Outback signs

ISSN 1038-9733 OBS/2013

universe at

war!

Ken Duncan:

“average photographer”

Love the

outback

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editor’s note with Lee Dunstan

heavens declare . . .

I

I’d come Duncan—the very person something plausib tepping through the glass The Girl Who to interview. le. Especially in her first of the doors into the Ken DunTalked to the Ken Duncan has a Medal 20 years, Stars I thought, Dolly services can Gallery on the Cenwould Order of Australia for his have had few constan tral Coast of New South through his landscape arts the to ly her life. She’d been ts in . BusiWales, I was immediate photography and publishing hunted oned air-conditi cool royalty, pushed by rulers, from one family , embraced ness leaders, national to humid another, treated and spirair. It was a relief from the like a slave, the stars of entertainment the And experienced joy, summer heat outside, and heartbreak itual leaders collect his prints. n and so on. I surmis suggests dust and noise of the constructio yet nothing about Duncan The Ken each evening, after ed that, work on the main road. such a stratospheric inhabits he the its triwith als of the day, she Duncan shop and gallery, world. would SanctuThe called lie café on gallery— his her in adjoining verandah mat The customers

BY ALAN HOLM e promand look at the dressed AN ary, offered an atmospher stars. today mostly young adults were steady, reliable They testaRead ised by the name of its restaurant. the story of in casual tourist garb—are and a continual eviden g older for yourself and Dolly Bonson ce I walk past an unassumin ment to that. Duncan’s majestic learned about in of the God she’d pho- free, be amazed.

It’s yours, church. I could man sitting in the café, enjoyand awe-inspiring landscape and without imagine Dolly newsfurther obliga chatting away to by everyone, ing a meal and reading the tion, when you them in the dark until that, while tos are appreciated or economic send they the paper. Little did I realise became her coupon to the regardless of social closest friends. a few address below.

For so many years, browsing through the gallery d. backgroun they Ken were her only minutes later, this man was the working title, friends. So I used “The Talked to the Stars.” Girl Who Girl Who Talked to the A Stars good Signs of the Times friend of to be visiting Townsmine happened PO Box 1115 time that Flo came ville at the same Wahroonga NSW 2076 across from Darwin to attend a Christian camp.

I arranged for the delivery of a draft Yes! Please send copy of the story. me my free copy Flo opened the of The Girl Who envelope, read Talked to the Stars. the I understand I will receive it FREE burst into tears. title and promptly and without obligat ion.* My friend didn’t know what to think or say. Stutter Name ing through her tears, Flo asked him how I knew Address the secret that only she had known. Dolly and her mother Town/Suburb had loved the stars 4 | SIGNS OF THE TIMES and talked to them State as friends, exactly Postcode as I had imagin ed. Flo’s first and ing * Personal copies reactio Outback/1 n was that the Holy last3 only.

Spirit had planted the theme in my mind— and that the book was meant to be.

28 | SIGNS OF THE TIMES §

S P/L 2012 DIVINE GUIDANCE KEN DUNCAN COPYRIGHT

the

the walls of offices and His photographs adorn as he tells Melody Tan, his homes countrywide, but what he can do for God. art is not as important as

The Girl Who Talked to the Stars

KEN DUNCANotographer an “average” ph

Flat SIGNS OF THE TIMES

|5

T

he sun had just risen above the desert scrub as I returned to my tent from a morning rything, includ walk. I could see evemy brother’s Pajero ing the flat rear tyre on 4x4. We were on second day of the our no! What are we outback adventure. Oh, going to do?

The previous afterno on my brother taken a wrong had turn. To get back right track, he’d on cut through bush. the in minutes his Withfront Now, in the middle right tyre was flat. of nowhere, his only

have enjoyed the great Outback through both pen and brush: in the humour of a Banjo Paterson poem, or in a Henry Lawson classic bush yarn. Add to that McCubbin and Namatjira, and more recently Duncan, one of which graces my home.

But you don’t really grasp the Outback—its life, its texture and beauty— unless you visit it. I’ve had that pleasure, experiencing a cool waterhole in a spectacular West MacDonnell Ranges gorge, the colour of underground Coober Pedy, the dust of the Nullarbor and stars above the Murray River.

It’s also a wonderful place to interface with nature and, in contemplation, get to know its Creator—the Creator—a little better. In its amazingly diverse biosphere we see a caring and thoughtful Creator. Looking at its animals, we learn that He is not only creative, He also has a sense of humour.

And the same thorns that mar its landscape, also allow its flora to survive and reproduce in a harsh, sin-affected climate.

But most of all, it reinforces that well-known passage of Scripture, penned

by King David who, as an outdoors sort of person, came to likewise appreciate nature for what it was—God’s creation, made for us: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard” (Psalm 19:1–3).

So enjoy your Signs of the Times, Outback special edition. ½ Published since 1886 Signs of the Times is published by the Seventhday Adventist Church.

Seventh-day Adventist Church (SPD) Limited ACN 093 117 689 Executive Publisher: Neale Schofield Managing Editor/Editor: Lee Dunstan Associate Editor: Melody Tan Graphic Design: Loopeck Lim Phone: +61 3 5965 6300 Cover Photo: Masterfile

The Outback is a harsh place. So it came as a surpr what Glenn Town ise end found there.

SIGNS OF THE

TIMES | 29

Email: signsmag@signspublishing.com.au Website: www.signsofthetimes.org.au Publisher: S igns Publishing Company Warburton, Victoria 3799

The inclusion of a personality or their image in Signs of the Times does not imply their endorsement of the Seventh-day Adventist Church or its beliefs.

Unless indicated, biblical quotations in this magazine are from the Holy Bible, New International Version, copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society.

Signs of the Times | 3

His photographs adorn the walls of offices and homes countrywide, but as he tells Melody Tan, his art is not as important as what he can do for God.

