22 Really Bizarre Facts About The Most Orwellian Society On Earth | End Of The American Dream

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a truly Orwellian society where there is absolutely no freedom of speech, absolutely no freedom of religion and absolutely no freedom of the press?  You may think that the rules that you are currently living under are bad, but the country that I am about to discuss exercises total control over the population.  In this nation, you can only choose a haircut off a pre-approved list, and smiling on the wrong day can literally get you sent to a prison camp.  Unfortunately, once you are sent to a prison camp you will be worked day and night until you either starve or drop dead.

Of course the country that I am talking about is North Korea.  The following are 22 really bizarre facts about the most Orwellian society on Earth…

#1 The first “Great Leader” of North Korea, Kim Il-sung, is deeply revered in North Korea.  In fact, there are approximately 40,000 statues of Kim Il-sung scattered all throughout the nation.

#2 In North Korea, it is believed that “destroying a statue is the most hideous insult to our supreme authority and our people and is an act of war no less serious than an armed invasion”.

#3 Hanging up pictures of founder Kim Il-sung is compulsory for every household in North Korea.

#4 It is against the law for citizens of North Korea to smile on the 8th of July.  If you break this law, you can be sent to a prison camp or in some cases you could even be executed…

Everyone loves a smile. But what if there were laws on when you could do it? Sound nuts? Believe it or not, it’s against the law for North Koreans to smile on July 8, the anniversary of Kim Il-sung’s death.

If Citizens do happen to break the law for this rule, they could be sent to concentration camps or even pay with their lives. The same goes for being loud, drinking, or having a birthday party. So, whatever you do, don’t smile on July 8.

#5 After he died, the body of Kim Il-sung was embalmed and it still lies in state in Pyongyang.

#6 The same thing was done to the body of Kim Jong-il when he died…

North Korea has announced that the body of late leader Kim Jong-il will lie in state permanently at a palace in the capital, Pyongyang.

His body will be displayed at the Kumsusan Memorial Palace alongside his father, Kim Il-sung.

#7 The North Korean people were told that Kim Jong-il actually bowled a perfect game the first time he ever tried bowling…

Kim Jong Il’s mythology is no less extensive. His birth was hailed as “heaven sent” by propagandists, and state media has often touted impossible feats: He scored a perfect 300 the first time he tried bowling, and shot five holes-in-one the first time he played golf. Upon his death in 2011, the skies about the sacred mountain Paektu in North Korea allegedly glowed red.

#8 The Constitution of North Korea actually guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of the press…

Citizens are guaranteed freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, demonstration and association.

The State shall guarantee conditions for the free activity of democratic political parties and social organizations.

#9 The Constitution of North Korea also guarantees freedom of religion…

Citizens have freedom of religious beliefs. This right is granted by approving the construction of religious buildings and the holding of religious ceremonies.

#10 In 1987, North Korea began construction on the Ryugyong Hotel, which would have been the tallest hotel in the world at that time if it had been finished on schedule in 1989.  Instead, construction of the bizarre 105 story skyscraper that somewhat resembles a pyramid was suspended in 1992, and the unfinished structure was just a massive concrete shell towering over Pyongyang completely empty for the next 16 years.  Work began once again on the project in 2008, but it is still unfinished to this day…

That pointy building in the center of the capital Pyongyang is the Ryugyong Hotel, also known as “the hotel of doom.” At a height of 1,079 feet (329 meters), it is the tallest unoccupied building in the world, according to Guinness World Records. Construction on the abandoned residence began in 1987 and has stopped and started several times over three decades due to North Korea’s economic woes.

#11 One of North Korea’s greatest national treasures is the Pueblo – a U.S. naval vessel that the North Koreans captured from “the imperialist Americans” back in 1968…

USS Pueblo (AGER-2) is a Banner-class environmental research ship, placed into service during World War II, then converted to a spy ship in 1967 by the United States Navy. She gathered intelligence and oceanographic information, monitoring electronic and radio signals from North Korea. On 23 January 1968, the ship was attacked and captured by a North Korean vessel, in what became known as the “Pueblo incident”.

#12 Current leader Kim Jong-un didn’t like the rules of basketball, and so he radically changed them…

Even the country’s sports are isolated from the rest of the world. Kim Jong-un apparently didn’t like the OG way basketball was played, so decided to rewrite it. The North Korean basketball rules say that slam dunks are worth three points and field goals in the final three minutes of the game are worth eight points.

#13 Police in North Korea are often given promotions when they are able to to identify and arrest Christians…

North Korea’s secret police, the Ministry of State Security, are incentivized with promotions when they apprehend Christians and other believers.

“Those charged with Christianity often face execution or are forced to live out the rest of their lives in political prison camps,” testified Inje Hwang, an investigator with Korea Future Initiative, during a webinar hosted by USCIRF.

#14 Children in North Korea are taught that Christian missionaries suck the blood of children…

Even children are taught from a young age to be suspicious of Christianity.

“In schools, young children are taught that Christian missionaries are spies of the countries who seek opportunities to invade North Korea and they’re shown graphic images of missionaries sucking the blood of children to show how malicious they are,” said Suyeon Yoo, co-director of Korea Future Initiative. “And they are taken to state-run exhibition halls where religious adherents are presented as murderers, spies, and where Bibles are displayed as trophies taken from enemies of the state.”

#15 Christians are executed in some of the most brutal ways imaginable in North Korea.  In one case, a group of Christians was crushed to death by a steamroller…

“While Interviewee 17 was in the North Korean Army, his unit was dispatched to widen the highway between Pyongyang and the nearby port city of Nampo. They were demolishing a vacated house in Yongkang county, Yongkang district town, when in a basement between two bricks they found a Bible and a small notebook that contained 25 names, one identified as pastor, two as chon-do-sa (assistant pastors), two as elders, and 20 other names, apparently parishioners, identified by their occupations. The soldiers turned the Bible and notebook over to the local branch of Department 15 of the Korean Workers Party (KWP), but the Party officials said it was up to the military police unit, Bowisaryungbu gigwanwon, to investigate. Tracked down at their place of work through the listing of occupation in the notebook, the 25 persons were picked up without formal arrest by the military bowibu. The interviewee was not aware of any judicial procedures for those seized. In November 1996, the 25 were brought to the road construction site. Four concentric rectangular rows of spectators were assembled to watch the execution. Interviewee 17 was in the first row. The five leaders to be executed – the pastor, two assistant pastors, and two elders – were bound hand and foot and made to lie down in front of a steamroller. This steamroller was a large construction vehicle imported from Japan with a heavy, huge, and wide steel roller mounted on the front to crush and level the roadway prior to pouring concrete. The other twenty persons were held just to the side. The condemned were accused of being Kiddokyo (Protestant Christian) spies and conspiring to engage in subversive activities. Nevertheless, they were told, “If you abandon religion and serve only Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, you will not be killed.” None of the five said a word. Some of the fellow parishioners assembled to watch the execution cried, screamed out, or fainted when the skulls made a popping sound as they were crushed beneath the steamroller. Interviewee 17 thought, at the time, that these church people were crazy. He thought then that religion was an “opiate,” and it was stupid for them to give up their lives for religion. He heard from the soldiers who took away the other twenty prisoners that they were being sent to a prison camp.”

#16 It has been estimated that over 150,000 people live in six giant North Korean concentration camps…

All the fanciful and funny myths about North Korea’s dictators cover up a disturbing truth, however: Some 154,000 North Koreans live in prison camps, according to South Korean government estimates. (Other international bodies put the number at closer to 200,000). There are six camps, surrounded by electrified barbed wire. Two camps allow for some “rehabilitation” and release of prisoners, according to “Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West” (Viking, 2012). The rest are prisons for life.

#17 The conditions that prisoners must endure in North Korea are absolutely deplorable…

Extrajudicial executions, rape, forced abortions, jail without trial, torture, starvation rations that leave prisoners so hungry some turn to eating insects.

These are just some of the abuses commonplace in North Korean prisons and other detention facilities, according to former detainees whose testimony forms the basis of a new report released by a human rights watchdog this week.

#18 A song entitled “No Motherland Without You” was written specifically for Kim Jong-il, and it is one of the most popular songs in North Korea.  It is regularly sung by the North Korean military.

#19 Most Americans don’t know that the North Koreans have developed a nuclear missile that can “reach anywhere in the U.S. mainland”…

North Korea said Monday leader Kim Jong Un has vowed to develop more powerful means of attack, days after the country’s first intercontinental ballistic missile launch in more than four years.

The statement suggests North Korea might perform additional launches or even test a nuclear device soon as it pushes to modernize its arsenal and increase pressure on the Biden administration while nuclear diplomacy remains stalled. Last Thursday, the North performed its 12th round of weapons tests this year, launching the newly developed, long-range Hwasong-17, which analysts say was designed to reach anywhere in the U.S. mainland.

#20 North Korea has successfully tested an undersea drone that is reportedly similar to Russia’s Poseidon doomsday weapon…

According to KCNA, the test was personally overseen by dictator Kim Jong-un, who wanted to warn the U.S. and South Korea they are causing a “nuclear crisis” with their “intentional, persistent, and provocative war drills.”

North Korea’s state Rodong Sinmun newspaper published a photo of Kim standing next to a large torpedo, which may or may not have been the undersea drone. The article also included photos that purportedly showed the drone maneuvering underwater and then kicking up a pillar of water, depth-charge style, when its test warhead detonated.

#21 Kim Jong-un has repeatedly threatened to nuke South Korea.  Here is just one example…

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un threatened to use nuclear weapons to destroy South Korea if attacked, state media reported Friday, after South Korea’s president warned that if the North used nuclear weapons it would “face the end of its regime.”

The fiery rhetoric isn’t new, but comes at a time of tension on the Korean Peninsula and just weeks after North Korean state media released images of Kim visiting a uranium enrichment facility, which produces weapons-grade nuclear materials.

#22 Kim Jong-un has also threatened to “thoroughly annihilate” the United States…

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his military to “thoroughly annihilate” the United States and South Korea if provoked, state media reported Monday, after he vowed to boost national defense to cope with what he called an unprecedented U.S.-led confrontation.

Even knowing all this, I would love to visit North Korea someday.

But those that visit are certainly not guaranteed to get out alive.

A woman named Yeonmi Park knows what daily life in North Korea is like, because she was born there.  By the age of 13, she had literally witnessed people drop dead from starvation right in front of her eyes.  Thankfully, she was able to escape North Korea for a better life.

In 2016, Park transferred from the university that she was studying at in South Korea to Columbia University here in the United States.  Initially she was very excited to be able to study in this country, but once she started attending classes she quickly realized that “even North Korea isn’t this nuts”…

A North Korean defector said she viewed the US as country of free thought and free speech – until she went to college here.

Yeonmi Park attended Columbia University and was immediately struck by what she viewed anti-Western sentiment in the classroom and a focus on political correctness that had her thinking “even North Korea isn’t this nuts.”

