pastor can give her advice. One of the great things about Oasis church is that it accepts people as they are, and doesn’t expect them to conform to traditional Christian standards of behaviour before they are made welcome. Anyway I doubt if you have anything against women with pierced ears for earrings. I don’t think there is anything in the Bible to say women can have piercings in some places but not others.
I have now updated this page. I haven’t written why we moved north – this was for my wife’s personal reasons.
Dear brother, you have a wonderful blog-website. Keep up the good work for The Kingdom.
God bless.
in Yeshua Messiah ha adOn.
Thank you, Len, and God bless you too.
It is a pleasure and an honor to meet you Peter.
Thank you, Chris, and welcome to Gentle Wisdom. It is a pleasure to have you here.
Dear servants of God
Greetings from Kenya, Africa. I thank God for directing us to your ministry. It’s our prayers that God’s will be done as you continue reading this email. Dear our mission is to bring glory to God by furthering the cause of Christ and to share the soul saving message of the gospel with the entire world (Mt.28: 18-20). We pursue this mission with great joy and deliberateness. Ours is a message of love, mercy, and redemption and taking care of the orphans, abandoned and the needy children. I request you to pray for us and the entire work and we shall continue asking God to open for you the way to come to visit and to minister in our church.
Thank you for being patient with our appeals. We are never asking for ourselves. We are the voice of the speechless, the children who cannot speak for themselves. May God richly bless you as we wait to hear from you.
In his service,
Pastor Sagana
Hi Peter, I notice that its been a while since this website was visited by anybody.
I believe that presently, there is a hunger out there, for the Bread (Word) of God to be broken so it can be made palatable for those seeking present truth, that is coming in this kairos of God.
Let me say, at the outset, that I am not propagating another Gospel, but only a more accurate Gospel of the kingdom of God.
For over two thousand years the Church has been “caught up” with a Gospel of salvation teaching what Christ can do for us. Yes, I agree with it, but the Church has failed dismally in getting the “saved” ones to make Jesus Christ Lord of all. This is a mature position of sonship with Christ of the Father. In the previous season our identity was that of child of God, which scripture defines as an immature position (1 Cor.13:11 and Heb.6:1 Ampl). Like Jesus, we need to advance in wisdom and stature and in favour with God and man (Luk.2:52). “Because as He (Jesus) is, even so are we in this world.” (1 Jn.4:17c).
Jesus did not remain a child, but became a Son. “For unto us a child is born, but a son is given (Isa.9:6). Sadly there are churches today who still only see the Babe and not the Son.
The Church of Christ needs to know her identity and must come to the knowledge of the Son of God that she might arrive at mature manhood, the completeness of character, which is nothing less than the standard height of Christs’ own perfection and the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ: that we may be no longer children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, but may mature in all things into Him, which is the head of the Church.
A new season of the Spirit has dawned (Jer.8:7) and Father desires that we migrate into that which He is presently releasing in the earth.
Yours because we are His
Laurie