TRAX 4WD Fellowship

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS.

When you are travelling in the Outback have you ever noticed that it doesn’t matter whether you are filling up with fuel, buying some supplies at the local General Store, or even just looking at some of the local sights that there are two basic questions that are invariably asked of you: namely –  “where’r y from?”,  and “where’r y headin”?

Good questions really, because they are great discussion starters. Someone that you have never met before, and who may not get to meet many people very often will naturally be interested in your trip and those two questions are great openers for a conversation. And conversations like this are great things. Many times such a conversation has led to a local telling me where to find a particular place of interest or how to find unusual formations which would have remained unknown if I had not bothered to answer the pleasant and well intentioned questions put to me.

This was highlighted many years ago when we were on the Cape York trip we were able to see many places which would have totally by-passed by the normal traveller but which became some of the most unforgettable highlights of the whole trip.

But such questions as the two above are not new. They have been asked of travellers for hundreds of years. In his book “The Pilgrim’s Progress” author John Bunyan gets several of his characters to ask these same two questions of the principal character of the book (whose name is ‘Christian’). He replies with all honesty that he is on a journey from a place called ‘the City of Destruction’ to another place called

‘The Celestial City’. (No 4WD for him, it was ‘shanks’ pony all the way!)  It was a tough journey and not for the faint-hearted – indeed he met a man called ‘Mr. Faint-Heart’ who had turned around and was running back to old home as fast as he could make it.

But, back to the story. Christian used the questions as an opportunity to share something about the reality of the place that he was going to and the truthfulness of the King of the place who had invited him to go there. Sometimes, such as in the incident at the town of ‘Vanity Fair’, the answers he gave caused him much strife and pain from people who only wanted to mock

him and cause trouble. At other times of course his answers caused people to really think about  their own life destination and what would happen to them if they neglected to take the journey that Christian was on.

Some years ago, one Christian group put out a little lapel badge which took the form of two interlocked question marks. The idea was that people would ask the wearer what the question marks were for? The reply was a simple one: “Ah, that is for the greatest question ever asked” would be the reply. “And what question is that?” would be the next question.  This: “What do you think of Christ?” would be the next reply, and this would often generate a conversation that might go on for hours, and not infrequently the questioner came to a living faith in Jesus.

Remember our two questions at the beginning of this article?  In a sense that is what TRAX is all about – helping people to enjoy going from one place to another – interesting places, different places, unusual places – but always places that are worth going to.

Which brings me to the real point of this article. Let me ask you in good old Oz words: “where’r y’ goin t?” Now by that I don’t mean, “where might you be going for your next holidays, or the destination of your next 4WD safari; because in reality they are only just stops along the way of the greater journey – the trip of your life.

Now at about this point some people might want to get a little coy or shy and not want to face the great issue. But sooner or later it’s a destination that has to be faced and it’s a trip that, like it or not, you and I will have to take. For some the thought of making preparations for this trip is put completely out of their minds with the excuse, ‘I’ll make preparations another day, not now.’ But that’s so crazy! No one in their right minds would attempt a trip down the Canning Stock Route for instance without first making a lot of preparations and doing a lot of planning. It’s a big long, a tough trip. You don’t just hop into the 4WD on the morning of your departure and say to the family “let’s go”!

In the same way it would be just as foolish to make the greatest trip of all without first taking stock and doing some careful planning. Jesus said there are just two ways to go – a broad and easy way that ends in destruction – and a harder road that few actually are prepared to find and travel on.   Now that is the real issue. Where is your life taking you?   “Where ‘r y’ goin’ t’?”

The interesting thing is that despite all the gloom and pessimism that abounds today we can know and we can be sure. When we did our great ‘Canning Caper’ trip in 1994 with TRAX we did careful research for months beforehand, so that when we finally hit the Canning it was almost like driving over track that we already were familiar with. It held no real problems or fears, and our pre trip research had paid real dividends in the ultimate enjoyment of the trip.

We can both know and be sure of our ultimate destination. That’s the real message of the Gospel in the New Testament. Jesus said that He was both ‘the Way’ and ‘the Truth’  (about the way) and ‘the Life’, or the means of both reaching the end of our journey, and staying there. Jesus’ friend John had decided to take Jesus’ advice and he proved the words and instructions to be true and totally accurate. In his letter to his Christian friends he said “I have written this to you who believe in the name of Jesus in order that you may know that you have right now eternal life.

“Where ‘r y’ goin?”  Was the question; and the answer can be a solid “I know for sure that I am going to be with Jesus in Heaven, and I also know the way to get there”……

Too good to be true? No way! It’s the easiest thing of all to be sure about. Want to know more? Then why not give one of our TRAX committee a call and have yarn…. We have a great road map to the greatest destination that we would like to give you – free for the asking.