Ken Duncan Copyright 2012 Divine Guidance P/L

S

tepping through the glass doors into the Ken Duncan Gallery on the Central Coast of New South Wales, I was immediately embraced by cool air-conditioned air. It was a relief from the humid summer heat outside, and the dust and noise of the construction work on the main road. The Ken Duncan shop and gallery, with its adjoining café called The Sanctuary, offered an atmosphere promised by the name of its restaurant.

I walk past an unassuming older man sitting in the café, enjoying a meal and reading the newspaper. Little did I realise that, while browsing through the gallery a few minutes later, this man was Ken

Duncan—the very person I’d come to interview.

Ken Duncan has a Medal of the Order of Australia for his services to the arts through his landscape photography and publishing. Business leaders, national rulers, royalty, the stars of entertainment and spiritual leaders collect his prints. And yet nothing about Duncan suggests he inhabits such a stratospheric world.

The customers in his gallery— today mostly young adults dressed in casual tourist garb—are testament to that. Duncan’s majestic and awe-inspiring landscape photos are appreciated by everyone, regardless of social or economic background.

Ken Duncan

an “average” ph

4 | Signs of the Times

n

hotographer

Signs of the Times | 5

not so ordinary Dressed in an orange polo shirt and jeans, Duncan could easily have passed as any other customer in the shop. He has an easy and warm manner, and the corners of his eyes crinkle whenever he smiles. Duncan comes across as that friendly person you might meet at your church, not a world-renowned photographer. As Duncan reminds people (and perhaps himself ), “I’m an average photographer with a great God.” His latest publications are a hardcover coffee table book called Australia: Our Island Paradise, which Duncan says took him a couple of years to complete, and two smaller books that mark his new “Inspirational Books” series. The series features his photographs coupled with inspirational quotes, including many from the Bible.

Duncan isn’t one to hide his

Christianity despite marketing primarily to a secular audience, in a country with strong anti-religious sentiment. “I dedicate my books to God because it’s the truth. If I don’t do that, what’s the point of my life?” he says. “God is my Provider. If I lift Him up, He will provide for me, He will look after me.

“If I just wanted to sell pictures of Australia forever and ever, then it’ll be fine. I can have an easy life, don’t talk about Jesus, don’t create any waves, especially if it’s going to affect your sales. But you know what?

You’re just another boring life. You need to stand for something.”

hearing from God Getting into nature, surrounded by God’s created beauty, taking those photos, is Duncan’s way of connecting with the God he came to know personally some 25 years ago.

in God he trusts On September 7, 2001, America Wide: In God We Trust, Duncan’s photo-book, which featured the 50 states of America, was launched. It was given to former president George W Bush on September 10 by then Australian prime minister John Howard.

Mr Howard asked Duncan to accompany the gift with a letter explaining why he decided to publish the book.

In the letter, Duncan wrote: “Mr Bush, the reason why I’d done this book is to remind America that the only thing which would keep them strong for troubled times ahead is their faith in God, and that is under attack. Trust in God.“ The next day, the September 11 terrorist attacks occurred.

Later, president Bush would write Duncan a letter saying, “Ken, at a time when I had to make some very heavy decisions over my nation, I’d like to thank you for

6 | Signs of the Times

it’s quite amazing, really.”

Duncan’s photo-taking expeditions normally last for two to three weeks (“. . . and then I have to stop because it’s too intensive”). He is quick to point out that while he enjoys photography, he also recognises the need to spend time with his family, to enjoy looking at life other than through the camera lens.

The photo-taking experience of the vast outdoors isn’t always as lonely or solitary as his photos sometimes suggest. In Australia: Our Island Paradise, Duncan recounts an experience where he had to wait an entire day at a waterfall because tourists kept wandering into his shot. But Duncan prefers to take photos of landscapes devoid of humankind because, as he asks with a laugh, “Do you really want a photograph of someone else on your wall?”

Ken Duncan Copyright 2012 Divine Guidance P/L

“I love spending time out in nature, because that’s where I talk to God more,” he says.

Maybe it has something to do with his childhood. Duncan was born to missionaries serving in the Kimberley region of north-west Australia, where his dad taught indigenous people to muster cattle. As a rebellious youngster, Duncan rejected the “simple” message of Christianity, but through his mum’s continued prayers and God’s love, eventually came to accept Christ.

“Normally if I go photographing, I really get in the zone. . . . I’ll go and really try and sense what is happening and say, ‘God, what am I meant to be shooting?’ and I get very focused. I believe that you can get into that place where you get so close to God and you can sense the way the clouds are moving, you can sense the way the waves are moving;

this book, because I’m reminded how blessed our nation is by God. Thank you so much on behalf of myself and my wife Laura.”

According to Duncan, he started the America project because of a burden laid upon him by God. Duncan went ahead with the project never understanding why, until the day the jetliners flew into the World Trade Center.

Signs of the Times | 7

“Occasionally I’ll put a person in a photo just to give scale, but one reason I love shooting landscapes is because I’m trying to let people come to terms with who they are,” he says. “People avoid going into nature because they’re scared to face who they are. There’s something about a beautiful landscape or a pristine area that challenges you to put yourself in that scene, in scale with everything that’s around you.

“As a Christian, when I stand in the beauty of God’s creation, I’m not afraid, because I think, ‘How great is my God, how big is my God and how small am I, and yet He loves me.’ Whereas a person who doesn’t know God, it begins to show them how small they are and how imprisoning fear can be.

“My job is to bring peace into people’s lives. If you put one of these landscapes in your house, the one that speaks to you, it’s amazing how over the years you’ll just go ‘wow.’

It’s not because it’s about me, it’s because you’re looking at a slice of God’s creation, a moment in time. It has the ability to touch you.”

reaching others Duncan’s ministry doesn’t stop with his photography. He is also heavily involved in Christian outreach programs, and has established a not-for-profit organisation called Walk a While. On his website he has an option for visitors to send him a prayer request.