It is so easy to mock North Korea, but the truth is that much of the rest of the world has been going down the same Orwellian path.

Hopefully there will be some positive changes now that a new administration is in power here in the United States.

But in most nations, basic freedoms are being eroded at a staggering rate.

Liberty is such a precious thing, and once it is lost it can be exceedingly difficult to ever get back.

Just ask the people of North Korea.

Michael’s new  book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written eight other  books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  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.  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.

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Our Civilisation Is at the Crossroads | CultureWatch

Our Civilisation Is at the Crossroads

Douglas Murray and others on the decline of the West:

That Western civilisation is at a critical juncture is undeniable. This has been warned about for quite some time now. One of my favourite quotes comes from T. S. Eliot and his 1948 book, Notes Towards the Definition of Culture. I have shared it often and am unashamed to once again do so here. He wrote:

It is against a background of Christianity that all our thought has significance. An individual European may not believe that the Christian Faith is true, and yet what he says, and makes, and does, will all spring out of his heritage of Christian culture and depend upon that culture for its meaning. Only a Christian culture could have produced a Voltaire or a Nietzsche. I do not believe that the culture of Europe could survive the complete disappearance of the Christian faith. And I am convinced of that, not merely because I am a Christian myself, but as a student of social biology. If Christianity goes, the whole of our culture goes. Then you must start painfully again, and you cannot put on a new culture ready made. You must wait for the grass to grow to feed the sheep to give the wool out of which your new coat will be made. You must pass through many centuries of barbarism. We should not live to see the new culture, nor would our great-great-great-grandchildren: and if we did, not one of us would be happy in it. To our Christian heritage we owe many things beside religious faith. Through it we trace the evolution of our arts, through it we have our conception of Roman Law which has done so much to shape the Western World, through it we have our conceptions of private and public morality. And through it we have our common standards of literature, in the literature of Greece and Rome. The Western world has its unity in this heritage, in Christianity and in the ancient civilisations of Greece, Rome, and Israel, from which owing to two thousand years of Christianity, we trace our descent.

Many in the West today are also greatly concerned about such matters. Speakers at the latest ARC (Alliance for Responsible Citizenship) conference in London would be among them. It has just concluded after 3 days of powerful and challenging talks, attended by some 4000 people.

Some of the main speakers included Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Jordan Peterson, Os Guinness, Niall Ferguson, Douglas Murray, Konstantin Kisin, Nigel Farage, Tony Abbott, Bishop Robert Barron and Bjorn Lomborg. Other panellists included John Anderson, Peta Credlin, Katy Faust, Eric Metaxas, Rod Dreher, Peter Costello and Jacob Rees-Mogg.

So it was a mix of Brits, Americans, Aussies and others, and it was a mix of Christian and non-Christian speakers. They were mostly conservative and mostly greatly concerned about the state and fate of the West. A few can be highlighted here.

Ali, the former Muslim and former atheist, and now Christian author and lecturer, spoke at the conference but also did a brief interview with Credlin, the Australian Sky News host. She warned about the dangers of multiculturalism and Western naivety about political Islam and the dangers it poses to a free and democratic West. She said this in part in her interview:

Unfortunately, the result of that for some of these immigrants, not all of them, but for some of these immigrants, was to form their own ghettos. Enter radical Islam, which is an international ideology that seeks to transform everywhere it goes and tries to take over control and power.

The philosophy of multiculturalism empowered the Islamists into isolating Muslim individuals, convincing them that the Islamist worldview is their worldview, and that that is what it is to be a Muslim, and turning them against the local populations. If you want to bring about social cohesion in a nation state, you emphasise what unites us, you don’t emphasise what divides us. And multiculturalism is about emphasizing what divides us.

Credlin also announced after the interview that Ali would become a regular contributor to her show in the weeks ahead. That is something we can look forward to.

Another speaker that I want to quote from more extensively is Douglas Murray. He spoke about the truth of Western civilisation’s decline and how we need to be involved in trying to put it back together. He looks at what Trump, Musk and DOGE are doing in the US:

There has been much whining and howling about DOGE’s attempts to not just stop government waste but actually expose it. One of its great advantages so far is you not only see a way in which a country like America might balance the budget but, in stripping away all those layers of bureaucracy, you also discover the kind of rot our societies have been willing to put up with for so long.

The administration in Washington – after USAID was found to be so rotten it had to be gotten rid of entirely – is now looking at the Department of Education. In America, as in the rest of the West, there is no greater task. In New York State, where I spend much of my time, an average spend for state school is now, per pupil, around $US35,000 a year.

For that sum, kindergarten through to 12 students finish with only about half of them attaining basic literacy and about half basic numeracy. So nobody can say money is the problem. You can keep throwing money at this problem, and you can still create more and more illiterates.

He discusses his home country of the UK:

When I returned to Britain recently, I discovered the great debate was about how to kill the elderly more efficiently. I was struck that the only argument any Labour minister could make against euthanasia coming online with the National Health Service was from an MP who said she didn’t think the NHS was capable of performing euthanasia efficiently. I mentioned at the time that this was wrong in one important respect. The NHS is a world leader in killing the elderly; it’s just they only kill the people who don’t want to die. The NHS is always said to be the envy of the world and yet no one can find a GP appointment.

Clever people can sometimes say very stupid things. And in a recent interview, Yuval Noah Harari, who wrote Sapiens, was asked if there was any book he would recommend that people could read in the present to understand the future that’s coming. He said no he couldn’t think of such a book because change was going to be so incredibly fast. That’s flat out wrong. Change has always happened. And if you want a book to guide you, how about having the book that’s guided your forebears? Now to do that, you need civilisational renewal and that includes the ability to look back.

He too looks at the issues of immigration and multiculturalism:

One response to the era of mass migration that I’ve written a great deal about has been what I’ve called the deculturation of our societies, the idea that in order to welcome people into our societies, we effectively have to pretend we’re uninteresting and unimportant places until migration makes us interesting.

Recently a friend of mine used an analogy to explain this to me. He said that, as a boy, he had the impression that ice cream was something whose base flavour was vanilla, and all other flavours were added on top of vanilla. It was only at some point in his youth, he said, that he discovered vanilla itself has a flavour, and a very complex flavour.

The West has created an extraordinarily complex and rich flavour, and we have spent recent years pretending we have no flavour, or that flavour is something that only other people bring to us. This is, of course, flat out wrong, but it’s been something we’ve now told more than one generation of young people in the West.

We’ve told them that we don’t really have anything very great, or if we do we ought not to talk about it much. I believe this is wrong because what we have in the cities of Europe and the West are the greatest civilisation the world has known.

He concludes with these words:

We have a choice either to live in the wastelands or to rebuild them. Now, there are cities in Europe – I think of Budapest and I think of many German cities – where the idea is you actually can restore beauty to the built environment, and that people do not need to wander like lost souls around the wastelands looking for meaning against buildings that tell them, “you are nothing, you do not matter”.

We have the opportunity to restore not just the built environment, but the educational environment. And when we talk about our culture we must realise that it’s not just something young people should revere, but something they can add to – to understand the conversation, the poetry of mankind. To understand that just because Mozart is great does not mean you cannot build on Mozart. That just because great buildings are great does not mean you cannot add to them.

In the age of reconstruction, I would urge that our greatest task is not just to break through with innovation but to reclaim what is ours. To say that we love it, and that if people wish to join us in the veneration of this civilisation, they are very, very welcome to do so. If they don’t wish to join us, there are other places they can be.

Everybody who reveres TS Eliot reveres him in part because he told us and tells us still that a civilisation can be reclaimed even at the 11th hour. But I would say there is another possibility, which is that civilisation can also be reclaimed even at the 13th hour, in the most inauspicious circumstances.

As far as I know, Murray, as with a number of other speakers at ARC, is not a Christian. Two things can be said about this. One, I pray daily for Murray and folks like him, be it Peterson or Naomi Wolf or Musk or Farage or Trump. You should join me in such prayers.

Two, even as a non-Christian, many of these individuals have so much of importance to share. I have quoted Murray often before and will do so again. And I have reviewed some of his previous books, such as this one: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2022/06/07/a-review-of-the-war-on-the-west-by-douglas-murray/

As such, I am looking forward to his next book, On Democracies and Death Cults, due out in mid-April. I will certainly be getting it and reviewing it, so stay tuned. In the meantime, we need to work to preserve what is good in this world, while resisting that which is evil.

Sure, at some point the West, like everything, else will be no more. But until then, we can work towards being salt and light in a dark and despairing world. Things like the ARC conferences will not usher in the Kingdom, but they can do much good along the way.

In a fallen world that is a pretty good outcome.

[1868 words]

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MUST WATCH: White House Press Reporters Look Miserable as Stephen Miller Crushes it with Epic Monologue Highlighting Trump’s First 30 Days | The Gateway Pundit

MUST WATCH: White House Press Reporters Look Miserable as Stephen Miller Crushes it with Epic Monologue Highlighting Trump’s First 30 Days

Stephen Miller

On Thursday, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller made an appearance in the press briefing room.

The brilliant Stephen Miller opened up Thursday’s briefing with an epic monologue highlighting Trump’s first 30 days. The White House reporters looked miserable as they were forced to listen to Stephen Miller boast about Trump’s historic accomplishments.

“I want to thank you all for joining today our one month celebration of the most historic opening to a presidency in American history. No president comes close to what President Trump has achieved over just the last 30 days,” Stephen Miller said with a smile on his face.

“He has packed eight years of transformative action. Restoring this nation, restoring our laws, economic opportunity, and national security, into just one month. No one in this country has ever seen anything like it. When you look at the consequential reality and the significance of the transformative nature, it truly defies description,” Miller said.

Stephen Miller ripped the Biden Regime’s DEI policies and praised President Trump for dismantling the illegal discrimination.

“In just one area, this nation has been plagued and crippled by illegal discrimination, diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. It has made every aspect of life more difficult, painful, and less safe. He has ended all DEI across the federal government. He has terminated all federal workers associated with these unlawful policies. He has ended diversity, equity, and inclusion in all federal contracting. He has restored merit as the cornerstone of all federal policy and reinstated the full, fair, and impartial enforcement of our federal civil rights laws. For the first time in generations,” Stephen Miller said.

Stephen Miller touted President Trump for saving women’s sports by banning transgender athletes (biological men) from competing against women.

“He has also saved women’s sports by ending the participation of men in women’s sports. He has ended radical gender ideology across the entire federal government and he’s pressured the private sector to also end and combat radical gender ideology as well. He’s reestablished the biological truth that there are only two sexes in this country – MALE AND FEMALE – and that those are biologically based determinations… sex can never be based on gender identity. That includes rooting out Department of Defense all DEI policies and critical race theory, all gender madness, once again ensuring that the military is focused solely and exclusively on readiness, preparedness, and lethality,” Miller said.

