There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. —Soren Kierkegaard. "…truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. That is why truth does not yield to opinion, fashion, numbers, office, or sincerity–it is simply true and that is the end of it" – Os Guinness, Time for Truth, pg.39. “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” – Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
We must be particular in our thanksgivings to God:
For the discoveries that he has made to us in his word of the goodness of his nature.
We give thanks to the God of gods, to the Lord of lords, for his steadfast love endures forever. Psalm 136:2-3(ESV)
Your goodness is your glory, Exodus 33:19(ESV) and it is for that which all your works give thanks to you and all your saints bless you. Psalm 145:10(ESV)
You are gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, Psalm 145:8(ESV) and have told us that you do not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men; but, though you cause grief, you will have compassion according to the abundance of your steadfast love. Lamentations 3:32-33(ESV)
You take pleasure in those who fear you, in those who hope in your steadfast love. Psalm 147:11(ESV)
For the many instances of his goodness.
The goodness of his providence relating to our bodies and the life that now is; and this,
1st, With reference to all the creatures and the world of mankind in general.
You have stretched out the heavens like a tent, Psalm 104:2(ESV) and in them you have set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy. Psalm 19:4-5(ESV) And you make your sun rise on the evil and on the good, and send rain on the just and on the unjust. Matthew 5:45(ESV)
When we look at the heavens, the work of your fingers, the sun, the moon, and the stars which you have set in place, Lord, what is man that you care for him? Psalm 8:3-4(ESV) For truly the light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun: Ecclesiastes 11:7(ESV) All glory be to the Father of light, James 1:17(ESV) who commands the morning and causes the dawn to know its place. Job 38:12(ESV)
I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ, His only-begotten Son, our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary; suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried; He descended into hell; the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from there He shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit; a holy catholic Church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen
Into three parts: the first is about God the Father and our creation; the second, about God the Son and our redemption; the third, about God the Holy Spirit and our sanctification.
25. Since there is only one God,1 why do you speak of three: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit?
Because God has so revealed Himself in His Word,2 that these three distinct Persons are the one, true, eternal God.
1 Deut 6:4; Isa 44:6, 45:5; 1 Cor 8:4, 6; 2 Gen 1:2-3; Isa 61, 63:8-10; Mt 3:16-17, 28:18-19; Lk 4:18; Jn 14:26, 15:26; 2 Cor 13:14; Gal 4:6; Tit 3:5-6
Life is full of unknowns. And if you are like most people we have a natural inclination to fear the unknown. For example, no one can know the date when they will die. Or no one can know what stock prices will be one year from now with absolute certainty. And if you are like me, I much prefer knowing the outcome of things before they happen, than being left in the dark. However, as a Christian I have learned that while things may be unknown to me they are not unknown to God.
In fact, when you walk with Jesus you really never need to be afraid of the unknown because you are walking with the One to whom nothing is unknown. I really like what Corrie Ten Boom said regarding the unknown: “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”1 And my friends as a Chrisitan the more you read the Bible the more certain you can be of your future since Scripture tells us so much of what the future holds for believers. For example, we know where we are going when we die. We know that even if we are living with chronic pain, one day we will get a glorified body and never experience pain again. And while so many people spend their whole lives searching for the real purpose of life, we know that we were created to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
And the exciting thing about the unknown is that when we walk with the Lord we need not concern ourselves with the day to day unknowns but with doing God’s will and knowing that everything will work together for our ultimate good and God’s glory. D. A. Carson shared, perhaps, one of the most exciting insights on this whole area of the unknown when he said: “To walk into the unknown with a God of unqualified power and unfailing goodness is safer than a known way.”2
In closing, I would like to leave you with a verse that has always been very comforting to me: “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.” (Deuteronomy 29:29). I like this verse for two reasons. One, there will always be unknown (secret) things that only God knows and we need not fret that we don’t know them but rest in the confidence that our good God knows them and that we need not be afraid to walk with our God into the unknown with Him. And two, our job is not to concern ourselves with these secret things, but to rejoice that God has given us so much revelation about Himself and how we ought to live. And as a result, our focus should be on following all the words of His revealed will for us and get excited, not only about life, but that God always has our back, even as we walk through the unknowns we inevitably will face.
In this sobering episode of Sound Theology and Discernment, Justin Peters examines what may be Benny Hinn’s cruelest false prophecy his claims about Nigeria and Islam. Through historical footage, biblical exposition, and verified reporting, Justin exposes the devastating consequences of false prophecies, showing how they exploit the poor, distort the gospel, and bring reproach on the name of Christ. This episode is both a warning and a call to repentance for those caught in deception and a reminder of the sufficiency of God’s Word.
