There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. —Soren Kierkegaard. "…truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. That is why truth does not yield to opinion, fashion, numbers, office, or sincerity–it is simply true and that is the end of it" – Os Guinness, Time for Truth, pg.39. “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” – Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
Today’s devotion is from a friend of mine, Angel Torres. He is a young man with a passion for Jesus and I pray today’s devotion will bless you as it did me. Angel will be contributing his writings from time to time and if you are blessed by this or any of his future devotions drop him an email to encourage him as I know he will be encouraging you. His email is: angeljtorres77@gmail.com
Hi everyone, my name is Angel Torres and I would like to extend a warm “thank-you” to my friend Curt for allowing me to share some of my writing with you all! I’m a 23-year old student at Macedonia Baptist College and I enjoy reading, writing, and learning about apologetics (how to defend one’s faith). I am married to my beautiful wife, Grace, and we welcomed our daughter, Eden, into the world last year. Our growing family has been so blessed by God, and I’m looking forward to sharing the things that God has put on my heart with you all in the coming days. With that being said, I would like to share with you what I believe to be a great message of hope and encouragement!
“Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen” (Jude 24-25 KJV).
These words round out the short yet extremely interesting and impactful Book of Jude. The focal point of this Book is about the threat of false teachers, however, Jude ends with a beautiful reminder that every believer should know: it is God alone who is able to keep us from falling, and it is God alone who will present us spotless before Him (and this will be a joyous occasion!). What does it mean that God is able to “keep us from falling?” Well, put simply, it is God who keeps on going on the right track. Imagine a time when you were driving and you made a wrong turn. If you were driving through a neighborhood or city that you were familiar with, it probably wasn’t too difficult to get back on track. If you were in an unfamiliar place, however, it might’ve been more tricky to get back to where you needed to go. As Christians, we are “strangers and pilgrims” (1 Peter 2:11) in this world. We are living in an unfamiliar neighborhood so to speak. As a result, we must rely on God’s power and strength to keep us going in the right direction. If it were all up to us, we’d be in trouble! (At least I know I would be!) Only God can keep us from going down the crooked path and falling into various kinds of temptations.
Additionally, it is God who will present us as “faultless” before Him. Though we stumble and struggle daily, God the Holy Spirit is actively working in the lives of His people, cleaning and furnishing us for the Master. This will be an occasion marked by great joy and celebration! If you have been born again, then you have an eternity of “exceeding joy” awaiting you! I pray that this will challenge and encourage us to live accordingly. Even before that time comes, however, we can still say in unison with our brother Jude, “To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.” When I read these kinds of prayers from men and women in the Bible, I’m amazed and inspired by their high view of God. Jude spares no expense in extolling God by highlighting His (1) wisdom, (2) salvation, (3) glory, (4) majesty, (5) dominion, and (6) power. Only the God who is wise, glorious, majestic, sovereign, and capable of bringing salvation to sinners is able to keep said sinners from falling!
Lastly, I want to encourage you to look carefully at Jude’s wonderful description of God. He refers to God as “God our Savior,” a clear reference to the divine nature of Jesus Christ. In fact, God emphatically declared that there is no Savior besides Him (Isaiah 43:11). Interestingly, it is believed and understood that Jude was actually one of Jesus’ half-brothers! Despite his familiar tie to the Savior of the world, Jude still exalted Him as God incarnate. May we do the same, both on this side of heaven and for all of eternity. I’ll close with one of my favorite quotes from the Prince of Preachers, Charles Spurgeon:
“He who counts the stars and calls them by their names is in no danger of forgetting His own children.”1
The Greek word “agape” is the supreme concept of love in the Bible, a love that has its foundation in the character of God Himself. Today, R.C. Sproul expresses how Christians are to manifest this love in the world.
This is both parts of a two part sermon preached by Reverend Kenneth Stewart.
2 Peter 3:4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
2 Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
There is always something unexpected about Christmas, even when you have been expecting it for months. It is not just the presents, which you somehow anticipate anyway. It is the grace of God in sending his Son as our Savior. Grace is always unexpected. So whenever we capture even a small part of what Christmas means, the message of grace is somehow always there and surprises us.
We should not be surprised that this is the case, however, for all biblical references to the coming and birth of Jesus, including all the prophecies of his coming in the Old Testament, have this characteristic. This is particularly true of the first messianic prophecy, occurring as early in the Bible as chapter 3 of Genesis. It is unexpected because the scene in which it occurs is of judgment. Satan had tempted Eve to sin. She had believed Satan rather than God and then had sinned in eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which both she and Adam had been instructed not to eat from. Adam had also sinned in eating of the tree. Now God had come into the garden to call them to task for their sin and to mete out judgment. What fears they must have had! How terrified they must have been as they waited for a punishment perfectly suited to their crime! Do you remember that song from Gilbert and Sullivan’s Mikado in which the Lord High Executioner sings of his desire to have each punishment perfectly suit the crime? He sings:
My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time:
To make the punishment fit the crime,
the punishment fit the crime.
My favorite verse is the one about billiard players.
The billiard shark, whom anyone catches,
His doom’s extremely hard.
He’s made to dwell in a dungeon cell
In a spot that’s always barred.
And there he plays extravagant matches
In fitless finger stalls,
On a cloth untrue with a twisted cue
And elliptical billiard balls.
Well might we shudder as we think of a punishment suited to the greater crime of Adam and Eve in their unjustified and totally heinous sin against the Creator. But we find only a token judgment—pain upon the woman in childbirth, grief for the man in earning a living—and, wonder of all wonders, a promise of a deliverer to come.
This is the unexpected wonder of Christmas in its very first form: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel” (Gen. 3:15).
God of Conflict
At first glance this verse does not seem particularly wonderful, for it is talking about a conflict that began between the devil and Eve and continues up to the time of Christ and beyond. The verse speaks of “enmity,” which means “ill will on one side or on both; hatred; especially mutual antagonism” (Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary). It is hard to see how this can be good. But this enmity is good, and we should be alerted to this by the fact that it is God who creates it.
A person might ask how evil can be good or how God can be the author of enmity in any form. But the context readily explains this. We remember that Satan is a fallen angel whose original sin consisted in trying to replace God as the chief being in the universe and in trying to gather the worship of the creatures about himself rather than about God. His attempt proved unsuccessful. Now he had appeared on earth to attempt to do among the new race of human beings what he failed to do earlier. Undoubtedly, his temptation of Eve and Adam had in mind, first, seducing our parents away from the worship of God and, second, winning their allegiance and worship for himself. We know sadly that he succeeded in the first objective. He did break the fellowship of the man and the woman with God. But he did not succeed in his second objective, for God announces here that he is putting enmity between Lucifer and the woman.
It is significant that these words are spoken to Satan. For the new thing was not Satan’s hatred of Eve. Satan hated Eve from the moment of her creation, even when he was pretending to be her friend and confidant in tempting her to eat of the forbidden tree. The new thing was to be Eve’s (and Adam’s and all their true offspring’s) hatred of Satan as one aspect of God’s gracious preservation of and provision for the race.
What a blessing that was! We think many times of the love, joy, and happiness that the coming of Jesus Christ brought us, and we thank God rightly for those things. But we should not forget to thank him for a corresponding hatred of sin, sorrow at sin’s ways, and increasing misery when we find ourselves ensnared in sin’s tentacles. When we sin, we often find that we like the sin but want to escape sin’s consequences. We would like to destroy ourselves in comfort, like the addict destroying himself in the dreamlike stupor of debilitating drugs or booze. We would like to go to hell happy. But it is one aspect of grace that God does not allow that to happen. God makes sin miserable and sets up an antagonism between ourselves and Satan that modifies the hold of sin and makes it possible for us to hear God’s loving voice, even in our misery.
The Two Humanities
The enmity established by God was not only to be between the woman and Satan, however—that is, an enmity merely on the personal or individual level. It was also to be an enmity between her offspring and his. This could presumably mean between human beings and the demons, but it is unlikely that it does. For one thing, Satan does not really have offspring. He is not engendering little devils. The demons were created once by God, before their fall, and they are not now increasing in number. For another thing, the passage moves in the direction of one specific descendant of the woman, Jesus Christ, who shall defeat Satan. That is, it is moving from the general to the specific. In view of these facts, the verse probably refers to the godly descendants of the man and woman, influenced by God himself, and the ungodly descendants of the man and woman, influenced by Satan. Certainly, the Book of Genesis goes on to distinguish between the two humanities (chapters 4 and 5).
If this is so, this is a message for the godly in every age. There is a divinely created animosity between the people of God and those who are not his people, and it is for our good. It is to sharpen our will to serve God. One of Isaac Watts’s great hymns (“Am I a Soldier of the Cross”) asks:
Are there no foes for me to face?
Must I not stem the flood?
Is this vile world a friend of grace,
To help me on to God?
In the context of that hymn the answer is clearly no. Watts wants us to fight against the world for Christ’s sake, which we must certainly do. But there is also a sense in which the world is a “friend of grace,” for its animosity toward us pushes us to a greater measure of dependence on God.
There is also a more specific meaning to this verse. As the Book of Genesis unfolds we see God calling out Israel as a special nation through whom he would work, and we see the animosity of Satan (who heard and well understood this prophecy) directed particularly against the Jews. Here is the birth of anti-Semitism. It begins in Genesis and stretches all through history even to the end times described in the Book of Revelation. “A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne” (Rev. 12:1–5). In this passage the dragon is certainly Satan, the woman Israel, and her child the Lord Jesus Christ.
Satan’s strategy is to destroy Israel in order to destroy Christ. This is the reason for anti-Semitism, and also the reason why no Christian should ever have a part in it.
Christ Versus Satan
There is a third antagonism in these verses, more beneficial even than the others. The first two give us room for hope; they tell us that God has not abandoned us, that he has established a beneficial enmity between those who desire good and those who desire evil. This last enmity assures us, not only of hope, but also of victory. It is the antagonism between Jesus, as the specific and climactic seed of the woman, and Satan himself. It was to result in the bruising of Jesus but also in the crushing of Satan and his power.
Donald Grey Barnhouse traces the conflict like this:
When the Lord Jesus Christ was born Satan’s hatred came to white heat. We can see the hatred of Satan at every point in the earthly story of the life of our Lord. Joseph was moved to cast off Mary because he knew that she had not been his wife as yet and drew the natural conclusion that there was sin on her part. But the Lord manifested himself and Joseph accepted Mary because of this divine revelation. The child of promise, the seed of the woman, the branch of David, was born, the Eternal Word was made flesh. Satan moved Herod to kill all of the babies from two years old and under according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. But God had arranged escape in advance, and had brought gifts of gold to the family of the young child so that a flight into Egypt was made possible.
At twelve years of age he was left behind in Jerusalem among the followers of Satan and the enemies of God. The child was growing up before his Father as a tender plant and the heavenly care was about him.
As soon as our Lord was publicly manifested, Satan immediately confronted him and sought in the three temptations to turn him aside from the path laid down for him in the counsels with the Father. When he had been routed with the sword of the Word, Satan left the Lord, but returned again and again, both personally and through the religious leaders who had become veritable children of the devil, to destroy the Lord before he could come to the hour of the cross. It was Satan who stirred up the people of Nazareth to take Christ to the brow of the hill and thrust him to his death on the occasion of his first public sermon. He had announced the doctrine of salvation by grace apart from works on the basis of the sovereign will of God (Luke 4), and the heart of man rebelled against it and turned easily to the enemy who would exalt the flesh. “But he, passing through the midst of them, went his way.”
Again and again Satan played the old plot with different scenes and characters. Sometimes they picked up stones to stone him; they sent officers to arrest him; their leaders attempted to incite the people against him. Always the nerve of their action was paralyzed. Their desire was that of the carnal mind which is enmity against God. Now, for the first time in history, God was visibly before them as the object of their hatred. They were the sons of those who had killed the prophets, but they themselves would have killed their God. He described them fully in the parable of the tenants who killed the messengers and when the owner, last of all, sent his son, cried, “This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance” (Matt. 21:38). Always he escaped unhurt. He was master of every situation. He said, “No man taketh it [my life] from me; but I lay it down of myself” (John 10:18).
When human allies failed, Satan moved directly to kill the Son of God. On one occasion the Lord’s disciples were with him in a boat on the sea of Galilee. They were lifelong fishermen who were in their home waters. They had thought that there was not a wave that could be unfamiliar to them. But suddenly a storm of such fury broke out that even these hardened mariners were chilled with fright. They rushed to the Lord as he lay asleep in the boat and roused him with their cry of anguish, as they deemed themselves on the point of death, “Master, save us; we perish!” The gospel narrative states that the Lord arose at the call of the frightened disciples and “rebuked the wind.” Let the deniers of Scripture realize that if Satan were not behind the power of the storm, then the action of Christ must be compared with that of a child who, hurt by stumbling against a chair, begins to kick at the chair, crying out with petulance against it. But if we understand that Satan had raised that storm to kill the Lord Jesus, … we see the whole pattern of these attacks, and understand the force of the words addressed to the storm, “Peace, be still” (Mark 4:35–41). The verb in Greek means “to muzzle,” and in ancient domestic life was sometimes addressed to a dog to silence him.
Finally, the prophecies were fulfilled and Satan bruised the heel of the Lord Jesus Christ and had his own head crushed in the bruising.
Two Victories
We know how the bruising of the Lord Jesus Christ took place. It happened at the cross as Satan finally succeeded, so it seemed, at striking back at God and silencing his meddling in human affairs forever. It was bruising with a vengeance. It included the hatred of the religious leaders, the mocking of the crowds, the beatings, eventually the crucifixion with its great agony. And yet, it was only a bruising, not a defeat, for on the third day after the crucifixion Jesus rose from the tomb triumphantly.
On the other hand, although Satan achieved what he believed to be a true victory, it proved to be a Pyrrhic victory, for his power over us was broken. I do not know precisely what Satan was thinking of as he finally achieved his goal of having Christ crucified, but I am sure he had at least forgotten this prophecy or else had dismissed it as applying to other times and circumstances. He failed to see how even his moment of triumph was to be turned to defeat in accord with this prophecy. John Gerstner declares, “Satan was majestically triumphant in this … battle. He had nailed Jesus to the cross. The prime object of all his striving through all the ages was achieved. But he failed. For the prophecy which had said that he would indeed bruise the seed of the woman had also said that his head would be crushed by Christ’s heel. Thus, while Satan was celebrating his triumph in battle over the Son of God, the full weight of the Atonement accomplished by the Crucifixion (which the devil had effected) came down on him, and he realized that all this time, so far from successfully battling against the Almighty, he had actually been carrying out the purposes of the all-wise God.”
Satan’s only true power—quite unlike his pretensions to power—comes from the character of God that declares that sin must be punished. Satan’s power consists in working within the laws of that character. He reasoned that if he could get the man and woman to sin, which he did, the wrath of God against sin must inevitably come down on them. God’s good designs would be thwarted. What Satan failed to see (and what no one ever did see clearly before the death of Christ) is how God could be both just and the justifier of the ungodly (Rom. 3:26). He failed to see how Jesus would take the place of sinners, bearing their punishment, and how he, Satan, would have his power broken in the process.
But now we do see it, if we will, for Christ’s was an open triumph. Paul says, “Christ … canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Col. 2:13–15).
In view of this victory (and echoing the language of Jonathan Edwards), Gerstner calls Satan “the greatest blockhead the world has ever known.” He says, “The very fact that he is probably the most intelligent being ever created makes him the greatest blockhead, for he was supremely stupid to suppose that he could outthink the All-wise or overpower the Almighty.”
Although the victory has been won for us by the Lord Jesus Christ, there is nevertheless still another to be won by those who follow Jesus. It is a victory certain of being achieved, but it is still in the process of being achieved and will be achieved only as we who profess the name of Jesus actually draw close to him and fight in his power. Paul referred to this victory when he wrote to the Romans, “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet” (Rom. 16:20). John referred to it in Revelation, saying, “They overcame him [the accuser of our brothers] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” (Rev. 12:11).
Christ and Adam
Genesis 3:15
“And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
In Romans 5:14 the first man, Adam, is called a “pattern” (niv) or “figure” (kjv) of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was to come. That statement encourages us to think of Adam and Christ together, both for similarities and contrasts, as Paul himself does in Romans 5 and in 1 Corinthians 15. Since Genesis 3:15 is the first text in the Bible in which Adam and Christ appear in proximity, it seems unwise to pass it without looking at this theme carefully.
The theme has figured prominently in Christian theology. Indeed, it is the basis of what is sometimes called “covenant” theology. According to this system, God established an agreement or covenant with Adam according to which he was to stand as the representative of the race of men and women who were to follow him. He was to stand before God on the basis of his obedience. If he continued in obedience, all who followed would also be established in obedience and would be blessed by God. If he fell, all who followed him would fall in his transgression, and sin and death would pass on to them because of Adam’s sin. We know what happened. Adam did fall, and we fell in Adam (cf. Rom. 5:12–21). On the other hand, God also established a covenant with the Lord Jesus Christ according to which he was to be representative of the great company of the redeemed. They would be joined to Christ, as all were once joined to Adam, and they—the redeemed—would be saved by Christ’s sacrifice.
To be sure, there are no explicit texts concerning the establishing of the covenant with Adam. There is very little written about Adam in the Bible at all. But there are many texts that speak of God’s covenant with Jesus (Isa. 53:10–12; Pss. 22:25–31; 40:6–8; cf. Heb. 10:8–10; 12:22–24; 13:20; John 6:37, etc.), and the explicit comparison of Christ and Adam in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 clearly establishes this doctrine. In most books of theology the first covenant is called a “covenant of works” and the second a “covenant of grace (or redemption).”
What Adam Did
With this theological background, we turn to the first Adam, our ancestor, and consider his covenant with God in two parts: first, what Adam did in breaking it, and, second, what the consequences of his transgression were.
It has been suggested by various commentators that in eating of the forbidden fruit Adam cast reproach upon “God’s love, God’s truth and God’s majesty.” We have already looked at these in one form or another in considering the nature and effects of the fall, but we look at them again now in order to contrast what Adam did when he sinned and what Christ did in obedience. It is clear how Adam cast reproach on God’s love. God had created him in his own blessed image and had placed him in a garden of earthly delights. Adam had every pleasure he could desire. He had rule over the animal world. Moreover, he had valuable work to do both in ruling and in studying and cataloging the animals. He had every incentive to continue in obedience to such a loving God. Yet when Satan came with the suggestion that perhaps God was not essentially good, that he was essentially prohibitive in withholding the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that had power to make one wise, “knowing good and evil,” Adam (as well as Eve) began to doubt God’s goodness and eventually repudiated his love by eating of the forbidden fruit.
Again, Adam cast reproach on God’s truth. God had said, “You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die” (Gen. 2:17). God taught that blessing was by way of obedience. But Satan said, “You will not surely die.… For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:4–5). Adam may not have been deceived, as the woman was, thinking that he could disobey God and escape the consequences of death. But he certainly felt that he could improve his condition by rebellion. In so thinking he slanderously called the God of all truth a liar.
Third, Adam cast reproach on God’s majesty by an attempt to throw off his authority. Arthur Pink writes wisely: “As the Creator, God possesses the inherent right to issue commands, and to demand from his creatures implicit obedience. It is his prerogative to act as Law-giver, Controller, Governor, and to define the limits of his subjects’ freedom. And in Eden he exercised his prerogative and expressed his will. But Adam imagined he had a better friend than God. He regarded him as austere and despotic, as One who begrudged him that which would promote his best interests. He felt that in being denied the fruit of this tree which was pleasant to the eyes and capable of making one wise God was acting arbitrarily, cruelly, so he determined to assert himself, claim his rights and throw off the restraint of the divine government. He substitutes the Devil’s word for God’s law: he puts his own desire before Jehovah’s command.”