8 | Signs of the Times

A dedicated team prays for every request and, according to Duncan, they have seen miracles result. Duncan also plans a few outreach programs a year, drawing people in with his photos. These programs are usually held in Melbourne, in conjunction with local churches. “We just show [people] the beauty of God’s creation, tell them funny stories and have fun.”

At the end of the programs, they ask people if they would like to accept Jesus as their Lord and Saviour and, says Duncan, they’ve seen hundreds come to know Him. “When I see someone come forward to give their life to Christ, with tears in their eyes, I get so excited that I start crying with them, because I’m taken back to that time when I first gave my life to Jesus. I cried then, but it was with tears of joy, because I’d finally found what I’d been searching for, and that is peace.”

never enough It was a little over seven years ago that Duncan established his Walk a While Foundation, aimed at reconciliation and sharing Christ with the indigenous communities of central Australia. Photography, cinematography and music projects helped build connections and relationships, and he has plans underway for the building of a dedicated arts centre in one of the remote communities.

Duncan, supported by a number

of Christians churches, also aims to create a haven for indigenous people, cultivating their talent “so that they can earn an income doing what they want to do . . . where they are not dependent on the social welfare system and it also gives them pride.”

Walk a While’s most ambitious project to date has been to build a 20-metre cross on top of a mountain in Central Australia. Duncan is in the midst of organising an exhibition in the gallery featuring artwork from the indigenous people in the area, in order to raise funds for the project.

“People tend to think, ‘Oh, he must have a lot of money,’ but I’ve never had enough money to do what God has told me to do,” Duncan says. “My journey is by faith. He always gives me enough to start [a project] and it builds faith, because you have to believe in Him. He sometimes leaves it right to the last minute [to provide], but He’s never let me down.” n So after seeing so many beautiful things and experiencing such a rich life, does anything in the great outdoors still impress this talented photographer?

“Yeah!” he says without hesitation.

“I’m always overwhelmed. When people ask what my favourite photo is, my response is ‘the next one.’ ” For someone whose photographic masterpieces hang on walls of the rich and famous, there is nevertheless something simple and humble about Ken Duncan. ½

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Flynn of the Inland It was a minister of religion who gave a “mantle of safety” to the isolated heart of Australia, as Rebecca Beisler tells.

J

ohn Flynn, the face on the $20 note, is one of Australia’s greats. In establishing the Australian Inland Mission (AIM) just over 100 years ago, Reverend Flynn began a process that would transform the life people lived in the great empty Outback, as he set up medical services, developed a means of communication that today we take for granted and lobbied for better infrastructure to reduce isolation. But his greatest and most enduring legacy is the invaluable Royal Flying Doctor Service.

Flynn, as a pastoral carer to a scattered flock, was to create a “mantle of safety” for people in the Outback; he wanted to make life sustainable 10 | Signs of the Times

despite the challenges of distance and isolation—and he dedicated his life to making this happen. Today, this same vision to build strong and resilient communities at the heart of Australia continues in a direct line through the ongoing work of Frontier Services.

who was John Flynn?

Flynn was a dreamer. He was constantly devising big plans and liked to talk about the impossible. At the same time, he was a very practical person. He carried a toolkit wherever he went and could be found fixing things late at night on the lamp-lit verandah of an Outback homestead. This preoccupation with

Signs of the Times | 11

(top): The early days of the Royal Flying Doctor Service: a lantern slide used by John Flynn in lectures. (middle): John Flynn talks with a stationkeeper c.1937. (bottom): Kingsley “Skipper” Partridge (of the Central Patrol) sends a morse message on a portable, pedalpowered radio set, while on patrol.

getting things done ensured that Flynn was more than a dreamer: he made dreams happen.

As a young man, Flynn had a growing conviction that he was destined to serve God. In 1901, a fortnight before his twentyfirst birthday, he wrote to his father about becoming a minister in the Presbyterian Church.

“The more I think, the more I see the grandeur and beauty of Christianity and the hollowness of human life considered complete in itself*,” Flynn wrote. This sense of “calling” led him to pursue a life of service to people.

At the same time, Flynn sensed his calling to the Outback. He had a desire to work with that hardy group of people who eschewed comfort and took on the dust and heat, settling in the nation’s remotest places. In his graduate year, he published a pocketsized handbook called The Bushman’s Companion, which contained helpful hints for people in the Outback.

Then after he was ordained in 1911, Flynn accepted a placement at the Smith of Dunesk Mission, in Beltana, 12 | Signs of the Times

South Australia, 500 kilometres from Adelaide. The mission had operated for some 15 years, providing pastoral care to a wide-flung diocese.

However, Flynn’s father discouraged him from going to Beltana, thinking it a seemingly impossible task for a young minister. But Flynn was undeterred. He wrote: “As to the future, God only knows what it holds in store for us. My going to the bush must seem to you inconsiderate, and I shrink from it terribly at times. But I dare not turn back.”

And so it was there that Flynn’s dream of expanding Christianity’s work in the Outback began to turn into reality.

the Australian Inland Mission In Flynn’s time, outback Australia was considered no-man’s land. In the book At the Very Heart, published in 2012 to mark the centenary of AIM, author Storry Walton writes about Flynn’s compassion for remote peoples: “[Flynn] saw the courage and the frequent tragedies in the lives of workers and families who were among the most remote people in Australia. He was outraged by the inequity of their situation, citizens of a bright new polity based on equality and fairness who lived productive lives, but with no proper roads, no wireless communication, no neighbours, no shops, no ready access to supplies, no home comforts, no doctors, nurses, hospitals nor schools.

Far from seeing a dead heart, he saw

people who, with proper support, could develop the inland.”