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. (2:12–13)
The process of the Spirit’s transmission of God’s truth is called inspiration. His truth cannot be discovered by man; it can only be received. In order to be received, something must first be offered. God’s truth can be received because it is freely given. The Spirit who is from God, not the spirit of the world (that is, human wisdom) has brought God’s Word—which comprises the things freely given to us by God. The Bible is the Spirit’s vehicle for bringing God’s revelation. The we’s and the us of verses 12–13 (as in vv. 6–7, 10) do not refer to Christians in general but to Paul himself. God’s Word is for all believers, but was revealed only to the apostles and the other writers of Scripture. Only those men properly can be said to have been inspired. The promise of John 14:26 (“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit … will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you”) is for the benefit of all believers, but was given only to the apostles. Paul and the other writers of Scripture did not record their own ideas and interpretations. They recorded what God gave them and only what He gave them. We have received … that we might know. The Spirit used words that the human writers knew and used, but He selected them and arranged them in precisely the order that He wanted. The Bible, therefore, not only is God’s Word but God’s words. It is not simply the “Word behind the words” that is from God, as many liberal and neoorthodox interpreters maintain. “All Scripture is inspired by God [lit., ‘God-breathed’]” (2 Tim. 3:16). Scripture means “writings,” and refers specifically to what God’s chosen men wrote by His revelation and inspiration, not to everything they said and wrote. It refers, as Paul explains, to the things freely given to us by God, to the “God-breathed” words they recorded. When Jesus responded to Satan’s first temptation in the wilderness, He said (quoting from Deut. 8:3), “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Matt. 4:4). God gave His own Word in His own words. “Every word that proceeds out the mouth of God” is revealed, inspired, and authoritative. Which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.
MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1984). 1 Corinthians (pp. 62–63). Moody Press.
Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may know the things freely given to us by God. a. “Now we have received.” In the previous verse, Paul spoke in generalities that involved man’s spirit. But here he specifies the Corinthians and himself by using the plural personal pronoun we. This pronoun takes the first place in the Greek sentence and so receives emphasis. With this inclusive pronoun, Paul has come to the heart of the paragraph on God’s Spirit versus man’s spirit. He offers the comforting assurance that we have received the Spirit, whom God has given us. b. “Not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God.” The negative clause not the spirit of the world has been interpreted in various ways: it describes the rulers of the world who crucified Jesus (v. 8); it denotes evil that has established its own rules and objectives (see 2 Cor. 4:4; 1 John 4:4; 5:19); it is equivalent to the wisdom of this world (1:20); it is the spirit in man that is worldly.
We say that the spirit of the world is the spirit that makes the world secular. From the time Adam and Eve fell into sin, the spirit of this world has revealed itself in opposition to God’s Spirit: for example, in the lawlessness prior to the flood, in the building of the tower of Babel, and in the false teachers who sought to destroy the church in apostolic days (2 Peter 2; 1 John 4:1–3; Jude 4–19). It is the spirit that rules a person in whom God’s Spirit does not live. It is a power that determines “all the thinking and doing of men, which places itself over against the Spirit who is of God.” By contrast, as Paul expresses in eloquent Greek, believers have received the Spirit that proceeds from God (see John 15:26; Gal. 4:6). God’s Spirit comes to the believers from a sphere other than this world and conveys knowledge of God, creation, redemption, and restoration. Since Pentecost, God’s Spirit dwells in the hearts of all believers (6:19). c. “That we may know the things freely given to us by God.” Why does God grant us the gift of his Spirit? The answer is that we may know innately the things that pertain to our salvation. The Spirit teaches us the treasures we have in Christ Jesus, whom God handed over to die on a cross so that we have eternal life (1 John 5:13). If God delivered up his Son, he certainly will graciously give us in him all things (Rom. 8:32). Believers appropriate the gift of salvation through the work of the Holy Spirit. They realize through faith that in Christ sin and guilt have been removed from them, that God is reconciled to them, and that the way to heaven has been opened for them.
Kistemaker, S. J., & Hendriksen, W. (1953–2001). Exposition of the First Epistle to the Corinthians (Vol. 18, pp. 88–89). Baker Book House.
Do I make the honor of God the great object of my life and the rule of my conduct? If so, He will honor me. I may for a while receive no honor from man, but God will Himself put honor upon me in the most effectual manner. In the end it will be found the surest way to honor to be willing to be put to shame for conscience’ sake.
Eli had not honored the Lord by ruling his household well, and his sons had not honored the Lord by behavior worthy of their sacred office, and therefore the Lord did not honor them but took the high priesthood out of their family and made young Samuel to be ruler in the land instead of any of their line. If I would have my family ennobled, I must honor the Lord in all things. God may allow the wicked to win worldly honors; but the dignity which He Himself gives, even glory, honor, and immortality, He reserves for those who by holy obedience take care to honor Him.
What can I do this day to honor the Lord? I will promote His glory by my spoken testimony and by my practical obedience, I will also honor Him with my substance and by offering to Him some special service. Let me sit down and think how I can honor Him, since He will honor me.
November 10, 2025 •Theme: Testing the Spirits in a Confused Age
In a world where spiritual movements are multiplying and voices claim divine authority at every turn, Christians must stand firm in biblical discernment. Scripture calls us to vigilance. “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God”(1 John 4:1–6). Spiritual activity alone does not equal the work of God. True discernment begins with the Word of God and is empowered by the Spirit of God.Question: How can believers test the spirits in an age filled with spiritual confusion and competing voices?
Christ Is Always Exalted in the Work of the Spirit
The first and most essential test asks whether a movement or message magnifies Christ as Lord and upholds the gospel. “Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.” If a teaching diminishes Christ or distorts His person and work, it is not from the Holy Spirit. (1 John 4:2–3)
The Spirit of God Always Aligns with Scripture
The Holy Spirit never contradicts the Scriptures He inspired. (2 Timothy 3:16–17) Claims of fresh revelation must be weighed against the Bible. If a message, prophecy, or practice departs from or adds to the biblical witness, it cannot be of God.