What were the results of Adam’s disobedience? Paul spells it out in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15, showing that sin and death entered the experience of all because of his transgression: “Sin entered the world through one man” (Rom. 5:12), “Many died by the trespass of the one man” (Rom. 5:15), “By the trespass of the one man, death reigned” (Rom. 5:17), “The result of one trespass was condemnation for all men” (Rom. 5:18), “Through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners” (Rom. 5:19), “In Adam all die” (1 Cor. 15:22). God passed judgment on all for Adam’s sin.
People have questioned why the sin of Adam should involve his posterity, even to our time. They have judged it wrong for God to hold unborn generations accountable for the sin of their first parent. But regardless of how we may choose to judge, it is evident from observation of our own lives as well as the history of those who have lived before us that this is precisely how God operated. When Adam sinned he died. He died in his relationship to God; his fellowship with God was broken, which he proved by hiding when God came looking for him in the garden. He died in respect to his own personality; he tried to shift the blame for his sin to Eve, his companion. In time, he and those who followed did things that were much worse. At last Adam died in body and returned to the dust from which he came. Each of these results of sin has passed on to us. Consequently, we see in the universal reign of death, even over infants who have not reached the point of being able to commit any personally guilty act, proof that we are all looked on by God as guilty and are judged for it.
We may recognize these things to be true and still resent them. We may consider God to be arbitrary and cruel in so acting. But before we make this judgment we must ask whether we would not choose to live in precisely the same condition in which Adam lived and fell, if the choice were offered to us (as, in fact, it may even have been offered to Adam). Would any of us have chosen to have it differently?
Charles Simeon of Cambridge, England, wrote about this more than a hundred years ago. “How deep and unsearchable are the ways of God! That ever our first parent should be constituted a federal head to his posterity, so that they should stand or fall in him, is in itself a stupendous mystery. And it may appear to have been an arbitrary appointment, injurious to the whole race of mankind. But we do not hesitate to say, that if the whole race of mankind had been created at once in precisely the same state and circumstances as Adam was, they would have been as willing to stand or fall in Adam, as to have their lot depend upon themselves; because they would have felt, that, whilst he possessed every advantage that they did, he had a strong inducement to steadfastness which they could not have felt, namely, the dependence of all his posterity upon his fidelity to God; and consequently, that their happiness would be more secure in his hands than in their own.”
Simeon then shows that if each human being were asked whether he should prefer to be judged in Adam or in himself, the thinking person would choose to be judged in Adam. For Adam faced but one temptation, and that so small as hardly to deserve the name. Besides, he was surrounded with every possible incentive to do good. We, by contrast, are beset by many temptations and certainly do not have the fullness of Adam’s incentives for obedience. None of us would fault God’s arrangements if only we could think clearly.
The Second Adam
Still, the fullness of God’s grace in dealing with Adam is not seen even in these matters. It is seen only when we turn to the person of Christ and see his victory on behalf of those who are joined to him by saving faith.
When we were studying the works of Adam, we saw how Adam terribly dishonored the love, truth, and majesty of God. How different is the case of the Lord Jesus Christ! Arthur Pink writes:
How [Jesus] vindicated the love of God! Adam harbored the wicked thought that God begrudged him that which was beneficial, and thereby questioned his goodness. But how the Lord Jesus has reversed that decision! In coming down to this earth to seek and to save that which was lost, he fully revealed the compassion of deity for humanity. In his sympathy for the afflicted, in his miracles of healing, in his tears over Jerusalem, in his unselfish and unwearied works of mercy, he has openly displayed the beneficence and benevolence of God. And what shall we say of his sufferings and death on the cross? In laying down his life for us, in dying upon the cross he unveiled the heart of the Father as nothing else could. “God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” In the light of Calvary we can never more doubt the goodness and grace of God.
How Christ vindicated the truth of God! When tempted by Satan to doubt God’s goodness, question his truth and repudiate his majesty, he answered each time, “It is written.” When he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day it was to read out of the Holy Oracles. When selecting the twelve apostles he designedly chose Judas in order that the Scriptures “might be fulfilled.” When censuring his critics, he declared that by their traditions they made void “the Word of God.” In his last moments upon the cross, knowing that all things had been accomplished, in order that the Scriptures might be fulfilled he said, “I thirst.” After he had risen from the dead and was journeying with the two disciples to Emmaus, he “expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” At every point, and in every detail of his life he honored and magnified God’s truth.
Finally, Christ completely vindicated the majesty of God. The creature had aspired to be equal with the Creator. Adam chafed against the governmental restraint which Jehovah had placed upon him. He despised God’s law, insulted his majesty, defied his authority. How different with our blessed Savior! Though he was the Lord of Glory and equal with God, yet he made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant. O matchless grace! He condescended to be “made under the law,” and during the whole of his stay here upon earth he refused to assert his rights, and was ever subject to the Father. “Not my will” was his holy cry. Nay, more: “He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” Never was God’s law so magnified, never was God’s authority so honored, never were God’s government claims so illustriously upheld, as during the thirty-three years when his own Son tabernacled among men.
What was the result of this obedience? We have already seen the results of Adam’s disobedience. It was death for himself and all who followed him. In the case of Christ, God’s judgment is reversed. Adam brought death; Christ brings life. Adam brought condemnation; Christ brings justification. And all by the same principle—the principle of representation, the one for the many! “For just as through the disobedience of the one man [Adam] the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man [Jesus] the many will be made righteous” (Rom. 5:19).
Thus it is that, far from being an example of an arbitrary injustice on the part of God, the principle of the covenant is actually a means of grace. For it is only by considering all as condemned in the first Adam that God can also consider believers to be justified in the second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ.
God’s Grace
There is one thing more. Paul compares the effects of sin and grace and concludes that the effects of grace through the obedience of Christ are far greater than those of sin through Adam: “For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!” (Rom. 5:15). How is this possible, particularly since not all are saved? How are the effects of Christ’s work greater than the inheritance from Adam? One writer suggests the following:
1. The work of Christ is superior to that of Adam in respect to time. When measured by time the effect of Adam’s disobedience is temporary so far as the redeemed are concerned, while the effect of Jesus’ victory is permanent. From the perspective of earth the reign of sin seems long. But the history of earth is but a small thing in the infinitely greater expanse of eternity, and the time is coming when we who are now far too prone to sin will be freed from it and will be made like Jesus.
2. The effect of Christ’s work is superior to Adam’s. It is true that when Adam sinned, death came to Adam and through him to all men and women. But the power of death could be broken. This Christ did. He “has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Tim. 1:10). By contrast, Christ’s work cannot be undone, for Satan has no power to reclaim those who have been redeemed by Christ. They are Christ’s forever.
3. The work of Jesus is superior to the work of Adam in that it will ultimately affect a far greater number of people. These are described as a “great assembly” (Ps. 22:25), “a great multitude that no one could count” (Rev. 7:9).
When we look about us we may well wonder how this can be true. It seems that the majority do not believe in Christ, and we even remember the words of our Lord, who said, “Wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it” (Matt. 7:13–14). It is probably the case that we just do not see the whole story. Christ’s words are undoubtedly true of adults living in this present age. But what of children? It is possible that those dying in infancy are reckoned among the elect. And what of the future reign of Christ on earth? It is possible that those born in that age may also be among the redeemed and may even be used by God to populate the universe with innumerable, godly offspring.
4. The victory of the Lord Jesus Christ is greater than the disobedience of Adam in respect to the territory affected. Adam’s sin affected only this earth. Even though men and women may spread the contagion of their disobedience more widely through planetary travel, it is impossible that they can spread it far. On the other hand, the victory of Christ is to be celebrated throughout the universe.
5. Finally, the victory of Jesus exceeds the work of Adam because Christ’s is the work of God and Adam’s is the work of a mere man. As men, we have such high opinions of ourselves that we imagine we can do just about anything. But actually we can do very little when measured by the activity of God. In salvation we can do nothing. By contrast, Christ does all that needs to be done, and what he has begun to perform he will certainly bring to completion (Phil. 1:6).
Apart from the story of the fall, little is told about Adam, as we noted earlier. But it is enough. We are told that he was created by God, placed in perfect surroundings, given a charge of obedience as representative of the race. We are told that he fell and that the effects of his fall passed on to all. We may summarize by saying that Adam was the first man and the first sinner and that we have been judged for his sin. (Lest we think too harshly of Adam, we are reminded that we would have done precisely what he did had we been in his place.) It is in Adam, way back at the beginning, that we learn the principle of the one standing for the many and see the means by which God has provided salvation through the second Adam.
Every one of us is in Adam. Some, by the grace of God, are also in Christ. Can you look to the cross of Christ and know that you are in him? You become “in him” by faith, by believing in what he has done and by committing yourself to him.
Grace Abounding
Genesis 3:15
“And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
It is common to define grace as “God’s unmerited favor” or even “God’s provision for the undeserving.” But those definitions are almost too weak. They are weak because God’s grace is shown, not merely to those who do not deserve it, but to those who deserve precisely the opposite.
There is a sense in which everything God does is gracious, because none of us deserves anything. Adam deserved nothing even before his fall. The gift of life was gracious. So was God’s gift of the garden, of a wife, of meaningful work to do. But this is not the way the Bible usually speaks of God’s grace for the simple reason that the fullness of grace is seen only against the black backdrop of sin. In Adam’s case it is seen in God’s gentle dealing with him following the fall and in the promise of a deliverer to come. Later it is seen in God’s continuing care of the people of Israel in spite of their constant wandering from him. Above all, it is seen at the cross of Christ where, in spite of the sin of man in hounding the Lord Jesus Christ to death by crucifixion, God was nevertheless providing the basis by which all who call on the name of the Lord might be saved. Grace actually means that God has provided for us in every possible way, both physically and spiritually, in spite of the condemnation we deserve.
Then, too, there is the matter of the abundant or overflowing nature of grace, which may be stated as: believers gain more through the work of Christ than they lost in Adam. A poet wrote,
Marvelous grace of our loving Lord,
Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt!
Yonder on Calvary’s mount outpoured—
There where the blood of the Lamb was spilt.
The Bible says, “Where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 5:20–21).
The Life of God
Since Genesis 3:15 is the first verse in the Bible to speak about the grace of God in this sense and since it compares the great and total triumph of Christ to the lesser and ultimately ineffective blow of Satan against both Christ and Adam, it leads us to think about some of the great verses of the Bible that amplify on Genesis 3:15 by speaking of the fullness of Christ’s victory. These verses show why grace is abundant and why we have gained more in Christ, the second Adam, than we lost in the first Adam.
The first verse is Colossians 1:27, which says, “To them [that is, the saints] God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” We know from the way Paul speaks elsewhere that he is referring here to the fact that those who have believed in Christ have been made alive in him so that the life of Christ himself may be said to be within them. In Galatians he writes, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). Or again in Romans, “The Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you” (Rom. 8:11).
This has two important consequences. First, the divine life within us is eternal. It will not die. Second, the divine life will always strive after righteousness, for that is its nature. It will abhor sin. It will cleave to the good. It is on this basis that the apostle John appeals to the presence of righteousness within the life of a Christian as proof that he or she has been born of God. “The man who says, ‘I know him,’ but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did” (1 John 2:4–6). “No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God” (1 John 3:9). John does not mean that Christians never sin. That would be untrue, and John explicitly denies this conclusion (cf. 1 John 1:8). But he does mean that the new life of Christ within any true child of God will inevitably yearn after righteousness and lead the believer in that direction day by day throughout his or her life.
This is a great improvement over the case of Adam, for the natural life of Adam (even though without any moral flaw) did not apparently so lead. On the contrary, Adam chose rebellion and death. In granting us divine life, the grace of God in Christ has abounded.
Gift of Justification
The second text is Romans 5:16, which says, “The gift of God is not like the result of the one man’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification.” This verse is from that great passage in Romans (which we have looked at in the last chapter as well as this one) in which Paul is comparing the entrance of death into the world through Adam and the entry of eternal life through the work of Christ. It is making the chief comparison: sin and grace (the gift), condemnation and justification. But how is it that the grace of God in Christ to justification is greater than the working of sin in Adam to condemnation? Paul answers that the condemnation was based on just one sin. But justification is God’s answer, not only for that one, original sin, but for all the many sins committed down through the many ages since Adam by the many multitudes of God’s people.
Justification is a legal term, referring to the work of God in dealing with the most basic of all religious questions: How can a man or woman become right with God? We are not right with him in ourselves; this is what the doctrine of sin means. Sin means that we are in rebellion against God, and if we are against God we cannot be right with him. We are transgressors. Moreover, we are all transgressors, as Paul says elsewhere: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). The doctrine of justification is the most important of all Christian doctrines because it tells how one who is in rebellion against God may become right with him. It says that we may be justified from all sin by the work of Christ alone received by faith, and not by our own works-righteousness.
Paul puts it like this: “All who believe … are justified freely by his [that is, God’s] grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:22–24); “a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law” (v. 28); “to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness” (Rom. 4:5). These verses teach that justification is God’s work and that it flows from grace. As Paul says later on in the letter to the Romans, “It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns?” (Rom. 8:33–34).
In God’s justification of the sinner there is an entirely unique factor that does not enter into any other case of justification. That unique factor is Christ’s atonement for our sin coupled to God’s provision for our need of a divine righteousness through him. In justification God declares that he has accepted the sacrifice of Christ as the payment of our debt to the divine justice and has imputed Christ’s righteousness to us in place of the sin. Because Christ’s atonement satisfied the justice of God in regard to all our sins, God’s grace clearly abounds in justification.
There is another way in which the grace of God in our justification exceeds the sinful work of Adam. When Adam fell, he fell from a position of innocence, which is a neutral position, to that of being a sinner. But the work of Christ does not merely restore us to a state of innocence but lifts us up and beyond that to make us people who know both good and evil but who choose the good. We can understand this as a scale. Imagine a scale running from plus 100 down through zero to minus 100. We may say that Adam started at zero and fell to minus 100. That is, he lost 100 points. The work of Christ may be portrayed as double that work, for he restores his people not merely to the zero point but to the plus 100, disposing of the many sins by a superabundance of righteousness.
Joint Heirs with Christ
The third text is Romans 8:17, which tells us that the redeemed are “heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ.” This is an improvement on Adam’s state, for at best Adam was merely God’s regent over an earthly paradise. We, by contrast, are to inherit all that is Christ’s and actually rule with him over creation (2 Tim. 2:12).
In law there is an important difference between being an heir and being a joint (or co-) heir. Suppose a certain man dies and leaves a $400,000 estate to his four children. If they are designated his heirs, the estate will be divided equally among them. Each will receive 25 percent or $100,000. But suppose the children are designated coheirs. In this case, the estate is not divided, and together they possess the $400,000. Each one can say, “I am worth $400,000.” In human affairs things are rarely done this way, because human beings have a hard time getting along, and children finding themselves in the position of those in our illustration would probably argue. But what does not work well in human affairs will work in divine affairs, because the coheirs of Christ will have the spirit of Christ and will always work together for the good of all.
What is our inheritance? It is all that is Christ’s. Donald Barnhouse writes,
Shall the King possess something and not share it with his bride? “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ” (Eph. 1:3). Does he have riches? Then “ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). Does he have love and fellowship with the Father? In showing forth this portion of our inheritance it would be possible to cite the whole of his great high priestly prayer in the garden on the Mount of Olives the night before he died.…
There are three verses in the New Testament, each wonderful in its own right, which, when taken together give us a startling picture of our association with our Savior Lord. It was on the Mount of Olives that he prayed, “And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was” (John 17:5). We know that he says that all his prayers are answered, but to Peter was given a special revelation concerning this particular prayer asking for glory. Speaking of the death and resurrection of our Lord, Peter writes, “Christ [was the] lamb without blemish and without spot, who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory” (1 Peter 1:19–21). Did you note those last words? God raised him from the dead and gave him glory—the glory that he had prayed for, particularly the night before he was crucified.
But what did he do with the glory which he received in the triumph of his resurrection? Go back to the Mount of Olives and listen to him pray, “And the glory which thou gavest me, I have given them” (John 17:22).
How incalculably wonderful! Partakers of his glory! Fellow-heirs with his resurrection triumphs! We are become “the fullness of him that filleth all in all” (Eph. 1:23).
Moreover, ours is an inheritance that can never depreciate in value or be lost. It is, as Peter said, “an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade—kept in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:4). We know that Adam lost his inheritance through sin. But we cannot lose our inheritance because it is given on a different basis. Adam’s inheritance was based on a covenant of works. If he remained in obedience, the inheritance would be his. If he rebelled, it would be forfeited. Our inheritance is based on the covenant of grace, and since grace is neither earned nor deserved—it is based purely on the will of the unchangeable God—our inheritance is secure and certain.
Romans 8:17 says this in other language, arguing, “If we are children, then we are heirs.” We become children by the grace of God, for we are born “not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God” (John 1:13). Since our inheritance is based on our being children and since we become children not by our own will but by the will of God, nothing can alter it. In this the grace of God in Christ also abounds over the sin of Adam.
Exceeding Great Joy
Our fourth text is the benediction that ends the Book of Jude: “To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy” (v. 24). This teaches that our joy in God, in the future and also now, is greater than the joy Adam had in God before his fall. Although Adam’s joy was great, he had nothing to compare his state of sinlessness to and therefore undoubtedly did not value it as much as the redeemed. Nor did it run the gamut of their experience. We know what it is to be lost and to be brought from that darkness into God’s marvelous light.
We see the principle illustrated even among the redeemed, for those who have been forgiven much, love much. Take the case of John Newton. Newton had been raised in a Christian home in England in his early years, but he became orphaned when he was seven and was sent to live with a non-Christian relative. There Christianity was mocked, and he was persecuted. At last, in order to escape the conditions in the home, Newton ran away to sea and became an apprentice in the British navy. Debauched and rebellious, at last he deserted and ran away to Africa. He tells in his own words that he went there for just one purpose: “that I might sin my fill.” In Africa Newton joined forces with a Portuguese slave trader in whose home he was cruelly treated. At times the slave trader went away on expeditions, and the young man was left in the charge of the slave trader’s African wife, the head of his harem. She hated all men and took her hatred out on Newton. He tells that she exercised such power in her husband’s absence that he was compelled to eat his food off the dusty floor like a dog.
At last the young Newton fled from this treatment and made his way to the coast where he lit a signal fire and was picked up by a slave ship on its way to England. The captain was disappointed that Newton had no ivory to sell, but because the young man knew something about navigation he was made a ship’s mate. He could not keep even this position. During the voyage he broke into the ship’s supply of rum and distributed it to the crew so that the crew became drunk. In a stupor Newton fell into the sea and was saved from drowning only when one of the officers speared him with a harpoon, leaving a fist-sized scar in his thigh.
Near the end of the voyage, as they were nearing Scotland, the ship on which Newton was riding encountered heavy winds. It was blown off course and began to sink. Newton was sent down into the hold with the slaves who were being transported and told to man the pumps. He was frightened to death, feeling sure that the ship would sink and he would drown. He worked the pumps for days, and as he worked he began to cry out to God from the hold of the ship. He began to remember verses he had been taught as a child. As he remembered them he was miraculously transformed. He was born again. He went on to become a great teacher of the Word of God in England. Of this storm William Cowper, the poet, wrote:
God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the sea
And rides upon the storm.
Newton himself wrote many poems, among them:
How sweet the name of Jesus sounds
In a believer’s ear!
It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,
And drives away his fear.
He wrote this classic.
Amazing grace—how sweet the sound—
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind but now I see.
’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed!
Through many dangers, toils and snares
I have already come;
’Tis grace has brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.
And when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess within the vale
A life of joy and peace.
When we’ve been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise
Than when we’ve first begun.
