Ken and his wife Ghale are ordained ministers with Australian Christian Churches (ACC) and founders of Challenge Ministries, an interdenominational evangelistic, prophetic, and healing ministry. Ken has ministered throughout Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia, and Africa. Together they have planted churches, served as missionaries in Africa, and equipped believers through Bible college leadership, teaching, and Spirit-empowered ministry.

Welcome to 12-Minute Converse with Jesus Believers.

God chose first to have a conversation with us, his creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you, Pastor Ken.

It's a pleasure to meet you.

What part of the world are you in today?

I was born in a place called Cape Town, South Africa.

And we then came over to Melbourne, and I guess we've lived more of our lives in Melbourne than we have in South Africa.

You immediately went to WeMove the Cross.

You've been married that long, have you?

I just was 20, so I got married very young in Cape Town.

And my eldest daughter, I have three children, all married.

My eldest daughter was born on my 21st birthday.

Yeah, I guess there are advantages there.

Do you have any grandchildren as yet?

We do, Angel.

We have five grandkids.

My youngest daughter, it's actually their anniversary tomorrow, so they wanted to start a family.

But my other two children, between them, they have five kids.

Wow, it must be fun to have working knees while having grandchildren.

Yes, they keep you busy, keep you occupied, but it's a good thing.

I am actually talking about the fact that the age at which you got married, which then contributed to the age you had grandchildren.

You're a younger man while having grandchildren, yeah?

So I'm now in my 60s.

It was quite early, and we learned a lot along the way, but God's been good to us.

Tell me about your wife, please.

Back in Cape Town, she lived in a country area.

I was a city boy, and I found out later on in life that my dad courted my mom.

My mom was from the same town that my wife was from.

So he did the journey from the city to the country, and I followed suit.

I didn't realize I was doing that, but I did the same thing.

It was just the way it worked out.

She's been with me in ministry over the years.

We've been in ministry 40-something years.

Been married for 47 years.

Yeah, so she's quite involved in raising the grandkids, obviously raise the kids, and also has a ministry in her own right.

So she's a credentialed minister in her own right as well.

How did you come to meet Jesus?

Long story short, when I was 16 in Cape Town, both my wife and I—I didn't know it back then, but after I was about 16, we were raised Anglican Church of England, but I went to a Scripture Union camp where I heard about being born again for the first time.

So I gave my life to Christ.

That lasted for about a year, simply because it was stuff happening in the church I didn't understand.

So I fell away from the church, but not from—it's amazing, you don't really fall away from God, but from church.

And when we came over to Australia in 1980, 1982, my wife actually gave her life to the Lord, got born again, went to a Pentecostal church.

And then it was 1983, I just felt the conviction of God to really give my life up to Christ, and that's what I did.

The 23rd of January, 1983, I was in a bit of a mess, to be honest.

My marriage was in a mess.

I was really on the verge of becoming an alcoholic and not really in need of a lot of things that was going on in my own personal life.

But I gave my life to Jesus on that 23rd of January, 1983, and all those addictions in that one night fell away.

It was just bang, a new creation, and I've never looked back since.

How did you get into ministry?

When I gave my life to Christ back in 1983, there was just a hunger inside of me for the things of God.

And so we went to church with as many meetings as we could.

I started Bible school, did my first year of Bible college, just felt God lead me, did some part-time work on the side, but I went.

And another minister from the church that we were at asked me to go with him and start another church in another suburb of Melbourne.

So I went with him and soon became the assistant pastor.

That was 1985, became the assistant pastor of that church.

Then from that church, we went and started another church, which we took on full-time.

And that's how we got started.

So we were involved in church planting.

We planted a number of churches around Melbourne, got involved in missionary work, went overseas as missionaries for a while, planted a church in northern Ghana.

And yes, so God's opened up the door for one thing led to the other.

Did you go straight into ministry work or did you transition from the career to ministry work?

I transitioned from the career to ministry work.

So when I came over to Australia, I was a qualified tradie, as we call them in Australia, particularly in motor mechanics.

And I did that.

When I went to Bible school, I had to leave that behind because Bible school was virtually full-time and I had some time in the afternoon.

So I did odd jobs, Angel.

I just did sales.

I worked in a factory, whatever I could do, but then transitioned full-time into the church.

How has it been when you look back over the years?

Yeah, because the last, before I went to Bible college, I was working at a trucking plant.

And I had a very, I actually became a supervisor in that plant.

And the job was good.

There was good money.

Then working in the workshop as a mechanic, it was just, and they wanted me to promote me, but I just felt God called me and I had to leave all that.

So you'd step out in fear interpretation.

God has asked you to do this.

Yeah.

And you've learned a lot of lessons, making some wise decisions, making some unwise decisions, but in it all, God uses everything, doesn't he?

And yeah, so here we are.

How has the ministry work affected your children's lives as you see it today?

So I have three children, elder daughter, she's married, a middle son, he's married.

And then the younger daughter that I mentioned that she just got married, but probably two years ago.

And when we were growing up, my eldest daughter was always on the straight and narrow.

She loved Jesus.

She was a worship leader in the church and all the rest of that.

The other two children, my son and my youngest daughter, they felt because in church life, as much as you love people, there's things that happen in pastoral work.

Things that happen that you don't want to happen.

People, people leave, people say things, people do things, people, this all come and they saw that what happened to mom and dad.

So I think it affected them, but we prayed for them.

And so they left, not left the Lord, but back to from church for a while.

But they're all back in church now, all serving God with their families.

And so we learned big lessons, always making our family, God first, then our family, and then our church, because that family is our first church.

So we're starting to get that right.

We're encouraging other ministers to take care of their family.

Yeah.

So we've learned a lot of valuable lessons.

Some lessons I can't learn again, but they're all in church now, all loving God, loving Jesus.

What's on the horizon for you?

Besides the local church that we're involved in, God is opening up doors in doing conferences around the place.

So we've got a conference, a visionary leadership conference coming up with different pastors in our area.

And then on the 1st to the 3rd of May, I've been invited to do a nation's conference in Amsterdam, which is my first time to Europe.

I've been to Asia, Africa, across Australia, New Zealand, but I've never been to Europe.

Yeah.

And so that's been quite a big thing for me, which I really appreciate the door that God's opened there.

And then, of course, we do a lot of work in Indonesia and Malaysia, Philippines.

And so we've got a trip back there in August, July, end of July, August.

My friend, it's been a pleasure catching up with you.

I appreciate you coming on here and sharing a piece of your life to inspire others.

If someone's listening and they are where you are, when you were back in 1985, thereabouts, yeah, working at a shop but being called by God, what would you suggest to them that they do?

I think really get on your knees, seek the Lord, get into God's Word, seek Him in prayer and fasting, if it's a direction and where God wants you to be.

And then get some wise counsel from men of God, men and women of God that have been before that are credible, integrable, humble, and are willing to share their lives with you.

And do what God tells you to do.

Again, amazing audience, show notes, links to connect with Pastor Ken and his wife.

Definitely a pleasure.

I treasure.

Pastor Ken, thank you for being on what is inspired by 12 Minute Convos.

Thank you.