Experience Must Never Replace Biblical Truth
Our age often prizes visions, impressions, and feelings above the Bible. Yet Scripture warns against voices that promise comfort without repentance or assurance without obedience (Jeremiah 23:16–17). True renewal calls sinners to Christ in faith and produces reverent obedience.
True Renewal Is Word-Centered and Obedient
Genuine revival is not driven by spectacle or emotion. It is driven by the Word planted in hearts, producing enduring fruit. The Spirit illuminates Scripture, convicts of sin, strengthens holiness, and exalts Christ. The Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and this witness is rooted in the truth of Scripture. (Romans 8:16)
The Gospel Must Be Guarded Without Compromise
Everything must be measured by the gospel once for all delivered to the saints. If a message revises or supplements the gospel, Scripture commands us to reject it, even if it arrives with claims of angelic authority. (Galatians 1:6–9)
The Fruit of the Spirit Confirms What Is Genuine
By their fruit you will know them. A work of the Spirit produces humility, holiness, unity grounded in truth, and obedience to Scripture. If the result is confusion, pride, division, or unrepentant sin, the source is suspect. (Matthew 7:16–20)
A Call to Faithful Discernment
Test every teaching, impression, experience, and movement by the timeless Word of God. Ask these questions and look for these fruits:
Does this exalt Christ?
Does this align with Scripture?
Does this uphold the gospel?
Does this produce godly fruit?
Be steadfast in the truth. Stay grounded in Scripture, rely on the Holy Spirit who guides into all truth, and guard your heart from deception. Christ is sufficient, His Word is clear, His gospel is enough.
For more from Contending for the Word Q&A, please visit our page here at Servants of Grace or our YouTube channel.
Zaccheus stopped and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much.” And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (19:8–10)
Luke does not describe the Lord’s presentation of the gospel to Zaccheus, or his response. But the salvation of the man is evident from the transformation of his life, which revealed itself in that part of his life where his sin was most openly manifested. Zaccheus stopped (the Greek word is better translated “took a stand”), acknowledged Jesus as Lord (cf. Rom. 10:9–10), and expressed his self-denial (cf. Luke 9:23–24) by saying to Him, “Half of my possessions I will give to the poor” (cf. 2 Cor. 8:3; James 2:15–16; 1 John 3:17). Further, his statement, “If I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much,” declared his intent to make restitution for the wrongs he had committed, in keeping with the maximum amount required by the Old Testament law (Ex. 22:1; cf. vv. 4–14; Num. 5:6–7). The genuineness of Zaccheus’s salvation was made evident by the complete transformation of his behavior. Jesus confirmed the reality of Zaccheus’s salvation when He said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham.” Zaccheus had, of course, been a son of Abraham ethnically all of his life. But as the apostle Paul wrote,
He is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God. (Rom. 2:28–29; cf. 9:6)
Even so Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham. The Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “All the nations will be blessed in you.” So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer.… And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise. (Gal. 3:6–9, 29; cf. John 8:33–44)
Paul had been a zealous Pharisee, proud of his Abrahamic heritage (Phil. 3:4–6). But after his salvation he viewed all of that as “rubbish” (v. 8), and himself as the foremost of all sinners (1 Tim. 1:15). So complete was Zaccheus’s transformation that he instantaneously went from being a thief to being a benefactor; from being selfish to being unselfish, from being a taker to being a giver. He became a true Jew, part of the Israel of God (Gal. 6:16), a Jew who was one inwardly. He was no longer just a son of Abraham by race, but a son of Abraham by faith. That very day he was justified by faith. The one who had been lost was saved and delivered from sin, death, and hell. The Lord gave him life and light to believe and repent and his conduct was transformed. Son of Man, a messianic title taken from Daniel 7:13, was Jesus’ most common way of referring to Himself. It describes both His humanity and His deity. The verbs translated seek and save are infinitives, and express the purpose for which Jesus came into world. To save is to rescue from harm and deliver from danger. Lost translates a form of the verb apollumi, which means “to be ruined,” or “destroyed.” Sin has devastated all of humanity, leaving lost sinners marred, corrupted, evil, ruined, and headed for eternal damnation (Rom. 3:10–18; Eph. 4:17). But God, in His mercy, grace, and love, sent Christ to seek and to save those who face His own wrath and judgment. In the words of Philip P. Bliss’s hymn “Hallelujah, What a Savior!”:
“Man of Sorrows!” what a name
For the Son of God who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim!
Hallelujah, what a Savior!
When a sinner does seek after God (Jer. 29:13; Amos 5:4; Matt. 6:33; 11:28) he does so only because God has first sought him (John 6:44; cf. 1 John 4:19), called him “out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9), and shattered his state of death by making him alive (cf. Eph. 2:1–3).
MacArthur, J. (2014). Luke 18–24 (pp. 74–75). Moody Publishers.