Newton was a great preacher of grace, and it is no wonder, for he had been lost and was found. He had been blind, but by the abounding grace of God in Christ he had come to see.[1]
15 This verse is one of the most famous cruxes of Scripture. Interpreters fall into two categories: those who see in the decree a messianic import and those who see nothing of the kind. The more conservative and traditional writers (e.g., Schaeffer, Leupold, Vos, Kidner, Aalders, and Stigers) opt for the first approach, but the bulk of authors in the critical camp (e.g., Skinner, von Rad, Speiser, Vawter, and Westermann) fail to see any promise of a Messiah in this verse and agree that far too much has been read into it. At best, according to this school, the story is an etiological myth that explains why there is hostility between mankind and the serpent world.
At least three difficult issues are involved in this verse: (1) the meaning of the verb that describes what the woman’s seed and the serpent’s seed shall do to each other; (2) the possibilities involved in the understanding of “offspring”; and (3) the identification of the “it” who is to crush the serpent’s head.
First, the question of the verb—“it will šûp̄ your head and you will šûp̄ its heel.” Presumably we should translate the verb the same way both times, there being no evidence in the Hebrew text to support divergent readings (cf. AV, RSV, NAB, NEB, Speiser). It seems unwise to translate the first šûp̄ as “crush” and the second as “strike at,” as is done in NIV and JB. For this creates the impression that the blow struck at the serpent is fatal—its head is crushed—while the blow unleashed by the serpent against the woman’s seed is painful but not lethal—it comes away with a bruised heel. Such a shift in translation is not only artificial, but it forces on the text a focus that is not there. The contrast is not only between head and heel but between it and you. Note the prominence given to these pronouns, which in the Hebrew text precede the verb for added emphasis: “as for it, it shall …,” and “as for you, you shall.…”
The precedent for translating šûp̄ in two different ways is the Vulg. rendering. While the LXX chose to translate both times with tēréō, “to watch, guard,” the Vulg. used conterero, “to crush, grind, bruise,” the first time, but shifted to insidior, “to lie in wait, to lie in ambush, to watch,” in the next phrase. This change has led a number of writers to suggest that the second šûp̄—what the serpent will do to the woman’s seed—is a by-form of šāʾap̄ I, “to gasp, pant after, long for.”
Another suggestion is to look to Akk. šápu, “to tread with the feet,” as the etymological origin of Heb. šûp̄. Hence the obvious translation would be “crush.” The problem here is that while “crush with the foot” is an appropriate designation of what a man would do to a snake, it is an inappropriate description of what a snake would do to a person’s heel.
The verb in question occurs only two more times in the OT: Job 9:17 and Ps. 139:11. Translations such as AV, RSV, and JB opt for “cover” in Ps. 139:11, with a footnote in JB that “cover” is the reading in Symmachus and Jerome, but the Hebrew is “crush.” These same versions read “crush” in Job 9:17. Dahood appeals to Arab. šāfa, “he watches, looks,” however, and translates both passages with “observe.”
In order to maintain the duplication of the Hebrew verb, whatever English equivalent one decides on must be used twice. We have already suggested a reason why “crush” would not be appropriate. strike at covers adequately the reciprocal moves of the woman’s seed and the serpent’s seed against each other rather than something like: “He shall lie in wait for your head” and “you shall lie in wait for his heel.”
We turn now to a discussion of offspring or “seed.” This divinely ordained hostility is one that takes place between the serpent’s seed and the seed of the woman. In the vast majority of cases where zeraʿ (lit., “seed”) refers to an individual child, it refers to an immediate offspring rather than a distant descendant. For example, Seth is Eve’s “other seed” (4:25); Abram laments that he is still without seed (15:3); Lot’s daughters want to bear their father’s seed (19:32, 34); Ishmael is Abraham’s seed (21:13); Onan refuses the chance to father a child for his sister-in-law Tamar (38:8–9); Samuel is Hannah’s seed (1 Sam. 1:11; 2:20); Solomon is David’s seed (2 Sam. 7:12). This observation alone should caution us about seeing too quickly a clear-cut reference here to some remote individual.
Similarly, one should not force an interpretation on her offspring that the expression cannot bear. The LXX translates Heb. zarʿāh (lit., “her seed”) as spérmatos autḗs (lit., “her seed”), and the Vulg. as semen illius (also lit., “her seed”), but to read the LXX as “her sperm” and the Vulg. as “her semen” (an oxymoron if there ever was one!) in order to see a hint here of the virgin birth of this seed (the absence of a sperm-supplying father) is farfetched indeed. If for no other reason, Gen. 4:25 would invalidate that proposal, for here Eve says that God has given her “another seed,” and certainly Seth was not born of a virgin!
Nevertheless, in a number of passages Heb. zeraʿ is a collective referring to distant offspring or a large group of descendants (Gen. 9:9; 12:7; 13:16; 15:5, 13, 18; 16:10; 17:7–10, 12; 21:12; 22:17–18). Although most modern translations use a plural for these references—“descendants”—the Hebrew itself never uses the plural. A translation like “posterity, offspring” captures the collective sense of zeraʿ more accurately. It would be difficult to prove that the word is flexible enough to denote both a group of descendants and an individual who is representative of that group. At least one is hard-pressed to find examples of this flexibility in the OT itself, except for Gen. 3:15—if one follows the zarʿāh with “he,” and this leads us to the third issue in this verse.
The question is: How should we translate the anticipatory hûʾ in “it will strike at your head”—“he” or “they” or “it”? The ancient versions offer various alternatives. Few are inclined to follow Vulg. ipsa, “she” (!). LXX has autós, “he,” even though the antecedent is spérmatos, which is neuter in Greek. One might have expected autó instead of autós. The LXX seems to have had a messianic understanding of the verse, for, as has been pointed out, the independent personal pronoun hûʾ occurs more than one hundred times, but this is the only one that the LXX translates literally with autós, although the Greek idiom would require the neuter. Nevertheless, one must decide whether the LXX should be allowed to carry so much weight here and whether it offers the correct understanding of the original intention of Gen. 3:15.
We may want to be cautious about calling this verse a messianic prophecy. At the same time we should be hesitant to surrender the time-honored expression for this verse—the protevangelium, “the first good news.” The verse is good news whether we understand zeraʿ singularly or collectively. The following words of God to the woman and the man include expressions both of divine grace and of divine judgment. Yes, there will be pain for Eve, but she is promised children. Sterility will not be one of her problems. Yes, there will be frustration for Adam because of intractable soil, but he will eat and not starve to death.
One may surmise, therefore, that God’s speech to the serpent contains both judgment and promise. Indeed, the serpent is banned and he becomes a crawler. He is under judgment. The promise is that some unspecified member(s) of the human race will one day lash out against this serpent’s seed. More than a change in the serpent’s position is involved here—it is now a question of his existence.
Would this individual, or these individuals, be among the kings of Israel and Judah who are the “offspring” of their father (2 Sam. 7:12; Ps. 89:5 [Eng. 4]), who “crush” their enemies (Ps. 89:24 [Eng. 23]) “under their feet” (2 Sam. 22:39), so that these enemies “lick the dust” (Ps. 72:9)? Later revelations will state that it is Jesus who reigns until he puts all his enemies under his feet (1 Cor. 15:25).[2]
3:15. ‘And I will put enmity between you and the woman; and between your seed and her seed; and he will crush you [on the] head, and you will crush him [on the] heel.’
The verse begins with the statement, ‘I will put / set enmity …’ The noun ‘enmity’ is emphasized because it appears as the first word in the sentence in the original Hebrew. The term ‘enmity’ obviously means that one party ‘is an enemy to’ the other. The noun form occurs five times in the Old Testament, and in each of those cases it signifies hostile intent, of such severity that it can lead to murder (see Ezek. 25:15; 35:5; Num. 35:21–22). We must understand that the new order announced in Genesis 3 includes extreme hatred, animosity and the desire for murder.
It should not be forgotten that it is God who is setting up this new order. He is in control, acting in his providence and managing history unto his own ends. History is being played out according to his desire, will and plan.
The first part of the conflict will be between the serpent (‘you’) and the woman. The serpent is mentioned first because he is the one to whom God is directly speaking.
Part of the conflict has already occurred at the beginning of Genesis 3 in which the serpent plays a major role in the fall of mankind into sin. It is interesting that Jesus equates Satan’s activity in the fall of mankind not merely with deception and lying, but also sees it as an act of murder (which ties back into the meaning of the word ‘enmity’): ‘You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar, and the father of lies’ (John 8:44).
The second stage of the conflict is between ‘your seed’ and ‘her seed’. The Hebrew term for ‘seed’ is commonly used of lineage / descent. The Septuagint normally renders the word as sperma, which reflects the idea of posterity. Thus we see:
It is critical to understand that this is not referring to physical lineage but to spiritual descent. Satan, or the serpent, cannot bear children. He is a fallen angel, and nowhere in Scripture is there any evidence that he had the power of physical reproduction (cf. Mark 12:25). It is rather a spiritual idea, in which one can be a child of Satan by will, heart and intent. Remember that Jesus said to the Pharisees that ‘You are of your father the devil …’ (John 8:44). The believer, or seed of the woman, by way of contrast says, ‘Our Father who is in heaven …’ (Matt. 6:9).
The idea of the two seeds, or seed theology, has immediate consequences in the book of Genesis. In chapter 4, Cain, who ‘was of the evil one’ (1 John 3:12), murders his brother Abel, who ‘was righteous’ (Heb. 11:4). And the basic theme of animosity and conflict can be traced throughout the history of mankind. In John’s Apocalypse, the apostle describes the animosity of the two seeds even to the end of time: ‘And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. But the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman, so that she could fly into the wilderness to her place, where she was nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the presence of the serpent. And the serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, so that he might cause her to be swept away with the flood. But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and drank up the river which the dragon poured out of his mouth. So the dragon was enraged with the woman, and went off to make war with the rest of her children [literally, ‘seed’], who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus’ (Rev. 12:13–17).
The conflict will reach its climax in a battle between two individuals. The final stage is as follows:
In this final clause, the serpent is not mentioned first but the one referred to as ‘he’ is—that is to demonstrate the latter’s primacy and pre-eminence in the conflict. In addition, it should be noted that the blow to the serpent is to the head—a mortal, deadly wound. The other combatant’s wound is merely to the heel, one that is certainly not fatal.
Application
Genesis 3:15 is Messianic. And the identity of the said descendant is clear from genealogies such as Luke 3, in which the line of Jesus is traced back to Adam and Eve—Jesus is in the direct lineage from the woman. Jesus is simply the ‘he’ of Genesis 3:15. It is significant in confirming this truth that immediately after the genealogy in Luke 3 we read how Jesus is led into battle with Satan in the wilderness temptation. It is a raging war that finds its climax at the cross, where the Messiah lands a mortal blow to the serpent. In consequence, contained in the curse on the serpent in Genesis 3 is the prophecy that God will send a Redeemer to crush the enemy. Jesus is the seed who is descended from Eve and went to do battle against Satan. The remainder of Scripture is an unfolding of the prophecy of Genesis 3:15. Redemption is promised in this one verse, and the Bible traces the development of that redemptive theme.[3]
Ver. 15 I will put enmity between thee and the woman.—The believer’s conflict with Satan:—
I. That there is a continual conflict between Satan and every believer in Jesus Christ, whom He represented in the first promise, according to the purpose and grace of Almighty God.
II. In that stern combat which the Lord of glory, God manifest in the flesh, was to wage with Satan, it was declared that the enemy should bruise the heel of the seed of the woman, and that Jesus should not get the victory unwounded. And thus it is with His spiritual offspring; as “He was, so are they in this world.” We learn, therefore, secondly, the Christian’s suffering in his conflict with the old serpent.
III. But although the conflict may be fierce, and long, and stubborn, we are not permitted to doubt on which side the victory will fall. Hence I would observe, thirdly, the assurance of triumph given in the text to the seed of the woman—the believing members of Christ. Satan will bruise their heel, but, as assuredly, they shall bruise his head. As Jesus assumed human nature, that He might avenge Himself and His people upon Satan, so shall they triumph in Christ. The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly, who are in Christ Jesus. (R. P. Buddicom, M.A.)
The first promise:—
Here, in this verse, first springs a river which flows right through the broad wilderness of Time, refreshing every generation as they pass; and will yet, beyond the boundary, make glad for ever the city of our God. In this verse the gospel of grace takes its rise. If we saw only the tiny spring we should not be able fully to estimate its importance. It is our knowledge of the kingdom in its present dimensions and its future prospects that invests with so much grandeur this first, short message, of mercy from God to man. We know the import of that message better than they who heard it first. And yet, as the negro native on the mountains near the sources of the Nile can drink and satisfy his thirst from the tiny rill that constitutes the embryo river, while he who sails on its broad bosom near the sea can do no more; so those who lived in the earliest days of grace might satisfy their souls at the narrow stream then flowing, as well as those who shall be found dwelling on the earth at the dawn of the millennial day. From the feeble stream that burst through the stony ground near the closed gate of paradise righteous Abel freely drank the water of life: the same, and no more, shall they do who shall see the knowledge of the Lord covering the earth in the latter day. God opened a spring in the desert as soon as there were thirsty souls sojourning there. Here, as we have said, the gospel springs. But this is not the beginning of mercy. Its date is more ancient; its fountain-head is higher. “God is love”: there, if you will trace mercy to its ultimate source—there Redemption springs, thence Redemption flows. One or two things of an introductory character must be at least stated, inasmuch as they are essential to the comprehension of the main lesson. And the first of these is the existence and agency of an evil spirit, the enemy of man. “Didst thou not sow good seed in thy ground?” said the surprised and grieved servants to their Master; “whence, then, hath it tares?” “An enemy hath done this,” said the Lord. Man has been damaged by the impact of evil after he came from his Maker’s hands; and the damage, now that help has been laid on the Mighty, may be removed. There is a healing for the deadly wound. The enemy, in this text and in other instances all through the Scripture, is impersonated as the serpent. Now a series of lessons directly practical.
1. There is a kind of friendship or alliance between the destroyer and his dupe. The root of the ailment lies here. If the first pair had not entered into a covenant with the wicked one, there would not have been a fall. Neither at the first nor at any subsequent period has the enemy come forward as an enemy, declaring war, and depending on the use of force. Not the power, but the wiles of the devil have we cause to dread. If either he or we should assume the attitude of adversary, our cause were won.
2. Enmity must be engendered between these two friends. The first and fundamental necessity of the case is that the friendship should be dissolved. As long as the adversary by his wiles succeeds in making it sweet, and as long as the dupe loves it, so long is the captive held. Nothing in heaven or earth can do a sinner any good until he has fallen out with his own sin!
3. God will put enmity between a man and the enemy who has enticed, and so overcome him. When created beings are involved in sin, as a law of their being they cannot break off by an effort or wish of their own. The spirit that launches once into rebellion against God, goes on helplessly in rebellion for ever, unless an almighty arm, guided by infinite love, be stretched out to arrest the fallen—the falling star. It is profitable to remember that we are helpless. It is only a cry out of the depths that will reach heaven, and bring help from One that is mighty. “Lord, save me, I perish,” is a prayer that reaches the Redeemer’s ear: it melts His heart, and moves His hand. To put enmity between a man and the devil who inhabits his heart—to change his affections, so that he shall henceforth loathe what he formerly loved, and love what he formerly loathed—this is God’s prerogative. “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.”
4. Notice now the relation which Christ our Redeemer bears to the breach of peace between a man and his Tempter. Over and above the promise that enmity will be put between the serpent and the woman, it is said in the text that enmity will be put between his seed and hers. We are guided by the Spirit of inspiration in the interpretation of this clause. We know certainly from Scripture “her seed” means first and chiefly the second Adam, the Lord from heaven. As enmity between the two friends must be generated, and as only God can efficiently kindle that enmity, so it is only through Christ the Mediator that such a breach could be made. He is Mediator between God and man, for reconciling the alienated; He is Mediator between man and Satan, for alienating the united. As His acceptance with the Father is our acceptance with the Father, when we are found in Him; so His breach with the adversary is our breach, when we are found in Him. His twofold mission is to break up one friendship and begin another.
5. The part which Christians act in the quarrel. Christ was the first-fruits in this enmity; but, afterwards they that are Christ’s. In Him the strife began; and it is continued in His members after the Head is exalted. The feud is hereditary, inextinguishable, eternal. The Church on earth is the Church militant; that is, the Church soldiering. There is another wing of the grand army, called the Church triumphant. Those who remain in the body wield the sword: those who have been admitted into heaven wave the palm and wear the crown. The real business in hand for Christians is not heaven, but holiness. The issue may be left in the Leader’s hands: the duty of the soldiers is to stand where they are placed, and strike as long as they see a foe. Until the trumpet shall sound, calling the weary to rest, our part is to fight. (W. Arnot, D.D.)
The beginning of the gospel:—
These words have been appropriately called the “Protevangelium,” the first gospel. At first sight it seems strange that these words should be considered the beginning of the gospel. The form is not that of a gospel but of a curse. It is the first curse that we meet with in reading the Bible. But think a moment. On whom, on what is it a curse? It is a curse on the great adversary of mankind. It is a curse upon evil—on sin, and death and hell. It is a curse upon our curse. You will observe, and it is well worth noticing, that there is no curse pronounced upon the man, nor upon the woman either. But can the gospel come in the form of a curse? It can—nay, it must. There are those who, shutting their eyes to the terrible fact of sin with all its dreadful consequences, as they are seen in the world, please themselves and try to please others by preaching a gospel of easy good-nature, of love and mercy and good-will to all mankind—a sort of universal salvation on the easiest terms possible, or without any terms at all. But sin and its terrible consequences are fearful facts that cannot be ignored. “Love is the fulfilling of the law,” and the end of the gospel; but hatred—hatred of sin—is the only portal to true, and pure, and holy love. When the Spirit, the Comforter, comes, what is the first thing He does? He convinces of sin (John 16:8, 9).
I. As soon as we look at it, we recognize, speaking generally, a great conflict ending is victory. Of this conflict there is a threefold presentation.
1. First, there is a personal conflict: “I will put enmity between thee and the woman.” Here it is worth while to notice that the Hebrew tense admits of a present as well as a future interpretation. So it is not only, “I will put enmity”; but, “I am putting and will put enmity between thee and the woman.” The work is begun. The unholy alliance, into which Eve had been beguiled by the Evil One, is already broken. She is already a changed woman. She is no longer on the serpent’s side. She is on the Lord’s side. There is enmity between her and the serpent.
2. After the personal comes the general conflict: “Enmity between thy seed and her seed.” What is meant by the two “seeds”? We would not have very much difficulty in guessing, but we are not left to guess-work. We are very plainly told in the later Scriptures. For example, in the eighth chapter of the Gospel of John, the Jews had been congratulating themselves on belonging to the promised seed—“We be Abraham’s seed” (verse 33). Our Saviour said, in reply: “I know that ye are Abraham’s seed; but ye seek to kill Me.” That is a strange thing for Abraham’s seed. You may be Abraham’s seed literally, but certainly not spiritually. “They answered and said unto Him: Abraham is our father. Jesus saith unto them: If ye were Abraham’s children, ye would do the works of Abraham.” Notice how distinctly He recognized the spiritual sense of the term, not the literal. “If ye were Abraham’s children ye would do the works of Abraham.” “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning. That is the reason ye seek to kill Me.” Or turn to Matthew 23:33, where, addressing the same kind of people, the Saviour says—“Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers” (i.e., ye seed of the serpents), “how can ye escape the damnation of hell?” Or take the parable of the tares (Matt. 13:38): “The good seed are the children of the kingdom. But the tares are the children of the wicked one.” Perhaps most definite of all is a passage in the 3rd chapter of the 1st Epistle of John. Read from the 8th verse: “He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.” Then follows something like a definition of the two seeds. “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one and slew his brother.” You see how plainly it is stated that the seed of the serpent are those who follow the deeds of the serpent; they are those who inherit the wickedness of their father the devil, as it is put here. And, of course, if the seed of the serpent are those who inherit the wickedness of the evil one, the seed of the woman are those that inherit the saintliness of the woman. It is as plain as anything can be, that it is the spiritual, and not the literal, seed that is meant; that character is in view, and not simple descent.