While in Beltana, Flynn was assigned to carry out a survey of the inland. Beginning in Darwin, he documented the land and its resources, the people and their way of life, the hardships they faced, as well as their spiritual needs. He then wrote recommendations about the work he believed needed to be undertaken. The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church received his report with enthusiasm and AIM was established on September 26, 1912.

Appointed superintendent, Flynn went about constructing his “mantle of safety.” He was concerned with both the physical and spiritual needs of the people. AIM set up nursing posts and hospitals in such places as Port Hedland, Western Australia; Halls Creek, Maranboy and Alice Springs in the Northern Territory; and Birdsville, South Australia. In those early days, nursing sisters travelled to the end of the rail, then by camel and horse, but also motor tricycle. From 1913, so-called Patrol Padres were sent out on horse and camel to provide spiritual care and, importantly, to extend the hand of solidarity and friendship to the people of the Outback.

With the rapid development of flight during World War I, Flynn saw the possibility of using aircraft to conquer the vast distances of the remote inland. Then in 1917, a Signs of the Times | 13

young medical officer, Lieutenant Clifford Peel, wrote to Flynn with a detailed proposal for an aerial medical service. Tragically, Peel died in action, shot down over France, aged 24. But inspired by his vision, Flynn campaigned over the next decade to establish an aerial ambulance.

Eventually he met Hudson Fysh, a cofounder of Qantas, the world’s seminal airline, and signed an agreement to operate his new ambulance service from Cloncurry, Queensland, the Qantas base. He leased their single-engine, timber and fabric biplane named Victory at two shillings (20 cents) a mile.

The first operational flight took off in 1928, and AIM Aerial Medical Service came into being. It would later become a separate organisation, the iconic and very Australian Royal Flying Doctor Service that we know and respect today.

At around the same time, Flynn was looking at how to improve communication for people across the vast Outback. He employed engineer Alfred Traeger who developed the pedal wireless. Sets were installed in homesteads across the spread of the Outback, opening communication and ending isolation and, most importantly, allowing people to call for medical help.

Flynn died in 1951, but the work to which he dedicated his life did not stop. Fred McKay succeeded Flynn as the head of AIM and the service continued to grow and adapt 14 | Signs of the Times

to meet the needs of people in the bush.

Frontier Services** Following the formation of the Uniting Church in 1977, the outback work of AIM, the Methodist Inland Mission and the Congregational Union came together employing a name Flynn himself had coined—the aptly named Frontier Services.

Today, Flynn’s mantle of safety still serves remote Australia. Frontier Services delivers 120 services to some 15,000 families in isolated areas, from the tip of Cape York to the west coast of Tasmania, from the Kimberley to Alice Springs, and all in between. These include services for children, health, general community support, aged- and communitycare and patrol ministry.

Following in the footsteps of Flynn’s Patrol Padres, Frontier Services Patrol ministers still visit families and communities in isolated places. Every year, the Patrol ministers cover more than a million kilometres by road and plane providing pastoral care and a helping hand.

So the Outback has much for which to thank a visionary reverend, as have many of today’s intrepid visitors and travellers in the vast and isolated inland. ½ * Letters taken from John Flynn, of Flying Doctors and Frontier Faith by Ivan Rudolph.

Photos: AIM Collection, National Library of Australia ** For more information go to www.frontierservices.org

As terrible as were the two world wars, Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East, they’re merely battles in a much greater conflict, as Loren Seibold describes.

universe

at war!

D

uring the twentieth century, two wars caused such extensive devastation that they were called “world wars.” The name was well deserved, because each involved scores of countries fighting over vast territories, and the casualties numbered in the millions. World War I and World War II were two of the most

horrible conflicts in all of human history.

Yet there is a war going on right now that is far more ruinous than either of these. Let us call it, for the sake of understanding its full magnitude, the Universal War. It has been going on since long before you and I were born—before, in fact, any of our human ancestors ever walked this earth. All the wars that human Signs of the Times | 15

armies have ever fought are merely skirmishes in this war. We, as well as those who lived before us and those who will come after us, are all, in varying degrees, its collateral damage.

What’s particularly ironic about this Universal War is that most of us live our lives quite unaware of its spiritual battles, which are raging about us.

a spiritual battleground That future-looking book of Revelation records a significant bit of ancient history: “There was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back” (Revelation 12:7). This story comes from a time before human existence, a time when the universe was peopled with angels, all of whom were a part of God’s retinue.

Though they’d been created to be God’s loyal army, He gave these angels the ability to make choices of their own. And one of them made the choice to nurture within himself a seed of jealousy. This particular angel was God’s highest-ranking associate, whom the Bible called a “guardian cherub” (Ezekiel 28:14).

This designation placed him just below God Himself!

This guardian cherub possessed remarkable qualities: He was “the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty” (verse 12).

Speaking of him, God said, “You 16 | Signs of the Times

were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you” (verse 15).

That wickedness was his ambition to take over the place of God Himself, for the Bible quotes this angel saying, “I will make myself like the Most High” (Isaiah 14:14). n When competing leaders claim supremacy, conflict nearly always results. The all-powerful, all-knowing God of the universe couldn’t allow a rival god to live in heaven— especially one He’d created in the first place!

The Bible quotes God saying, “I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God, and I expelled you, O guardian cherub” (Ezekiel 28:16).

This was the first battle of the Universal War, when God cast this rebel angel from heaven.

Satan went from the vicepresidency of heaven to heaven’s enemy number one! We, of course, know him as Satan, also called “the devil.” Revelation 12 pictures him symbolically as a dragon.

Satan didn’t fight God by himself.

We know this because, speaking of this dragon, the Bible says that “his tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth” (Revelation 12:4). This appears to be a cryptic reference to his winning the loyalty of a third of heaven’s remaining angels.