10 This could well be considered the “key verse” of Luke. As noted in the Overview, the context is rich with Lukan themes and an appropriate setting for a significant verse. The verse itself expresses the heart of Jesus’ ministry as presented by Luke—both Jesus’ work of salvation and his quest for the lost. Luke has portrayed the “lost” throughout his gospel, from Jesus’ own statements (e.g., the programmatic statement in 4:18–19) to the disdainful comments of the self-righteous (e.g., the Pharisee in 18:11 and here in v. 7). Jesus has sought and found another of the “lost” in Jericho. He uses the occasion and the criticism of the people (v. 7) as an opportunity to restate his mission. This entire incident is the epitome of the messianic mission described in Luke 4.
Liefeld, W. L., & Pao, D. W. (2007). Luke. In T. Longman III & D. E. Garland (Eds.), The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Luke–Acts (Revised Edition) (Vol. 10, p. 286). Zondervan.
Legalized Abduction: Children At Risk Across America Alyssa Johnson, a mother from Oregon, hasn’t seen her daughter in years. Not because of a crime, custody battle, or court order — but because of Oregon laws that let minors be removed from their parents and placed in host homes or foster programs without parental consent. Under ORS 419B.150 and 419B.152, if a child tells a teacher, counselor, or youth worker they feel “unsafe” at home, they can be taken into state custody immediately — no court order, no investigation, no due process. “Unsafe” doesn’t mean abuse. It can be as simple as parents not using preferred pronouns or requiring homework before screen time. … a child gains access to state-backed programs offering housing, stipends, and medical interventions — including gender transition services — while parents are cut out.
Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks Full SNAP Payments The Supreme Court issued an emergency order on Friday night, temporarily blocking full payments of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. … the High Court granted the Trump Administration’s request to appeal a previous ruling that would require SNAP to be fully funded amid the ongoing federal government shutdown.
More signs of new offensive in war-torn Sudan Sudan’s national army has thwarted a drone attack on the town of al-Ubayyid, a military source told AFP. There is growing evidence that the RSF militia is preparing an offensive against the strategically important region. Horrific reports of mass executions have followed the recent capture by RSF forces in late October of the town of al-Fashir in western Sudan.
German town shocked by blood-painted swastikas days before Kristallnacht anniversary Residents in Hanau, Germany, awoke Thursday morning to find more than 50 cars and several buildings covered in swastikas painted in blood, shocking a town already scarred by a far-right massacre five years ago. Police said a 31-year-old Romanian man was arrested at his home hours later after a witness recognized him near one of the vandalized streets and alerted authorities.
Tornado in southern Brazil – over 700 injured At least six people have died and around 750 people have been injured after a tornado swept across southern Brazil, local authorities said. Winds of over 69 meters per second have toppled trees and cars. Several buildings and homes have been damaged. The city of Rio Bonito do Iguaçu, in the state of Paraná, with a population of around 14,000, was hardest hit by the tornado. According to the state’s civil defense, 90 percent of the city was damaged, and a spokesperson likened the devastation to “a war zone.”
Tehran turns off water at night The year 2025 has been the driest in Tehran in more than a hundred years, and it is now having consequences for the residents. “We are forced to shut off the water supply during certain evenings so that the reservoirs can be filled,” said Energy Minister Abbas Ali Abadi, according to the pro-regime news agency Isna. In addition, the water pressure is reduced, so that less water is used.
New typhoon threatens already-stricken Philippines The new typhoon has been named Fung-Wong and has a radius that covers “almost the entire country,” according to local meteorologists. In addition to winds of 40 meters per second, (~90 mph) heavy rains are also expected, which could cause extensive flooding.
Staunchly Pro-Israeli Republican Elise Stefanik Launches Bid for NY Governor Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), a vocal and steadfast ally of Israel, officially announced on Friday her bid for governor of New York in the 2026 election, on the heels of the election of anti-Israel radical Zohran Mamdani as the mayor of New York City earlier in the week. Her campaign announcement targeted incumbent Gov. Kathy Hochul, branding the Democrat the “worst governor in America.”
Texas Protects The Religious Freedom Of Judges, Allowing Them To Forgo Officiating Same-Sex Marriages the Texas Supreme Court’s judicial code of conduct was amended in response to a lawsuit by McLennan County Justice of the Peace Dianne Hensley. In 2019, she declined to marry a same-sex couple, saying it would be “inconsistent with her religious faith.” Hensley received a public warning from the State Commission on Judicial Conduct, who said her behavior produced distrust in her “capacity to act impartially.” Hensley, who then stopped performing weddings altogether, filed suit under the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act (TRFRA) in December 2019. Arguing that her religious rights were violated, she requested $10,000 in attorneys’ fees and lost income. In 2021, lower courts dismissed her case. However, the case reached the Texas Supreme Court in July 2024, which reversed most of the dismissal.
Protestant group fires off complaint to King Charles III over papal prayer service Senior officials with a historic Protestant fraternal group based in Northern Ireland fired off complaint letters to King Charles III for having prayed with Pope Leo XIV last month, which the group alleged was a violation of his coronation oath. On Oct. 23, King Charles III participated in an ecumenical worship service with Pope Leo XIV in the Sistine Chapel, marking the first time a reigning British monarch has attended such a service since the English Reformation nearly five centuries ago. …the king took a solemn oath in 2023 to “maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed religion established by law.”
