Signs of the Times

April 2007

Sam Mitchell Leads With Integrity

In a career that has already seen significant highlights, Mitchell judges his footballing achievements on what he has yet to do.

The Kokoda Track

Instead of being a monument to war and death, Kokoda is a monument to living. It helps you appreciate the wonderful life and freedom we so easily take for granted.

How often in your busy life have you pencilled into your calendar, “Do nothing”? Even in our leisure time, we feel compelled to watch or listen, fix or clean. How about occasionally doing nothing—and enjoying it?

Clashing Symbols

Symbols are important for identity and community. They tell me who I am and us who we are. Such is a flag and such is the cross. The flag connects us to our nation and the cross joins us to our King—a king who was lifted up on a cross to separate us from death.

Death and Resurrection

Nowhere has this influenced human thought more than the areas of life and death. The Greek philosophers believed there were two realms of existence, one material and the other spiritual.

A Name to Honour

We left there thinking: How sad! How would it feel to know that your own father didn’t claim you, and didn’t give you his family name?

Sabina’s Love

Watching your family murdered—devastating.
Meeting your murderer in the dead of night— priceless.
Forgiving and embracing him—possible.

Still a Hero

There were widows and orphans created that day not only in the sunburnt country but also in the land of the rising sun.

Faith in Health and Healing

393 patients admitted to the coronary-care unit at San Francisco General Hospital were computer assigned to either a 201- patient control group or to the 192 patients who were prayed for daily by five to seven people in home prayer groups. Neither patients, nurses, nor doctors knew which group the patients were in.

From Poverty to Proprietor

Life did not start out well for Jargal.* Adopted^ as a baby, he was then abandoned to be raised by his elderly grandmother. When
he was just seven years old, she passed away. Jargal wandered from relative to relative, and never attended mainstream school.

Play at It

My friend Charlie Croteau was a tall, blond 20-year-old at university when his life went into reverse. The fateful moment came when he was in a gymnastics class trying to master a backward summersault on the trampoline.

Thanks for Everything

We have a lot to be thankful for.” You usually hear people say that after they’ve been in a car crash, their house has been swallowed by a sinkhole and their cat is on dialysis.