3. Not only is there a personal and a general conflict, but there is a special one. “Thee and the woman”—personal. “Thy seed and her seed”—general. “It” (or he, because the pronoun is masculine) “shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel”—special. Now, I do not say that Christ is very plainly indicated here. The time had not yet come for this. The hope of the coming personal Saviour was only gradually unfolded. But I do say that certain lines are drawn which, when produced, are found to converge on Christ, who occupies the point of sight, away on the distant horizon. Observe, further, that it is only at this point that victory comes in: “I will put enmity between thee and the woman,” only conflict there; no victory. “And between thy seed and her seed,” only enmity, no victory. But come to the point of sight, and there is not only conflict, but victory—“He shall bruise thy head.” Apart from the Captain of our Salvation, there was nothing for us but defeat. Though victory is finally assured to all the true seed of the woman, it will be His victory, made theirs by faith.
II. Let us now look at the facts in history, to which the prophecy points, and which constitute its fulfilment. In the first place, we see the development of this conflict right along from the time of its first beginning; “from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias, slain between the temple and the altar”; and from the days of the first martyr, Stephen, down to the present time, when in heathen lands converts still must seal, at times, their testimony with their blood, and when in Christian lands “those that will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer” certain kinds of persecution, and keep up a constant conflict with the powers of evil. The conflict will go on, and will not cease until the last of Satan’s captives shall be rescued from his grasp and brought as sons to glory; when there shall be the great gathering of the people around Shiloh, the Prince of Peace, the Captain of our Salvation. But of all that long conflict, the crisis, the decisive action, is that to which our attention is specially called in the prophecy—the conflict that the Lord Jesus had to wage against the powers of darkness and the machinations of evil men when He was here upon the earth. Our Saviour, having taken our place, had this warfare to fight all through His life. Have you not often asked yourself the reason of the great difference between the death of the Lord Jesus and the death of so many martyrs, who endured unheard-of tortures without flinching or uttering a cry? Had the Master less courage than the servants? Was He less able to endure suffering than Stephen, or any of the martyrs? Oh, no! It was because He had sufferings to bear that none of them had any knowledge of. He had their battle to fight as well as His own. As the Captain of their Salvation and ours, He stood in the front and thickest of the battle, and by His strong agony gained the victory for them and us. Now that He has gained the victory, that victory is secured for all the rest, who may well face death in any form bravely, now that the Captain of their Salvation has conquered all its terrors for them. It is secured for all the seed; and we have a picture of its consummation in the book of Revelation, where is celebrated in thrilling imagery the final victory of the saints of the Lord “by the blood of the Lamb.” But while victory has been secured for us, it must also be accomplished in us. There must be a conflict and a victory in every human heart. There is not only the special conflict, which the Lord Jesus so victoriously waged, and the general conflict ending so triumphantly for all the seed, but there must be a personal conflict in each individual soul. (J. M. Gibson, D.D.)
Christ the conqueror of Satan:—
The promise plainly teaches that the Deliverer would be born of a woman, and, carefully viewed, it also foreshadows the Divine method of the Redeemer’s conception and birth. So also is the doctrine of the two seeds plainly taught here—“I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed.” There was evidently to be in the world a seed of the woman on God’s side against the serpent, and a seed of the serpent that should always be upon the evil side even as it is unto this day. The church of God and the synagogue of Satan both exist.
I. The facts. The facts are four, and I call your earnest attention to them.
1. The first is, enmity was excited. Satan counted on man’s descendants being his confederates, but God would break up this covenant with hell, and raise up a seed which should war against the Satanic power. Thus we have here God’s first declaration that He will set up a rival kingdom to oppose the tyranny of sin and Satan, that He will create in the hearts of a chosen seed an enmity against evil, so that they shall fight against it, and with many a struggle and pain shall overcome the prince of darkness. The Divine Spirit has abundantly achieved this plan and purpose of the Lord, combating the fallen angel by a glorious man: making man to be Satan’s foe and conqueror.
2. Then comes the second prophecy, which has also turned into a fact, namely, the coming of the champion. The seed of the woman by promise is to champion the cause, and oppose the dragon. That seed is the Lord Jesus Christ. The conflict our glorious Lord continues in His seed. We preach Christ crucified, and every sermon shakes the gates of hell. We bring sinners to Jesus by the Spirit’s power, and every convert is a stone torn down from the wall of Satan’s mighty castle.
3. The third fact which comes out in the text, though not quite in that order, is that our Champion’s heel should be bruised. Do you need that I explain this? You know how all His life long His heel, that is, His lower part, His human nature, was perpetually being made to suffer. He carried our sicknesses and sorrows. But the bruising came mainly when both in body and in mind His whole human nature was made to agonize; when His soul was exceeding sorrowful even unto death, and His enemies pierced His hands and His feet, and He endured the shame and pain of death by crucifixion. Before the throne He looks like a lamb that has been slain, but in the power of an endless life He liveth unto God.
4. Then comes the fourth fact, namely, that while His heel was being bruised, He was to bruise the serpent’s head. By His sufferings Christ has overthrown Satan, by the heel that was bruised He has trodden upon the head which devised the bruising.
II. Let us now view our experience as it tallies with these facts. He means to save us, and how does He work to that end?
1. The first thing He does is, He comes to us in mercy, and puts enmity between us and the serpent. That is the very first work of grace. You began to hate sin, and you groaned under it as under a galling yoke; more and more it burdened you, you could not bear it, you hated the very thought of it. So it was with you: is it so now? Is there still enmity between you and the serpent? Indeed you are more and mere the sworn enemies of evil, and you willingly acknowledge it.
2. Then came the Champion, that is to say, “Christ was formed in you the hope of glory.” You heard of Him and you understood the truth about Him, and it seemed a wonderful thing that He should be your substitute and stand in your room and place and stead, and bear your sin and all its curse and punishment, and that He should give His righteousness, yea, and His very self, to you that you might be saved.
3. Next, do you recollect how you were led to see the bruising of Christ’s heel and to stand in wonder and observe what the enmity of the serpent had wrought in Him? Did you not begin to feel the bruised heel yourself? Did not sin torment you? Did not the very thought of it vex you? Did not your own heart become a plague to you? Did not Satan begin to tempt you? Did he not inject blasphemous thoughts, and urge you on to desperate measures; did he not teach you to doubt the existence of God, and the mercy of God, and the possibility of your salvation, and so on? This was his nibbling at your heel. He is at his old tricks still. He worries whom he can’t devour with a malicious joy.
4. But, brethren, do you know something of the other fact, namely, that we conquer, for the serpent’s head is broken in us? How say you? Is not the power and dominion of sin broken in you? Do you not feel that you cannot sin because you are born of God? Some sins which were masters of you once, do not trouble you now. Oftentimes the Lord also grants us to know what it is to overcome temptation, and so to break the head of the fiend. I ought to add that every time any one of us is made useful in saving souls we do as it were repeat the bruising of the serpent’s head. In all deliverances and victories you overcome, and prove the promise true—“Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shall thou trample under feet. Because he hath set his love upon Me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known My name.”
III. Let us speak awhile upon the encouragement which our text and the context yields to us; for it seems to me to abound.
1. I want you, brethren, to exercise faith in the promise and be comforted. The text evidently encouraged Adam very much. Adam acted in faith upon what God said, for we read, “And Adam called his wife’s name Eve (or Life); because she was the mother of all living” (verse 20). She was not a mother at all, but as the life was to come through her by virtue of the promised seed, Adam marks his full conviction of the truth of the promise though at the time the woman had borne no children.
2. Notice by way of further encouragement that we may regard our reception of Christ’s righteousness as an instalment of the final overthrow of the devil.
3. Next, by way of encouragement in pursuing the Christian life, I would say to young people, expect to be assailed. If you have fallen into trouble through being a Christian, be encouraged by it; do not at all regret or fear it, but rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy, for this is the constant token of the covenant.
4. Still further encouragement comes from this. Your suffering as a Christian is not brought upon you for your own sake; ye are partners with the great seed of the woman, ye are confederates with Christ. You must not think the devil cares much about you; the battle is against Christ in you. I have heard of a woman who was condemned to death in the Marian days, and before her time came to be burned a child was born to her, and she cried out in her sorrow. A wicked adversary, who stood by, said, “How will you bear to die for your religion if you make such ado?” “Ah,” she said, “Now I suffer in my own person as a woman, but then I shall not suffer, but Christ in me.” Nor were these idle words, for she bore her martyrdom with exemplary patience, and rose in her chariot of fire in holy triumph to heaven. If Christ be in you, nothing will dismay you, but you will overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil by faith.
5. Last of all, let us resist the devil always with this belief, that he has received a broken head. I am inclined to think that Luther’s way of laughing at the devil was a very good one, for he is worthy of shame and everlasting contempt. Luther once threw an inkstand at his head when he was tempting him very sorely, and though the act itself appears absurd enough, yet it was a true type of what that great Reformer was all his life long, for the books he wrote were truly a flinging of the inkstand at the head of the fiend. That is what we have to do: we are to resist him by all means. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The curse of Satan including a blessing to man:—
There are four things here intimated which are each worthy of notice—
1. The ruin of Satan’s cause was to be accomplished by one in human nature. This must have been not a little mortifying to his pride. If he must fall, and could have had his choice as to the mode, he might rather have wished to have been crushed by the immediate hand of God: for however terrible that hand might be, it would be less humiliating than to be subdued by one of a nature inferior to his own. The human nature especially appears to have become odious in his eyes. It is possible that the rejoicings of eternal wisdom over man was known in heaven, and first excited his envy; and that his attempt to ruin the human race was an act of revenge. If so, there was a peculiar fitness that from man should proceed his overthrow.
2. It was to be accomplished by the seed of the woman. This would be more humiliating still. Satan had made use of her to accomplish his purposes, and God would defeat his schemes through the same medium: and by how much he had despised and abused her, in making her the instrument of drawing her husband aside, by so much would he be mortified in being overcome by one of her descendents.
3. The victory should be obtained not only by the Messiah Himself, but by all His adherents. Now if it were mortifying for Satan to be overcome by the Messiah Himself, considered as the seed of the woman, how much more when in addition to this every individual believer shall be made to come near, and as it were set his feet upon the neck of his enemy?
4. Finally: though it should be a long war, and the cause of the serpent would often be successful, yet in the end it should be utterly ruined. The “head” is the seat of life, which the “heel” is not: by this language therefore is intimated, that the life of Christ’s cause should not be affected by any part of Satan’s opposition; but that the life of Satan’s cause should be that of Christ. (A. Fuller.)
Blessings through Messiah:—
Through the promised Messiah a great many things pertaining to the curse are not only counteracted, but become blessings. Under His glorious reign, “the earth shall yield its increase, and God, our own God, delight in blessing us.” And while its fruitfulness is withheld, it has a merciful tendency to stop the progress of sin: for if the whole earth were like the plains of Sodom in fruitfulness, which are compared to the garden of God, its inhabitants would be as Sodom and Gomorrah in wickedness. The necessity of hard labour too in obtaining a subsistence, which is the lot of the far greater part of mankind, tends more than a little, by separating men from each other, and depressing their spirits, to restrain them from the excesses of evil. All the afflictions of the present life contain in them a motive to look upwards for a better portion: and death itself is a monitor to warn them to prepare to meet their God. These are things suited to a sinful world: and where they are sanctified, as they are to believers in Christ, they become real blessings. To them they are but light afflictions, and last but for a moment; and while they do last, “work for them a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” To them, in short, death itself is introductory to everlasting life. (Ibid.)
It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.—Bruising the head of evil; or, the mission of Christianity:—
That there were two grand opposing moral forces at work in the world, “the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent,” is manifest from the following conceptions:—
1. The universal beliefs of mankind. All nations believe in two antagonistic principles.
2. The phenomena of the moral world. The thoughts, actions, and conduct of men are so radically different that they must be referred to two distinct moral forces.
3. The experience of good men.
4. The declaration of the Bible. Now in this conflict, whilst error and evil only strike at the mere “heel” of truth and goodness, truth and goodness strike right at the “head.” Look at this idea in three aspects:—
I. As a characteristic of Christianity. Evil has a “head” and its “head” is not in theories, or institutions, or outward conduct; but in the moral feelings. In the likes and dislikes, the sympathies and antipathies of the heart. Now it is against this “head” of evil, that Christianity, as a system of reform, directs its blows. It does not seek to lop off the branches from the mighty upas, but to destroy its roots. It does not strike at the mere forms of murder, adultery, and theft; but at their spirit, anger, lust, and covetousness. This its characteristic.
II. As a test of individual Christianity. Unless Christianity has bruised the very “head” of evil within us it has done nothing to the purpose.
1. It may bruise certain erroneous ideas, and yet be of no service to you.
2. It may bruise certain wrong habits, and yet be of no real service to you.
III. As a guide in propagating Christianity. The great failure of the Church in its world-reforming mission may be traced to the wrong direction of its efforts. (Homilist.)
God’s great patience, notwithstanding man’s provocations:—
Suppose a man should come into a curious artificer’s shop, and there with one blow dash in pieces such a piece of art as had cost many years’ study and pains in the contriving thereof. How could he bear with it? How would he take on to see the workmanship of his hands so rashly, so wilfully destroyed? He could not but take it ill and be much troubled thereat. Thus it is that as soon as God had set up and perfected the frame of the world, sin gave a shrewd shake to all; it unpinned the frame, and had like to have pulled all in pieces again; nay, had it not been for the promise of Christ, all this goodly frame had been reduced to its primitive nothingness again. Man by his sin had pulled down all about his ears, but God, in mercy, keeps it up; man by his sin provokes God, but God, in mercy, passeth by all affronts whatsoever. Oh, the wonderful mercy—oh, the omnipotent patience of God! (J. Spencer.)
The first promise:—
The first promise (Gen. 3:15) is like the first small spring or head of a great river, which the farther it runs the bigger it grows by the accession of more waters to it. Or like the sun in the heavens, which the higher it mounts the more bright and glorious the day still grows. (J. Flavel.)
First things:—
What delight there is to us in first things! The first primrose pushing through the clods telling of winter gone, and summer on the way: the first view of the sea in its wondrous expanse of power: the first sense of peace that came by a view of Christ as Saviour. A certain authoress who became very famous, speaks of the exquisite sense of delight she felt when she began her first literary work in the reviewing of books: the opening of the first parcel was as the “bursting of a new world” on her eyes. (H. O. Mackey.)
The gospel preached in paradise:—
The words are considerable—
1. For the person who speaketh them, the Lord God Himself, who was the first preacher of the gospel in paradise. The draught and plot was in His bosom long before, but now it cometh out of His mouth.
2. For the occasion when they were spoken. When God hath been but newly provoked and offended by sin, and man, from His creature and subject, was become His enemy and rebel, the offended God comes with a promise in His mouth. Adam could look for nothing but that God should repeat to him the whole beadroll of curses wherein he had involved himself, but God maketh known the great design of His grace. Once more, the Lord God was now cursing the serpent, and in the midst of the curses promiseth the great blessing of the Messiah. Thus doth God “in wrath remember mercy” (Hab. 3:2). Yea, man’s sentence was not yet pronounced. The Lord God had examined him (ver. 8–10), but before the doom there breaketh out a promise of mercy. Thus mercy gets the start of justice, and triumpheth and rejoiceth over it in our behalf: “Mercy rejoiceth against judgment” (James 2:13).
3. They are considerable for their matter, for they intimate a victory over Satan, and that in the nature which was foiled so lately. In the former part of the verse you have the combat; in the text the success.
(1) The conflict and combat: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed.” I shall not consider the conflict now as carried on between the two seeds, but between the two heads, Christ the Prince of life, and the devil “who hath the power of death” (Heb. 2:14). It was begun between the serpent and the woman; it is carried on between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent: but the conflict is ended by the destruction of one of the heads; the prince of death is destroyed by the Prince of life.
(2) The success and issue of the combat. Where observe—
(a) What the seed of the woman doth against the serpent, “He shall bruise thy head”;
(b) What the serpent doth against the seed of the woman, “Thou shalt bruise his heel.”
(α) There is something common to both; for the word bruise is used promiscuously both of the serpent and the seed of the woman. In this war, as usually in all others, there are wounds given on both sides; the devil bruiseth Christ, and Christ bruiseth Satan.
(β) There is a disparity of the event, “He shall bruise thy head,” and “Thou shalt bruise his heel”; where there is a plain allusion to treading upon a serpent. Wounds on the head are deadly to serpents, but wounds on the body are not so grievous or dangerous; and a serpent trod upon, seeketh to do all the mischief it can to the foot by which it is crushed. The wound given to the head is mortal, but the wound given to the heel may be healed. The seed of the woman may be cured, but Satan’s power cannot be restored. The devil cannot reach to the head, but the heel only, which is far from any vital part. (1st.) For the first clause, “It shall bruise thy head.” The seed of the woman crushed the serpent’s head, whereby is meant the overthrow and destruction of his power and works (John 12:31; 1 John 3:8). The head being bruised, strength and life is perished. (2nd.) For the other clause, “Thou shalt bruise his heel.” Where—
(1) Note the intention of the serpent, who would destroy the kingdom of the Redeemer if he could; but he can only reach the heel, not the head.
(2) The greatness of Christ’s sufferings; His heel was bruised, and He endured the painful, shameful, accursed death of the cross. Doctrine: That Jesus Christ, the seed of the woman, is at enmity with Satan, and hath entered the lists with him; and though bruised in the conflict, yet He finally overcometh him, and subverteth his kingdom.
I. That Jesus Christ is the seed of the woman. That He is one of her seed is past doubt, since He was born of the Virgin, a daughter of Eve. That He is “The seed,” the most eminent of all the stock, appeareth by the dignity of His Person, God made flesh (John 1:14; 1 Tim. 3:16). As also by His miraculous conception (Luke 1:35; Matt. 1:23). Now, if you ask what necessity there was that the conqueror should be the seed of the woman, because the flesh of Christ is the bread of life, and the food of our faith? I shall a little insist upon the conveniency and agreeableness of it.
1. That thereby He might be made under the law, which was given to the whole nature of man (Gal. 4:4).
2. That He might in the same nature suffer the penalty and curse of the law, as well as fulfil the duty of it, and so make satisfaction for our sins, which as God He could not do. He was “made sin for us” (2 Cor. 5:21), and was “made a curse for us” (Gal. 3:13; Phil. 2:8). “He became obedient to death, even the death of the cross.”
3. That in the same nature which was foiled He might conquer Satan.
4. That He might take compassion of our infirmities, having experimented them in His own person (Heb. 2:17, 18).
5. That He might take possession of heaven for us in our nature (John 14:2, 3).
6. That after He had been a sacrifice for sin, and conquered death by His resurrection, He might also triumph over the devil, and lead captivity captive, and give gifts to men in the very act of His ascension into heaven (Eph. 4:8).
II. That Christ is at enmity with Satan, and hath entered into the conflict with him.
1. We must state the enmity between Christ and His confederates, and Satan and his instruments.
(1) There is a perfect enmity between the nature of Christ and the nature of the devil.
(2) An enmity proper to His office and design. For He came “to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8); and was set up to dissolve that sin and misery which he had brought upon the world.
2. The enmity being such between the seeds, Christ sets upon His business to destroy Satan’s power and works.
(1) His power. Satan hath a twofold power over fallen man—legal and usurped.
(2) His works. There is a twofold work of Satan—the work of the devil without us, and the work of the devil within us.