Deadly tornado destroys 80 percent of Rio Bonito do Iguaçu, Paraná, Brazil A powerful tornado struck the municipality of Rio Bonito do Iguaçu, Paraná, southern Brazil, in the late afternoon of November 7, 2025, killing at least five people and injuring over 130, of whom 30 were seriously injured. Winds exceeding 240 km/h (150 mph) destroyed most of the town’s structures, prompting a large-scale emergency response by Civil Defense, the Fire Department, and state authorities.
‘Jesus Lifted High’: Hundreds Baptized at University of Cincinnati Revival …On Wednesday night, more than 5,500 students gathered at the University of Cincinnati for a “UniteUS” worship event. But this was no ordinary gathering. It was a genuine move of God, culminating in hundreds of students being baptized in truck beds outside the Reds baseball stadium.
US To Establish Military Base In Syria’s Damascus The US is planning to establish a military base in Damascus, Syria…as the Trump administration continues to strongly back the new Syrian government that’s led by former al-Qaeda leader Ahmed al-Sharaa. The report said that the US will establish a military presence at an airbase on the outskirts of the Syrian capital for the purpose of enabling a security pact that Washington is attempting to broker between Israel and Syria.
Police warn vicar that vans Bible verse could be hate speech “…Now the priest has revealed he was approached by a police officer while at a petrol station in Lancashire, who told him ‘the writing could be seen as hate speech in the wrong context’. Despite being told he wasn’t there to arrest Mick, the officer said that ‘if someone reported it police would investigate, and [he] could end up in trouble.’”
Alleged Iranian plot to kill Israel’s ambassador to Mexico was thwarted, US and Israel say Mexican authorities with assistance from the United States and Israeli intelligence agencies thwarted an alleged plot by Iran to assassinate the Israeli ambassador to Mexico, Israeli and U.S. officials said Friday. Mexican authorities denied any knowledge of such a plot.
Providence Baptist Church on RSBN featuring Pastor Dr Rusty Sowell live from Providence Baptist Church in Beauregard, AL Sunday Morning Worship 11/9/25
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., weighs in on the government shutdown, which has become the longest in U.S. history, on ‘The Story.’ #fox #media #breakingnews #us #usa #new #news #breaking #foxnews #thestory #johnkennedy #senjohnkennedy #kennedy #schumer #chuckschumer #shutdown #governmentshutdown #politics #political #politicalnews #government #congress #senate #washingtondc #washington #dc #republicans #democrats #democrat #democraticparty
and attribution of single-event bad weather to the use of natural hydrocarbons.
The 1.5°C figure is a meaningless number invented by politicians and activists to concentrate Net Zero minds; tipping points are climate model codswallop; and ditto attribution crystal ball-gazing.
None of them are backed up by credible scientific evidence and observation.
Which of course is why political elites have trashed the scientific process of inquiry, banned and cancelled any dissenting discussion and declared the matter ‘settled’.
The foundation scam is temperature. The world is said to be warming dramatically, leading to tipping points and worsening extreme weather. Changes are said to be occurring at unprecedented rates and are caused primarily by humans increasing atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide. In fact the temperature rise is small, about 1°C over 200 years (making allowance for all the fake temperature estimates and urban heat-ravaged measurements) and similar rises are commonplace in both the historical and paleo record. The recent ‘hottest evah’ rises have been seen in the past – sudden changes in temperature are caused by sudden local events such as volcano eruptions. As it happens, the underwater Hunga Tonga volcano released vast quantity of water vapour into the upper atmosphere in 2022, a ‘greenhouse’ warming event that would have been helped along by a recent strong El Niño oscillation. Recent accurate satellite measurements show the overall global temperature has been falling during 2025.
Don’t take my word for all this natural movement. Professor Mark Maslin is a Professor of something termed Earth Systems Science at UCL and one of the authors of a recent tipping point report timed for COP30. This particular computer model-based bilge suggested that warm water corals may already be crossing their “thermal tipping points”, despite the fact that coral has been around for hundreds of millions of years and survives in waters between 24-32°C. This would appear to be the same Mark Maslin who as a humble geography lecturer in 1999 wrote a paper that said possibly most of the large climate changes involving movements of several degrees occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, “and perhaps even a few years”. These days he whines that “Earth is already becoming unliveable”, while climate change politics helps build “a new political and socio-economic system”. In 2018, he was one of a number of eco-activists who signed a letter to the Guardian saying they would no longer “lend their credibility” by debating climate science scepticism.
No wonder people like Maslin – needless to say a BBC regular on all learned climate Armageddon matters – walked away from climate science debate.
Tying CO2 levels to rising temperatures to make Left-wing political capital relies on observations from just a few recent years. Widen the observations out to hundreds and then hundreds of millions of years gives a different picture. Sometimes temperatures rise and fall at the same time as CO2, sometimes not. Sometimes even CO2 levels rise before the following temperatures, more often than not they don’t. The simple explanation that warming gases such as CO2 become ‘saturated’ once they pass certain concentrations, with heating falling off a logarithmic cliff, is a scientific hypothesis or opinion, but it has much to offer when past observational evidence is considered.
Let us consider some of these observations starting with the long term record over 600 million years. The graph below shows wide temperature-CO2 divergence.