This set the stage for a second battle in the Universal War. Satan had soldiers. Now he needed subjects.

like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4, 5).

Behind the Universal War is this accusation: God is inherently selfish—God can’t be trusted. And so what’s on the line in this war is not only our loyalty to God but God’s own reputation. Is He, or is He not, worthy of the universe’s confidence?

Adam and Eve’s wrong choice left their children and grandchildren, and in fact the earth and all of nature, open to Satan’s hurtfulness.

Deviousness, audacity and ruthlessness are characteristic of ea of

the

And so he took the battle to Earth, to the first man and woman. n Genesis tells how Satan suggested to Eve that she eat fruit plucked from a particular tree—a tree whose fruit God had given express instructions never to eat. In this first temptation we see Satan’s marvellous cunning. To Eve’s protests that disobeying God would lead to death, Satan scoffed, “You will not surely die.” In fact, he argued, God is selfishly trying to keep a wonderful experience from you by placing you under an arbitrary rule: “God knows that when you eat of [this tree] your eyes will be opened, and you will be

id

il w ee

Satan was once considered the “morning star, son of the dawn” (Isaiah 14:12), but was cast out of heaven when he rejected his already exalted position and chose to become like God. He said, “I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my throne above the stars of God” (verse 13).

Like Satan, Adam and Eve chose to disobey God. God had told them, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die” (Genesis 2:16, 17). However, through Satan’s persuasive powers, Eve chose to eat the fruit from the tree and shared it with Adam.

The Universal War and our parents’ fall that allowed sin to enter this world would not exist if God had simply created us without free will. Without the ability to choose, we would have to worship and obey God. However, what good is an existence without free will? We might as well have been created as robots.

God loves us so much that He took the risk and gave us the very thing that might separate us from Him—the ability to choose whether to worship and love Him or not.

God never forces, He gently leads. We may choose to ignore His call, but He will never deliberately punish us for our choices. We merely have to live with their consequences.

fr

l

Signs of the Times | 17

Satan’s methodology to this very day.

Every temptation is Satan’s attempt to get us to trust him and distrust God—while causing as much devastation as possible in the process.

the decisive battle Centuries passed during which an unbiased reporter might have doubted the outcome of the Universal War. The record of history, from ancient times to the present, demonstrates Satan’s battle tactics as amazingly effective. He rarely appears in person. Instead, he whispers dark but peculiarly compelling temptations into the minds of humans. He not only encourages jealousy, selfishness and hatred, but provokes us to act upon those feelings.

The consequences from our choices to follow his suggestions run from simple gossip and unkind words to slander, theft, rape, broken families, violence, war, murder and every other variety of human suffering and misfortune.

Fortunately, God’s victory ceased to be in doubt after a crucial battle in the Universal War. That battled happened about 2000 years ago, when God sent His Envoy from heaven to take personal charge of the battlefront. His name is Jesus Christ, and Scripture describes Him simply as God’s Son. Jesus’ strategy couldn’t have been more unlike Satan’s. n Where Satan accused, Jesus simply loved. He showered the world with kindness, healing sickness, speaking 18 | Signs of the Times

truth, restoring damaged reputations and meeting human needs. And in one final stroke of ultimate goodness, He offered Himself, the Son of God, as a martyr, to prove beyond doubt that His love of humankind was pure and unselfish.

When Christ died on the cross, He defeated Satan. Satan’s accusations couldn’t stand, for how could anyone make a charge of selfishness stick to One “who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness” (Philippians 2:6, 7)?

As for God being untrustworthy, the idea is preposterous in light of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.

He so loved the world, and all of us in it, that He “became obedient to death” (Philippians 2:8).

Through the cross, He was able to “reconcile to himself all things,” including you and me, “by making peace through his blood” (Colossians 1:20). With mercy triumphing over justice, He set aside the inevitable results of breaking His law, “nailing it to the cross” (Colossians 2:14).

Even in defeat, Satan continues to wage war against God—and against us. Though he himself cannot win, he battles with a wild and ferocious anger to take as many with him to eternal destruction as he can.

But when all is said and done, he’s defeated. For Jesus has “disarmed the

powers and authorities.” He “made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). Satan and all who follow him are doomed. n Here’s how Revelation pictures the end of the war, when the forces of Satan are arrayed over against the forces of God: “Fire came down from heaven and devoured them” (Revelation 20:9). With that tragic

event, the Universal War will end, and the entire universe will be forever free of the taint of sin.

Only one question remains and it’s one that only you can answer: Whose side am I on in the Universal War? If you’re on Satan’s side, you’ll share his ultimate fate; if you’re on God’s side, you will spend a joyful and amazing eternity with Him in His everlasting kingdom. ½

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why 7 days?

Most of us take the seven-day week for granted. Marvin Hunt explains how it came to be seven days and not six, eight or ten.

20 | Signs of the Times

S

ome say the answer is hidden among the stars, but so far, no astronomer has been able to train their telescopes on the universe and find an explanation. Some say the answer is here on earth in the ceremonies of some ancient culture or custom, but so far, anthropologists have only a few clues. “ Why is a week seven days long?�

The question sounds simple enough until you begin to search for the facts. Then you soon learn that the road to discovery comes to an abrupt end. Read along with me and

Masterfile

see whether you can solve the mystery. n First, a quick review from highschool science: the earth rotates on its axis once every 24 hours. We call that span of time one day. Next, the moon circles the earth once every 30 days. So we call that span of time a moon-th, or a month. Finally, the earth orbits the sun once every 365 days and we call that span a year.

As you can understand, these divisions of time come about quite naturally and have been known and used by the human race since ancient times. But we are still no closer to answering the question, “Why a seven-day week? Why not a week of eight, nine, 10 or even 20 days?”

Concerning this question, anthropologists have uncovered some interesting clues. They have found that, indeed, some cultures have tried five-, six-, and eight-day weeks. Some tribes in West Africa tried a week a mere four days long.