See you on the TRAX,
Neil Flower – TRAXION Editor

Who, if anyone at all is in charge?

Good question! But the really sad thing is that very few people are getting a serious or credible answer. Lots of noises are being made and much sabre rattling, but the world is still no closer to peace than it was 2,000 years ago. People still long for peace and talk and write extensively about it, but for billions it will just be another chance to “dream the impossible dream”.

What a gloomy way to begin a “CROSS TRAX” article I hear you say! No, not gloomy but realistic – it would only be gloomy if I too was asking the questions that most people are asking while at the same time not having any answer.

Yes, there are answers! And credible, relevant, and verifiable ones too!

“I HAVE A DREAM…” said the late Rev. Martin Luther King, a ‘dream where all people will live in peace and without hate.’ – and a good dream it was too – except that that was all it was – a dream, and those who believed in the reality of hate and killing shot him to try to show that hate was a stronger force than dreamy idealism. But Martin’s dream was not really fantasy, it was perhaps only premature – premature in thinking that real peace could be both achieved and maintained in this world.

“Only arrogant people claim to have answers” – but that is just as baseless and foolish as those who speculate and claim some direct or prophetic guidance. It is neither foolish nor arrogant to claim to have an answer if one is basing one’s claim on revealed or demonstrated truth. The problem in the Western world today is that multitudes have swallowed the lie that says that there is either no such thing as truth and that therefore no-one can claim to have a definitive answer to the really BIG issues of life. Well the problem is that such a statement is even more arrogant (because it shows a closed mind in not recognising that others may have found an answer).

OK, no more beating around the bush; let me give you an answer that you can check out for yourself. In short it goes like this:

1. God was not caught unawares by the recent tragic events in either the U.S. of A. or elsewhere. He does not take delight in, or want, such things to happen. They happen because mankind has rebelled and decided to live in a way that is not God’s.
2. God does not intervene to stop these things because if He did, we would then complain more than we do now because then we would be merely programmed puppets with no will of our own.
3. God however has acted, but in a way that is not a ‘band-aid’ solution, but is actually a ‘final solution’ which looks at the ‘big’ or ultimate picture – a new creation where there will be no evil.
4. God has given notice of this by sending Jesus into the world to demonstrate His love and concern and by taking the punishment of all sin and evil (yes, even the sin of the New York Bombers) on Himself. This is such great news that many people either do not want to hear it or reject it because of the hatred of good in their own hearts.
5. Failure to accept God’s plan does not either cancel or nullify it. God’s plan for the world is still being played out whether people will accept it or not.
6. Jesus – the Prince of Peace – is the only hope for a broken and divided world, and God has promised His return to set up a kingdom that will not only never fail, but will also exclude all hate, evil and crime.
7. Entrance to Jesus’ kingdom is still open and invitations are still being issued.
8. Failure to enter the Kingdom will not be God’s fault – He has issued invitations – without exception.
9. Have you accepted?
10. One last thing. Jesus said that the day of invitation will not last forever. God has fixed a day when invitations will be closed and no further opportunities to enter will exist. Now that will be a sad day for many – sadder than any event in known history..

But in the meantime…. Want to know more, or how to get your questions answered?
Well, contact me – there’s nothing I like better than showing how a person can accept that Great Invitation. I look froward to hearing from you.

In the meantime, see you on the TRAX!

– Neil Flower – TRAX President

This year will mark the 25th anniversary of one of the greatest trips that I ever did…..

It was 1975, and we packed the family and enough food for 5 weeks and enough spare parts for any eventuality and set off in the old 1957 Land Rover Series 1 Station Wagon for Cape York with friends in 4 other Land Rovers of varying age and models. It would be an understatement to say that “it was quite a trip”, but it was and one day I must write an article about what 4WD touring was like in the ‘old days’ when only about 15 – 20 vehicles a year ever attempted the Cape York trip……

It was also Les Hiddens’ first major trip too, and we had some interesting encounters with his party’s vehicles; but that too is another story that I must tell you about some day as well….

Anyway, let me tell you about what all this has got to do with a “CROSS-TRAX” article before you begin to wonder why I’m writing all this.

It all began when some friends and I saw the original Malcolm Douglas film called “Across The Top” about his adventures with a friend as they made their way across the top of Australia and up to Cape York in about 1968. It was great stuff – (I’ve still got a copy of the film on video if anyone wants to borrow it), and it made us all decide then and there to go and take a look for ourselves.

