The Genius of God – the Story behind the Story!

God is a genius! He lays out His plans and spends a lifetime preparing a person to discover their calling. The story of how God used the wreck of a 1934 Alvis Speed 20 to speak into my life is well known. I was starting to restore this classic old sports car, when God spoke to me and said, “You could restore this broken car, but I can restore broken lives.”

At that moment, God birthed into my spirit the vision which eventually became Ellel Ministries and which has now gone round the world. But it would be wrong to conclude that suddenly, out of nowhere, God invaded my mind with this life-transforming revelation without having prepared my heart for that dramatic destiny moment.

There is a story behind the story! And this story has two strands:

One, the story of my personal spiritual journey which began with giving my life to the Lord at the age of nine; and

Two, the story of how God spent twenty years nurturing my love for old cars and motoring, so that in 1970 I would be in the right place at the right time to hear His voice and respond to His call upon my life.

My personal spiritual journey is told in the book Strands of Destiny, but I have never before spoken of how God began, at the age of six, to nurture my interest in cars and prepare me for my destiny moment. Those twenty years of preparation were just as important as that one night of personal revelation – they were the genius of God!

Sometimes the answers to our prayers take a while in coming! I had been asking the Lord for years what it was He really wanted me to do with my life. In all that time I had tried to follow Him step by step, without ever really knowing what it was that God had up His sleeve for me! Little did I know that He was carefully preparing me in ways that I could never have imagined. My love for old cars wasn’t just a fascinating hobby.  It was God-inspired!

I had often read the stories of missionary pioneers and seen how God had been preparing them for years, even decades, before their work actually began, but I had never thought of applying that self-same principle to my own life – until that dramatic life-changing moment of revelation.

For more than fifteen years, now, I have been jotting down details of how God used my love of cars to direct my life, remembering influential moments and collecting hundreds of pictures. And now, at last, just before I stand down as International Director, this previously unwritten story is complete, and the book, One Life, Many Cars, is now out. This is the real story behind the Ellel story!

While the book is not an overtly Christian book, the message of God’s hand on my life is clearly there throughout the story and all the adventures I had along the way. It culminates in an Epilogue pointing people to the Lord. I have often seen ladies on our courses or retreats looking for something to take home as a gift for the family – but there has never been anything suitable for the men in their life, many of whom are unsaved, or reluctant believers! While I know there will be many women interested in the story, I have had these men particularly in mind as I put the book together.

So, as well as being a fascinating account of motoring experiences in the fifties, sixties and seventies which I loved describing, it does also have a clearly evangelistic purpose. And it could be a great Christmas gift as well!

The book has within it some amazing pictures (over 220) and I am hoping and praying it will find its way into the wider classic car world as well. It could be the first ever evangelistic motoring book!

You can find out more and order copies of the book at: www.peterhorrobin.com/olmc

One Life, Many Cars is a large-format book (250mm x 200mm). 144 pages of quality paper with 227 photos and illustrations. The book is priced at £19.95 in the UK – a very modest price for a motoring book of this size and with so many pictures.

In their reviews, David Cross (Ellel Leader) and Rev.Dr.Robert Ward (lately Vicar of St.Luke’s Newcastle-upon-Tyne) summed up the book in this way:

“I so enjoyed this remarkable book . . . fascinating . . . extraordinary . . .  a modern-day parable.” (David)

“A treasure trove of suspense, adventure and breath-taking escapades! . . .  I whole-heartedly commend this wonderful book.” (Robert)

To  find out more about its contents and order One Life, Many Cars, go to www.peterhorrobin.com/olmc