Elon Musk explained why he bought Twitter in a tweeted note in which he spoke about promoting a “digital town square” where various beliefs can be expressed within limitations. “The reason I acquired Twitter is that it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated healthily without resorting to violence,” he wrote in a tweet.
However, Musk repeatedly said that he shelled out the $44 billion necessary to acquire Twitter for tworeasons. The second is in reality the primary reason. Musk wants to make his dream of an everything app, a reality. The name X.com was Elon’s first company. It became PayPal when X.com merged with Confinity in 2000. PayPal was eventually bought out by eBay. PayPal is a niche payment system. It never aspired to be what Musk wanted for X.com to take over the world’s financial system. Musk’s idea for X.com, was to create an “everything-store for all financial needs: banking, digital purchases, checking, credit cards, investments, and loans.
According to his biographer Walter Isaacson, Musk had been planning to rebrand Twitter to X in a bid to fulfill his dream from the ’90s since before he took over the company.
A major plank of Elon Musk’s plan for expanding X into an “everything app” has been grafting a payments network onto its main social networking service. The details of this project have remained blurry, but dozens of documents the company has submitted to state regulators—which have not previously been made public—give a new view of the business. Those plans include a Venmo-like payments feature that will let users store money on their X accounts, pay other users or businesses, and even buy goods and services in physical stores.
Expect an announcement from Musk on X.com’s expansion into financial services before the end of 2024. Considering his success with PayPal, Tesla, Space X/Star Link, and now X.com, Neuralink, and The Boring Company, it is reasonable to conclude that X.com (previously Twitter) will shake up the world’s financial system.
This is all part of the Biblical prophesied end times scenario playing out in our day. Musk is the richest man in the world and he is becoming the person the world is looking to for answers. Undoubtedly, he has a brilliant mind and says the right things such as he wants what is best for humankind in all that he does. But as he comes from South Africa he is not a candidate for the Antichrist.
There seem to be many paradoxes in Scripture. Not in the sense that the Bible contradicts itself, but that the Bible proclaims truth that makes no sense to those who are not in Christ. Even for believers, we’re struck by the unfathomable workings of a God who makes all things work together for good to those who love Him.
For instance, Scripture proclaims that, for the Christian, to lose is to gain. We read that to be humble is to be exalted. Perhaps most amazingly, the Bible proclaims that Christ’s victory over the grave means that to die is to live and to live abundantly. But what I’m sure confuses many, in or out of the church, is this concept Paul writes about in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, where he makes the case for how our weakness is our strength. It’s interesting, especially given the fact that weakness is often considered a grave flaw, and something meant to be hidden.
“ But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”2 Corinthians 12:9-10
How are we expected to boast about our weaknesses? We are far weaker than we ever care to admit. It is in ignoring our weaknesses that our lives become harder. In fact, Christianity only makes sense when you’ve reached the end of yourself.” Think about it — it is the proud who most believe they have no need for God. The plague of thinking, “I can do it,” has hurt countless relationships. But Christianity declares this profound truth that what often makes Christianity most understandable is rooted in the fact that we need help. We need saving. Why? Because we are weak and helpless.
James 1:9 tells us, “Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger,” we shrink back in shame as we reflect on the fact that, more often than not, we’re actually slow to hear, quick to speak, and quick to resort to anger.
And if you take a step even further back, it becomes clear just how quickly we fail in many other areas of life — especially when compared to how Scripture calls us to live. We often covet, lie, steal, and cheat. We may not be as heinous as a murderer, yet murder occurs frequently in our hearts.
Thankfully the Bible provides stories such as David and Bathsheba: Scripture tells us that David is a man after God’s own heart, and yet David not only sleeps with Bathsheba and gets her pregnant but he tries to cover it up and when that is unsuccessful he conspires to kill Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband.