Over 600 million years it is difficult to observe any general lockstep connection between temperature and gas. It might, however, be noted that over 600 million years, CO2 has generally been declining in the atmosphere to the near denuded levels seen today. As we have seen over the last 40 years even small rises in CO2 lead to significant planet-wide biomass growth. All that CO2 was good for the dinosaurs who roamed the Earth until 66 million years ago, with levels more than three times higher than today. The little extra has also been good for humans since recent crop yields have soared and helped to alleviate naturally-occurring world famine.
These records of course are very long term and are compiled from proxies with accuracy only to a few thousand years. In the more immediate record we find additional and conclusive proof that CO2 is not the main climate thermostat. Temperatures in medieval times were similar to today, possibly slightly higher in the Roman period and often 3-4°C higher in the Holocene thermal maximum around 8,000 to 5,000 years ago. During these periods, CO2 was remarkably stable around 260 parts per million, a mark that is in fact dangerously low to sustain life on Earth. The notorious Michael-Mann-1,000-year temperature ‘hockey stick’ removed the linking problem by abolishing the medieval warming period and the subsequent little ice age that ran up to around 1800.
Remarkable recent scientific evidence has emerged to suggest that abrupt rises in temperature have been a feature of the global climate going back to the iceless Jurassic period over 150 million years ago. Dramatic temperature changes based on 1,500-year cycles, as the younger Maslin can testify, have been known to have occurred in Greenland and the North Atlantic. But a group of French scientists led by Slah Boulila from the Sorbonne found large temperature hikes going back millions of years across the globe. The scientists noted warming up to 15°C within a few decades, “pointing to abrupt and severe changes in Earth’s past climate”. The 1,500 year cycles are often called Dansgaard-Oeschger (DO) events after the scientists who discovered them. Some scientists have downplayed the initial DO findings and suggested the short term temperatures rises of around 1.5°C were caused by specific northern hemisphere oscillations of ice sheets and surrounding waters.
However, the French scientists note: “The 1,500-year cycle is documented in both hemispheres, in other oceans and in continents.” Their work is said to support the global nature of DO-like events, and in particular that their potential primary cause is independent of ice sheet dynamics. Meanwhile, scientific evidence continues to grow indicating much higher temperatures a few thousand years ago. One recent paper found the plant Ceratopteris had grown 8,000 years ago at 40°N in northern China, suggesting winter temperatures 7.7°C higher than today. Another found types of molluscs surviving in the Arctic Svalbard 9,000 years ago that indicated temperatures were 6°C warmer.
The current Net Zero fantasy rests on catastrophising tiny temperature rises that frankly are not even measured properly, demonising CO2 boosts that are helping Earth return to a more healthy biosphere and atmospheric balance, inventing ‘tipping points’ using junk computer models and insulting the intelligence with untestable tales claiming humans are making the weather worse.
New York’s incoming mayor has been transparent about his socialist thinking, and history has shown that the kind he subscribes to should be cause for concern.
To put it bluntly, we aren’t talking about a polite and fashionable Fabian socialism of the British upper class of 100 years ago, with its practical desire to construct cradle-to-grave welfare states. Rather it’s the one drawn from the older tradition of Karl Marx and his utterly mistaken attempt to trace all social evils to the existence of private capital. This view is ridiculously old-fashioned, kept alive entirely by the fake world of academia that is wholly shielded from any real-world experience in economics.
Part of that, of course, means not looking at the material world through the lens of objective reality and economics. This worldview imagines that the government can simply make all things free, lower and freeze rents, and deliver groceries by simply announcing it to be so, with some help from heavy taxes on the successful.
When the plan does not work, as it never does, in this worldview, leaders would have to resort to authoritarian measures. This is true everywhere it is tried. New York City is an awful state right now, and this path is guaranteed to make matters worse. One supposes we will see another round of exodus from Gotham in the coming months, not just fleeing capital but fleeing people.
It’s not just large enterprises and big corporations that should worry. It’s all businesses in the city. This point of view regards any surplus flowing to capital as an unjust flow from workers to owners; that is, from value creators to value exploiters.
It’s a relatively simple outlook that is rooted in a single error, one that seems plausible at first but collapses on closer look. It traces the very existence of economic value exclusively to the manifestation of physical toil. It’s called the labor theory of value. This is genuinely an empirical proposition.
In this view, the whole output of industrial production was equal to the value of manual labour and should be allotted accordingly. Any money deducted from labor—to pay owners of capital or for raw materials or new inventions or for marketing or to lenders—is robbery from labor. Ironically, in this view, those who do mental work (the intellectuals) are doing nothing. Except that the socialists came up with an escape hatch for that one: the intellectuals are the vanguard of the proletariat and therefore necessary.
Is it really the case that all toil generates economic value that should always and everywhere flow only to workers and never owners? Clearly not. Anyone anywhere is fully capable of doing anything and everything that is not regarded as valuable by anyone. Labor alone does not cause value to come into being; what generates value is the act of valuing.
The labor theory of value, however, has long roots in history, even hinted at in the works of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, points later adopted by socialists to argue for the nationalization of capital.
It was the rise of Marxian theory that provoked great clarity on value theory during the so-called Marginal Revolution of the 1880s. Three theorists—Stanley Jevons, Leon Walras, and Carl Menger—argued persuasively for what came to be known as the subjective theory of value as against the labor theory of value.