Stephen Miller praised Elon Musk’s DOGE team for uncovering corruption in the federal government.

“He has undertaken a cost cutting effort, launching the first ever Department of Government Efficiency [DOGE], uncovering corruption on a scale that we never thought imaginable. He has terminated every federal worker found to be engaged in corruption, theft, and the waste of taxpayer dollars already saving $50 billion in a single year, which over a 10 year period would be $500 billion,” Stephen Miller said.

Miller said Trump ended the weaponization of federal government and restored the DOJ to its true mission of combating real threats.

“[Trump] has ended the weaponization of the federal government and restored the Department of Justice to its true mission of combating threats and keeping the American people safe. He has ended all federal censorship of free speech. This has been one of the greatest crises that has plagued this nation. Years years and years the federal government violated the First Amendment, taking away the right to free speech. President Trump has demanded that all federal workers and law enforcement cease any effort to intimidate the rights of Americans or police speech,” Stephen Miller said.

“He has also restored the death penalty at the Department of Justice, including for illegal aliens who commit murder and including for those who murder police officers. The death penalty is back. Law and order is back. The streets are being made safe once again,” he added.

Stephen Miller praised RFK Jr. for his mission to “Make America Healthy Again” – or MAHA.

“He has launched the nation’s first ever commission, MAGA – Make America Healthy Again, following the historic confirmation of RFK Jr. to finally uncover the true root causes of the public health crisis in this country, the spiraling rates of pediatric cancer, and devastating childhood sickness. He finally created a situation where federal health agencies will focus on preventing disease and keeping children from getting sick in the first place, not sending them into a lifetime of in and out hospitals suffering needlessly when we could find ways to prevent this epidemic of illness,” Stephen Miller said.

Stephen Miller boasted about Trump’s swift work to secure the southern border. Something that ‘Border Czar’ Kamala Harris was never able to accomplish.

“Border crossings, since the day he took office are down 95%. I think it’s almost impossible to describe the scale and scope of the achievement. President Trump, within days of taking office, cut border crossings by 95%. Those few who have dared to cross are either being prosecuted or deported. They are either facing significant jail time for trafficking, smuggling, and harboring, aiding, impeding or they are being immediately removed. At the end of the process, they are going home,” Miller said confidently.

Stephen Miller continued, “America is safe and free. The entire world now understands that if you do not come here illegally — If you do, you will go to jail, you will go home, and you will not succeed. This is the biggest and most successful change in any area of law enforcement that this nation has ever seen and he did it in under one month.”

WATCH:

Stephen Miller (@stephenm): "I want to thank you all for joining today our one month celebration of the most historic opening to a presidency in American history. No president comes close to what President Trump has achieved over just the last 30 days." pic.twitter.com/sJavBFdj3q

— CSPAN (@cspan) February 20, 2025

The post MUST WATCH: White House Press Reporters Look Miserable as Stephen Miller Crushes it with Epic Monologue Highlighting Trump’s First 30 Days appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

Kash Patel Confirmed With A Popular Mandate To Clean House At Corrupt FBI

Patel enters with eyes open to the bad actors that cost this nation millions in bogus political investigations.

https://thefederalist.com/2025/02/20/kash-patel-confirmed-with-a-popular-mandate-to-clean-house-at-corrupt-fbi/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=kash-patel-confirmed-with-a-popular-mandate-to-clean-house-at-corrupt-fbi

The Answer To 1913 Is 2025: 3 Charts That Show Why The Income Tax, The IRS And The Federal Reserve Should All Be Abolished | The Economic Collapse

Most Americans don’t know that for much of U.S. history there was no federal income tax and there was no central bank.  But now everyone assumes that we must have a federal income tax and a central bank in order to have a functioning society.  Today, there are just a handful of nations that do not have an income tax, and more than 99 percent of the entire population of the globe lives in a country that has a central bank.  Of course the two work hand in hand.  A central bank creates a spiral of borrowing that is meant to be unbreakable, and an income tax is necessary to service payments on that debt spiral.  It is not a coincidence that a federal income tax and the Federal Reserve were both established in 1913.  Since that time, we have piled up the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world, and that is precisely the outcome that the system was designed to produce.

So what is the solution to this colossal mess?

The answer to 1913 is 2025.

This year, we are seeing things get proposed in Washington D.C. that once would have been unthinkable.

For example, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick just told Fox News that President Trump wants to “abolish the Internal Revenue Service”…

More details have emerged from the Trump administration about alleged plans to get rid of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and utilize tariffs so the “whole economy explodes.”

“His goal is to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and let all the outsiders pay,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Wednesday on “Jesse Watters Primetime.”

“As the president said, reciprocal tariffs, either you bring yours down or we’re going to bring ours up. If we go to their level, it will earn us $700 billion a year to be equal to everybody else,” he expanded Thursday on “America’s Newsroom.”

And it appears that the Trump administration is already taking concrete steps toward that goal.

In fact, it is being reported that “approximately 7,000 probationary workers” at the IRS are about to be hitting the bricks…

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is planning to slash approximately 7,000 probationary workers in Washington, D.C., and across the U.S. starting Thursday, according to reports.

The layoffs will affect probationary workers who have been employed for one year or less and have not been able to secure full civil service protection, The Associated Press reported, citing a person familiar with the plans.

Wow.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve is also being targeted by the new administration.

In fact, Elon Musk has suggested that the Federal Reserve could soon get visited by the Department of Government Efficiency…

Musk wrote on X in response to a user’s post about the billionaire’s support for an audit of the Fed that the central bank isn’t above scrutiny from DOGE.

“All aspects of the government must be fully transparent and accountable to the people. No exceptions, including, if not especially, the Federal Reserve,” Musk wrote.

Musk is a longtime critic of the central bank and has called out its decisions on monetary policy as well as claiming the Fed’s workforce is bloated.

This is wonderful news.

Because what we have been doing for decades is clearly not working.

The Federal Reserve system is designed to create debt, and the income tax is designed to service that debt.

We find ourselves on an endless hamster wheel that becomes more painful with each passing year.

The charts that I am about to share with you tell a very clear story.

The primary reason why we have had an almost unbelievably high standard of living over the past three decades is because we have piled up the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world.  Once upon a time the United States was the wealthiest country on the entire planet, but all of that prosperity was not good enough for us.  So we started borrowing and borrowing and borrowing and we have now been living beyond our means for so long that we consider it to be completely normal.

When President Woodrow Wilson entered the White House in 1913, the U.S. was less than 3 billion dollars in debt.

Now we are 36 trillion dollars in debt…

This is what a central bank is designed to do.

Most people simply do not understand this.

We have been robbing future generations blind for so long that it doesn’t even seem to bother most people anymore.

It is time for a change.

Sadly, Americans have also accumulated the largest mountain of household debt in the history of the world.  The following chart which comes directly from the Federal Reserve shows the growth of household and non-profit organization debt over the years…

Of that amount, more than 18 trillion dollars of it is household debt…

Americans’ household debt levels, including credit card debt, rose to new all-time highs in the fourth quarter of 2024, according to a report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The report showed that overall household debt increased by $93 billion to $18.04 trillion at the end of 2024, an all-time high. Credit card balances rose by $45 billion from the prior quarter to reach $1.21 trillion at the end of December, which is also a record high.

We have become accustomed to living in debt.  We go into massive amounts of debt to get an education, we go into massive amounts of debt to buy a home, we go into massive amounts of debt to purchase our vehicles, and we even pile up debt to buy holiday gifts and to purchase groceries.

The American people want to hear that better times are ahead.

But under the current system the only way to give the American people “better times” is to crank up the debt spiral to an even higher level.

That is the approach that our leaders have been taking for a long time, and it is madness.

When you add up all forms of debt in our society, it comes to a grand total of more than 100 trillion dollars…

We are literally committing national suicide.

I wish that I could get more people to understand this.

30 years ago, the total amount of debt in the system was less than 20 trillion dollars.

Now we have surpassed the 100 trillion dollar mark.

We are talking about a financial bubble that is unlike anything that the world has ever seen before.

If we continue down this road, our children and our grandchildren would have no future.

When people hear words like “billion” or “trillion” they tend to tune out.

But that is a mistake.

There is an enormous difference between a billion dollars and a trillion dollars.

Just how big is one trillion dollars?

To answer that question, I would like to use an illustration that I have used in my books.  If right this moment you went out and started spending one dollar every single second, it would take you more than 31,000 years to spend one trillion dollars.

Yet somehow we have piled up more than 100 trillion dollars of debt, and our financial status just keeps getting worse month after month after month.

If we want to get free from all this debt, we have to abandon the system that created all of this debt in the first place.

We need to abolish the Federal Reserve, the IRS and the income tax.

We have been living far, far beyond our means for decades, and it has been the greatest party in the history of the world.

But it is time to turn out the lights because the party is over.

The good news is that change is in the air.

The answer to 1913 is 2025, and those that are attempting to dismantle the current system should be applauded.

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written eight other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  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.  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.

The post The Answer To 1913 Is 2025: 3 Charts That Show Why The Income Tax, The IRS And The Federal Reserve Should All Be Abolished appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

IS THIS THE NEXT GREAT AWAKENING? AN INVESTIGATION OF UNIVERSITY REVIVALS! | Fortis Institute

IS THIS THE NEXT GREAT AWAKENING? AN INVESTIGATION OF UNIVERSITY REVIVALS!

Segment 1:

• Lots of Buzz, But Few Reports: We sent a reporter to investigate what’s happening on college campuses.

• The Unite Us Movement: 7-8K attendees, passionate worship, but how clear was the Gospel?

• Speakers & Worship: Tonya Prewett & Jennie Allen led—was this a revival or just an experience?

Segment 2:

• Jonathan Pokluda Delivered a Solid Gospel Message: But why was he mingling with this particular movement?

• 1,500 People Walked Forward: What does that mean? Were they making decisions for Christ or caught in emotion?

• Baptism Surge: 1,000-1,500 baptisms happened—but was there a clear discipleship plan?

Segment 3:

• 52% of Teenagers Want to Know More About Jesus: But do churches know how to engage them?

• ROAD TRIP TO TRUTH Mention: Gen Z prefers deeper discussions over small group structures.

• Hollywood Mentions Jesus: Kelsey Grammer & Tim Allen bring up faith, but was it the real Gospel?

Segment 4:

• We’re Ready to Bring Truth to College Campuses: But we need solid campus ministries to invite us in.

• AI Dating & The Rise of Romance Fraud: The loneliness crisis is deeper than we realize—how can the Church respond?

• Security Crisis? The government is even recognizing loneliness as a growing national issue.