During Napoleon’s time, the French government experimented with a 10-day week. But, like the others, it was replaced by the standard seven-day week. Today the question of why a week has seven days still remains unanswered by scientists and scholars. n There is an answer, but strange as it may seem, it is found in only one place—the Bible. “By the seventh day God finished the work he had been doing; . . . And God blessed

the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done” (Genesis 2:2, 3). So there it is, the origin of the seven-day cycle we now call a week.

However, we still haven’t answered the question of why God made this repeating cycle we know as a week. Some think it was His way of repeating over and over again to an often-forgetful human family that they should remember their roots.

human memorials Perhaps this point can be better understood by looking at some of the extraordinary ways men have tried to leave a memory of themselves to the world. Egypt’s pharaohs erected huge monuments called obelisks, hewn from a single piece of red granite, in order to leave glorious details of their battles and other achievements chiselled deep into the polished stone surface.

The Greeks used marble and bronze to produce likenesses of their heroes, athletes and philosophers.

Their successors, the Romans, made a practice of preserving wax masks of ancestors and also hired sculptors to make personal statues to be displayed in front of their homes. Even today, shelling out several thousand dollars for an elaborate cemetery headstone is not uncommon.

From the time of the Egyptian pharaohs to the present, monuments, statues and markers have Signs of the Times | 21

had basically the same reason for being—man wants the world to remember him.

God’s memorial Could the seven-day week be God’s method of reminding us to remember our Creator?

Imagine that you had had the challenge of making a permanent marker to be set up at the beginning of time in the Garden of Eden that would remind people throughout eternity that they were to forever remember and respect their Creator. You could have had the message chiselled into a huge stone, but it would have been subject to the deteriorating effects of heat in the summer, freezing cold in winter and of course, the eroding effects of rain.

Even if it survived the forces of nature, it would still have been subject, as were the pharaohs’ monuments, to human tampering. Hist­ ory tells us that a conqueror thought nothing of chiselling out a predecessor’s achievements and changing battle accounts to suit himself.

So it seems that a stone marker, no matter how large, would not do. After all, we’ve managed to lose something as important as the original copies of the Ten Commandments, which God wrote in stone with His own finger. Besides, what language could you choose that would be understood by all peoples for all time? n Considering all the difficulties, don’t you think God chose the best way when He created the seven-day

do we still keep Jesus’ Sabbath?

Think back to last Saturday, the seventh day of our week. Then go back a week, and another, and another, for 2000 years. Would the Sabbath Jesus kept have lined up in seven-day weekly cycles with our seventh day today?

Today’s Saturday Sabbath keepers get that question now and then, and the answer is Yes, our Saturdays line up in seven-day cycles with Jesus’ Sabbaths.

We know this for at least three reasons: ◗◗ Chronologists tell us that there has been no change in the weekly cycle for more than 2000 years. ◗◗ Jews are very strict about keeping the seventh day, especially Orthodox Jews, and today’s Jews still observe Sabbath on our Saturday. ◗◗ If people who observe the Sabbath on the seventh day in honour of Creation (Genesis 2:1-3) are keeping the wrong day, then people who observe Sunday in honour of Christ’s resurrection are also keeping the wrong day.

22 | Signs of the Times

week? The idea of seven days strung together like beads on the strand of time is so unique that humanity can never claim the idea to be of natural origin linked in some explainable way to the moon, sun or stars. Furthermore, we can see that the sevenday week exists entirely because of the Sabbath day.

The Sabbath can be compared to the period at the end of a sentence. It tells you when to stop. It’s the period at the end of the week— after six ordinary days, the Sabbath punctuates the week and says, Stop here. The seven-day week exists only because God appointed the Sabbath day to mark its conclusion. All the other days of the week are so ordinary that the Bible simply numbers them as first, second, third and so on (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, etc.). The evidence seems abundant that the only source of the seven-day week is the supernatural work of God, the Creator.

why holy time?

There’s another important aspect to the Sabbath God set aside at Creation: He blessed the day and made it holy. Several thousand years later, to make sure that human beings clearly understood the purpose and function of the Sabbath, God gave these instructions: “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On

it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:8–11). n Isn’t it puzzling that the only things that last are things we cannot touch, taste, hear, smell or see?

The apostle Paul called them the invisible things of this world. The seven-day week and the reason it exists (the Sabbath day) are invisible, unchangeable markers on the unseen stream of time. Their existence will continue on into the era when the earth is made new, and beyond: “ ‘As the new heavens and the new earth that I will make will endure before me,’ declares the Lord, ‘so will your name and descendants endure. From one New Moon to another and from one Sabbath to another, all mankind will come and bow down before me,’ says the Lord” (Isaiah 66:22, 23).

The seven-day week and the Sabbath will always remain a mystery for some. But those who accept God’s invitation to enter that oasis in time understand that God’s holy Sabbath and the seven-day week began in Eden, continue today, and are a definite part of the future throughout eternity. ½ Signs of the Times | 23

the return of the

Princess Alan Holman tells the story-behind-the-story of a remarkable woman and her place in Australian history.

D

olly Bonson, aged 95, died in March, 1988.

To most people who knew her, she was the typical white-haired lady next door—quiet, gentle and always ready to lend a hand. In short, she was the last person one would suspect of having a secret past. A church-going Christian for most of her long life but never baptised, it was while she was actually 24 | Signs of the Times

standing waist-deep in the baptismal font that all was revealed. She quietly announced to the congregation that she was Bett Bett, the Aboriginal servant girl featured in We of the Never-Never and the lead character in The Little Black Princess books by Jeannie Gunn, now part of Australian folklore. It had been thought that Bett Bett had disappeared into the vast Australian bush in 1902. It was then 1969.