III. That in this conflict His heel was wounded, bitten, or bruised by the serpent.
1. Certain it is that Christ was bruised in the enterprise; which showeth how much we should value our salvation, since it costs so dear as the precious blood of the Son of God Incarnate (1 Pet. 1:18, 19).
2. But how was He bruised by the serpent? Certainly on the one hand Christ’s sufferings were the effects of man’s sin and God’s hatred against sin and His governing justice; for it is said, “It pleased the Father to bruise Him” (Isa. 53:10). Unless it had pleased the Lord to bruise Him, Satan could never have bruised Him. On the other side, they were also the effects of the malice and rage of the devil and his instruments, who was now with the sword’s point and closing stroke with Christ, and doing the worst he could against Him. In His whole life He endured many outward troubles from Satan’s instruments; for all His life long He was a man of sorrows, wounded and bruised by Satan and his instruments (John 8:44). But the closing stroke was at last; then did the serpent most eminently bruise His heel. When Judas contrived the plot, it is said, the devil entered into him (Luke 22:3). When the high priest’s servants came to take Him, He telleth them, “This is your hour, and the power of darkness” (Luke 22:53). The power of darkness at length did prevail so far as to cause His shameful death; this was their day.
3. It was only His heel that was bruised. It could go no further; for though His bodily life was taken away, yet His head and mediatory power was not touched (Acts 2:36). Again, His bodily life was taken away but for a while. God would not leave His soul in the grave (Psa. 16:10). Once more, though Christ was bruised, yet He was not conquered. So for Christians, He may divers ways wound and afflict us in our outward interests, but the inner man is safe (2 Cor. 4:16).
IV. Though Christ’s heel was bruised in the conflict, yet it endeth in Satan’s final overthrow; for his head was crushed, which noteth the subversion of his power and kingdom. To explain this, we must consider—
1. What is the power of Satan.
2. How far Satan was destroyed by Christ. First: What is the power of Satan? It lieth in sin. And Christ destroyed him, as He “made an end of sin, and brought in everlasting righteousness, and made reconciliation for iniquities” (Dan. 9:24). Secondly: How far was Satan destroyed or his head crushed?
1. Negatively.
(1)Non ratione essentiæ, not to take away his life and being. No; there is a devil still, and shall be, even when the whole work of Christ’s redemption is finished (Rev. 20:10; Matt. 25:41). Then eternal judgment is executed on the head of the wicked state.
(2)Non ratione malitiæ, not in regard of malice; for the enmity ever continueth between the two seeds, and Satan will be doing though it be always to loss, “The devil sinneth from the beginning” (1 John 3:8).
Therefore he is not so destroyed as if he did no more desire the ruin and destruction of men. He is as malicious as ever.
2. Affirmatively, it remaineth that it is ratione potentiæ, in regard of his power. But the question returneth, How far is his power destroyed? for he still governeth the wicked, and possesseth a great part of the world. Therefore the devils are called “The rulers of the darkness of this world” (Eph. 6:12). He molesteth the godly, whether considered singly or apart, or in their communities and societies. Singly and apart he may sometimes trouble them and sorely shake them as wheat is winnowed in a sieve. “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat” (Luke 22:31). And in their communities and societies. “Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say; many a time have they afflicted me from my youth” (Psa. 129:1, 2).
Use 1. Thankfulness and praise to our Mediator.
1. Satan’s design was to dishonour God by a false representation, as if envious of man’s happiness (Gen. 3:5). And so to weaken the esteem of God’s goodness. Now in the work of our redemption God is wonderfully magnified, and represented as amiable to man; not envying our knowledge and delight, but promoting it by all means, even with great care and cost (1 John 4:8).
2. To depress the nature of man, that in innocency stood so near God. Now that the human nature, so depressed and abased by the malicious suggestions of the devil, should be so elevated and advanced, and be set up far above the angelical nature, and admitted to dwell with God in a personal union, oh! let us now cheerfully remember and celebrate this victory of Christ. Our praise now is a pledge of our everlasting triumph.
Use 2. To exhort us to make use of Christ’s help for our recovery out of the defection and apostasy of mankind. Oh! let Satan be crushed in you, and the old carnal nature destroyed.
Use 3. To show us the nature of Christ’s victory, and wherein it consisteth; not in an exemption from troubles, nor in a total exemption from sin for the present.
1. Not in an exemption from troubles. No; you must expect conflicts. Though Satan’s deadly power be taken away, our heel may be crushed.
2. It is not a total exemption from sin. Necessary vital grace is only absolutely secured; you shall receive no deadly wound to destroy your salvation.
Use 4. To animate and encourage Christ’s servants in their war against Satan’s kingdom, at home and abroad, within and without: “Not to give place to the devil” (Eph. 4:27). Christ whom we serve is more able to save than Satan is to destroy. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Man’s restoration promised:—
The promise of the recovery of mankind out of Satan’s bondage, and from under God’s curse, contains in it these principal heads, all of them expressed or implied in those few words, being so many grounds of our faith.
1. That God’s promise of grace is every way free, not solicited by Adam, and much less deserved, as being made unto him now, when he had offended God in the highest degree, and stood in enmity against Him, and therefore must needs proceed from God’s free will.
2. That it is certain and infallible, as depending, not upon man’s will, but upon God’s, who speaks not doubtfully or conditionally, but positively and peremptorily, that He will do it Himself.
3. That it shall be constant and unchangeable: the inward hatred and outward wars between Satan and the holy seed shall not cease till they end at last in Satan’s total and final ruin.
4. That it shall not extend to all the seed of the woman according to the flesh, but to some that are chosen out of her seed. For some of them shall join with Satan against their own brethren.
5. The effect of this gracious promise shall be the sanctifying of their hearts, whom God will save, manifested in the hatred of Satan and all his ways; which though they had formerly embraced, yet now they should abhor.
6. This work of sanctification shall not be wrought upon them as a statuary fashions a stone into an image; but God shall make use of their wills and affections to stir them up and to set them against Satan, as this word—enmity—necessarily implies.
7. Those affections shall not be smothered and concealed in the inward motions of the heart, but shall outwardly manifest themselves in serious endeavours for the opposing of Satan and his power, as the war here mentioned and intimated by the wounds on both sides, necessarily supposeth.
8. The work of sanctification, though it shall be infallible and unchangeable, yet shall be imperfect, as is implied in the bruises which the godly shall receive by Satan’s hand, not only by outward afflictions, but by inward temptations, which shall wound their souls by drawing them into divers sins, all implied in that phrase of bruising the heel.
9. Those wounds which they receive at Satan’s hands shall not be deadly, nor quench the life of grace, which the devil shall not be able to destroy, as is intimated in that part of the body which shall be wounded, which is the heel, far enough from any vital part.
10. The author of this work of sanctification shall not be themselves, but God by His Spirit. For it is He that shall put enmity into their hearts against Satan and his seed, as the words import.
11. This work of sanctification by the Spirit shall be established by their union with Christ their Head, with whom they shall be joined into one body, as is implied when Christ and His members are termed one seed.
12. By virtue of this union the holy seed shall have an interest in and a title to all that Christ works. For so, in effect, Christ’s victory over Satan is called their victory, when it is said the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head, that is, Christ and His members shall do it.
13. For the making way to this union and communion between Christ and His members, He shall take on Him the very nature of man, so that He shall truly and properly be called the seed of the woman. (J. White, M. A.)
Lessons:—
1. Let us mark how God proceeds in His inquiries after sin. He first traces it out step by step, tracks it in all its windings, ere He utters one word of judgment. His dealings hitherto had been with Adam, as the head of creation. Therefore He speaks first to him. Then from Adam sin is traced to the woman, then from the woman to the serpent. By this process it was brought solemnly before the conscience of the transgressors, that they might see what they had done. Even in the order of judgment, how careful to mark His sense of the different kinds of criminality! Such is a specimen of the way in which He will judge the world in righteousness!
2. Let us mark the circumstances in which the sentence was given. It was given in the hearing of our parents. It was not specially directed to them. They were but hearers. Yet the scene was designed for them. This curse on the serpent was spoken in their ears, because “it contained in it God’s purpose of grace towards them.”
(1) That God meant to save them, and not to give them up to the snares of their enemy;
(2) That they could only be saved by their enemy being destroyed;
(3) That this destruction would be attended with toil, and conflict, and wounds;
(4) That it was easy to ruin a world, but hard to save and restore.
3. Let us mark how God hated that which Satan had done. “Because thou hast done this,” are the words of awful preface to the sentence. God had no pleasure in the snare or the ruin it had wrought. His words are the expression of deep displeasure against him who had done the horrid deed, and at the deed which had been done. And let us not forget how much of that which Satan has since then been doomed to suffer, as well as of that which be shall hereafter suffer, has its origin here. His sin, by means of which he succeeded in casting man out of Eden, shall be the sin by which he himself shall be cast wholly out of earth, to deceive the nations no more.
4. In undoing the evil God begins at its source. The drying up of the stream will not do; the source must be reached. Sin was the real enemy, and love to the sinner must proceed at once against this enemy, not resting till it is utterly destroyed.
5. God shows that Satan shall not be allowed to triumph. His victory is only temporary and partial. God is taking the sinner’s side; and this is the assurance that Satan’s victory shall be reversed!
6. God Himself undertakes man’s cause. It is not, “there shall be enmity”; but “I will put” it. God Himself will now proceed to work for man. The serpent’s malice and success have but drawn forth the deeper love and more direct interposition in man’s behalf.
7. God promises a seed to the woman. All that this implied she could not know at the time. But it is evidently declared that she was not to die immediately. The salvation was to come from God, and yet it was to come through man.
8. God is to put enmity between the serpent and the woman, and between the serpent’s seed and the woman’s seed.
(1) The enmity between Satan and the Church. There can be no friendship with him, and no sympathy with his works. Thus the distinction between the Church and the world is as old as Eden; and it is not merely distinction, it is hostility.
(2) The enmity between Christ and Satan; between Him who is the representative of heaven and him who is the representative of hell; between Him who is the friend and him who is the enemy of man.
(3) The name given to the ungodly—“the seed of the serpent.” And it was this expression that Christ took up when He spoke of the “generation of vipers,” and said to the unbelieving Jews, “Ye are of your father the devil.” By birth we are the serpent’s brood, till grace transforms us, and we become the woman’s seed; then our friendship with the accursed race is for ever broken.
(4) The name of the Church—“the seed of the woman.” Yes, the seed of her who sinned, who “was in the transgression”—offspring of Eve—of her who was first in apostasy. What tender favour is thus shown to her!
(5) The name of Christ. The same as the Church’s, the “seed of the woman.” Yes, He was indeed “born of a woman”—the Son of Mary—the Son of Eve—the Son of her that had transgressed.
9. There is not only to be enmity, but conflict. That these two parties should keep aloof from each other was not enough. There must be more than this. There must be alienation and hatred; nay, there must be warfare, and that of the most desperate kind. Satan and the Church must ever be at open warfare. The world and the Church must ever be foes to each other.
1. The bruising of the heel of the woman’s seed. It is not the woman’s heel that is to be bruised, but the heel of her seed; neither is it the woman that is to bruise the serpent’s head, but her seed—“it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” It was an inferior part that was to be wounded, not a vital one. Yet still there was to be a wound. The serpent’s seed was to have a temporary triumph, and this was fulfilled when Jesus hung on the cross. Then the heel was bruised. Then Satan seemed to conquer. That was the hour and power of darkness. Then “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities.” Then that wound was given which defeated him who gave it, and began our victory.
2. The bruising of the serpent’s head. It was his most vital as well as his most honourable part that was to be bruised. An intimation this of utter defeat and ruin. He has received many a stroke. His deadly wound was given upon the cross, in that very stroke by which he bruised the heel of the woman’s seed. So that from that moment our victory was secure, But the final blow is reserved for the Lord’s second coming. Then it is that the great dragon, that old serpent, is to be bound in chains, and shut up in the abyss. (H. Bonar, D.D.)
The remedy:—
Near the manchaneel, which grows in the forests of the West Indies, and which gives forth a juice of deadly poisonous nature, grows a fig, the sap of which, if applied in time, is a remedy for the diseases produced by the manchaneel. God places the gospel of grace alongside the sentence of death. (W. Adamson.)[4]
Leviticus 4:2 — Sinning through ignorance. Centuries earlier Job was concerned about his children sinning in ignorance (Job 1:5).
Leviticus 5:3 — A “clean” person became “unclean” by touching an “unclean” person. The opposite was not true, however. The “unclean” person did not become “clean” by being touched by a “clean” person. The only exception happened 1,400 years later (Matthew 8:3)!
Mark 2:13 — I had the opportunity to travel with Jimmy DeYoung to Israel and we stayed by the sea side of Galilee.
Mark 2:17 — I’m glad that Jesus came to call me to repentance!
Psalm 36:7 — Lovingkindness – again we see the root word hesed. Discover the Word points out how this word is exemplified in Ruth 3:10: she chose to stay loyal to Naomi, an act of kindness, a choice of love. John MacArthur discusses hesed as well:
… the Hebrew word “chesed” is often translated “loving kindness”. That is the attribute of God that we want to focus on. God is possessed by an innate goodwill toward sinners, an innate kindness. God is by nature merciful, tender-hearted, compassionate. God withholds judgment. God grants benevolent favors because it is His nature. It is a reason to praise Him. It is a reason to honor Him. It is a reason to worship Him …
Proverbs 10:1 — We have moved from the introductory contrasts, to the pithy saying section. Twenty-six of the thirty-two verses in this chapter use “but” as a contrast, which is a key feature of antithetical Hebrew poetry.
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Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them, that thy profiting may appear to all. (1 Timothy 4:15)
This is, practically, a promise that, by diligent meditation and the giving up of our whole mind to our work for the Lord we shall make a progress which all can see. Not by hasty reading but by deep meditation we profit by the Word of God. Not by doing a great deal of work in a slovenly manner, but by giving our best thought to what we attempt, we shall get real profit. “In all labor there is profit” but not in fuss and hurry without true heart-energy.
If we divide ourselves between God and mammon, or Christ and self, we shall make no progress. We must give ourselves wholly to holy things, or else we shall be poor traders in heavenly business, and at our stocktaking no profit will be shown.
Am I a minister? Let me be a minister wholly and not spend my energies upon secondary concerns. What have I to do with party politics or vain amusements? Am I a Christian? Let me make my service of Jesus my occupation, my lifework, my one pursuit. We must be in-and-in with Jesus, and then out-and-out for Jesus, or else we shall make neither progress nor profit, and neither the church nor the world will feel the forceful influence which the Lord would have us exercise.
The apostle Peter was not an obvious candidate for leading the early church. He was impulsive, reckless, and vacillated between chest-beating bravado and cowardly retreat—not exactly the kind of guy you’d want to have responsible for your own well-being.
“Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.”1 Peter 2:16
When you think of “freedom,” what do you think of? Emancipation from slavery? Getting out of jail? Leaving work? Moving out of the house? Freedom is associated with all of those thoughts and more.
Today, many tend to associate freedom to mean “free to do as I please.” This concept applies to all of the categories mentioned above. A slave becomes free from his master’s commands. An ex-con can now do things without being guarded all the time. An employee is now free to relax outside of work. A young adult can abide by his or her own wishes instead of his or her parents’ wishes.
The Bible mentions the word “free” or “freedom” many times throughout the New Testament. But the Bible associates freedom with something else entirely.
Being free in Christ means a different kind of freedom. It is the freedom from being enslaved to sin.
Nonbelievers don’t have the means to be freed from their habitual sins apart from Christ. They hopelessly continue to fight and struggle without any resolution.
We have been redeemed! We are freed from the vicious sin cycle that ensnares nonbelievers. Although we may struggle in this life, our struggle is not in vain. We have eternal freedom.
We don’t have to worry about sin entangling us to the point where we cannot be delivered. We don’t have to live in hopelessness. Yes, we will still sin, but sin doesn’t have us beat. We can conquer whatever sin comes our way through Christ.
Dear Lord, please give me the ability to conquer sin in my life. Give me the strength that I need, which will give me the hope of victory. Amen.
Think about an area in life that may be enslaving you. Have a problem with lying incessantly? Negative attitude? Harsh words? Whatever it may be, honestly ask Christ to help you defeat these sins so you can be free.
The Global Deep State: A Fascist World Order Funded By The American Taxpayer The problem is not so much that taxpayers are unaware of how their hard-earned dollars are being spent. Rather, “we the people” continue to be told that we have no say in the matter. This financial tyranny persists whether it’s a Democrat or Republican at the helm. The “government of the people, by the people, for the people” has been overtaken by a shadow government—a corporatized, militarized, entrenched global bureaucracy—that is fully operational and running the country.
Dear world, we see you. We see you, and we won’t forget. The double standard and hypocrisy surrounding this war and Israel, in general, is astounding and disgraceful. Here is a partial list. The fact that anyone, in their right mind, would call for a ceasefire when Hamas proudly declares it’ll repeat October 7th over and over. …
Inspired Idiot Of The Week: American Psychological Association “Can Selecting the Most Qualified Candidate Be Unfair?” asked researchers in a recent study published by the American Psychological Association. YES: hiring the most qualified people based purely on their merit and talent is unfair. So, the next time some Inspired Idiot wails about how wonderful diversity and inclusion is… and justify their position by saying things like “studies show” and “the science says”, we can thank the American Psychological Association.
Laura Ingraham tells Biden to release tape of special counsel interview The fallout from the report by special counsel Robert Hur on Joe Biden’s decision to willfully take and keep classified government documents in unsecure locations like his private office, home and even garage continues. Hur concluded there was lots of evidence that Biden did, in fact, mishandle government documents, but he wasn’t recommending charges because a jury likely would perceive Biden as an elderly man (81) who had diminished mental capacity.
Fani Willis’ old friend strikes damning blow to the Democratic DA’s preferred narrative during misconduct hearing Not long into Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ misconduct hearing Thursday, a witness provided a damning indication that the Black Panther’s daughter and her lover may have been less than honest with the court about their potentially compromising affair. Whereas Willis would prefer Judge Scott McAfee to think her affair started in 2022, it may actually have started as early as October 2019.
Azerbaijan planning ‘full-scale war,’ Armenia warns Azerbaijan is planning a “full-scale war” against Armenia, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said Thursday, two days after a skirmish on their border left four Armenian troops dead. Tensions between the two Caucasus neighbors have remained high since Baku recaptured the Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh last September in a lightning military offensive.
X providing premium services to terrorists Despite US sanctions against terrorist organizations, Hezbollah leader leader Hassan Nasrallah, the Houthis, and other organizations have successfully paid X, to mark their accounts as verified by placing a blue check mark next to their tweets. According to a report by the “Tech Transparency Project,” 28 accounts associated with terrorist organizations and their leaders have paid X for its premium features that include the verified symbol, access to advanced options, and additional exposure.
US, Arabs ‘rushing’ plan to establish Palestinian state The Biden administration is preparing to make a major push for Palestinian statehood if a Gaza ceasefire agreement being negotiated in Cairo this week takes effect.
US carries out cyberattack on Iranian warship in Red Sea The United States conducted a cyberattack recently against an Iranian military ship in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden that had been collecting intelligence on cargo vessels, NBC News reported on Thursday, citing three US officials. The cyberattack took place a week ago as part of a government response to a drone attack by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq that killed three US service members in Jordan late last month and wounded dozens of others, the report said.
Hamas terrorist admits: Dozens of terrorists hid in Nasser Hospital Hagari revealed footage from the interrogation of a Hamas terrorist who admitted that dozens of Hamas operatives were in the hospital during the war and at least ten hostages were held there. “We don’t go into a hospital for no reason,” Hagari clarified. “In the Nasser Hospital there are about 400 uninvolved patients, and exactly for that reason the Hamas and Jihad terrorists chose to hide there after the massacre which they committed.”