___

Undercover video: DoE using secret encrypted app to run program for illegal immigrants and hide it from DOGE

Project Veritas dropped another bombshell this morning, with undercover tape and footage of a Department of Education official explaining how they funnel federal funds to illegal immigrants while communicating on an encrypted app to escape scrutiny from the Trump administration.

https://notthebee.com/article/undercover-video-dept-of-education-using-secret-encrypted-app-to-run-a-sanctuary-program-for-illegal-immigrants/

Seven planets are aligned in the night sky | Denison Forum

Seven planets are aligned in the night sky

As every schoolchild knows, there are eight planets in our solar system. (I was taught that Pluto was the ninth planet, but alas, it was reclassified as a “dwarf planet” in 2006 because it shares its orbital space with other large objects in its vicinity.)

Later this month, those of us on the third planet from the Sun can see the other seven in the night sky. Known as a “planetary alignment,” this is what happens when the planets align on the same side of the Sun. You can click here for a guide to seeing them; Uranus and Neptune will require a pair of binoculars or a small telescope.

This planetary alignment makes no practical difference to us since there is no significant gravitational force between the planets. Some hypothesize that planetary alignments might impact solar activity, but much more research is needed.

However, such alignments can be very practical for interplanetary spacecraft, which use the specific positioning of planets to perform gravity assists that slingshot them with a speed boost toward their final destination. Voyagers 1 and 2 took advantage of an alignment of the large planets, for example, with Voyager 2 getting boosts from Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

Here’s the part of the story that interests me: while planetary alignments have no practical impact on our physical planet, they were highly significant for ancient cultures that tried to use them to forecast the future. Here we see the difference between astronomy (the scientific study of celestial objects) and astrology (a non-scientific belief system that uses celestial bodies to predict future events or personality traits).

People who read their horoscopes practice astrology. People who study the stars and planets using the scientific method practicice astronomy.

The chasm between the two suggests significant principles for faith in our post-Christian culture.

Walking the altar-lined streets of Ephesus

When Paul made his way to Athens as part of his second missionary journey, he had a right to expect highly reasoned conversations with some of the intellectual elites of his day. And in fact he encountered Epicurean and Stoic philosophers and “conversed” with them (Acts 17:18)—the Greek word means to dialogue, debate, ponder together.

But he also discovered that “the city was full of idols” (v. 16). In fact, he used their altar to “the unknown god” as a springboard to preach the gospel: “What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you” (v. 23).

Why would such brilliant people be so susceptible to the mythologies and traditions of their polytheistic religion?

From Cain to today, humans have sought to use religion to leverage the blessing of God or the gods (cf. Genesis 4:4–7). This is an expression of our “will to power” that seeks to be our own god (Genesis 3:5). Paradoxically, we use God to replace him as god, engaging in transactional religious practices by which we do what he wants so he will do what we want.

We see this across the ancient Roman Empire. I have walked the streets of Ephesus lined with altars to the various gods of their day, witnessed vast temples in Corinth and Rome dedicated to the same purpose, and visited what we would call “pagan” temples across modern-day Turkey that were similarly transactional in nature.

Christians are by no means immune. When we begin the day with Bible study and prayer in the hope that God will then bless our day, when we pray to get what we want from the Lord, and when we serve him and donate to his causes so he will serve us, we are engaging in transactional religion.

Like astrologers of old and today, we are seeking power over our surroundings and our future. To predict the future through a horoscope is to gain a measure of control over it. To sacrifice to a God, known or unknown, as a means to our ends is to do the same.

“The greatest day that a Christian can ever experience”

The paradox is that the God who created the planets of our solar system and the rest of our vast universe is much more of a blessing to us in a transformational relationship than in a transactional religion. The best gift he can give us is the privilege of being a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17) who manifests the character of Jesus (Romans 8:29) by demonstrating the “fruit” of his Spirit (Galatians 5:22–23).

When we worship God because he loves us rather than so he will, we experience him in intimate ways that draw us closer to the people we are created to be. When we serve him because he has served us rather than so he will, we offer gratitude for grace that transforms us and those we influence.

The Creator who measures the entire universe with the palm of his hand (Isaiah 40:12) now holds his children in that same hand (John 10:29). The gift of all gifts is that he wants a personal relationship with us. Not because we deserve such mercy, but because he “is” love (1 John 4:8).

Then, one day, we will step from this fallen world filled with transactional religion and works-driven righteousness into a perfect world filled with transformational relationship and worship-driven joy. RC Sproul noted:

The day of one’s birth is a good day for the believer, but the day of death is the greatest day that a Christian can ever experience in this world, because that is the day he goes home, the day he walks across the threshold, the day he enters the Father’s house.

In the meantime, our calling is to embrace the grace of Christ and to share it with everyone we can. In Simply Good News: Why The Gospel Is News and What Makes It Good, the brilliant theologian NT Wright assures us:

Many people today assume that Christianity is one or more of these things—a religion, a moral system, a philosophy. In other words, they assume that Christianity is about advice. But it wasn’t and isn’t. Christianity is, simply, good news. It is the news that something has happened as a result of which the world is a different place.

How will this news make your “world” a “different place” today?

The post Seven planets are aligned in the night sky appeared first on Denison Forum.

LIVE: CPAC 2025 Day Two – 2/21/25

CPAC 2025 in DC is here! RSBN will provide full conference coverage for all three days. Stay tuned for RSBN’s exclusive interviews with America’s top conservative figures. RSBN will be LIVE starting at 8:00 a.m. ET.

Source: LIVE: CPAC 2025 Day Two – 2/21/25

February 21 Morning Verse of the Day

176 The last note of the psalm is a cry from a broken spirit rather than a confession of apostasy. The psalmist feels helpless, like a “lost sheep” (cf. Jer 50:6; Ezek 34:4–6, 16) and cries to his Good Shepherd to “seek” (b-q-š) him (cf. Luke 15:4–7). The psalmist’s lostness is a result of the adversities he has so frequently mentioned and not because of his neglect of God or his word.

VanGemeren, W. A. (1991). Psalms. In F. E. Gaebelein (Ed.), The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs (Vol. 5, p. 763). Zondervan Publishing House.

Ver. 176.—I have gone astray like a lost sheep (comp. ver. 67). Some see in this verse nothing but a reference to the outward circumstances of the psalmist’s life. But this is certainly not the idea generally attached in Scripture to the image of the “lost sheep” (see Isa. 53:6; Jer. 50:6; Luke 15:4–7; 1 Pet. 2:25). Dean Johnson’s exposition is probably correct, “I have wandered far from thee and from home, as a sheep lost and ready to perish in the wilderness.” Seek thy servant. “Seek him, lest he be not able of himself to seek thee; and bring him again to thy fold.” For I do not forget thy commandments. In my worst wanderings I have not fallen away wholly from thee. Thy Law has been ever in my thoughts. I have not “forgotten” it, but meditated on it and longed for it (vers. 15, 20, 40).

Spence-Jones, H. D. M., ed. (1909). Psalms (Vol. 3, p. 113). Funk & Wagnalls Company.

176. I have wandered like a lost sheep. He is not to be understood as here confessing his sins,—an opinion erroneously held by many,—as if he had been drawn into the traps of Satan; for this is inconsistent with the second clause, in which he denies that he had forgotten God’s law. It is a poor solution of this difficulty to say, that, previous to the time of his calling, he was a wandering sheep, but that from the time of his calling he was devoted to godliness—or that in straying he was withheld by some godly affection from utterly casting off the fear of God; for the same time is undoubtedly referred to in both clauses. Again it is easy to gather, that the two clauses of this verse ought to Be connected together by although or notwithstanding, or some other such particle, as the Latins call adversative, as if the Prophet had said, Although I have wandered about like a lost sheep, yet I have not forgotten the law of God. His meaning, I conceive, is, that he wandered, because, being chased by the force and violence of his enemies, he transported himself from place to place in great fear, in quest of retreats in which he might hide himself. We know for certain, that David was so hunted that in his exile he could nowhere find a secure place. This similitude would therefore very properly apply to him, because, although driven away and hunted after by his persecutors, he yet never turned aside from the law of God. Moreover, as the wolves pursued him everywhere, he prays God to bring him back and give him a place of safety and tranquillity, that he may at length cease from any longer wandering hither and thither, and being as a vagabond.2 He had a very good ground for believing that he would be heard in the fact, that although provoked by manifold wrongs he yet never swerved from the fear of God—a statement which, however, ought to be referred rather to the general course of his life than to particular acts. Although when he fell into adultery he continued for a time in a state of insensibility, yet it cannot be denied that in his adversities he was restrained by a holy patience, so as to persevere in following after righteousness.

Calvin, J., & Anderson, J. (2010). Commentary on the Book of Psalms (Vol. 5, pp. 50–51). Logos Bible Software.

Ver. 176. I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek Thy servant; for I do not forget Thy commandments.—The Christian, conscious of departure from God:—
We have in this verse the description of a believer—not as he ought to be—not as he would wish to be—but as he is. It is not a fancy picture; it is a picture of life.
I. IT IS AN HONEST CONFESSION. It is upright; and downright. He does not throw the blame upon the world’s seducements, and say—“That was too great an enemy for me, it overcame me.” He does not throw the blame upon Satan. Neither does he throw the blame upon the flesh that was in him; though we know that was the source of the evil. He takes the whole blame to himself—“I have gone astray like a lost sheep.”
II. THE PRAYER: “Seek Thy servant.” It implies that he had got so far that he did not know his way back. Quite evidently: “I have gone astray, seek Thy servant,” I cannot find any way of return.
III. THE PLEA: “For I do not forget Thy commandments.” There are periods in a believer’s life in which he not only has one evidence, but he has a hundred evidences of his adoption. But there are periods when it seems almost reduced to the little spark on the ocean. Here is that little spark—“I do not forget Thy commandments.” Do not think it a mere point of memory. No, it is something more than that. “Though I have gone from Thee, though I have left Thy precepts, though I have not followed them as I ought to have followed them, yet ‘I do not forget’ they are sweet to me; I love them; I wish to have them written out in my heart.” Conclusion—

1. The tendency there is in sin. It is not contented with making us miserable; it wants to destroy us, and that for ever.
2. The weakness of the believer. Like a lost sheep.
3. The faithfulness of the Holy Spirit. He puts this plea in the heart.
4. The kind Restorer of this wandering sheep.
5. Beware of whatever leads to going astray. Love of the world, idleness, etc.
6. Seek that which promotes the life of God. Live upon Christ. (J. H. Evans, M.A.)

Exell, J. S. (1909). The Biblical Illustrator: The Psalms (Vol. 5, p. 145). Fleming H. Revell Company; Francis Griffiths.