Among these works, my favorite is Carl Menger’s “Principles of Economics” (1871). It still makes for a compelling read and a good tutorial on economic basics. On the issue of value, he writes:
“Value is therefore nothing inherent in goods, no property of them, but merely the importance that we first attribute to the satisfaction of our needs, that is, to our lives and well-being, and in consequence carry over to economic goods as the exclusive causes of the satisfaction of our needs. … It is a judgment economizing men make about the importance of the goods at their disposal for the maintenance of their lives and well-being. Hence value does not exist outside the consciousness of men.”
Once you understand this point, the entire theoretical structure of Marxism and even socialism falls apart. It is the unending process of cooperative exchange, driven by people’s perception of their own needs and nonstop working benefit from satisfying the needs of others, that generates value, which is something imparted by the individual minds.
It is not possible for any politicians, intellectuals, or bureaucrats to replicate this delicate system, much less replace it with a new and wholly externalized vision of what is valuable and what is not. Nor can outsiders slice and dice prices and accounting that results from the market process and say: this is too high, this is too low, and here is a plan to make it right. That kind of planning can only result in wild distortions.
There is a deeper point here that relates to the history of the United States. There is nothing about our history as a nation that has any roots in socialist theory. I cannot think of a single Founding Father who had any interest in pre-Marxian utopian socialist theory. Sure, there were anabaptist sects who held things in common and celebrated community. That’s not the same thing. There were plenty of utopian socialists around from the ancient world to the present but the Founders discussed them not at all.
Indeed, do you know the name of Thomas Jefferson’s favorite economist? It was not Adam Smith. It was the French physiocrat Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de l’Aulne (1727–1781). He was a champion of low taxes, property rights, small business, trade, and the commercial experience generally. It was he who warned the French monarchy to lower taxes and free prices to forestall revolution, a plea that went unheard.
Jefferson was a close reader of Turgot’s great book “Reflections on the Production and Distribution of Wealth” (1766), which pushed the market theory of value long before Menger. His book is meticulous and deeply empirical, laying out the formation of prices via supply and demand and discussing the origin and uses of money.
In his role as adviser to the court, he condemned industrial monopolies and intervention by the Crown into commercial affairs of small business. He was a brilliant innovator. Jefferson admired him so much that he had a bust of him made to display in the main portico of Monticello.
If there is an American economics, this is it: The celebration of private ownership, small business, low taxes, no industrial monopolies, agronomy, entrepreneurship, community service, independence, self-reliance, hard work, creativity, pride in a job well done, frugality, sound money, savings, long-term commitment, family and faith.
To be sure, America has had its debates over economics in the earliest years. The Jeffersonians battled it out with the Hamiltonians. Jefferson hated debt, taxation, was suspicious of banking empires, and opposed forced industrialism and tariffs. Hamilton liked business finance, industry, large banks and leverage, and favored the protective tariff. These are legitimate American debates, deeply rooted in our history. The idea of a national bank went through several rounds of controversy for over a century until the Federal Reserve Act and the income tax came along.
Even with all these disputes and debates, we have no history at all of Hegelian histrionics of the sort that have emerged on the left and sometimes on the right. Not even our earliest socialists like Eugene Debs were communists. His main passion was for free speech, individual rights, and peace not war. This is the long heritage of the American left from a century ago. Woke theory and mass redistribution and fundamental rejection of economic freedom are not really in our DNA.
It’s urgently necessary that Americans reacquaint themselves with the economic system that made this country great. It is inseparable from freedom and rights. What is moral is also practical from an economic point of view. What grants dignity also grants prosperity. That is the American belief and practice.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent made a Sunday appearance on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” to discuss the ongoing government shutdown and the implications of Democrats holding the country hostage.
Bessent kicked off the interview explaining the impact that the shutdown is having on the economic growth, which he said “could be cut by as much as half if the shutdown continues,” making it clear that the Democrats’ mission is to sabotage Trump’s record going into the midterm. He further commented the “human cost” and expectations that goliday air travel, as well as cargo transport and supply chain, will face slowdowns.
Stephanopoulos then asked about the President’s calls for Republicans to terminate the filibuster and whether that is the best way to end the shut down, but Bessent flipped the script calling out Stephanopoulos then explaining that “five Democrats can cross the aisle and reopen the government.”
“You were involved in a lot of these in the ’90s,” Bessent told the former Senior Advisor to then-President Bill Clinton, then pointing to his previous statements accusing the GOP of “terrorism” and creating a “hostage crisis” during a government shutdown in 1995. Stephanopoulos also amplified this rhetoric in his memoir, “All Too Human.”
When Bessent referenced his past comments, Stephanopoulos lost it and denied the claim while he tried to change the subject, but Bessent brought the receipts. “I’ve got all your quotes here, George,” he said.
“I’m sure you do. But let’s talk about the situation right now,” Stephanopoulos responded before Bessent obliterated him, stating, “I went back and read your book. So, you got one purchase on Amazon this week. And that’s very much what you said.”
WATCH:
Stephanopoulos: The president continues to post about ending the filibuster. Is that — is that the best way to end the shutdown right now? Is that what the administration’s position is?
Bessent: No, George, the best — the best way to do it — and look, you were involved in a lot of these in the ’90s. And, you know, you basically called the Republicans terrorists and, you know, you said that it is not the responsible party that keeps the government closed.