Israel won’t accept Hamas ‘delusional’ hostage deal says Netanyahu Hostages-for-ceasefire negotiations can only advance when Hamas drops sweeping demands that would strengthen the terror group, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said following talks in Egypt. “Israel did not receive in Cairo any new proposal of Hamas on the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu’s office stated, reiterating that his government refuses to give in to Hamas’s “delusional” demands.
Hezbollah commander and deputy killed in IDF strike The IDF announced that it eliminated a senior commander in Hezbollah’s elite Radwan force along with a deputy in southern Lebanon on Thursday. Ali Muhammad al-Debes and his deputy Hassan Ibrahim Issa were involved in a March 2023 bombing at the Megiddo Junction that seriously injured a man and also planned many other terrorist attacks, including multiple bombings on the border with Israel.
HonestReporting Canada persuades ‘CBC’ to retract Palestinian history claim The media watchdog identified several factual falsehoods in an article by a senior writer. An article published by CBC News titled “B.C. minister under fire for comments about Middle East before creation of Israeli state” received multiple corrections following a critique from HonestReporting Canada. The reporting focused on comments by Selina Robinson, who until recently was minister of post-secondary education in British Columbia.
Five small red cows that rocked the world According to the Mishnah, the written version of the Jew’s oral teachings, the red heifer sacrifice has only been performed nine times in the history of the Jewish people to provide ashes for consecration. The ashes from the red heifer are needed to dedicate the Third Temple. The red heifer must be without a spot or a blemish (Numbers 19:1-2, 10). There is a prophecy in the Mishnah stating that when the “tenth red heifer” appears, it is a sign that the temple will be restored, and the Messiah will finally come.
‘Kfar Saba won’t be another Kfar Aza’ – Israeli leaders furious over reported US plans for Palestinian state Numerous Israeli politicians expressed outrage on Thursday after a Washington Post report suggested that U.S. officials are working on a plan for a long-term ceasefire in Gaza that would lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state, and could be presented within weeks. The American plan directly clashes with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s position, who has repeated his rejection of a Palestinian state several times in recent months.
Major wildfire in Christchurch’s Port Hills, state of emergency declared, New Zealand Fire and Emergency New Zealand reported a large vegetation fire covering about 650 ha (1 606 acres) in the Port Hills near Christchurch on February 15, 2024. A state of emergency was declared the previous day, with 130 firefighters, 11 helicopters, and heavy machinery deployed. Evacuations affected 80 properties, though no homes were lost. The blaze remains uncontained, and a public health warning was issued due to smoke.
50 homes damaged, 5 destroyed by twin tornadoes in Limassol, Cyprus Two tornadoes wreaked havoc in Limassol, Cyprus, on February 14, 2024, causing extensive damage across the city, particularly in the Germasogeia suburb. The storms tore roofs off houses, downed a building crane, and caused other significant infrastructural damage. Local officials report that the damage is massive and unprecedented, with emergency services and maintenance workers responding to the aftermath.
UK citizen army: Preparing the ‘pre-war generation’ for conflict Talk of a wider war in Europe and the potential need for mass mobilization or a “citizen army” may sound alarming. But the head of the British Army Gen Sir Patrick Sanders is not alone in issuing a national call to prepare for a major conflict on European soil.
Climate Agenda Set To Push Food Prices Even Higher, Analysts Say As inflation remains stubbornly high, farmers throughout the Western world are warning that cost increases from the net zero movement will drive food prices still higher, while simultaneously putting many smaller farmers out of business.
DISGUSTING! Burger King Launches Sandwich Advertisement Starring Porn Actor Fast food chain Burger King has launched an ad in Brazil starring a porn actor to kick off a new promotion for Whopper sandwiches. Known as “Kid ‘Bengala,” the porn actor makes a series of mischievous comparisons while delivering the attributes of the fast-food chain’s flagship product.
Biden admin submits rule to force all public schools to embrace LGBT ‘identities’ The U.S. Department of Education (DOE) under President Joe Biden has submitted to the U.S. Office of Management & Budget (OMB) its finalized Title IX rule forcing widespread recognition of LGBT “identities” on the American education system in potentially its biggest gift yet to radical gender-fluidity activists.
Tlaib ‘present,’ as House votes unanimously to condemn Hamas for rape “Rep. Tlaib isn’t content to ‘All Lives Matter’ the mass rape of Jewish women by Hamas. She has actually appropriated the atrocities perpetrated against Jews,” wrote Batya Ungar-Sargon, Newsweek’s opinion editor.
New Jersey Offers Students Cash to Promote Scandal-Plagued COVID-19 and HPV Vaccinations The “Protect me with 3+” contest, sponsored by the New Jersey Department of Health, seeks to turn naïve students into propagandists for a scandal-plagued industry that has bankrolled politicians and media for years. The program targets children in grades 5 through 12 under the guise of “raising awareness” about the “importance of adolescent immunizations.” Winners receive gift cards.
A New Zealand doctor is punished for speaking the truth about covid New Zealand’s Dr. Peter Canaday has had his medical license suspended, and dragged through a professional conduct complaint and a week-long appearance at a Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal. Why? Because he did what good doctors are meant to do: He thought, he questioned, he amassed evidence, he insisted on basic foundational principles of medicine and he brought his concerns to the public.
Two driverless cars crash into the same truck, prompting first Waymo recall The driverless car division of Google’s parent company Alphabet has issued its first ever recall for its robotaxi fleet. The recall comes after two Waymo vehicles crashed into the same truck on the same day last year, in what the company described as a “rare scenario.”
Your Carbon Footprint Will Set Your Carbon Passport The summer of 2023 has been very significant for the travel industry. By the end of July, international tourist arrivals globally reached 84% of pre-pandemic levels. In some European countries, such as France, Denmark and Ireland, tourism demand even surpassed its pre-pandemic level.
Wall Street experts have been sounding the alarm thatstocks are overvaluedand the economy remains in a precarious position — even as some investors continue to feel confident about a soft-landing.
But recession risks are very much alive, even if the economy looks resilient on the surface. The bond market has been sounding the alarm for a recession since late 2022, with the notorious 2-10 Treasury yield curve brieflyreflecting its steepest inversion since 1981.
The “full model,” another recession indicator based on a handful of economic data points, is flashing an85% chance a downturn could hit the economy this year, the highest odds of a recession seen since the Great Financial Crisis.
According to Paul Dietrich, the chief investment strategist of B. Riley Wealth Management, even amild recession could send the S&P 500 tumbling by over a third. He pointed to the recession that struck the economy in the early 2000s, where GDP dipped just 1%, though the S&P 500 cratered nearly in half as the bubble in internet stocks burst.
“Even in a mild recession, investors holding the S&P 500 index should expect to lose over a third of their retirement investments in stocks,” Dietrich wrote in a note last week.
Inflation has also disappointed economists— another factor that could help send stocks tumbling from their highs. Consumer prices came in hotter than expected in January, rising 3.1% year-over-year. Core inflation rose 3.9%, the largest jump in eight months.
Higher prices have dampened the outlook for Fed rate cuts this year, which central bankers will only consider if they’re confident inflation is returning to its 2% target.
That means investors have a good chance of being disappointed with the amount and timing of interest rate cuts, which could deliver a hefty blow to stocks. Markets are still pricing in a 32% chance rates could be cut by 100 basis-points by the end of the year, more than what the Fed has officially forecast, according to theCME FedWatch tool.
“The real problem — and one that most people hadn’t even begun to consider — is that if inflation re-accelerates and goes higher again then the Fed will be forced to resume raising rates, which would have a major impact on stock prices,” Chris Zaccarelli, CIO of Independent Advisor Alliance, wrote in a note this week.
It doesn’t help that stocks keep notching new highs, with the S&P 500 closing at another record on Thursday. Investors are in a frenzy over artificial intelligence, which has catapulted the Magnificent Seven stocks to dizzying heights in the last year.
But the market is likely being driven by investor hype more than anything, Dietrich said, meaning many stocks are probably overvalued.
“So many investors get caught up in the excitement, momentum, and enthusiasm of a stock market that is running like the Kentucky Derby,” Dietrich said in a note last week. “It is that irrational Fear Of Missing Out, or ‘FOMO,’ that fuels this behavior.”
The Magnificent Seven reflect one of the biggest “speculative orgies” the market has seen in decades, investing veteran Bill Smead told Business Insider in December. Smead said he predicts the most expensive stocks on the market eventually will see 70% of their value wiped out.
John Hussman, the Wall Street investor who called the 2000 and 2008 market downturns, also warned stocks could plunge as valuations look extreme.
“Without making forecasts, it’s fair to say that we would not be surprised by a near-term market loss on the order of 10% or more in the S&P 500, nor would we be surprised by a full-cycle market loss on the order to 50-65%, nor a US recession that the consensus seems to have ruled out,” he said in a note this month.
Those risks may be lost on some investors, who are feeling pretty optimistic that momentum in stocks can continue. 42% of investors said they felt optimistic about the stock market over the next six months, according to the AAII’s latest Investor Sentiment Survey.
“There is no good government but what is republican. [T]he true idea of a republic is ‘an empire of laws, and not of men.’” —John Adams (1776)
On this day in Patriot history in 1804, Lt. Stephen Decatur and a small band of U.S. Marines conducted a daring naval raid into Tripoli harbor. The USS Philadelphia, part of President Thomas Jefferson’s military actions against the Barbary pirates, had run aground and fallen into the hands of our adversaries. Decatur made sure it was of no use to them by burning it. That’s why the Marine Hymn contains the phrase “to the shores of Tripoli.” —Mark Alexander
The former president is under legal assault on many fronts this week, which will have big political ramifications.
Nate Jackson
The legal persecution of Donald Trump has gone wall to wall this week.
In New York, he’s facing legal peril for alleged bookkeeping violations related to hush money paid to a mistress, as well as significant economic damage for allegedly over-inflating real estate values. In Georgia, the prosecutor leading the witch hunt against him for trying to “steal” the election there is on the defensive over her own illicit relationship. And in Washington, DC, Special Counsel Jack Smith is pushing for a speedy trial against the former president also over trying to “steal” the election. That’s to say nothing of Smith’s case against Trump for the alleged mishandling of classified documents or the recent unbelievable second settlement against Trump in a defamation case.
With four indictments and 91 charges against Trump, on top of two civil trials, there’s never a dull moment.
But none of it’s political, USA Today assures us: “While Trump has long alleged that the four sets of criminal trials he faces are simply a roadblock for his reelection campaign, there is no evidence federal or state officials are targeting the former president’s White House bid.”
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! That’s some Babylon Bee-level satire right there.
We’ll dispense with a couple of the quicker updates first. Yesterday, New York Judge Juan Merchan rejected Trump’s in-person attempt to dismiss Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s preposterous case against the former president. The case will proceed to trial on March 25 as originally scheduled. Long story short, Trump allegedly had an affair with porn star Stormy Daniels and allegedly used campaign funds to pay her hush money. The George Soros-backed Bragg went through serious legal contortions to come up with 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover it up.
Bragg’s is an incredibly weak case, but that doesn’t mean he’ll lose the first-ever criminal trial against a former U.S. president. Either way, it’s not helpful to Trump’s election prospects for suburban moms to be reminded of his history with women.
As for Jack Smith’s election case, Trump’s legal team pushed to delay that trial, telling the U.S. Supreme Court this week that Smith has given “the appearance of partisanship” and that he answers to Joe Biden, who just happens to be (for the moment, anyway) Trump’s likely opponent in the 2024 election. Smith, on the other hand, says the case is one of “unparalleled gravity” and that “there is a national interest in seeing the crimes alleged in this case resolved promptly.”
Also in that case, Trump opted not to further pursue immunity for his role in the January 6 riot.
Back in New York, the sham trial over Trump’s alleged civil fraud regarding real estate values should see a ruling later today. Trump faces a fine of $370 million and the loss of his access to New York real estate, all because he falsely inflated the value of his real estate holdings. It’s a “crime” with no victim. Banks gave him loans. He repaid the loans. It would be the end of the story were it not for New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose campaign pledge was to get Trump for [insert details later]. Then there’s the partisan hack of a judge, Arthur Engoron, who had already effectively said Trump was guilty before the hearings even began. Now, like a real estate deal, it’s just haggling over the price.
However, the case that has everyone’s attention today is the one in Georgia.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis took the stand yesterday to give feisty testimony rebutting allegations that she had an improper relationship with her lead prosecutor in the case, the now-divorcing Nathan Wade. Willis is accused of hiring Wade because of the relationship, which one witness says began in 2019 — well before Willis chose him for this case in 2021 — as well as paying him a far higher rate than other attorneys and reimbursing him in cash for travel expenses. She admits to the relationship but says it began after he was chosen. “It is a lie!” she yelled yesterday from the stand while holding up documents serving as evidence of her misdeeds.
Judge Scott McAfee called a short recess for Willis to cool down, and she is not retaking the stand today as initially expected. Her self-defense was nearly as ridiculous as her RICO case against Trump and his campaign. “The case will have to be dropped,” Trump said, calling Willis “disgraced.”
According to Willis, her critics are — wait for it — racist.
If she’s removed from the case, it’s unclear whether or how it will proceed, but Trump has to like his chances after the circus Willis made of it.
So after all that, here’s the real point. Joe Biden is clearly unfit to serve another four years — the special counsel in his own classified documents case said so. Therefore, the only hope for Team Biden (or whoever replaces him on the ballot) is to make the election a referendum on Trump.
The Democrat strategy is already working given that Trump is sailing to the GOP nomination. That doesn’t mean it will continue working, especially if Biden remains on the ballot and polls continue to show Trump in the lead. Biden might be the only guy Trump could beat, but the reverse may also be true. Democrats are counting on a tidal wave of negative media coverage from multiple trials to overwhelm Trump this year.
Republicans see it as two-tiered justice, and most are rallying to the former president. Nearly 80% of Democrats don’t even want Trump on the ballot. Where will independents fall? That depends far more on what happens in the courtroom than it does on the campaign stump.
Hur to testify before Congress, Alexei Navalny dies in prison, Putin endorses Biden, and more.
Douglas Andrews, Thomas Gallatin, & Jordan Candler
Cross-Examination
Hur to testify before Congress: This should be fun. March 12 is the expected date, so it’s still a ways off. But that’s when Special Counsel Robert Hur, the man who authored the scathing critique of Joe Biden’s deeply diminished mental capacity, will testify before Congress — specifically before the House Judiciary Committee chaired by Ohio Republican Jim Jordan. It’ll be interesting to see whether Democrats treat him respectfully or adversarially, but one item of contention will no doubt be the Beau Biden flap, which isn’t quite the cheap shot that Joe Biden would have us believe it was. According to Fox News, rather than the special counsel remarking that Biden couldn’t recall the year in which his eldest son died, “Two well-placed sources familiar with the investigation said it was Biden who brought up Beau’s death in the interview — not the special counsel.” As our Nate Jackson put it last week, the emperor has no memory. Indeed, Hur called him “a sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory,” which can hardly instill confidence in the American people for their commander-in-chief and doesn’t bode well for the likelihood that Biden can serve another five years in office.
Alexei Navalny dies in prison: In a grievous blow to human decency, Russian officials announced this morning that Vladimir Putin’s most prominent critic, Alexei Navalny, has died in a penal colony north of the Arctic Circle. He leaves behind a wife, a daughter, and a son. Navalny, 47, the country’s most popular opposition leader and a real threat to Putin’s rule, was imprisoned three years ago to begin serving a decades-long sentence for a conviction that everyone understood for what it was: a purely political outrage. A lawyer-turned-politician, Navalny became a vocal critic of his country’s rampant corruption and, naturally, its tyrannical leader. For that, for taking up the most dangerous political position in the world, he was nearly poisoned to death with a military nerve agent in August 2020. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference this morning, VP Kamala Harris had this to say about Navalny’s death, news of which had broken just before she was scheduled to address the conference: “This is, of course, terrible news, which we are working to confirm. My prayers are with his family, including his wife, Yulia, who is with us today.” Indeed, Yulia Navalny spoke at the conference shortly after Harris, fighting back tears and saying, “I don’t know whether I should believe the news,” adding that she wants Putin and his allies “to know that they will be punished for what they have done with our country, with my family and with my husband. They will be brought to justice, and this day will come soon.” Navalny’s death makes the introduction to the eponymous Oscar-winning 2022 documentary “Navalny” all the more chilling. In it, director Daniel Roher presciently asks the protagonist, “You might hate this, but I really want you to think about it: If you are killed, if this does happen, what message do you leave behind to the Russian people?” Navalny’s response: “Oh, come on, Daniel. No, no way. It’s like you’re making movie for the case of my death.”
NYC cop attackers were members of a Venezuelan gang: At least two of the illegal aliens involved in the attack on two New York City police officers last month have been identified as members of a violent Venezuelan gang. Both migrants, one 19 and the other 21, have been detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Department of Homeland Security noted that the two were both illegally in the country and are part of the Tren de Aragua gang, which has been tied to a string of thefts across the city. One of the gang members had been ordered deported by a judge a year ago, yet it is not clear why ICE never picked him up. Retired U.S. marshal Robert Almonte explained that Tren de Aragua “started off as a prison gang, and they’re extremely violent in Venezuela.” He noted that the gang is infamous for human trafficking, extortion, and murder, adding, “They’re over here now, so I don’t see why they wouldn’t continue that here.” Here is just another example demonstrating why Joe Biden’s open-border policy is so dangerous.
The latest on that mysterious J6 pipe bomber: One wonders whether this case will ever be cracked, but it gets curiouser and curiouser, and the evidence keeps pointing toward an inside job. As independent journalist Julie Kelly reported earlier this week: “An individual who appeared to be part of a security team guarding the Democratic National Committee headquarters used a canine to conduct a search of a small sport utility vehicle in front of the building more than three hours before a plain-clothed Capitol Police officer discovered an alleged pipe bomb just a few feet away on January 6.” What are the odds? As we wrote last July: “The case of the DC pipe bomber is particularly interesting, given that he’s somehow avoided capture for a crime that was committed in the most heavily surveilled area of the most heavily surveilled city in the world. As political analyst Tristan Justice notes: ‘A whistleblower revealed the agency identified the car used by the prime suspect but refused to track the vehicle down. Both bombs were reportedly inoperable, according to the whistleblower.’ When Director Wray refused to talk about the oddities of this case, Kentucky Congressman Brian Massie reminded him that it’s been some 900 days since the bombs were discovered.” Again, we ask: What are the odds? And why hasn’t the FBI gotten to the bottom of it? Incidentally, Kamala Harris was at the DNC headquarters at the time, a fact she concealed to the extent that the Department of Justice falsely stated that she was at the Capitol and used that non-fact to suggest that trespassers there might have been endangering her. These people, these Trump-deranged Democrats, have neither shame nor integrity.
Democrats are the biggest threat to democracy: It has been repeated so often and incessantly that it has become a trope. Donald Trump and his supporters are a “threat to democracy,” Democrat lawmakers and their cohorts in the Leftmedia claim without even the slightest hint of self-awareness. Indeed, this messaging has so resonated with their base that nearly 80% of Democrats believe Donald Trump should not be allowed on the ballot. According to a recent Rasmussen Reports survey, 78% of Democrats “approve of states removing Trump from the 2024 ballot.” Meanwhile, “75% of Republican voters disapprove of keeping Trump off the ballot.” The core principle of a democratic system is that the voters are given freedom to choose their leaders. Seeking to disqualify a candidate based on dubious legal theories meant to cover up political disagreements, which is what the Democrats are engaged in doing with Trump, violates that core democratic principle they ironically claim to be defending. One of the primary reasons Trump has seen so much steady political support is due to this blatant anti-democratic double standard being perpetuated by Democrats.