176. This is the finale, the conclusion of the whole matter: “I have gone astray like a lost sheep”—often, wilfully, wantonly, and even hopelessly, but for thine interposing grace. In times gone by, before I was afflicted, and before thou hadst fully taught me thy statutes, “I went astray” from the practical precepts, from the instructive doctrines, and from the heavenly experiences which thou hadst set before me. I lost my road, and I lost myself. Even now I am apt to wander, and, in fact, have roamed already; therefore, Lord, restore me. “Seek thy servant.” He was not like a dog, that somehow or other can find its way back; but he was like a lost sheep, which goes further and further away from home; yet still he was a sheep, and the Lord’s sheep, his property, and precious in his sight, and therefore he hoped to be sought in order to be restored. However far he might have wandered he was still not only a sheep, but God’s “servant,” and therefore he desired to be in his Master’s house again, and once more honoured with commissions for his Lord. Had he been only a lost sheep he would not have prayed to be sought; but being also a “servant” he had the power to pray. He cries, “Seek thy servant,” and he hopes to be not only sought, but forgiven, accepted, and taken into work again by his gracious Master.
     Notice this confession; many times in the Psalm David has defended his own innocence against foul-mouthed accusers, but when he comes into the presence of the Lord his God he is ready enough to confess his transgressions. He here sums up, not only his past, but even his present life, under the image of a sheep which has broken from its pasture, forsaken the flock, left the shepherd, and brought itself into the wild wilderness, where it has become as a lost thing. The sheep bleats, and David prays, “Seek thy servant.” His argument is a forcible one,—“for I do not forget thy commandments.” I know the right, I approve and admire the right, what is more, I love the right, and long for it. I cannot be satisfied to continue in sin, I must be restored to the ways of righteousness. I have a homesickness after my God, I pine after the ways of peace; I do not and I cannot forget thy commandments, nor cease to know that I am always happiest and safest when I scrupulously obey them, and find all my joy in doing so. Now, if the grace of God enables us to maintain in our hearts the loving memory of God’s commandments it will surely yet restore us to practical holiness. That man cannot be utterly lost whose heart is still with God. If he be gone astray in many respects, yet still, if he be true in his soul’s inmost desires, he will be found again, and fully restored. Yet let the reader remember the first verse of the Psalm while he reads the last: the major blessedness lies not in being restored from wandering, but in being upheld in a blameless way even to the end. Be it ours to keep the crown of the causeway, never leaving the King’s highway for By-path Meadow, or any other flowery path of sin. May the Lord uphold us even to the end. Yet even then we shall not be able to boast with the Pharisee, but shall still pray with the publican, “God be merciful to me a sinner;” and with the Psalmist, “Seek thy servant.”

Spurgeon, C. H. (n.d.). The treasury of David: Psalms 111-119 (Vol. 5, p. 435). Marshall Brothers.

Exploring Old Testament Typology: Joseph’s Foreshadowing of the Savior | Elizabeth Prata

Exploring Old Testament Typology: Joseph’s Foreshadowing of the Savior

By Elizabeth Prata

There are lots of “types” in the Bible. A fancier name for it is Biblical Typology. Biblical Typology is…

…a special kind of symbolism. (A symbol is something which represents something else.) We can define a type as a “prophetic symbol” because all types are representations of something yet future. More specifically, a type in scripture is a person or thing in the Old Testament which foreshadows a person or thing in the New Testament. For example, the flood of Noah’s day (Genesis 6-7) is used as a type of baptism in 1 Peter 3:20-21. The word for type that Peter uses is figure.

Another example of a type is in Hebrews 9:8-9: “the first tabernacle . . . which was a figure for the time then present.” The blood sacrifices of lambs prefigured or was a type of the actual sacrifice of the Lamb of God. And so on.

Ligonier defines typology as

Typology is based on the fact that God works in recurring patterns throughout history and says that a past event or person can prefigure or serve as a type of a future person or event.

Joseph, son of Jacob, is in many respects one of the strongest types depicting the Savior.  Sold into slavery, descended into the pit (jail), Joseph interpreted the Cupbearer’s and Baker’s dreams and said to them as they were called to Pharaoh’s side, “Remember me”. Joseph was forgotten, … until the Cupbearer heard that Pharaoh needed someone to interpret Pharaoh’s dream. Joseph was called to the King’s side-

Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they quickly brought him out of the pit. And when he had shaved himself and changed his clothes, he came in before Pharaoh. (Genesis 41:14)

And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt.” Then Pharaoh took his signet ring from his hand and put it on Joseph’s hand, and clothed him in garments of fine linen and put a gold chain about his neck. And he made him ride in his second chariot. And they called out before him, “Bow the knee!” Thus he set him over all the land of Egypt. Moreover, Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, and without your consent no one shall lift up hand or foot in all the land of Egypt.” (Genesis 41:41-44).

When all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. Pharaoh said to all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph. What he says to you, do.” (Genesis 41:55)

Moreover, all the earth came to Egypt to Joseph to buy grain, because the famine was severe over all the earth. (Genesis 41:57)

Hopefully you notice the similarities. Joseph was reviled, sold as a slave, they put an iron fetter around his neck. (Psalm 105:17-18). He was in the pit, forgotten and ignored. One day in a moment, a twinkling, he was exalted and put in second place, only the King was higher than he. He rode in the second chariot. He was given a fine garment and his iron collar replaced with a chain of gold. All were told to bow the knee to Joseph, just as they will bow the knee to Jesus (Romans 14:11, Philippians 2:10). Joseph saved all in the land, all the earth.

The almost exact language was used by Pharaoh about Joseph as Mary had stated at the Wedding at Cana.

“Then Pharaoh told all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph and do what he tells you.” (Genesis 41:55 NIV)

His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” (John 2:5).

Of course, typology only goes so far. Joseph gave grain (bread) to the people to save their life, but Jesus IS the bread of life. However, it’s interesting to note types as you read along to think more deeply about what God is showing us through His word. Here are some further resources for you on typology.

Ligonier: Typology vs. Allegory.
Carm: Dictionary- Type
GTY: Melchizedek, a Type of Christ

Christ’s Petition and Our Protection | The Master’s Seminary Blog

I ask on their behalf…those whom you have given Me…Holy Father, keep them in Your name…keep them from the evil one…I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word. 

John 17:9, 11, 15, 20 

“Keep them in Your name…keep them from the evil one” (John 17:11, 15). By themselves, only eleven simple words, but when prayed by Jesus, they assure the Christian’s eternal destiny—a prayer of protection that continues its effectual work ever since Christ first laid it before His Father’s throne of grace.¹  

No request is more comforting. No greater care could be verbalized. No petition has ever been so needed.  

The Promise of Protection Explained 

Theologians call this doctrine the Perseverance of the Saints.² In common vernacular, it is referred to as the believer’s eternal security. 

The promise is this: Union with Christ guarantees eternity with Christ. Though every believer sins—and sometimes sins grievously—saving grace will never be withdrawn, forgiveness will never be revoked, justification will never be rescinded, redemption will never be canceled, reconciliation will never be severed, adoption into God’s family will never be annulled. There is “no condemnation”—nor will there ever be condemnation—“for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). 

How Can I Be So Sure? 

Have you ever asked that question? Of course, you have, if you’ve considered your own spiritual weakness or felt how strong the pull of this world can be. The adage is true: If you could lose your salvation, you would lose your salvation. 

But the doctrine of eternal security promises that the hypothetical “if” clause can never be so. Salvation cannot be lost. Satan is powerless to reclaim those who were once his. Every believer will “persevere to the end…and be eternally saved.”³  

Why?Because the safety of our souls does not rest on our hold of Christ but on the securing work of each member of the Trinity—the Father’s sovereign election always accomplishing its design,⁴ the Spirit’s indwelling work guaranteeing our final redemption,⁵ and (as this post focuses on) the Son’s continual intercession praying us into glory.⁶ 

Fragile Faith Calls for Urgent Prayer 

Having left the upper room with His apostles, only hours from betrayal and a rising sun from death, Jesus stopped just short of the Kidron Valley. What awaited Him on the other side was unimaginable horror. And He knew it.  

Jesus saw the Passover lambs’ blood still running down the ravine—a picture of His own slaughter to come.⁷ He recognized the route He was walking—the same route David took centuries ago when he, too, was betrayed by someone he loved and rejected by the nation.⁸ Jesus sensed the significance of Gethsemane—because of Adam’s failure in another garden.⁹  

And so, Christ stops. 

He knows what He must do. He must pray. But not only for Himself—though we would understand if that was what Jesus did. He needed to pray for His apostles, aware of how fragile their faith was, how intense their own temptations would soon be, and how vicious their enemy is. 

A Savage Enemy Requires a Praying Son 

Up to this point, the apostles have talked a good game. Peter had promised, “I will lay down my life for You” (John 13:37), a sentiment the rest of the apostles amened (Mark 14:31). Each man oblivious to the satanic battle they were about to face. 

Never before did these men have to worry about Satan’s evil schemes. Christ had been their constant shield. In fact, each time Jesus spoke of Satan to His apostles, it was always about Himself and His death.¹⁰ The apostles were never the target of Satan’s threats. 

But night had now fallen, and the Prince of Darkness would soon be let loose. No longer would Jesus be able to guard His apostles as He had done before. No longer would He be able to fend off the enemy on their behalf. His role of protector was about to end. Unbeknownst to the apostles, they were now in Satan’s sights. And his goal was ruthless: sift them like wheat¹¹ and devour their faith.¹² 

No wonder Jesus stopped to pray for these men. No wonder He called Satan “the evil one”—the most ruthless enemy this world has ever known. No wonder Jesus asked His Father to “keep them”—to do what Jesus could not do once He was taken into custody. No wonder He prayed “for those also who believe in Me through their word”—since Satan’s attacks on God’s people will never cease until he is sentenced to the pit. 

The adversary was stalking. The ruler of this world was about to unleash his worst. The savage nature of the enemy necessitated every word of Jesus’ prayer. 

Praying the Father’s Will Back to the Father 

For three years, Jesus promised to protect these men’s souls. 

• “Whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).  
• “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life” (John 5:24). 
• “Everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:40). 
• “I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand” (John 11:25). 

And now, on the precipice of death, Jesus turned each of those promises into prayer. Not to twist His Father’s arm to do something He did not want to do, but because frustrating Satan’s schemes and preserving His people’s faith is always what His Father wants to do. As Jesus said, “This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing…This is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life” (John 6:39-40). 

Our soul’s security is based upon the unity of will between the Father and the Son.¹³  

A Picture of Christ’s Protecting Power 

But can this prayer of protection be fulfilled? Is there an enemy too strong? A scheme too menacing? Jesus answered those questions later that night in a most vivid way. 

The scene was staggering. A cohort of 200 soldiers, a posse of religious leaders and their armed guards, and a Satan-indwelt Judas arrived in Gethsemane to arrest Jesus. But Jesus did not cower in fear or flee in terror as they expected Him to do. Instead, He spoke: “Whom do you seek?” A strange question since “Jesus [knew] all the things that were coming upon Him” (John 18:4). 

And yet, though strange on the surface, Jesus’ question was highly strategic—necessary to safeguard His apostles’ faith.  