But in those days it wasn’t all that easy to just ‘go’. Sure there were the inevitable permits to obtain (even in those days!), and that took quite a bit of time. But that was the easy part. There were maps too, but we found that many of them were not very reliable once we tried to use them. There were not many people who had done the trip to give us track details or pace notes either, so it was going to be a real frontier, ‘fly by the seat of your pants’-and hope to find the right point of destination’, bit of navigation. As well there were very few places along the way where fuel, food, spares or supplies could be obtained either, so of necessity it had to be a totally self sufficient operation.

Plans were made, dates were set, people invited to join ‘the crew’ and vehicles were prepared. Three families, one married couple, and a single man were the people, and five Land Rovers of various vintages (ours was the oldest), were the vehicles.

We were all set to go with much fear and trepidation when something happened which change the whole complexion of the trip. Something which lifted the load of worry from those of us (the three fathers in the group) who had the responsibility of taking very young children into an almost uninhabited part of the country, on a trip that no-one seemed to be able to give any details about short of saying ‘well we wish you luck’, or ‘we wish we could do something like that’, etc. It was the most fabulous piece of news that we could have possibly received, news that was almost too good to be true. It took the worry out of going and it made an otherwise scary or even dangerous trip seem easy. But let me digress for a moment to prove my point….

Quite regularly I meet people who have a real fear of the future, and especially about death. (Boy, I love these morbid articles in this magazine, don’t you?) When I try to tell them that death need hold no fear for them because of the great hope that a believer has, a response that I often get goes something like this: “Well you can’t really have peace because how can you be sure? After all we can’t know what it is like after death because no-one has ever come back to tell us what it is like and what to expect.” But a statement like this shows just how little most people really know about the message of the Bible and the good news of the Gospel.

Because the whole point of the Gospel is that Someone has died, and come back to not only tell us what it is like, but also to give us the certainty of a known way, and a proven path. And of course that person is the Lord Jesus Himself. He not only came to give us the exact directions of how to get to the most exciting destination of all, He actually trod the path of death and then came back to show us that death had been conquered and was no longer to be feared. Indeed, He also said that when the time came for us to ‘make that trip’ He would actually come and take us along the right track and deliver us safely to our eternal home. Great news!

Now back to my reminiscence. The great news we received was that the previous year a few members of the Sydney Land Rover Owners Club had gone to Cape York and had made notes and directions not only about the main track but also of some old WW2 tracks and alternative routes which would make the trip even more interesting. And yes, they were willing to share their maps and notes with us!

Someone had been there, seen it all, had returned, and was now willing to not only show the way, but also give exact references and lend maps and pace notes. One of this group even volunteered to come with us if we wanted him to, so keen was he to get back up there again. He had ‘done the track’, and it held no fear for him. He would also be our guide if we wanted it. It was a great offer but we decided to accept only the pace notes and track details.

What a trip! Being able to know where to look for the old wartime tracks, and then to follow them to areas that had not been traversed since 1945; to find old wartime wrecks and some crashed aircraft in the dense rainforest; to find an old observers post from the days when a Japanese invasion was real threat; made for a tremendous holiday – plus, the opportunity to go to some of the areas that the explorer Edmund Kennedy had passed over on his epic journey North. (This also makes for another great story about a rival group from the Australian Army who were also trying to find some of these places but didn’t!)

And it all came about because we didn’t have to worry about where we were to go, because someone else had already been there and come back to tell the tale, and to share their knowledge about what it was like.

There are two lots of documents that hold a lot of meaning for me. The first is a file of 25 year old pace and track notes, along with a big box of slides of the 1975 Cape York trek. The other is a collection of 1900 year old pace notes and track advice about how to know for sure the way to Heaven without having any fear of the trip or it’s track conditions – it’s called ‘The New Testament’. Actually I’m willing to lend any interested parties a copy of the first lot of documents, and to give a copy of the second lot to anyone who wants to ask for it. Now there’s some for pace notes for the greatest trip of all – free!

More next month, see you on the TRAX.
Neil Flower – President.

“The day the wheels fell off….
and the gear box died and….
the swivel pins seized….and…..”

Sounds like the words of a real ‘tear jerkin’, Tamworth Country Music Festival, prize-winning song about the woes of the ol’ Outback Sundowner…
But it isn’t…..
But it is quite a story, and worth relating here, so let me put you into the picture…..well, not exactly a picture but at least some prose…..

It all began when a young fellow in the youth group of the Church I was the minister of at that time decided that he would like to be able to ‘go bush’ too and see some of the things that he had seen of the Flower Family trips on the slide shows that we had presented at various Church functions. So, just to be like the minister he bought a well known brand of 4WD and proudly showed up at Church one Sunday announcing to all and sundry that he was going to do all the major trips beginning with the trek to Cape York like we had done the previous year. Now in those days, (the mid 70’s) it was indeed a long, hard and lonely trip – one that should only have been attempted by the experienced driver.