I first heard about this in 1994, when I was commissioned to write her biography. The brief from the publisher was to create a short story, to be used for Christian outreach to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island communities throughout Australia.

There were two main challenges. One was to find out what happened to Dolly in the years since Mrs Gunn unavoidably left her as a bewildered, skinny eight-yearold in the Northern Territory.

The other was to grapple with the cultural dynamics that had influenced her life since then.

Neither challenge proved easy.

For one thing, Dolly had been deceased for six years when I was handed the task, so I could hardly talk to her. Instead, I had to rely on a scratchy video interview conducted some years before her death.

But most valuable was my longdistance contact with her youngest daughter, Flo, who lived in Darwin.

Along with some library research at the Australian National University, relevant cultural centres and interviewing other people who had been involved, I started to piece together the jigsaw of her life—a roller-coaster of pain, pleasure and finally the serenity of old age.

Sometime in 1894, deep in the “Top End,” near the Katherine and

Roper Rivers, Dolly was born in the traditional way—mother-to-be and midwife, alone in the flat scrub.

On her arrival, the mother, Gmurdi—recognising the newborn’s light skin—hysterically opted to leave her on an antbed rather than suffer the embarrassment of having a “half-caste” child—and a girl at that. Dolly was rescued by her aunt Djoodi, who became her surrogate mother. Dolly’s early life was typically tribal, moving from place to place, sourcing food and avoiding war parties or tribal kidnappers.

Just as sinister were the government authorities, which at that time had a policy of forced relocation for Aboriginal children—regardless of the protests of their natural families. To the end of her days, Dolly expressed surprise that, on a number of occasions, she was able to evade the government officials.(Interestingly, it was a few months after the release of my book that the term “stolen generation” was first used to describe this activity.)

In 1902, Aenaeus Gunn moved to Elsey Station as manager. For his wife, Jeannie, it was a harsh introduction to the Australian bush.

Through an arrangement between Djoodi and Dolly’s European father, Dolly was sent to the homestead as a maidservant.

Her antics became part of Australian folklore through Mrs Gunn’s two best-selling books—possibly the first sensitive descriptions of life in the Signs of the Times | 25

Joe and Dolly married in 1918 and were inseparable until Joe’s death from illness at age 63.

Outback. When Jeannie reluctantly left Elsey after her husband died, Dolly was distraught. But the event brought her into contact with her white father, Mr Cummings, for the first time. They became great friends, although the relationship was legally and culturally prohibited.

Dolly was caught between two worlds. Her own culture wouldn’t accept her whiteness and the white community refused to accept her Aboriginal heritage. Dolly soon became a liability to her constantly travelling father, so she was reluctantly sent to a boarding house in Darwin. For the next decade, apart from some short moments of relative happiness, life was tough.

Her only significant relief was a short spell with the Ward family, who introduced her to their church.

They even took her to Adelaide on a holiday and arranged for a reunion with Jeannie Gunn. But just as things began to look rosy, the Wards were permanently transferred from Darwin to Adelaide and Dolly was alone again.

26 | Signs of the Times

Her next foster family treated her harshly but allowed her to continue to go to church. These were dark years. She was forced to work as a barmaid and was propositioned on many occasions at the encouragement of her foster-parents. Fortunately, at Dolly’s courageous insistence, a government official intervened and Dolly—confused, beaten and abused—was able to find new accommodation. She had lived in seven homes in her 17 years of life. She could not have guessed that the worst was over.

In all this time, there was never a connection with the fact that her name was in books all over Australia and overseas. Bett Bett had simply disappeared.

■ In 1918, she met and married Joe Bonson, a handsome Englishman. Their close relationship lasted until he died, 40 years later. Over the years, the Bonsons became part of the Darwin community. They had five children and only once experienced separation—during the Darwin bombing in World War II, Dolly and the children fled temporarily to Merbein, near Mildura, Victoria.

Just after the war, Flo, the youngest daughter, was rummaging

through her mother’s papers when she found letters from Mrs Gunn.

A few lines in and she realised she had to have a quiet chat with her mother. Dolly patiently explained to Flo that she had told Joe about her past life as Bett Bett before they married but had deliberately kept things quiet so they could live “normal” lives.

Flo was to respect the secret until her mother decided to announce it to the world, in her own time— standing in the baptismal water, in 1969, when she became a member of the Darwin Seventh-day Adventist church.

During an evangelistic meeting she and Flo had attended out of curiosity, Dolly had seen a picture of Jesus descending to earth through the stars. To her surprise and delight, it was the same unforgettable picture she had seen in a dream some time earlier. Dolly insisted on being baptised right away. There were a couple of newspaper articles at the time but then silence. Dolly never sought fame.

The roller-coaster ride that was Dolly’s life had yet another twist.

After Joe died and Dolly was living in Darwin with Flo, Cyclone Tracy hit with a vengeance in 1974. Their house was destroyed around them as the two women crouched under a double bed. A photo taken at the time shows a bare mattress, completely surrounded by a shattered house. Like many other Darwinians, Dolly moved into a caravan until the home was restored.

Life held no more dramas for Dolly, who lived to a ripe old age— being a friend to everyone. It was a pleasant end to her story.

■ But it wasn’t the end of my story. Over the months of putting the jigsaw pieces together, I had looked for a literary device on which to hang the story.

I eventually came up with something plausible. Especially in her first 20

Statues of Bett Bett and her dog, Susie, located in a park on the main street of Mataranka, on the Sturt Highway, Northern Territory.

Signs of the Times | 27

years, I thought, Dolly would have had few constants in her life. She’d been hunted, pushed from one family to another, treated like a slave, experienced joy, heartbreak and so on. I surmised that, each evening, after the trials of the day, she would lie on her verandah mat and look at the stars. They were steady, reliable and a

By Alan Holman continual evidence of the God she’d learned about in church. I Read the complete, fascinating could imagine Dolly chatting away to story of Dolly Bonson for them in the dark until they became yourself and be amazed. her closest friends. For so many years, It’s yours free and without they were her only friends. So I used further obligation. Just post the the working title, “The Girl Who coupon to Signs of the Times at Talked to the Stars.” the address below (post only).