“In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah. 15 In it he wrote, “Put Uriah out in front where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die.”2 Samuel 11:14-15
Though David made a horrible decision, he took responsibility and had remorse for his actions. He earnestly sought God’s forgiveness. David penned Psalm 51, “A Contrite Sinners Prayer for Pardon,” after his sin of adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah. In this Psalm, David brokenheartedly confesses his sin and asks for God’s forgiveness and restoration. David never stopped worshipping God.
Jealousy is such a blinding emotion that consumes us easily, and our hearts are hardened toward those we feel have wronged us. Scripture says to “bear with one another in love,” forgive “seventy times seven,” and “value others above” ourselves, but how often do those commands actually take priority in our lives?
Suddenly, when the world is crashing down around us, and we can’t seem to get anything right, we realize: “Wow, I truly am weak.” And it’s not just the rude awakening of becoming aware of said weaknesses that hurt, but the harsh reality of the fact that the world is quick to use them against us. Far too commonly, weakness is abused in the machinations of manipulation and mockery. And if the world was all we had to turn to, we’d likely find ourselves wondering: what’s the point of it all?
But thanks be to God because He does not define us by these weaknesses. Indeed, Psalm 103 declares, “The Lord works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. … The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. … He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.” Don’t you see? We may struggle, fail, or feel dismayed, but our God does not treat us as weak, failing sinners. He treats us as forgiven and free children of His promise!
Perhaps among several seemingly paradoxical yet joyous truths in Scripture is this understanding of our weakness being our strength, for it is in embracing our weaknesses that we can see Christ’s strength. And this strength resides within us, for Galatians 2:20a states, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” By the power of the Holy Spirit, we are new creations, and yet we still fail Him daily grieving the Holy Spirit. And yet, He never fails us. We neglect time with Him and time in His word, yet He never leaves us nor forsakes us. We made it necessary for God to send His Son to die on the cross, yet He has loved us with an everlasting love that leads us into eternity with Him. We take blessings for granted, yet He never stops blessing us. How astounding and unfathomable, this God we serve. May we never tire of singing His due praises, just as He never tires of holding us in His embrace of sovereign grace.
Adapted from an article in The Washington Stand 19/07/2024: Embracing Weakness Allows Us to Understand Our Strength Is Found in Christ by Sarah Halliday
Jordan Peterson interviews Elon Musk and discusses life’s deep things, like life’s meaning and purpose. It reveals the depth of intellect of both men. It is one of the most interesting interviews that I have watched and I strongly recommend it, but you need 2 hours to watch it. It was fascinating to hear Elon try and explain how consciousness evolved from hydrogen. It demonstrates to me that it is a spiritual issue, even intellectuals can be blinded to acknowledging their Creator to whom they are responsible. During the interview, Jordan often introduces Bible stories to make a point. It results in Elon saying he is a cultural Christian. God has used Jordan to challenge Elon about the existence of a Creator but not evolution. My prayer for Jordan therefore is that God will bring a PhD Creationist across his path who will be able to show Jordan that there is evidence to support the Bible’s young earth history and that evolution is a failed theory.
Elon Musk has twelve children and it was fascinating to hear him talk about them. He even disclosed that he was tricked into signing a document that allowed one of his sons to be given puberty blockers which in effect sterilised him. He has even challenged Newsom the Governor of California that if he passes the Bill allowing young people to be “mutilated and sterilised” he will move his companies from California.
When California enacted a school secrecy pact last week, Elon responded with surprising intensity. The law, which would require school personnel to lie to parents about their child’s gender identity was “the final straw” for Musk, who announced plans to relocate his businesses’ headquarters to Texas (Tesla’s headquarters relocated to Texas in 2021, but now SpaceX and X are set to follow).
He said that “the teachings of Jesus are good and wise” and called forgiveness “essential,” but he also put caveats around the teaching of Scripture and said he is “not a particularly religious person.”