And so, what we need is five brave, moderate Democratic senators to cross the aisle because right now it is 52 to three, 52 to three, five Democrats can cross the aisle and reopen the government. That’s the best way to do it, George.
Stephanopoulos: I can disagree with you about the history there, but we don’t need history lesson right now.
Bessent: No, George
Stephanopoulos: Let’s talk — let’s talk about — let’s talk about
Bessent: No, no, no. George, George, George
Stephanopoulos: Let’s talk — sir, let’s talk about what’s happening right now. I asked you a question
Bessent: If you want, I’ve got all your quotes here. I’ve got all your quotes here, George.
Stephanopoulos: I’m sure you do. But let’s talk about the situation right now.
Bessent: I went back and read your book. So, you got one — one purchase on Amazon this week. And that’s very much what you said.
In another clip, Bessent lays out the position of the Trump Administration: “We are not going to negotiate with the Democrats until they reopen the government. It’s very simple. Repoen the government, then we can have a discussion”
As The Gateway Pundit reported, the Senate is expected to vote today on a new spending measure to finally reopen the government on the 40th day of the longest shutdown in history.
Elon Musk reveals the real reason why Democrats never cleaned out the Social Security system of dead people is they were using those names to send fraudulent payments to illegals
If you removed those names, it would shutoff benefits form multiple other programs paying benefits… pic.twitter.com/45LBf4LTvf
It’s been over 15 years since Democrats passed Obamacare under the promise that it would make healthcare affordable. Americans were supposed to save money, keep their doctors, and finally get a system that worked for them instead of the big insurance companies.
Today, those promises look like a sick joke.
A recent post shared by our sister site Twitchy highlights how the Obamacare boondoggle really works, and why it doesn’t actually work for the people. Instead, it was built to enrich the healthcare industry, and the numbers prove it. Let me give you a rundown of how it works, if you can stomach learning how the sausage is made.
Every year, the federal government quietly funnels around $40 billion straight to insurance companies through cost-sharing reduction subsidies. These payments get sent automatically. There’s no congressional vote, no annual debate, no accountability. The money just flows. Meanwhile, everyday Americans still face insane deductibles and co-pays high enough to make anyone think twice before setting foot in a doctor’s office. The supposed “affordability” is an illusion built on taxpayer-funded handouts that prop up corporate profits.
Nonprofit hospitals, the ones constantly waving the banner of community service, aren’t exactly hurting, either. They rake in more than $125 billion every year in tax breaks because of their “nonprofit” status. That means they skip out on property, income, and sales taxes, while still cashing in from every direction. Medicare alone overpays them by another $28 billion each year, and hospitals charge anywhere from 60–80% more than independent doctors for the exact same procedures.
Take a look at where the money actually goes. These so-called nonprofits pay their CEOs multimillion-dollar salaries, spend billions lobbying politicians, and buy up independent medical practices to crush competition. And when regular Americans can’t pay their inflated hospital bills, these hospitals drag them into court. They invest huge sums to grow their stock portfolios, yet claim to operate for the public good.
Does that sound charitable to you?
Make no mistake about it, the system bleeds Americans dry. We pay three times for healthcare. Once through taxes that subsidize insurance companies and hospitals. Then again through our monthly insurance premiums. And a third time when the hospital bills finally arrive.
It’s the perfect setup—for them.
Meanwhile, nearly $200 billion a year flows to insurers and hospitals in the name of making healthcare “more affordable,” yet medical care remains out of reach for millions. The winners are always the same group: lawmakers, health insurance executives, and hospital system CEOs. The losers are the rest of us—families and workers who can’t afford the care they’ve already been taxed to pay for, even though we were promised that we’d be saving money because of this system. I spend thousands of dollars a year for coverage that doesn’t cover diddly squat until I max out my deductible.
I can still remember how much cheaper insurance was and how much more was covered before Obamacare was passed.
Democrats own this mess from start to finish. Remember, every single one of them voted for Obamacare. Not a single Republican did. Nancy Pelosi famously said back in the debate over the bill, “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.” Well, we’ve found out. And what’s inside isn’t reform—it’s rot. The entire structure depends on endless subsidies to keep the illusion of affordability alive. Without them, the program collapses under its own weight. With them, Americans just keep getting screwed.
And make no mistake, Democrats will defend this broken system at any cost.
They’ve proven they’ll even threaten a government shutdown if it means keeping the money flowing to their favorite industries. When Democrats talk about protecting healthcare funding, they’re really protecting the billion-dollar interests behind it. The same politicians who claim to fight for working families are guarding the financial lifelines of corporations that gouge those very families at the doctor’s office. Affordable healthcare? That was never the goal. Keeping the cash pipeline open to the right people—that’s Obamacare in a nutshell.
Editor’s Note: The Schumer Shutdown has now been dragging on over a month. Democrats aren’t negotiating in good faith, and seem determined to hold the country hostage while blaming the GOP.
Most voters agree with impeaching Judge Boasberg, the federal judge who was involved in the Biden administration’s “Arctic Frost” probe that involved targeting Republicans in Congress. According to the Rasmussen Reports telephone and online survey, 67% of likely U.S. voters “consider Arctic Frost to be a serious scandal,” including 43% who said it’s “very serious.”
Truth2Freedom's Blog 