Putin endorses Biden: In an interview with Russian state TV on Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin effectively gave his endorsement to Joe Biden. When asked who he would prefer to see win the election, Putin noted that he would work with “any U.S. leader who the American people trust,” but he hoped that leader would be Biden. Putin explained his rationale by saying he believed that Biden was “more experienced, more predictable. He’s a politician of the old formation.” When asked about the state of Biden’s clearly diminished mental fitness, Putin deflected, stating that he’s “not a doctor.” Of course, Putin would prefer Biden primarily because he is, as he noted, “more predictable.” That predictability is what makes it easier for Putin to plan out and realize his ambitions. A predictable foe is much easier to best than an unpredictable one.
Biden’s LNG halt — follow the money: Using the excuse of climate change, the Biden administration halted any new permits for liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports. The move was seemingly aimed at Texas, which has defied Joe Biden’s efforts to keep the southern border open. But there is more to the story, as halting the export of LNG serves to directly enrich certain Democrat-connected individuals who have heavily invested in green energy. These include big-time Democrat donors the Rockefeller brothers and Michael Bloomberg. Furthermore, there’s John Podesta, Biden’s climate czar, who effectively spearheaded the push for the new LNG policy. His brother, Tony Podesta, is a big lobbyist who represents foreign energy companies, and Biden’s new LNG policy is a boon for these foreign energy companies. Meanwhile, the House on Thursday passed a bill to override Biden’s LNG permit freeze, with all 215 Republicans joined by nine Democrats. Unfortunately, the Democrat-controlled Senate is not expected to take up the legislation, as it would prove to be beneficial to Republicans in an election year.
RINO Sununu embraces DEI: Aside from his palpable Trump derangement, New Hampshire’s popular governor, Chris Sununu, seems to have a lot on the ball: He’s smart, energetic, affable, and engaging. But it seems he also has a soft spot for censorship. How else to explain the decision by his administration’s Department of Information Technology — a decision ostensibly aimed at engendering inclusivity and respect — to release new guidelines for state government-run websites that ban perfectly descriptive words like “elderly” and “normal”? As The Washington Times reports: “According to a memo by Kathryn Michener, Director of User Experience, posted on the state’s internal network, the initiative encourages the use of inclusive language across digital platforms. The guidance document, titled ‘Embracing Inclusive Language,’ outlines recommendations to ensure communications are respectful and empathetic. Ms. Michener, who prefers the pronoun ‘they,’ said the push towards inclusivity is not about political correctness but about acknowledging and valuing diversity. The memo explicitly suggests the use of ‘they’ as a singular pronoun to replace gender-specific references.” Alas, what would we be without respect and empathy and without watered-down language meant to appease the Five Percent?
Headlines
Kansas City parade shooting stemmed from personal dispute (New York Post)
DC police union calls on capital city’s liberal leaders to “wake up” after shooting of three officers (Fox News)
FBI informant charged with giving false information about Hunter Biden in 2020 (Fox News)
House Republicans learn of bank account used to funnel money to Joe Biden (PJ Media)
PolitiFact has fact-checked Trump 1,000 times. Guess how many times it’s fact-checked Biden. (Townhall)
Did George Soros’s recent purchase just doom Republican radio media? (Washington Examiner)
Chicago scraps gunshot detection system accused of racial bias (The Guardian)
Biden admin wants more black veterans declared mentally disabled in the name of “equity” (Daily Wire)
Climate protesters target Constitution with red powder at National Archives (Washington Examiner)
According to new reporting from a trio of independent journalists, the Obama CIA set the table for the FBI’s phony Crossfire Hurricane investigation of Trump.
Douglas Andrews
When Barack Obama talked about “fundamentally transforming the United States of America,” he wasn’t kidding. Before he came to town, we used to have an intelligence community that focused on foreign threats. But what we have now is a deep state that will rig a presidential election and, failing that, use lawfare and disinformation to hobble the opposition party’s president for his entire term in office.
Thanks, Obama.
But the most alarming thing about all this is the awful apathy, the shoulder-shrugging acceptance of this new abnormal normal as somehow not worth the torches and pitchforks that it deserves. Again, the CIA used to restrict electoral interference to foreign countries. But now it’s interfering in American elections.
As we wrote last week, we know this because of an irregular drip of information about what journalist Jacob Siegel last year called “The Hoax of the Century,” namely the intelligence community’s illegal attack on Donald Trump and his associates under the pretense of Russian interference in the 2016 election. In fact, the whole American intelligence operation orchestrated by the soon-to-be outgoing Obama administration and its CIA director, John Brennan, was election interference.
We’ve spilled a lot of bytes on these pages about the Russia collusion hoax — about the deep state’s efforts to cast Trump’s election in 2016 as illegitimate and then hamstring his administration with an unwarranted special counsel’s investigation. Still, even with last year’s release of the damning Durham Report, there were some missing elements in this criminal scheme and an utter lack of accountability for the Obama administration officials who carried it out.
We’re still not convinced that accountability — either criminal or historical — will ever come to Obama and his henchmen, but new information unearthed by a trio of intrepid journalists does shed some new and disturbing light on the hoax. According to new reporting on Substack based on “multiple credible sources,” independent journalists Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, and Alex Gutentag say the CIA targeted 26 Trump associates for foreign spy agencies to “reverse target” and “bump” — that is, to actively contact these individuals and then manipulate them. These Trump team members thus became targets of our own intelligence community for collection and misinformation. As the intrepid trio reports:
Until now, the official story has been that the FBI’s [Crossfire Hurricane] investigation began after Australian intelligence officials told US officials that a Trump aide had boasted to an Australian diplomat that Russia had damning material about Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Until now. Remember, too, that it was the Clinton campaign that colluded with Russian agents to create the phony Steele dossier to damage Trump with all manner of salacious and utterly uncorroborated rubbish.
As Shellenberger told Jesse Waters on Fox News earlier this week, there’s also a binder of highly classified information detailing the whole operation — and those materials have gone missing. Shellenberger suggests that the deep state’s desperate search for this binder may have been what triggered the FBI’s July 2022 raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
Looking back, what we wrote shortly after that unprecedented raid now sounds spot-on: “What we’re hearing now is still speculation … but now we’re told that the feds were worried that Trump might ‘weaponize’ certain materials he’d been collecting in order to exonerate himself, perhaps during the upcoming 2024 presidential campaign.”
According to that Substack report, which was published Monday on Shellenberger’s public account, the U.S. intelligence community asked foreign spy agencies known as “The Five Eyes” (in addition to the U.S., these are Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand) to surveil those 26 Trump associates in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, which triggered the allegations that Trump’s campaign — remember Carter Page and George Papadopoulos? — had been colluding with Russia to rig the election.
Word of this massive deep state operation trickled out, which caused Obama to say on April 10, 2016, “I guarantee that there is no political influence in any investigation conducted by the Justice Department or the FBI, not just in this case, but in any case.” Uh-huh.
Obama’s CIA actors weren’t just involved in the Russia collusion hoax; they started it. Brennan asked our English-speaking allies to target Trump and his associates. These 26 would be bumped, and these interactions would be reported to the FBI as “suspicious” to then trigger an FBI counterintelligence investigation. Diabolical.
Republican House investigators led by since-retired California Congressman Devin Nunes had cracked the case, but the clock ran out on the Trump administration, which perhaps took that binder out of Langley. The Obama administration had launched a preemptive war against our republican democracy and got caught doing it. So where’s the accountability?
John Durham, for whatever reason, wasn’t looking in this direction during the years-long production of his utterly damning Durham Report. If we had to guess, we’d say this highly regarded career prosecutor on the verge of retirement simply didn’t want to look in this direction. He scratched the surface a bit with two failed prosecutions — those of Michael Sussmann and Igor Danchenko — which taught us that Washington, DC, is a scummy and hopelessly rigged town that votes nine-to-one Democrat and serves up juries to match.
Donald Trump called all this. He said the deep state was spying on him and his campaign back in 2018, and he was roundly ridiculed by the likes of former CNN talkinghead Don Lemon and others for doing so. But he was absolutely right. Was he ever. Asked about the spying allegations in October 2020, Obama smugly said: “The allegations are so absurd that even Republican-controlled committees, y’know, looking into it have dismissed them. And y’know, uh, Attorney General [Bill] Barr uh, has dismissed them. … You do not allow the politization [sic] of the criminal justice system, the intelligence system, the military. That is something that you keep out of politics.”
Uh-huh. Thanks again, Obama.
“It seems unlikely there will be anything in writing to establish John Brennan or another member of the U.S. Intelligence Community solicited assistance from the other members of Five Eyes,” writes The Federalist’s Margot Cleveland. “Nonetheless, Americans deserve to know what was in that 10-inch binder and which foreign intelligence services interfered in our 2016 election by ‘bumping’ members of the Trump campaign to craft the Russia hoax.”
Cleveland adds, “The now-known significance of that [missing CIA] binder also raises the specter that the search of Mar-a-Lago wasn’t to protect classified materials but to protect intelligence agencies — American and foreign.”
In a not-unrelated development, we learned this week that Russian strongman Vladimir Putin prefers President Joe Biden to President Donald Trump. As Hot Air’s Jazz Shaw writes: “When asked who he would prefer to see win the American election this year, Putin was careful to say that Russia would work with ‘any U.S. leader who the American people trust.’ But he first said that he would prefer Biden because he’s ‘more experienced, more predictable.’ That shouldn’t be too difficult for the public to translate.”
Here’s a less charitable translation: Biden’s a Russian stooge! So where’s the intel operation? Where’s the Crossfire Hurricane sequel?
Those are rhetorical questions. In case it wasn’t clear.
Globalists are up in arms again over the former president’s tough talk, but there’s no denying that he’s gotten results.
Brian Mark Weber
The Leftmedia is up in arms over another comment by Donald Trump. But once again, the talkingheads and partisans disguised as journalists twisted Trump’s words to fit their narrative that he’s unhinged and dangerous.
At a political rally in South Carolina this week, Trump spoke about NATO being broke when he was elected president. Then he decided that “everyone’s gonna pay” their fair share of the alliance’s bill.
He went on to reference a conversation he had with a “big country” that wasn’t doing so and asserted that if they didn’t pay up, he would encourage Russia to do “whatever the hell they want.” Instead, he said: “You got to pay. You got to pay your bills.” Those words set off a firestorm of criticism on the Left (and even on the Right) that Trump was opening the door for further Russian aggression while abandoning NATO.
Nikki Haley, hanging on by a thread in the Republican presidential primary contest and sensing an opportunity, went on the offensive against Trump. But some Republicans, including Florida Senator Marco Rubio, came to Trump’s defense by asserting that the former president “doesn’t talk like a traditional politician.” True that. Other GOP leaders sidestepped the issue.
Political spin aside, Trump was right. Some NATO members aren’t contributing fully to the defense of their own countries. But they did pay more when he was in the White House. The editors over at National Review agree that Trump was right about NATO:
The substance of his complaint — that the alliance was being shortchanged by many of its members — was fair. And his approach, reinforced by many Europeans’ growing realization that the threat from Putin could not be wished away, worked. Many more NATO members started to boost their defense spending.
President Joe Biden said that Trump’s words were “appalling and dangerous.” But David Brennan of Newsweek responded: “For all the outrage, the divisive former president has some grounds for criticism. The majority of NATO nations — 19, by the alliance’s own count in July 2023 — are still failing to spend 2 percent of GDP on their militaries, despite having agreed the target at the 2014 Wales summit.”
Here at home, Americans are growing weary of funneling billions of dollars to countries that seem to be taking advantage of us. Europeans, meanwhile, are unsettled over Trump’s comments. “The Europeans are right to be nervous,” Daniel DePetris writes at The Spectator. “But in a way, they only have themselves to blame. While Americans may not want the US to get out of NATO, they do find it objectionable that the US is doing most of the legwork in keeping Europe whole, free and at peace.”
As for the fearmongering of Trump’s critics that he’ll break up the historic NATO alliance if he’s elected again, one need only look at Trump’s term as president for perspective. The fact is that Trump didn’t withdraw the U.S. from NATO, nor did he interfere in the organization’s membership except to ask them to pony up.
“I MADE NATO STRONG,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “Even the RINOS and Radical Left Democrats admit that. When I told the 20 Countries that weren’t paying their fair share that they had to PAY UP, and said without doing that you will not have U.S. Military Protection, the money came rolling in.”
“But now,” he added, “without me there to say YOU MUST PAY, they are at it again. We are into helping Ukraine for more than 100 Billion Dollars more than NATO.”
In 2006, each country making up the NATO alliance agreed to contribute 2% of their respective GDP, but they made it very clear it was nothing more than a goal. At the time, NATO spokesman James Appathurai admitted that the allied countries were only making a commitment to pay their fair share.
“Yes, many European nations are spending more on defense,” noted our Nate Jackson back in 2022, “but only eight NATO countries spent the requisite 2% of GDP on defense in 2021. Germany refuses to commit. Italy and Belgium promise to meet the 2% threshold, but by the years 2028 and 2035, respectively.”
It must be nice to enjoy the protection of the U.S. military without having to pitch in.
We’re reminded of an old saying: The truth hurts. And maybe that’s why there’s such an uproar over Trump’s comments about NATO. Unlike Biden, Trump wasn’t afraid to call out those countries for failing to uphold their obligations.
We all know by now that Trump’s language isn’t smooth or sophisticated, but a little tough talk now and then can help get the job done.
Separating the conspiracy theories from what’s actually worth worrying about.
Emmy Griffin
Is singer/songwriter Taylor Swift a government plot? Was she an industry plant waiting to pounce on unsuspecting Republicans and foil a presidential victory in 2024? The short answer is no. If one took two seconds to really think about it, all the freakout over Swift potentially endorsing Biden again and perhaps getting her “Swifties” to vote her way is a whole lot of nothing. It’s hardly news that celebrities endorse Democrats.
What is true about Taylor Swift? She is a Democrat, a feminist, and a billionaire who famously writes all her own music and takes all her inspiration from her life experiences. They always say, Write what you know. Well, sadly for Swift, what she has experienced over and over again is what many feminists experience. Men they date fall short of their expectations or hurt them, so they then go back to saying they don’t need men or marriage or motherhood.
These feminists are unserious women who continually choose unserious men. Swift is 34, but once she’s in her 40s, she may find that all her feminist ideals only succeeded in keeping her in a continuous cycle of relationships that don’t work out. Or, like other women less famous than herself, she may find out that sacrificing marriage and family to the god of a career is an empty consolation. Money and fame don’t buy happiness.
Back to her political endorsement record. She has made very few forays into candidate endorsements, though steeped as she is in the glitterati entertainment culture, she has been an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ+ activists and other leftist culture war issues. Her first outspoken endorsement was against pro-lifer Marsha Blackburn in 2018. Blackburn went on to win her U.S. Senate seat with a sound victory in Tennessee. Swift subsequently endorsed Biden in 2020. So, her record of backing candidates is 50/50.
As for endorsing Biden in 2024, perhaps she will again. She’s a Democrat, after all, and if there’s one thing perfectly obvious about leftists, it’s that they fall in line when the voting counts. Is she going to sway many voters? Stats seem to say she’ll influence just as many anti-Biden voters as pro-Biden voters, so it’s little better than a net-zero gain. Furthermore, the group she has the most influence with, according to Newsweek, is the younger demographic that is historically less likely to vote. For example, after endorsing Biden back in 2020 and encouraging her followers to vote, she only managed to get 35,000 of her millions of followers to do so. It’s interesting that Biden staffers are all in on riling up the suspicious Republicans by trolling with the Taylor Swift conspiracy theories.
Swift has been making headlines a lot this year. She was Time magazine’s “Person of the Year,” and she started dating Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce (for which the NFL is eternally grateful, as it boosted viewership to record levels). Kelce and the Chiefs made it to the Super Bowl and, after a less-than-spectacular first half, came back to win the game. Those who have completely bought into the Swift conspiracy theory presumed that this was going to be the outcome.
After the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory, Team Biden posted this meme to social media to jovially reinforce the theory that the Swift and Kelce relationship is all a part of their plan to win reelection.
The Democrats are definitely giving themselves more credit and brains than they actually have.
The bigger question is, why are all the leftist apparatuses (media, politics, and Hollywood) pushing Taylor Swift to the forefront? There are several good political reasons to distract the country with the glitz and glamour of the life of a very famous and well-admired celebrity such as Swift.
The southern border is a disaster, and the Democrats are finally having to face the fact that they pushed too far and may have already destabilized the country (though that may have been their plan all along). Biden’s foreign policy is a disaster. The American economy is in shambles, with almost everyone except the elite struggling to stretch their dollars to pay for basics. Finally, Biden’s senility was put front and center by his own Department of Justice and a disastrous press conference last week.
Swift isn’t a CIA plant. She’s a shiny object, a political tool to distract the American public away from the political disaster that is the Biden administration.
The real question is, now that the Super Bowl is over, how can Democrats keep Swift and Kelce in the news to distract from the rest of their clown show? If the pattern for both Swift and Kelce holds, a breakup is on the horizon. Perhaps it’ll be just in time for the release of Taylor’s new album in April.
During a presidential election, the community has suddenly become a priority.
Ken Blackwell
It has been a year since the unfortunate train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, when, on the evening of February 3, 2023, a Norfolk Southern train derailed and spilled 1.6 million pounds of toxic vinyl chloride into the local community, affecting its nearly 5,000 residents. Since then, the resilient town has undergone a significant journey of recovery and reconstruction. This tragedy left a lasting impact on the community, prompting an elaborate cleanup and a reassessment of rail safety regulations and preparedness.
Now, President Joe Biden is visiting East Palestine. As you might recall, the Biden administration largely ignored East Palestine in the aftermath. But during a presidential election, the community has suddenly become a priority.
One year later, where does East Palestine go from here? Sadly, East Palestine, a staunchly pro-Donald Trump, blue-collar community, is still in bad shape. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, who was also widely criticized for not visiting East Palestine for months after the accident, only did the bare minimum of media interviews before turning his attention to more politically helpful issues. And the Biden administration has been far more focused on a blank check to support the Ukrainian war than support East Palestine.
President Biden himself, whose mental acuity seems to decline by the minute, probably thought until this week that East Palestine is near Israel.
Meanwhile, never slow to take advantage of a crisis, Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown and his union masters have used the tragic anniversary to promote heavy-handed legislation full of progressive pet priorities and handouts to left-wing special interests. Unfortunately, Ohio Senator J.D. Vance has shown rare political naivety by co-sponsoring this misguided legislation.
Meanwhile, without waiting for congressional mandates, America’s freight railroad industries moved quickly to implement safety solutions that make trains even safer than they already had been. For example, the most popular rail routes have seen hundreds of additional hot bearing detectors (HBDs), an upgrade to existing technology to monitor for potential defects in the rail. In addition, those HBDs are now utilized to enforce the new industry standard of stopping and inspecting trains when the temperature reaches 170 degrees Fahrenheit instead of previously higher limits.
In addition, the rail industry has also voluntarily worked closely with East Palestine officials to train many thousands of firefighters, paramedics, and law enforcement to ensure that all communities with rail lines have well-trained and certified rescue teams nearby.
More than 99.9% of all dangerous train cargo reaches its destination without an accident, and those few accidents have sharply declined year-over-year. Train transportation continues to be endlessly safer than transporting hazardous materials by truck, and it is the most environmentally friendly method. In comparison, more than 43,000 people die on U.S. highways each year. However, any accident is unacceptable, so the industry continues to take action.
In East Palestine, health and environmental recovery show signs of hope. One study by the University of Kentucky’s Dr. Erin Haynes showed that blood samples of East Palestine residents had no sign of the cancer-causing dioxins that were once feared to be released during the chemical fire, which backs up the Environmental Protection Agency’s reports.
Also, soil and water testing results show a significant reduction in environmental contaminants, indicating successful cleanup operations. This achievement is a testament to the effectiveness of the response teams and highlights the importance of prompt and thorough environmental assessments in such situations.