But Jesus did not allow people to think of him merely as a good and wise teacher. Jesus claimed to be God. If Jesus’s claim was true, then he must be worshiped as Lord. If it was false, then Jesus ought to be considered a liar and a charlatan, and no proper source of ethical wisdom.
Essentially, Musk admires Christian teaching, but he has not received it for himself. In his personal life, Musk is unconstrained by a biblical worldview of human sexuality; he has divorced two women three times and has had children with at least four different women. He remains on the outside looking in, unable to access the great benefits of Christianity, including eternal life, which are only available through faith in Jesus Christ and submission to him as Lord.
It is interesting to learn why Musk has switched from supporting the Democrats to now supporting Trump and the Republican Party.
Why aren’t our politicians following what is happening in Canada specifically in Ontario. Watch the video below and hear from Ontario politicians on what they believe about nuclear power.
(CAMBRIDGE, Ontario – April 19, 2024) – BWX Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: BWXT) announced today an investment to expand its Cambridge manufacturing plant. Already one of the largest nuclear commercial manufacturing facilities in North America, the site’s increased footprint will enable greater capacity to support ongoing and anticipated customers’ investments in Small Modular Reactors, traditional large-scale nuclear, and advanced reactors, in Canada and around the world.
The expansion, estimated to cost C$50 million, will increase the facility’s footprint 25 percent to 280,000 square feet. Additionally, over the next few years, BWXT will invest approximately C$30 million in advanced manufacturing equipment for the facility that has designed and manufactured hundreds of large nuclear components. This total estimated C$80 million investment will increase capacity significantly, improve productivity and create more than 200 long-term jobs for skilled workers, engineers and support staff in the area.
John MacQuarrie, president of Commercial Operations, BWXT, stated, “Our expansion comes at a time when we’re supporting our customers in the successful execution of some of the largest clean nuclear energy projects in the world. At the same time, the global nuclear industry is increasingly being called upon to mitigate the impacts of climate change and increase energy security and independence. By investing significantly in our Cambridge manufacturing facility, BWXT is further positioning our business to serve our customers to produce more safe, clean, and reliable electricity in Canada and abroad.”
Mike Rencheck, president and CEO of Bruce Power said, “The nuclear industry is powering Ontario’s economy, by supplying clean, reliable electricity, life-saving medical isotopes, and creating thousands of good jobs. We are supporting advanced manufacturing while providing a deeply decarbonized grid to attract new businesses to our province. The expansion at the BWXT facility in Cambridge is another great example of the positive impact our industry can have in communities all across the province. Clean air, cancer-fighting medical treatments, and economic expansion leading Ontario to a better future.”
Ken Hartwick, president and CEO of Ontario Power Generation (OPG), said, “As we refurbish our existing nuclear facilities and build new, OPG is also generating jobs and economic activity in Ontario’s robust nuclear supply chain. BWXT’s planned expansion is a great example of how building out a system to meet Ontario’s increasing clean energy needs is also paying dividends for our province’s economy.”
Premier of Ontario Doug Ford said, “We’re thrilled to see BWXT expand its footprint and create hundreds of new jobs in Cambridge. As our province continues to lead the future of nuclear energy, the company’s investment will help provide Ontario families and businesses with access to clean, reliable, and affordablepower.
The article in The Australian this weekend by Timothy J. Lynch, professor of American politics at the University of Melbourne, “The Assassin’s bullet shows why the left gets history all wrong” shows how academia and a society, that has rejected God as Creator, and His sovereignty over His Cosmos, will view events such as the recent assassination attempt on Donald Trump. He provides an analogy of the similarities of the assassination attempts on Trump and Hitler, to underscore not how similar Trump is to Hitler, but rather, how chance and luck – good and bad – often decide history.
Lynch’s assessment of where academia and society are at is strangely accurate: “We have built a culture on a misplaced sense of mastery, that we can control the weather, that gender is fluid, and that grand theories are better than simple explanations for the death of kings and survival of presidential candidates.