“When do you plan to do this trip?” I asked.
“Well we hope to leave in 4 weeks when my annual holidays start”, was the benign reply.
For once this preacher was speechless! Well almost anyway! He had no experience, done no research, an untried vehicle, no mechanical knowledge, no recovery gear, and to cap it all off it would have been the middle of the ‘wet’ season and all the unsealed roads impassible!

This was a job for ‘Superpreacher’ – to try to talk him out of making such a trip until he was ready and prepared for it.

At first my protests fell upon deaf ears. ‘He knew what he was doing’ he said, was ‘ready for the adventure’. So I tried another tack…
“What about your vehicle, is it ready? I mean, you’ve only just bought it, and you haven’t even given it a decent run yet to find out if there’s anything that may need to be repaired”. This at least caused him to do a bit of thinking, but then, “But the bloke at the car yard where I bought said she’ll do any trip”.

“Maybe” was my counter, “but how do you know if he was telling you the truth? Your vehicle’s brand is a good one but it still needs to be maintained and checked and treated the way the maker advises”.
“No worries, me and a few of the mates are going away next weekend to do a bit of camping up near Barrington Tops, so we’ll give it a good work out then”.
“But get it checked first by a competent mechanic”, I tried to explain, “and let me show you some of the basics of necessary maintenance for that type of vehicle”. But it was useless…. ‘He knew enough’ he said ‘about cars; he knew about gear boxes, and lubrication etc, etc’.

And maybe he did. But it turned out to be the other type of car that he knew about – the 2WD variety – that didn’t have a transfer case, and didn’t have a second differential or front swivel pin housings to be checked and lubricated.

That next weekend was a very rainy one it was! And they just about got to their destination they almost did too! Got to a very lonely, seldom visited spot, on a track that was almost completely washed out where there was this creek that was running quite high too! They made it through the creek alright, but just as they were going up the very steep incline on the other side there was a loud thump, and forward progress ceased. As a matter of fact reverse progress began and the vehicle began sliding backwards down towards, and then into, the creek and no amount of weight on the brake would stop it.

It was a very long, and wet walk out to the nearest phone. It was a very irate father who was called in the middle of the night. It was an extremely expensive tow job since a tractor (with willing farmer) had to be found and then the vehicle freighted on a semi back to Sydney for repair. It was a very broke young apprentice who finally realised that ‘Cars ain’t Cars’ and that although he knew a thing or two about ‘ordinary’ cars, this one was different and the maker had given some very clear and pertinent instructions as to how this type was to be run and maintained.

It turned out that the transfer case had died because it’s filler plug had long ago worked loose and fallen off – and, as a consequence all the oil had been flung out. Our young friend had checked the Gear Box but not the transfer case – (Didn’t know there was such a thing’, was his retort later). Likewise
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the front differential was also found to be wrecked through lack of oil, along with the swivel pins and front wheel drive mechanisms. Probably the former owner had not known/bothered/cared about checking or adding oil to them either. So much for the glib words of the car salesman.

Now here is the point of all this. Our young friend was typical of the attitude of so many people today when it comes to thinking about the Christian life and the Bible. They don’t stop to think that there is a world of a difference between ‘ordinary’ living and living life God’s way.

Four Wheel Drive vehicles (at least the ‘real’! ones anyway) are purpose and specially built, and are quite different to the ‘ordinary’ road vehicle. Likewise, a Christian, while still a person has been remade and is purpose built to serve his or her Creator and Maker.

They don’t run the same way, they work under a different set of maintenance regulations which must not be overlooked. There is a special service manual issued by the Maker which needs to be followed if the ‘vehicle’ is to last.

Poor “X”. (I can’t give his real name in case someone might identify him.) He wouldn’t listen. He thought he knew. But he was wrong. There is a great verse to illustrate this in the book of Proverbs in the Bible – “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” (Prov. 14:12). Experience can be a hard and sometimes fatal teacher. Fortunately this young man learned in time, and although it cost him a lot of cash it was certainly cheaper for his car to break down in N.S.W. and not very far from Sydney, than for it to have died on the lonely tracks leading to Cape York.

That’s why I suppose that becoming a Christian is like buying a 4WD vehicle in order to enjoy the ‘real’ bush. Not only is the vehicle different from ordinary ones, but we have to learn to drive it in a whole new way. The old patterns of driving (living), have to be abandoned and new patterns learned. The is a great instruction book direct from the maker that is there to be followed.

And incidentally, there are some pretty good ‘instructors’ as to how the new vehicle (your Christian life) is to be handled. Why not ask one of them today? There are quite a few of them in TRAX Fellowship who are competent in this area. They also will offer you a free instruction book as well. Now, that’s a better deal than young “X” got from his salesman!