First, His question allowed Him to claim “the mysterious and majestic name of God”¹⁴ for Himself. A confession that dropped each man to the ground like a defeated foe. Even a Satan-indwelt Judas had to recoil in fright. Martin Luther was right, “One little word can fell him.” 

Second, Jesus’ question forced the soldiers to identify the limit of their arrest warrant. “They said, ‘Jesus of Nazareth’” (John 18:7). They were there for only one man, not a group of men.  

And so, drawing on His divine authority just demonstrated and the legal limitations confining these soldiers, Jesus commanded the release of His apostles. “‘If you seek Me, let these go their way” (John 18:8). 

Remember, Satan wanted to sift Peter (and the rest of the apostles) like wheat. That’s one reason (maybe the reason) Satan was in this garden on this night. Couple that with the fragility of the apostles’ faith, and you realize why Jesus issued His directive. 

Jesus knew that if His men were taken into custody, the temptations they would face would be too strong for them to endure. Their faith would have faltered—permanently—and Satan would have won. But Jesus would not allow that to happen. Not on this night. Not ever! That’s why John includes his editorial explanation of Jesus’ command: it was to guarantee that “those You have given Me I lost none” (John 18:9). 

Here is a living picture of Christ’s protecting power for His own. A visible promise of the believer’s divine security and guaranteed perseverance. A graphic reminder that “God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able” (1 Corinthians 10:13).  

How else can you explain the soldiers not taking the apostles into custody? How else can you explain the soldiers not arresting a sword-wielding Peter? How else can you explain Satan not devouring the apostles’ faith?    

The Capstone of Christ’s Redeeming Work 

And yet, Christ’s prayer of protection is not limited to this night. Christ continually prays His people into glory—with one significant difference. He no longer prays as a humiliated Savior. He now prays as the exalted Lord who sits at His Father’s right hand. In fact, this is the capstone of Christ’s redeeming work for His people, “since He always lives to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). 

References

[1] Romans 8:33-34; Hebrews 7:25 

[2] Chapter 17 of The Westminster Confession of Faith is entitled, “Of the Perseverance of the Saints.” 

[3] Ibid. 

[4] Ephesians 1:4-5 

[5] Ephesians 1:13-14 

[6] John 17:9, 11, 15, 20; Luke 22:31-32; Romans 8:33-34; Hebrews 7:25 

[7] John 1:29; 1 Corinthians 5:7; 1 Peter 1:19; Revelation 5:8-9 

[8] 2 Samuel 15:12-14, 23 

[9] Romans 5:12, 14, 19. See also: Patrick Slyman, https://blog.tms.edu/christs-agony-and-our-imputed-sin (accessed January 29, 2025). 

[10] John 6:70; 8:44; 13:2, 27 and Colin Kruse, John, Tyndale New Testament Commentary (Downer’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 339. 

[11] Luke 22:31 

[12] 1 Peter 5:8 

[13] Thomas Goodwin’s words are appropriate here: “Let us consider both the person interceding, namely Christ; and the person with whom Christ intercedes for this favour, which is God; the one the Son, the other the Father; and so the greatness of Christ with God, and the graciousness of God to Christ, together with the oneness of wills and unity of affections in them both: so that Christ will be sure to ask nothing which his father will deny, and his Father will not deny anything which he shall ask.” As quoted in Mark Jones, Knowing Christ (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2015), 177. 

[14] Wycliffe Bible Commentary, ed. Everett F. Harrison (Chicago: Moody Press, 1987). 

https://blog.tms.edu/christs-petition-and-our-protection

What Repentance Looks Like / Ezra Chapters 9-10 – Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast

What Repentance Looks Like / Ezra Chapters 9-10 – Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast

What Repentance Looks Like / Ezra Chapters 9-10 – Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast

▶️Pastor Patrick Hines has recently had a brand new book published, called, “Earth’s Foundational History – Part 1: Genesis Chapters 1 Through 5.” (Paperback – May 4, 2023) https://cutt.ly/16RCeZ0

These two books are also available on Amazon. All proceeds go directly to Pastor Hines:

▶️Am I Right With God?: The Gospel, Justification, Saving Faith, Repentance, Assurance, & The New Birth https://cutt.ly/S6RCbuM

▶️Redrawing the Battle Lines: 23 Sermons on Critical Issues Facing the Church https://cutt.ly/m6RCTi0

▶️Bridwell Heights Presbyterian Church http://www.bridwellheightschurch.org/

▶️Reformed Presbyterian Pulpit Supplemental (Pastor Hines’ YouTube Channel):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClW5Qzh27Zx7HO2fKkCcR5g

▶️My X (formerlyTwitter) page https://twitter.com/RichMoo50267219

From the church website:

We subscribe to the Westminster Standards as our doctrinal statement. It consists of the following documents:

The Westminster Confession of Faith
The Westminster Larger Catechism
The Westminster Shorter Catechism

We also believe that Christian Worship is to be regulated and defined by God’s Word, the Bible.

Our worship services are designed to please and honor the Triune God of the Bible. We place Scripture reading and the preaching of the word of God at the center of worship along with Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. These are God’s gifts to His church and ought to always be at the center of Christian worship. We are a congregation that loves to sing God’s praises, recite His Word back to Him, and actively engage in hearing and learning from God’s Word.

We embrace and promote a comprehensive Christian world and life view.

There is no area of life which is not under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. It is to God and His law which all people, including governments and civil rulers, will answer. The Word of God embraces and informs the way we view marriage, the family, children, education, politics, worship, law, government, war, the church, missions, evangelism, and worship. In the world today there is a battle of opposing worldviews. There are basically only two positions: God’s Word and man’s ideas. We stand positively for Biblical truth and negatively against man’s ideas which are opposed to Biblical truth.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only hope for mankind.

Because all men fall short of obeying God’s law, all men everywhere are in need of divine grace and salvation from God. This salvation is found only in the Lord Jesus Christ who died for sinners, was buried, rose again, and is alive today seated at God the Father’s right hand.

We Worship God Together as Families.

We offer nursery during the morning worship service for newborns and infants but encourage people to keep as many of their children as they can with them for morning worship. The audio of the service is in the nursery via speakers. There is also a crying room with a video screen and audio of the sermon. We offer Sunday school classes for all ages, but worship together as families. We do not offer “children’s” church.

All who profess faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and are members of an evangelical church are cordially invited to participate with us in the Lord’s Supper.

▶️My WordPress blog: https://sermonsandsongsdotorg.com/
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Remember Death | Tabletalk

Remember Death

Let the reality of this next statement settle on you for a moment: you are going to die. It could be today or tomorrow, or maybe sixty or seventy years from now. For most of us, it will be sometime between now and then. Nevertheless, the fact remains, if the Lord doesn’t return before long, we are going to die. You are going to die.

In modern times, we work hard at not thinking of death. We’d rather focus on the temporal and just get on with it. But Christianity teaches that when we refuse to take death into account, we’re destined to live deluded and deceived existences. When we stave off thoughts of our own mortality, we’re doomed to waste our lives on trivial matters. For, as Moses reminds us, we never gain the heart of wisdom if we don’t learn to number our days (Ps. 90:12).

Historically, the church understood this. If you’ve ever visited Europe or a historic U.S. city and had the privilege to tour some ancient churches, you’ve likely noticed a graveyard surrounding the church. Lining the pathways that lead to the church’s entrance are tombstones with images of skulls or skeletons or angels. Bits of Scripture inscribed on the stones remind you that life is vain and fleeting (Eccl. 1:2), to die in Christ is gain (Phil. 1:21), and to lay up heavenly treasure—the only treasure that lasts (Matt. 6:19–21).

Aside from the fittingness of being laid to rest where you were most at rest in life—in the presence of God and His people—the graveyard served as a living reminder of mortality to the living. Each Lord’s Day, worshipers literally stepped over the dead on their way to offer a sacrifice of praise. They faced eternity on their way to meet with the eternal.

Now, lest we misunderstand, remembering that we are all dirt, and that the dirt we’re made of has an expiration date is not some dark, morbid reflection. Instead, it is intended to clear the mind’s eye, to help us see and live with eternity in view. When we remember our death, life is clarified and ordered. The things that seemed so important just a few moments ago disappear from view as eternal matters take the foreground.

Moses reminds us, we never gain the heart of wisdom if we don’t learn to number our days.

More importantly, remembering our death leads us directly to Jesus Christ. For starters, remembering our death is humbling. Death forces us to come to terms with our weakness, our neediness. It brings us to our knees, rubbing our faces in the sober acknowledge of our desperate estate. You are going to die.

When we first realize this, a haunting, inconsolable anguish fills the soul. Followed by a strong, desperate desire to outsmart death somehow. Followed even more quickly by a hopeless resignation: death is coming for you and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. No matter how good your life may be here, eventually death will rob you of it.

It’s at just this point that the breathtaking wonder of the gospel breaks on the horizon. For it’s against the backdrop of the bad news of death that the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ is so precious. For right at the center of the good news is a cross and a resurrection—a death that put death to death. That is to say, when a Christian remembers death, he remembers Christ, and to remember Christ is to remember life. For in Christ . . .

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?”

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Cor. 15:54–57)

You are dust and to dust you shall return, but dust you will not remain. For on the day of Christ’s return, a trumpet will sound and a voice from heaven will shout and the resurrection will begin. On that day, those “saints who from their labors rest” will meet “a yet a more glorious day.”¹ The graveyards will become the harvest fields, and the dead in Christ will rise, robed in bright array, to meet the risen Lord and live with Him forever.

So, in death, brothers and sisters, let’s remember Christ—and live!

 
 
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on January 14, 2022.

1. William Walsham How, “For All the Saints,” Trinity Hymnal (Suwanee, Ga.: Great Commission, 2014), no. 358.

Source

When Is the Last Time You Thought of the Fact That You Will Die?

Throughout the pages of the Bible, whether law or history or poetry or prophecy or gospel or letter, death is a fixation far more common than in our lives today. For biblical authors an awareness of death and its implications for life is crucial for a life of wisdom.

An Unpleasant Topic

When is the last time you thought of the fact that you will die? When did you last have a conversation with someone on the subject of death? Have you ever seen anyone die? Ever had someone die in your home? When did you last walk through a cemetery or attend a funeral? Have you read any book, watched any movie, even listened to any sermon that deals with the problem of death? I’m not talking about death by violence or death by accident or death by rare and virulent disease. I’m talking about death as a basic human experience—as basic as birth, eating, and sleeping.

Death is a fundamental human experience, uniting all humans across time and space, race and class. But in our time and place, death isn’t something we think about very often, if at all. The remarkable achievements of modern medicine have pushed death further and further back in the average Western person’s life span. We enjoy better disease prevention, better pharmaceutical treatments, and better emergency care than any other society in history. That’s a wonderful blessing, no question. But it comes with a major side effect: many of us can afford to live most of our lives as if death isn’t our problem.