He says, “I’ve spent a career in the social sciences. We tend to favour big causes of things. The economic determinism of Karl Marx was an inescapable part of the humanities for 150 years. Today, class-based analysis has been eclipsed by research programs setting out to show the explanatory power of race and/or gender. Entire university careers can be spun out sifting data to fit a chosen structural theory. Critical race theory is in vogue, especially in the US.
Its proponents claim that all issues, from the everyday interactions of men and women to global inequalities, can (and must) be tied to the racism of white people. In the Anglophobe West, you would be hard-pressed to find a college campus or government department that does not pay some sort of homage to this theory. It is only a theory, after all.
However, Trump’s narrow escape has no significant structural explanation. He was plain lucky. He moved his head, just as Hitler stood at the strongest part of the table, at just the right moment.
Academics hate this stuff. We are uneasy with the unexpected, the contingent, and the accidental.
We dismiss it as too epiphenomenal – as too unrelated to the big structural pressures we need to see manifest. To have world history turn on the turning of Trump’s head is impossible to model, measure, and predict.
We are still too close to know how the events in Pennsylvania will be remembered. But already, like those in Dallas on November 22, 1963, large causes, even conspiracies, are being found for what was simply one insignificant young man choosing to kill his significant peer.
The real agents of history turn out to be men such as John Wilkes Booth (who killed President Abraham Lincoln), Gavrilo Princip (who killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand), and Lee Harvey Oswald (who killed President John F. Kennedy).
The structure within which each man acted is a historical curiosity, incidental or irrelevant. Their skill, and certainly their luck, changed history. So why, in our explanations of events, do we grasp for structure over agency?
One important reason, I think, is ideological: agency as an explanation makes people accountable for their actions. Oppressed people cannot be responsible for, much less accountable, for their oppression. Intersectionality, the faux science of progressive academia, fits everyone onto an oppressor v oppressed scale.
This leads to a contemporary discourse where the individual is exculpated from the consequences of his poor decisions. George Floyd, for example, did not make dumb life choices leading to him to Minneapolis that 2020 day. His killing could not simply be a chance encounter with a bad cop. Rather, his fate was explicable wholly in terms of the racism of the city’s police, itself part of the “white supremacy” and “structural racism” of the wider system. For the left, his agency was irrelevant; he had none.
A second related reason is the need to condemn a “great man” theory, that the history of the world is but the biography of great men. The new left recoils at the notion that great white men are the engines of history – what about all the forgotten women and people of colour? – while claiming these individuals are the progenitors of contemporary injustice.
The irony is the left’s implicit faith in the diagnosis of history as an inescapable structural force by one of history’s greatest men: a 19th-century Jewish economic theorist called Marx.
A third reason we prefer structure to agency is psychological. It is much more reassuring to blame society for what ails us than to admit that miscalculation and bad luck account for our lot. The popularity of psychology as an academic discipline, especially among young women, speaks to a deep-seated need for answers that religious faith used to provide. Instead of individual repentance for sin as a guarantor of salvation, we now encourage groups to find blame in structures they cannot control but must work to change.
Life and death do not work this way. I’d wager your greatest love and most profound tragedy will have more to do with chance and fate (the goddess worshipped by Romans as Fortuna) than with any systemic, structural, or social force.”
Lynch mentions that the once-held religious faith provided the answers to the big questions and what is required for salvation. But a world that has rejected God’s history of the world given to us by God in His Word, the Bible, is now facing the wrath of God. Fulfilled prophecy proves God’s Word provides the true history of the world. We should therefore believe the future end times prophecies of God’s coming Trumpet (Revelation 8;6-) and Bowl (Revelation 16:1-) judgements.
God is foundational to our existence; seeking replacements will be a futile attempt to achieve ultimate fulfillment. Adam was made in the image of God. Man is a trinity just as God is a Trinity. He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; we are Body, Soul, and Spirit.
Importantly, man’s spirit was designed to contain the Holy Spirit (oil), enabling him to be the “lamp of the Lord” on Earth and to be in a relationship with God.
