Personal Stories

Recently I received an email news report informing me that Benny Hinn's wife has filed for divorce. I guess to some people it's newsworthy to note that a controversial televangelist's marriage has ended. I guess it's good for the Christian community to be informed that a brother and sister and their family needs our prayers as they go through what is likely the most excruciatingly difficult time of their lives. I guess it's even good to be reminded once in a while that even the most apparently full-of-faith people are afterall, frail, fallible and vulnerable human beings - just like the rest of us. But what disturbs me most about these kinds of news items - or news items about anyone in public life for that matter - is the endless curiosity and speculation that surrounds the failure of marriages. Be they people like Benny Hinn, Tiger Woods or Brad and Angelina... or the couple at church or down the road... people seem to get some kind of perverted gratification by involving themselves in the very private suffering of other people.

Black Saturday saw fires on a scale never before experienced in Victoria, or throughout Australia. With temperatures over 45c, high winds in excess of 70kms, dry grasslands and forests with years of uncleared  and unattended dry fuel was a recipe for disaster which saw some 2000 homes lost resulting in  many casualties and, as I write, over 200 lives taken.  Over 420,000ha destroyed, some 7000 homeless with at least twenty towns and hamlets affected right across the State of Victoria. Beautiful scenic Marysville has been burned to the ground 1500 residents have lost their homes, the town is still closed after 12 days, it is a crime scene with police still looking for bodies.

“As I left Australia to spend three and a half months on a hospital ship in one of the world’s poorest nations I had no idea what was ahead of me,” says Abbey Rowe of Brisbane.

It was my first opportunity to spend any reasonable length of time in an Arabic speaking country, but the Lord had definitely planted a desire in my heart to reach out to Muslims. Six months earlier, before I even knew that I would be traveling to Egypt, I had obeyed a prompt by the Holy Spirit to begin to learn Egyptian Arabic. The little that I learned came in very useful and helped me to develop and instant rapport with complete strangers who were both very surprised and delighted (and sometimes amused) to hear a foreigner attempt to speak to them in their own language. Whilst I was in Egypt I met two very key people... one was a lovely Christian woman by the name of Hanan, whom I met by providence at the library in Alexandria. She and I became instant friends. The other was a thief... a one-armed man by the name of Osama.

On the phone, in between his duties at Schofield Army Barracks in Hawaii, Sergeant Logan Laituri tells me he wants to "live radically for Christ." Normally I stumble over that sort of fervor – couched, as it is, in terms I would usually consider vague and cliche – but if following Jesus means telling your captain that 9/11 didn't absolve you of the need to love your enemies, I'll keep listening.

There I was drinking a nice hot chocolate with a friend at Gloria Jeans when I feel the urge to turn around. I look over my shoulder and suddenly I feel the whisper of God in my heart, “Pray for him.”

Given that God has the power to heal, why do some people still suffer and die? Is it simply lack of faith? Or are there other keys to healing?

What you will see in this video is difficult to describe in terms other than the miraculous.

Given that God has the power to heal, why do some people still suffer and die? Is it simply lack of faith? Or are there other keys to healing? Presumably all of those people whom Jesus healed when he was on earth went on to die somehow. So if miraculous healing is not about escaping the inevitability of physical death, then what is it about? Your thoughts?

Note: Some people may find this video footage disturbing.

 

My mind was going around in circles spiralling downwards with depression... I could not cope any longer and attempted suicide. I think an angel saved me that night...

Throughout the Church there are varied opinions and beliefs in relation to the phenomenon of 'tongues', ranging from assertions that such occurences died out with the death of the apostles and therefore no longer occur and should never be regarded as authentic, to the belief that these and other 'spiritual gifts' are imperative and vital for the effective work of the Church.