Death is no less inevitable than it’s ever been, but many of us don’t have to see it or even think about it as a daily presence in our lives. When people die, it is more likely than not in a medical facility, cordoned off from where we live, a sanitized, carefully managed, even industrial process that occurs when professionals decide to stop giving care.

Death is still inevitable, but it has become bizarre. Death has also become a taboo of sorts, not to be discussed in polite company. We label such talk as “morbid.” It’s a pejorative term applied to words or ideas that are unusually dark—distortions of the truth as we wish to see it. To bring up the subject of death is too often awkward at best, shameful at worst.

Read More

Faith, Doubt, Sickness, and Healing

We can all praise God when people are healed of various diseases and illnesses. But we can also praise God when that is not the outcome. Our faith rests not in our circumstances but in a loving and gracious God who is still on the throne.

There are some understandings of the sorts of things referred to in my title that are better, and more biblical, than others. One rather faulty teaching is found in the Health and Wealth Gospel. In nearly 100 articles I have already discussed all this in great detail. See those pieces here.

But there is always more that can be said. In the HWG, sickness in a believer’s life is mainly due to a lack of faith (and/or a lack of good teaching on the subject). If only we had more faith, we could enjoy good health. But there is a tendency here to see faith as an amulet. That is, health is there for the asking, if we simply have enough faith.

Scriptures obviously put a high premium on faith. Plenty of examples of it are found, although a rigid theological formula is not actually forthcoming. The closest we come to a working definition is Hebrews 11:1: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (KJV). Yet as most commentators note, even this is not so much a definition as a description of the way it works, or what comes as a result of faith.

But saying that faith is the “substance of things hoped for” seems to fit in with the faith teachers’ idea of positive confession, visualisation, and actualisation. They state that by strong faith and positive confession we can bring things into existence, including perfect health. See more on that here.

However, we learn in the rest of Hebrews 11 that having great faith is no guarantee that one will avoid all the hardships of life, be it ill health, poverty, or other forms of suffering and tribulation. The entire eleventh chapter, known as the believers’ hall of fame, or the heroes of the faith, makes several important points.

First, it is in the midst of great difficulty and suffering that the Old Testament saints are commended for their great faith. It is faith which sees one through difficulties, not faith that avoids them, that is being celebrated here. While the faith of some produced happy results, eg., “conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword” (11:34-35), many others did not receive the promises and did not have a pleasant outcome.

“Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. They were stoned; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated” (vv. 35-37).

It is most interesting to note that the same faith being commended which saw some escape the edge of the sword (v. 34) also resulted in some dying by the edge of the sword (v. 37). Once again, it is not escape or evasion of suffering that is always the mark of great faith.

As Leon Morris comments, “The statement that some were put to death ‘by the sword’ is important, lest it be deduced from. v. 34 that men of faith were safe from this fate. While God could deliver them from it, his purpose might be for some believers to be slain in that way. It is not for men of faith to dictate. They trust God and know that, whether in life or death, all will ultimately be well.”

To argue that faith results in an illness-free life, while the lack of faith results in all manner of illness and suffering seems to run counter to the thrust of this passage. Indeed, verse 13 makes this very point: “All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance”. And in verse 39 it says, “These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised”. Many commentators argue that “these all” refer to the entire list, commencing with verse 4.

The health gospel seems to have it backwards. It promotes a faith that obtains instant satisfaction, that receives immediate release from difficulty. Many of the saints here commended are those who did not receive, at least not right away, the hoped for benefits and deliverance associated with being a son of God.

In fact, it is the forward-looking nature of faith that is celebrated here. This is the second great truth of this passage. It is not so much obtaining a life free of suffering and hardship now that is characteristic of biblical faith, but a dogged tenacity to hang on to the promises of God when circumstances seem to belie such promises.

As William Lane expresses it, “in 11:1-12:3 faith is shown to be an orientation to the future. The forward-looking character of faith lends solid-ness to the realm of Christian hope. Faith celebrates now the reality of future blessings which are certain because they are grounded in the promise of God. For the Christian it is the future, not the past, that molds the present.”

Read More

Four Views on the Lord’s Supper: Spiritual Presence

For those who hold to the spiritual view of the Lord’s Supper, Jesus is truly present, and these benefits are truly enjoyed by means of the Holy Spirit and believer’s union with Christ.

In Matthew 26:26-28 Jesus spoke a few simple words that have been the cause of a great many differences between Christians. The differences, or disagreements, are centered upon what Jesus meant when the Bible tells us that:

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

Just about every Christian agrees that this is the establishment, or foundation, of the Lord’s Supper. Most even acknowledge that what Jesus is describing here—the practice of coming together as a body of believers to partake of bread and wine—is a practice that Jesus has mandated all Christians to participate in. In fact, for many, the Lord’s Supper is a highlight of corporate worship, wherein the gospel takes a physical and tangible form as the congregation participates in a sacramental meal commemorating all that Jesus has accomplished on behalf of sinners.

So, if the debates that rage are not over what the practice of the Lord’s Supper is to be, where then are the differences? Well, to put it simply, the question that has raised so much disagreement is, “In what way does Jesus mean that the bread is His body, and in what way does Jesus mean that the wine is His blood?” How, exactly, is Jesus present in the Lord’s Supper?

To answer this question, there have been several ideas put forth. The one that was likely the most common during the Middle Ages was the view of transubstantiation, which many Roman Catholics still believe today. This is the view that when the priest blesses the bread and wine, it transubstantiates into the literal body and blood of Christ. This is also why the Roman Catholic Mass is such a big deal—the priest is literally participating in offering up Jesus as a sacrifice to take away the sins of the people.

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When It Seems Impossible to Forgive | Blog – Beautiful Christian Life

Photo Credit: Gianluca Cinnante on Unsplash

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.

“Then Peter came up and said to him, ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times’” (Matt. 18:21-22).

Most of us have gone through the experience of being hurt badly by someone. Maybe the person asked for our forgiveness or perhaps seemed to think they had done nothing wrong. As Christians we know God commands us to forgive as we have been forgiven, so we strive to obey God and forgive the person with a sincere heart.

When we experience pain over past wrongs, we need to remember God’s word.

Yet, even when we’re confident that we have truly forgiven the person, it can happen that at some point the feelings come back suddenly and unexpectedly: feelings of rejection, pain, and anger, and the sense of being terribly wronged. What then? Did we not forgive well enough the first time? Do we need to forgive again (and maybe again and again) or perhaps somehow do a better job of forgiving?

I want to encourage you to have patience with yourself in the area of forgiveness. Because we have truly forgiven someone from the heart doesn’t mean all our memories are gone. Our act of forgiveness doesn’t mean all the pain goes away. This is particularly the case in very grievous wrongs committed against us and the people we love dearly, those in which the aftereffects plague us in one way or another for the rest of our lives. Instead of despairing over our struggles to forgive, we can take our struggles to God in our prayers.

It is God’s will for Christians to forgive others.

In the passage above where Jesus says we should forgive others “seventy-seven times,” he is telling us that there should be no limits to our forgiveness. There is no sin that anyone can commit against us that is beyond our forgiveness. Jesus emphasized the critical importance of forgiveness after teaching his disciples to pray, stating:

“For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” (Matt. 6:14-15)

We can look to Jesus as our example when we are struggling to forgive.

But do we have to forgive others who haven’t asked for our forgiveness? While some Christians teach that this isn’t required of believers, it’s difficult to think of a good reason not to forgive others regardless of the level of repentance on their part.

On the cross Jesus asked his Father to forgive his persecutors because they didn’t know what they were doing (Luke 23:24). And what greater example do we have of what it means to be a Christian than the one our Lord has given us? If we are following in Jesus’ footsteps, we should want to forgive as he forgives. How can we be stingy with our forgiveness when God has so generously poured out his forgiveness upon us?

Forgiving others involves humility and wisdom on our part.

Charles Spurgeon once stated, “Humility is to make a right estimation of one’s self.” When we remember all that God has forgiven us, including the countless acts of selfishness and rebellious behavior that we never even recognize we’ve done, it should bring us to our knees. As we look inwardly and consider the evil thoughts and actions our own fallen hearts have produced, both knowingly and unknowingly, we remember that without God’s mercy we would be without hope.

Forgiving people, however, does not mean that they deserve our immediate trust. When trust is breached in a relationship, it takes time and work to build it up again, and hopefully the trust will be even stronger. Sometimes, however, trust can never be rebuilt. Sometimes it will be the case that we must never again risk placing ourselves in certain situations due to even the remotest possibility of being harmed. Still, we can—and should—forgive those who have hurt us as Jesus commands us to do.

We need God’s help to forgive others as God has forgiven us.

In her book The Hiding Place, Holocaust survivor Corrie Ten Boom describes meeting one of the Schutzstaffel (SS) guards her sister Betsy and she encountered at Ravensbruck:

It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former S.S. man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there—the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie’s pain-blanched face.

He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. “How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein.” he said. “To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!”

His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.

Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.

I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give Your forgiveness.

As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand, a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.

And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself. (Baker Publishing Group, 2006, p. 247)

Our loving God makes seemingly impossible forgiveness entirely possible.

As Corrie Ten Boom so poignantly recounts, if we depend only on our own ability to forgive the most horrendous wrongs done to us and those we love dearly, we will likely fall short. We need God to give us his perfect, unending love so we can then give it to those who have trespassed against us. In forgiving others again and again we show compassion instead of condemnation—the very way we want God and others to treat us.

God sent his only begotten Son all the way to Calvary to die a horrible death so that we could be forgiven by Christ’s perfect righteousness and perfect sacrifice counted to us through faith in Christ alone. At the cross God found a way to be both “just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (Rom. 3:26). Since God showed us such unfathomable love in redeeming us, we can be confident that he will not forsake his beloved children in their ongoing struggles to forgive.

Like Corrie, may we pray to our Lord to give us his love to forgive and then forgive again and again, even when it seems impossible, and may we trust that God will work in our hearts to help us forgive completely and love fully as we have been forgiven completely and loved fully by him in Christ.

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This article is adapted from “When It Seems Impossible to Forgive” in Beautiful Christian Life’s September 2024 monthly newsletter, “Forgiveness.”

Related Articles:

• Forgive—We Can—We Must
• “Forgive Us Our Debts”: Getting Specific When Confessing Our Sins to God
• 4 Ways to Respond When Christians Hurt You
• 3 Reasons Why Christians Should Recite the Lord’s Prayer at Church
• How to Keep “Short Accounts” When Confessing Sin
• 3 Good Things to Remember When People Let You Down

Recommended:

All of Grace by Charles H. Spurgeon

https://www.beautifulchristianlife.com/blog/when-it-seems-impossible-to-forgive

Ecclesiology 101 | Steve Brown | Key Life

“It is a hard world and I need you desperately. That’s what church is all about…” Listen as Steve speaks about the body of Christ in this powerful short video based on 1 Peter 2:9-10.