A good friend of mine happened to be visiting Townsville at the same Girl Who Talked to the Stars time that Flo came across from DarSigns of the Times win to attend a Christian camp. I PO Box 1115 arranged for the delivery of a draft Wahroonga NSW 2076 copy of the story. Flo opened the envelope, read the title and promptly Yes! Please send me my free copy burst into tears. of The Girl Who Talked to the Stars.

My friend didn’t know what to I understand I will receive it FREE think or say. Stuttering through her and without obligation.* tears, Flo asked him how was it that I knew the secret that only she and her Name mother had known. Dolly had loved Address the stars and talked to them as friends, exactly as I had imagined. Flo’s first Town/Suburb and lasting reaction was that the Holy State Postcode Spirit had planted the theme in my Outback/13 mind—and that the book was meant * Personal copies only. to be. §

The Girl Who Talked to the Stars

28 | Signs of the Times

The Girl Who Talked to the Stars

Flat T

The Outback is a harsh place. So it came as a surprise what Glenn Townend found there.

he sun had just risen above the desert scrub as I returned to my tent from a morning walk. I could see everything, including the flat rear tyre on my brother’s Pajero 4x4. We were on the second day of our Outback adventure. Oh, no! What are we going to do?

The previous afternoon my brother had taken a wrong turn. To get back on the right track, he’d cut through bush. Within minutes his front right tyre was flat.

Now, in the middle of nowhere, his only Signs of the Times | 29

Terrorist threats, destruction by flood and fire, a shaky world economy—it’s enough to frighten anybody unless you understand what’s behind today’s headlines. And it isn’t all despair, gloom and doom: there’s hope!

To receive your free copy of End-time Hope complete the coupon below and mail it to Signs of the Times at the address below.

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Outback/13

spare was already on and my two spare tyres didn’t match his stud pattern.

The only thing we could do was to leave the families and take the two flats in the Land Rover to the next town or station or . . . we had no idea really.

When we arrived at the nearest station, large cattle dogs sniffed us as we tried to find someone. A noise near the horse stables alerted us to other life. The station owner was matter-of-fact when we explained our predicament.

“OK, Pete, go and fix the tyres before you look at the bores.”

We followed Pete to a machinery shed and pumped up the first tyre then placed it in a trough, marked the leak, then proceeded to remove the tyre from the rim by hand. Thump, thump, went the hammer and lever, as sweat poured off him. The repair made, the tyre was hit onto the rim, again by hand and sweat, pumped up and checked. Then the operation was repeated although this time the tube was repaired.

The job done Pete just wandered off. “See ya,” he said.

My brother strolled after him, “Thanks, mate. That was fantastic. What do I owe?”

“Nothin’ . . . someday I might need someone’s help.”

We were thankful and amazed, a tough Outback station hand

had granted grace and hospitality.

Upon our return, our families ran out from under the gums and cheered and within 20 minutes we were on the road—more a gravel station track—again.

Emus, kangaroos, goannas, galahs and wildflowers were among the sights we enjoyed as we journeyed toward Mount Alexander. Sometimes I took the lead, other times my brother did. We would follow just out of the dust. But, when in front, you couldn’t tell whether the other vehicle was following. The Pajero wasn’t and we did not have CB radios. Five kilometres of backtracking and we found my brother changing the rear right tyre. Again we got going, with me leading. I turned into Mount Alexander Station, where there would be fuel and tyre repairs. Fifteen minutes later, still no Pajero.

“Where are they?” and, “Surely not!” were the only words verbalised as again we turned back.

Back two kilometres, there was the Pajero. This time the tyre was not only flat but also badly damaged. Taking the children and two flat tyres, I trekked back into Mount Alexander.

The news wasn’t good from the laid-back repairer, Jock: the compressor was down and there were no hand tools, but he thought he might be able to put in some plugs.

He did—four in one leak. Jock was reluctant to fix the other tyre

because he “could not charge for it.”

He fixed it only because we needed a spare. Another three plugs, and using a tiny battery-powered compressor, we had pumped tyres and pumped people. A plug was worth $10, according to a sign, but Jock charged only $20 altogether. “You need the help,” was his candid comment. However, before I left the sun-baked shed, Jock said, “You better pray for those tyres.” He meant it, and so we did pray.

There was no fuel at Mount Alexander, but that’s another story. We travelled another 250 km before making Gascoyne Junction. As the Pajero pulled in, the recently repaired back tyre was on its way down again! But here there were fuel and tyre repairs. A few hours later we were on the road again with a second-hand tyre—wrong size but it did fit and it got us “flat free” all the way to Carnarvon. My brother was able to buy two new tyres there and was told how he could best drive them on Outback roads.

Five flat tyres had confirmed to me that God’s grace was alive in Outback hospitality. ½

Signs of the Times | 31

Find a Church Thursday Island Bamega Batchelor

Mossman Karumba Doomadgee

Hall’s Creek

Hughenden

Port Hedland Marble Bar

Cloncurry

Nullagine Tom Price Jigalong Emerald Karalundi

Finke

Wiluna Cue Northampton

Dongara

Roma

Oodnadatta Mullewa Mt Magnet

Mintabie Kalgoorlie Norseman

St George Lightning Ridge Coonabarabran Dubbo

Esperance

From Katherine to Coonabarabran, or Broome to Bamega, you will discover a friendly Seventh-day Adventist Outback fellowship* * Churches in most major regional centres, not shown.

To find your nearest Seventh-day Adventist church, visit: http://webapps.adventist.org.au/directory/