At least 176,000 tons of contaminated soil and over 44 million gallons of tainted water have been removed and are now being replaced by crews. Further testing is also underway to ensure a complete cleanup.
As East Palestine commemorates the sad anniversary of the derailment, it serves as a sobering reminder of the progress made and lessons learned. Going forward, America must make thoughtful rail-related policy decisions, guide efforts for meaningful rail safety regulations, and bolster emergency preparedness initiatives. Anything less would be a disservice to the communities that continue to bear the brunt of bureaucratic apathy and political indifference.
While the Biden administration has poorly served East Palestine, the town remains a beacon of hope and inspiration for other communities facing similar challenges. They are a reminder that, instead of rushed legislation for special interests, our communities need continuous vigilance and thoughtful improvements in rail safety, which are essential for the well-being of our nation.
“I’ve worked with many, many, many different terrorist and insurgent groups. Hamas is not a terrorist group for us, of course, as you know. It’s a political movement.” —UN official Martin Griffiths
Hot Air
“We need to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, require safe storage of guns, pass a national red flag law, enact universal background checks, and invest in proven solutions that reduce violence.” —White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre
Baghdad Bob
“This is a trip that [Biden] has been wanting to make.” —Karine Jean-Pierre regarding East Palestine, Ohio
“[Biden’s] leadership speaks fully and speaks really loudly.” —Karine Jean-Pierre
Grand Delusions
“That was a partisan report, and President Biden has been absolved in any criminal wrongdoing.” —Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) regarding Special Counsel Robert Hur
“I work very closely with President Biden. … He’s at the top of his game.” —Janet Yellen
“President Biden is absolutely fit.” —Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA)
The BIG Lies
“Because of the leadership of President Biden and Vice President Harris we have created 14.8 million jobs throughout the country. Inflation is cooling and wages are rising.” —Congressman Pete Aguilar (D-CA)
“People are better off than they were pre-pandemic.” —Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen
Village Academies
“There’s not something that we do that’s not part of our equity initiative because education is equity in this country.” —Education Secretary Miguel Cardona
For the Record
“[Biden] is more experienced, more predictable. He’s a politician of the old formation. But we will work with any U.S. leader whom the American people trust.” —Russian President Vladimir Putin
Food for Thought
“With no regard to the danger, this White House has thrown open the [border] gates to a stampede of evildoers. Almost 300 people from our Terror Watch List have already been caught. … If 19 terrorists [from 9/11] can inflict $8 trillion dollars’ worth of damage on this country, imagine what 300 could do.” —Tony Perkins
The Bottom Line
“A rational elite does not want their country to be overrun by people who inevitably will become public charges — people who will ultimately depend upon the government for assistance at every turn, whether it be for food, shelter or other necessities.” —Armstrong Williams
Political Futures
“Nearly every Republican Senator under the age of 55 voted NO on this [$85 billion] America Last [foreign aid] bill. 15 out of 17 elected since 2018 voted NO. Things are changing just not fast enough.” —Senator Eric Schmitt (R-MO)
“[Being in Congress] appeals to a certain type of person — one comfortable with being away from family, doing constant television hits, and getting into constant scrums with your mirror image on the other side. This is a House that works for Matt Gaetz and Eric Swalwell — not for the people.” —Ben Domenech
“An ABC News/Ipsos poll … showed that 86% of Americans believe Biden is too old to serve another term as president. To put that in context, by some polling data, only 80% of Americans agree that the earth is round; just 71% agree that NASA landed on the moon. Essentially, only members of Biden’s paid staff and his immediate family believe he is capable of serving another term.” —Ben Shapiro
“All Donald Trump has to do to defeat [Biden] is to shut up. And herein lies the problem. Trump’s tendency to put himself in the headlines overlaps perfectly with the media’s desire to put him front and center in the campaign, rather than Biden’s political and mental incompetence. Trump loves the rallies; he loves the lights. In reality, he’d be best off running Biden’s 2020 basement strategy, allowing Biden himself to be the issue of the election.” —Ben Shapiro
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The left and its corporate media have been having another panic about Donald Trump. This time, they’re calling Trump a would-be dictator. Whenever the left accuses the right of something, it’s almost guaranteed the left is doing that very thing. So who is really acting like a dictator right now? Joe Biden has been governing like a dictator since day one.
Believe it or not, even the New York Times said so after Biden’s first week in office when he signed a boatload of executive orders. You know it must be bad when the New York Times editorial board suggests “legislating through Congress is a better path.”
To keep their power, dictatorships must try to control the spread of ideas they find threatening.
This is not a South American-style dictatorship where political enemies are rounded up and executed. It’s a nice progressive-style dictatorship where opponents are monitored, or censored online, or get a knock on the door from an IRS agent.
You might wonder how Biden can be a dictator if he is practically senile. He can be both thanks to the administrative state. It’s a well-oiled machine. Biden is just the tip of the spear, the public face reading the teleprompter lines that he’s fed. And that’s on a good day.
It’s the left-wing activists in charge. It’s the Woodrow Wilson progressive dictatorship model. Franklin D. Roosevelt was a major fan of Wilson. He and his band of merry progressives took Wilson’s model to the next level with New Deal controls. Wilson and FDR both pulled off their dictatorships during wartime. Later, Lyndon Johnson tried to do it by declaring his own “war on poverty.”
In an ideal progressive dictatorship, you have control of Congress to rubber-stamp your ideas. In Biden’s case, he doesn’t need to pass legislation any more since he has the vast executive wing of federal government built by Wilson, FDR, LBJ, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama.
Here is a rundown of 10 ways Biden has acted as a dictator.
The eviction moratorium
Biden’s eviction moratorium in 2021 simply ignored property rights and placed undue financial hardship on small businesses. Ultimately, the Supreme Court correctly struck it down.
Unconstitutional vaccine mandates
Biden’s September 2021 executive order required vaccines for all federal workers and federal contractors, health care workers, the military, and all employers with more than 100 employees. Again, the Supreme Court struck most of it down. In his announcement, he said: “This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. … We’ve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin.”
Student loan cancellation
I bet you didn’t know that a president can just wave his magic wand and make loan debt disappear. Well, technically he can’t, but that hasn’t stopped Biden. Last summer, yet again, the Supreme Court shut down this plan as completely unconstitutional. But in true dictator style, Biden treats Supreme Court decisions as roadblocks to drive around. Just a few weeks ago, he canceled another $5 billion in student loan debt. This brings his grand cancellation total to $136 billion.
The Disinformation Governance Board
In 2022, Biden named Nina Jankowicz as the first censorship czar of the Department of Homeland Security’s Disinformation Governance Board, and she sounded perfect for the role. After all, she had called the Hunter Biden laptop story nothing more than “a Trump campaign product.” When the disinformation board was later shelved, the Washington Post blamed it on “right-wing attacks.” To keep their power, dictatorships must try to control the spread of ideas they find threatening.
Destroying American energy
During his first week in office, Biden canceled the Keystone XL Pipeline. He stopped new oil and natural gas leasing on public lands and offshore, even though a court ordered him to resume the lease sales as required by law. Then he drained our Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its lowest level since 1984. Then, since socialist dictators stick together, Biden reduced sanctions on Venezuela, allowing the country to resume pumping oil there and exporting 19% of it back to us.
An enormous land-grab
Biden claims he is “protecting” 1.5 million acres of public land so far as part of his “30 by 30” plan. He wants to protect “at least 30 percent of our lands and waters by 2030.” Biden didn’t come up with this idea on his own, of course. The Center for American Progress came up with the “30 by 30” program in a 2019 report titled “How Much Nature Should America Keep?”
John Podesta, the guy who started the Center for American Progress, is now replacing John Kerry as Biden’s climate czar. Podesta will officially just be a “coordinator” in the position. That way he won’t face confirmation by the U.S. Senate. Moreover, he won’t have to answer questions about Kerry, who refused to hand over simple information like who was on his staff, his expenses as climate czar, and what he actually worked on. It’s a great way to keep your radical climate agenda hidden from oversight.
This is how you run a modern progressive dictatorship: erasing the lines between left-wing dark money think tanks and the executive branch, sidestepping the Constitution, and avoiding Congress by working through government agencies to accomplish whatever the activists want.
The National School Boards Association letter
In 2021, the NSBA asked Biden for help and urged that parental threats be classified as “domestic terrorism.” It turns out that the NSBA coordinated with the White House and the Justice Department on the letter.
Attorney General Merrick Garland testified before Congress that the Justice Department was not using counterterrorism tools to target parents. Whistleblowers later said, however, that the Justice Department and FBI were investigating parents across the country with a “threat tag” created by the FBI’s counterterrorism division.
Targeting pro-life demonstrators
In 2022 alone, the Justice Department charged 34 people for blocking access to abortion clinics. Meanwhile, in the same period, there were 81 reported attacks on pregnancy centers and 130 attacks on Catholic churches since a draft of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision was leaked. Yet only two individuals have been charged related to thosecrimes.
When Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) questioned Garland about the disparity, the attorney general said it was because the pro-lifers committed their “crimes” during the daytime when their faces could be seen, while those who vandalized pregnancy centers and churches did so in the nighttime. Do you really buy that? As Senator Lee asked Garland, “How do you explain the disparity by reference to anything other than politicization?”
Trashing the First Amendment
Biden has been cracking down on the First Amendment by working with Big Tech platforms to censor speech on topics including COVID origins, masks, vaccines, lockdowns, the Hunter Biden laptop, climate change, mail-in voting, and election integrity. The censorship happened even when the social media companies knew the suppressed information was true.
Last year, Federal District Court Judge Terry Doughty called this case “the most massive attack against free speech in United States history.” Even after an injunction, the Biden White House is pressing on with its legal challenge, claiming the government’s free speech is being violated. The Supreme Court will hear the case this year.
In the meantime, we continue learning more about Biden’s censorship efforts, including the revelation earlier this month by U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) that the White House pressured Amazon to censor books related to COVID-19. Amazon caved and triggered a “do not promote” policy for books that were critical of vaccines.
Forcing transgenderism on schools
During Biden’s very first week in office, he signed an order declaring support for boys participating as girls in girls’ sports. In 2022, he signed an executive order expanding access to sex-change treatments for kids.
In addition, recent rule changes to Title IX will force school employees to report any improper use of a transgender person’s preferred pronouns to the Title IX coordinator for that campus. More policing of speech sounds totally constitutional.
Biden has been in the White House for three years and issued 131 executive orders so far — a little less than an average of one per week. During his first year in office alone, he issued 77 orders, almost double Obama’s first year, and 40% more than Trump’s first year.
These are dictator moves. Abusing executive power. Skipping past Congress. Ignoring the Constitution. Trampling on individual liberties. Targeting political opponents. This is how Biden delivers on his inaugural address promise to “restore the soul and to secure the future of America.”
A lot of people consider the 2024 election to be simply a rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, but that isn’t going to be the case. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has already announced that he is running as an independent, and polls have shown that a lot of Americans are willing to support him. And now there is a tremendous amount of buzz that Joe Manchin could soon join the race as the “No Labels” candidate, and if he does run he is suggesting that he would ask Mitt Romney to be his running mate. Needless to say, such a development would really shake up the race.
And while two-thirds (67 percent) of Americans say that they are generally “tired of seeing the same candidates in presidential elections and want someone new” according to a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, the problems are deeper than that and speak to the significant impediment each candidate faces.
Indeed, majorities of Americans say they would be “very” or “somewhat dissatisfied” with both Trump (58 percent) and Biden (56 percent) as the nominees, per AP-NORC Research Center polling.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the same poll shows just how unpopular both candidates are, with six in 10 (60 percent) Americans viewing Trump unfavorably, and a similar 54 percent having an unfavorable view of President Biden.
I cannot remember a time when both major party candidates were viewed so unfavorably.
So this really is a golden opportunity for someone else to jump in and try to pull off something that normally would be impossible.
For months, there has been speculation that Joe Manchin would run for president as the “No Labels” candidate. When asked about this on Thursday, he openly admitted that “everything is on the table”…
“Third party run, everything is on the table,” Manchin said in response to a question from NBC News. “Nothing’s off the table. I’m still evaluating all that. Super Tuesday [March 5] pretty much would be a deadline that tells you where you are.”
Manchin’s daughter has launched a group, Americans Together, that could be a vehicle for such preparations. The senator’s Cleveland visit was part of a new series of appearances set to include Columbus, Ohio, later Thursday. Manchin also is scheduled to address the Detroit Economic Club on Feb. 26 — the day before the Democratic presidential primary in Michigan.
To me, it sounds like he has already made his decision.
In any event, I think that he will publicly reveal what he is going to do some time in the first half of March.
If Manchin does not choose to run for some reason, it is always possible that No Labels could settle on another candidate.
But right now he is their guy, and on Thursday Manchin also told the press that if he had to pick a running mate right now it would be Mitt Romney…
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said he’d pick Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, or former Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman as potential running mates in a hypothetical third-party presidential run.
“Hypothetically, if I was picking my running mate… really, who I would ask right now is Mitt Romney,” Manchin said Thursday at the City Club of Cleveland breakfast forum.
“Maybe Rob Portman would be right there, too,” Manchin added. “Rob is a dear friend of mine. What a good man, what a good man.”
Since Manchin is a moderate Democrat, he would almost certainly pick a moderate Republican to be his running mate.
And last week Manchin and Romney actually joked that they “are a ticket”…
As for Romney, Manchin has previously joked about teaming up with him. During votes in the Senate last week, Romney said as he was walking with Manchin: “We are a ticket. There’s no question we are.”
“We are, he wants to be the not stupid party,” Manchin said.
“We’re taking a cognitive test right now, Romney added. “So we’ll let you know.”
Ultimately, I don’t think that Manchin and Romney would have a prayer of actually winning the election.
But their presence in the race could be a huge factor in determining the outcome.
Biden’s support is far softer than Trump’s support is, and so Manchin would likely take more votes away from Biden than he would from Trump.
If you doubt this, just consider the following poll results from Michigan…
Supporters of Joe Biden are more willing to break with their candidate than those backing Donald Trump when third party candidates are added to the mix in Michigan’s 2024 race, according to a new damning poll for the president.
In a hypothetical head-to-head matchup with Biden, former President Trump wins by only a margin of 2 percent – 47 percent to 45 percent.
But that gap widens to 11 percent when three other third-party candidates are considered in the general election, according to a Fox News survey of Michigan voters.
Just look at those numbers.
In the key swing state of Michigan, Trump barely has a lead in a hypothetical matchup with Biden.
But in a race with more than two candidates, it is a blowout for Trump.
This is why Democrats have been fighting so hard against everything that No Labels has been trying to do.
They are desperate to keep Manchin out of the race.
But of course there is no guarantee that Biden will even be the Democratic nominee by the time we get to November.
At this point he is really struggling both physically and mentally, and there has been a lot of speculation that he may ultimately have to be replaced.
But if such a decision comes after the Democratic National Convention, things could get really crazy for the Democrats…
While a Biden pre-convention withdrawal would make for quite a spectacle, things would really get wild if Biden were to be nominated at the convention only to subsequently die, resign or be disabled. In that scenario, party rules direct the party chair to “confer with the Democratic leadership of the … Congress and the Democratic Governors Association” and then report to the approximately 450-member Democratic National Committee, which would then choose a new nominee.
The chaos wouldn’t be confined to the Democratic Party: States would be forced to scramble to produce new ballots. Ballots for overseas military service members are shipped just a couple weeks after the late-August Democratic convention, and in-person voting kicks off on Sept. 20 in Minnesota and South Dakota.
It is going to be such a wild year.
I am convinced that it will be the most chaotic election cycle that any of us have ever seen, and I believe that it will set the stage for even greater chaos afterwards.
To me, it sounds like Manchin has already decided to run, and I think that there is a very good chance that Romney will join him on the ticket.
If that actually happens, it will be really bad news for the Democrats, because it would make a Biden defeat in November much more likely.
About the Author: Michael Snyder’s extremely controversial new book entitled “Chaos” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written seven other books that are available on Amazon.com including “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned) When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing. You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter. Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites. You can connect with Michael on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, and sharing his articles on your own social media accounts is definitely a great help. These are such troubled times, and people need hope. John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In an unexpected turn of events, Vice President Kamala Harris was removed from the top spot of “Worst Diversity Hire of All Time” after Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis opened her mouth during a televised trial about inappropriate use of funds and an alleged affair with a top prosecutor of former President Donald Trump.
“DA Willis’ perfectly executed court disaster may not have been enough to get her to top the proven record of VP Harris,” said one onlooker, “But wearing her dress backwards, what a coup de grace!”
Those close to Kamala Harris say her team is scrambling to prepare her to assume the role of President now that she is no longer the most embarrassing example of racial diversity efforts to ever live.
In a public statement released shortly after the incredible, live circus act of Fani Willis, VP Kamala Harris stated, “I am now, as have ever been, ready for the responsibilitous station imparted on me to be ready, now and forever, for the role of President of the United States, which is what presidents are called.”
At publishing time, Kamala Harris had regained First Place as “Worst Diversity Hire of All Time” after opening her mouth while on television.
By now the whole internet has heard Ben Shapiro rapping, but did you know that there are actually two more verses they cut out of the track?
A prominent Christian researcher is warning that “we are on the precipice of Christian invisibility in this nation,” as new research shows that preteens are rejecting beliefs associated with a biblical worldview.
A new report claims that federal officials need to take a closer look at a chemical that is increasingly prevalent in oat-based products.
The Environmental Working Group published research in the Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology that said 80 percent of the people tested in the group’s research tested positive for the chemical, according to the New York Post.
The study said that the chemical known as chlormequat is “an emerging contaminant with documented evidence of low-dose adverse health effects in animal studies.”
Noting that no human research has been done on the drug, the study said that in animals, the drug is linked to reduced fertility, altered fetal growth and delayed puberty.
The study is based on research from three sets of samples taken in 2017, 2018-2022 and 2023. In the 2017 test, 16 of 23 urine samples showed the presence of the chemical. The 2018-2022 tests found the chemical in 17 of 23 samples.
But in the 2023 round, the chemical was in 45 of 50 samples, for a 90 percent rate. Overall, the chemical was found in 80 percent of the tests.
The study said the chemical was “only allowed for use on ornamental plants in the U.S,” but “a 2018 decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) permitted the import of foods, primarily grains, treated with chlormequat.”
The chemical is used to decrease stem height on grains, making plants less likely to lean over, and making harvesting easier, the study said.
A news release on the website of the Environmental Working Group noted that “we detected the chemical in 92 percent of oat-based foods purchased in May 2023, including Quaker Oats and Cheerios.
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“The fact that so many people are exposed raises concerns about its potential impact on public health,” the release said.
General Mills, which makes Cheerios, and PepsiCo, which makes Quaker Oats, did not reply when the Post sought comment about the study.
The release said that the EPA has been asked to allow the chemical to be used on oats and other grains grown in the U.S.
The study’s bottom line was that it had learned enough to warrant further investigation.
“This pilot investigation into an emerging chemical exposure within the U.S. indicates that chlormequat chloride is present in the U.S. food supply, primarily in oat-based products, and is detectable in a majority of urine samples collected from nearly 100 individuals in the U.S., suggesting continuous exposure,” the study concluded.
“Additionally, trends in these data suggest that exposure levels have increased and might continue to increase in the future,” the study said.
“Given the toxicological concerns associated with chlormequat exposure in animal studies, and widespread exposure to the general population, in European countries, and now also likely in the U.S., monitoring of chlormequat in foods and people, in conjunction with epidemiological and animal studies, is urgently needed to understand the potential health harms of this agricultural chemical at environmentally relevant exposure levels, particularly during pregnancy,” the study said.
“Research about chlormequat’s effects is ongoing, and no studies have determined how much of a risk this chemical might pose. That’s where the government has a vital role to play in overseeing the future of chlormequat in the U.S.,” the group said on its website.
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