Watch the full sermon here.

The post Ecclesiology 101 | Steve Brown | Key Takeaways appeared first on Key Life.

Do You Have Joy? | G3 Ministries

Do You Have Joy?

“True joy comes only from God and He shares this joy with those who walk in fellowship with Him.”
—Jerry Bridges¹The Pursuit of Holiness (NavPress, 2006), 124.

Joy is one of those words that we know but the experience of it may be, for the most part, unknown to us. We hear about joy, but do we experience this joy? Jesus said to His disciples, “These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full” (Jn 15:11). Do you know that this is true for all of those in Christ? When God calls us and causes us to be born again, the Holy Spirit who now dwells in us, transforms us to be like Christ our Lord by uniting us to Him. As a result of that union, Christ’s life is now ours and His affections for the Father are now ours. The Holy Spirit cultivates in us holy affections for God, and from that work our hearts grow more deeply love and devotion toward the Lord. Michael Reeves states that “the Spirit wakes us up to share the holy taste of the Son,” and that “the Spirit brings us to share in the Son’s own heartbeat.” The Christian having now been united to Christ shares in the desires of Christ. Reeves goes on to state, “Our joy, prayers, mission, holiness, suffering, hope, all are a sharing of the life of the Son. . . . Jesus Christ is the first-born and we live in His slipstream.”²“New Life Through Our Union With Christ,” The Way, the Truth, and the Life: 2024 Ligonier National Conference … Continue reading What is Reeves saying? First, of course, that our salvation is in Christ alone who is our right standing before God, and because we are “in Christ,” we share His delight and love for the Father. That joy of Christ in serving the Father is produced in our hearts by the Spirit of God. 

Dear Christian, in light of this I want to ask, “Do you have joy in Christ? Is this joy from Christ manifested in your life? Do you have joy in serving Christ? If not, why? Do you believe God only has affection for us when we do well? Is it because all you see is your sin and the disappointment of your continued struggles keeps you in despair? Are you so fixated on obedience as a Christian duty rather than a privilege that is to be joyfully experienced?” Friend, there is a joy that is ours in Christ even in times of disappointments, struggles, etc. In order to have joy, we must look away from ourselves unto Christ that we may behold the grace, mercy, and love that is in Him. What do I mean by joy? I do not mean simply being happy all the time. Joy is that inner gladness of heart that we have in Christ regardless of our present circumstances. It is an inner gladness, a delight that the Holy Spirit produces in us, and that is manifested outside of us. In the lives of some, joy seems to be absent. In my own opinion, and from my own experience, I think there are two reasons some Christians lack joy: sorrow over sin and being influenced by legalism. 

Sorrow over Sin

As Christians we experience disappointment because we strongly desire to love and serve God faithfully, but we end up doing the very thing we hate rather than the thing we want to do (Rom 7:15). This can certainly frustrate us, but dear Christian, we have to be careful not to fall into utter despair. Your salvation is outside of yourself! Yes, we should mourn over our sin, but we should also run back to Christ and be reminded of who He has made us to be and of the grace and forgiveness that is found in Him. Sinclair Ferguson writes: “As I look at myself I see failure, sin, sometimes shame and disgrace. But that is neither the ultimate nor the whole truth about me as a Christian. No! I am united to Christ, a joint heir of his riches, a child of God.”³Quoted in Joel Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, “Spirit and Salvation,” Reformed Systematic Theology, Vol 3 (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 263. Michael Reeves echoes this saying, “My new identity as a Christian is in Christ, the Righteous One. And so, not my feelings, not my behavior, not my faithfulness. He is my righteousness, He is my status, He is my standing before God, the same yesterday, today, and forever.”⁴“New Life Through Our Union With Christ” (https://www.ligonier.org/learn/conferences/the-way-the-truth-and-the-life-2024-national-conference/new-life-through-our-union-with-christ. To this we should give a hearty, “AMEN!” Friend, Christ Jesus is your right standing before God. Be encouraged, though, that the Lord is and will continue to work in you through this life. As the old saying goes, “I know I’m not who I should be, but thank God I’m not who I used to be.” Can you look back and see how God has worked in your life thus far in transforming you? Whereas you once hated God and the things of God, do you see how the Lord has placed in your heart a desire to obey Him faithfully? So, pursue what is good and right according to the Scripture with all your heart, and do not take your eyes off the cross. Alistair Begg said, “If I take my eyes off the cross . . . it will lead [me] either to abject despair or a horrible kind of arrogance.”⁵“The Man on the Middle Cross Said I Can Come,” Truth For Life Blog, (https://blog.truthforlife.org/the-man-on-the-middle-cross-said-i-can-come. Pursue the Lord and His righteousness and may your joy of knowing Christ, who is your righteousness, and the forgiveness in Him fill your heart with joy in the Spirit. 

In order to have joy, we must look away from ourselves unto Christ that we may behold the grace, mercy, and love that is in Him.

Legalism

This brings up the other reason for having a lack of joy and that is having legalistic leanings. I do not mean those who have fallen into legalism in the sense of adding anything to salvation, such as “we must do “x, y, or z” to be saved.” I have in mind those who believe in salvation by grace alone in Christ alone, however, they think more highly of themselves in comparison to others when it comes to living the Christian life. They have placed a standard upon themselves and others according to their own views and convictions resulting in their belief that they live a more disciplined Christian life. Their demeanor is that of seeing others as inferior to their standard of holiness, which results in continued disapproval of other believers. The result is, then, they busy themselves with constant examinations of others. They become fixated on their own lives and the lives of others according to their personal standard. Obedience becomes a practice performed out of duty rather than out of love for God. When any of us have this mentality, it causes us to focus on ourselves rather than beholding “the glory of God in the face of Jesus” (2 Cor 4:6). Perhaps, these people inevitably lean towards the idea that obedience is the primary means of making sure of their own salvation and that of others rather than looking to Christ as the primary means of our assurance. Indeed, the Scripture clearly states, “You will know them by their fruits” (Matt 7:20). But let us not forget as well, the Apostle Paul states, 

I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin. (Rom 7:21–25)

Paul describes the life of a genuine believer in Christ. For us all, we desire to obey God faithfully, but we often fail. However, it is our desire to do what is right that distinguishes a true believer from a false believer. A false believer only professes Christ and yet has no desire to obey Him. If you have no desire to obey Christ, then you will not have any conflict in yourself when it comes to sin. There is a crucial difference with one who has genuine love and affection for Christ Jesus and struggles in sin versus someone who easily indulges in sin with no conviction. We have to be very careful that our judgments of others are 1) not according to the standard of traditions or personal convictions, and 2) that our judgments are not declaring that one is an unbeliever because he or she struggles with sin. Remember dear Christian, you have your own sins you struggle with too. It would be helpful to come alongside people to help them overcome their sin. Love them, pray for them, encourage them, and hold them accountable as a brother or sister in Christ. 

Be very cautious with your judgments, friends. A friend of one of our pastors said to him, “Christians are the ones who are most likely to kill their wounded.” Let our judgments be made, not by their struggles with sin, but by their words that manifest the desires of their hearts. Again, if there is no desire to serve God faithfully, then there is reason to be suspicious of one’s profession of faith. If it’s a matter of struggling with sin, remember this, our assurance of salvation is not in our performance, but in the One who lived the perfect life and died in our place. If we base it on our performance, at what point would we feel “secure” that we are saved? If we are honest, we will have to admit that there is a need for all of us to improve, as well as a continued awareness that we will never achieve perfection in this life. Christian, your Righteousness is in heaven sitting at the right hand of the majesty on high! That’s where your and my assurance is. We look to Christ, who despite our lack of perfect righteousness “is not ashamed to call [us] brethren” (Heb 2:11). We must remember that in and of ourselves, we are nothing and have no righteousness of our own. Christ is our righteousness, and so out of genuine affection for Him, we strive to walk in obedience to the Lord according to what is written. 

Pursue what is good and right according to the Scripture with all your heart, and do not take your eyes off the cross.

Dear Christian, though your intentions may be honorable in that you desire for others to serve Christ faithfully, you must keep in mind two things: 1) The Scriptures are rule for faith and life and not your personal convictions, and 2) Guilting others should not be the primary means you employ to motivate them to serve Christ. Place the majesty of God before them and remind them of God’s great love in His Son. Michael Reeves states: 

The Son of God never acts out of guilt, neediness, or a desire to curry favor with His Father. No. Why does the Son of God act, why does He do anything? He comes, He lives, He dies all because so much love has been showered on Him. He overflows with it. He cannot help but love His Father back, and delight to do His will, and His love spills over to the world. This is how it is for the Son of God, and that is how it is for the sons of God.⁶“Talk 3,” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSEp94cdfrM&t=1314s), 2013.

God’s love for us should be our primary motivation for honoring and obeying our Lord. Our Lord certainly chastens us out of His love, and that being either sorrow over sin or He allowing us to endure the consequences of our sin. Here again, though, He does so out of His love for us. Through the Spirit’s work in us, we are confronted with the fact that we have sinned against the One who loved us and saved us. It is then that we run back to Christ and strive to walk worthy again, not out of servile fear, but out of fear of disappointing Him who loves us. The Lord of glory who sits on His cosmic throne loves us! Does this not fill your heart with joy?

Conclusion

Friends, if we think too highly of ourselves, if we are continually critical of others who perhaps have liberties that we do not, if we fail to come alongside others who have genuine struggles—we will miss the joy of serving Christ with our other brothers and sisters in Christ and being a help to Christ’s sheep. If the standard of our obedience is our personal convictions and they are done out of duty, we will miss the joy of serving Christ out of our affection for Him. Take joy in serving Christ with other believers who are your equals. Seek to edify them and allow them to edify you. Love one another, encourage one another, and if there are things that need to be addressed, approach one another in the spirit of gentleness (Gal 6:1). May the Lord fill all our hearts with true joy that comes from Him and that is experienced in knowing Him and serving Him.

References

1	The Pursuit of Holiness (NavPress, 2006), 124.
2	“New Life Through Our Union With Christ,” The Way, the Truth, and the Life: 2024 Ligonier National Conference (https://www.ligonier.org/learn/conferences/the-way-the-truth-and-the-life-2024-national-conference/new-life-through-our-union-with-christ.
3	Quoted in Joel Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, “Spirit and Salvation,” Reformed Systematic Theology, Vol 3 (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 263.
4	“New Life Through Our Union With Christ” (https://www.ligonier.org/learn/conferences/the-way-the-truth-and-the-life-2024-national-conference/new-life-through-our-union-with-christ.
5	“The Man on the Middle Cross Said I Can Come,” Truth For Life Blog, (https://blog.truthforlife.org/the-man-on-the-middle-cross-said-i-can-come.
6	“Talk 3,” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSEp94cdfrM&t=1314s), 2013.