“The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord, searching all his innermost parts.” Proverbs 20:27
Sadly, the Holy Spirit departed Adam’s spirit when he rebelled against God at the time of the Fall.
In his epoch-making theological treatise, Knowing God, J. I. Packer put it this way:
“What makes life worthwhile is having a big enough objective, something which catches our imagination, and lays hold of our allegiance, and this the Christian has, in a way that no other man has. For what higher, more exalted, and more compelling goal can there be than to know God?”
Once the grace of God has been tasted and peace is established with the Almighty all else becomes incomparable. God’s grace captures a believer unlike anything else. Hence, evangelism should become the communication of desiring grace for others as they react to God.
Stereotypically, people perceive Christianity as having to attend weekly church meetings, reciting prayers, having a narrow worldview, and restricting one’s lifestyle to do’s and don’ts. When in fact, the Gospel is freedom, fulfillment, and “unspeakable joy.”
“And you will know the truth,” Jesus promises, “and the truth will set you free”
“If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”John 8:31-32
Paul similarly states, “Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans. 5:1).
Did Jesus and Paul purposely fabricate claims to try and make people feel good? Did they have huge egos that required authority over others? Were they deceived? If so, by whom or what? No, they encouraged people towards “the way, the truth, and the life.” so, through Jesus Christ, they can acquire God’s love by receiving the Holy Spirit to enable them once again to be children of God bearing His image.
“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ...God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” Romans 5:5
The Gospel is powerful and its grace will surely materialize in those who wholeheartedly call upon the Lord Jesus. It’s a sure thing. The Holy Spirit assures it.
Amazon and Walmart are good examples of how AI will adversely affect employment opportunities.
The online retailer behemoth, Amazon, is the second-largest private employer in the U.S. – 1.5 million people. It’s also one of the largest investors in AI.
It’s building out fully autonomous warehouses… It’s working to automate the delivery process with self-driving vans and delivery drones… and 30% of its “workforce” are already robots.
Robots don’t sleep. They don’t take vacations. They never need a break. So, let me ask you this: How much longer until Amazon decides these robots are ready to take on the full workload of its 1.5 million remaining workers? And what do you think will happen when 1.5 million hardworking Americans are suddenly out of a job? Biblical prophesied end times lawlessness will be the outcome. Young people will be marching on the streets causing havoc.
“And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.” Matthew 24:12-13
And Amazon is far from the only giant company doing this. Walmart Inc. (WMT), the largest private employer in the U.S., is rolling out fully automated distribution centers using a combination of AI and robots. The company’s distribution centers are in operation but come with one big catch: There aren’t any people.
What about “knowledge workers” – i.e., accountants, business strategists, lawyers, and doctors – who make optimal decisions, are good at problem-solving, can strategize, and always act in the best interests of the business?
ChatGPT and other forms of AI are killing that paradigm. It makes it so that businesses can scale critical thinking and knowledge work. It doesn’t matter if you have a blue or white collar: AI could be a threat to your job. The reason why AI is more of a threat now than it was when ChatGPT made its debut in 2022 is because of quantum computing. Quantum computers allow for multiple computational pathways to be explored at the same time, opening new avenues and speeds for solving complex problems.
We’re talking about machines so advanced that they can instantly execute calculations that would take the world’s most advanced supercomputers nearly half a century to process.
It’s not like the transition from the horse and buggy to the automobile. It’s more like horse and buggy to the SR-71 Blackbird… the fastest jet ever made. The difference is utterly mind-blowing.
With quantum computing, the digital elite will have AI that is not constrained by computational speed. Quantum-powered AI will drive efficiencies by getting rid of human workers and driving up corporate profits. No matter the job, robots, software, and AI – powered by a new breed of computer – will be able to do it better and cheaper.
This is the societal and economic equivalent of a 10,000-foot mega tsunami. It’s about to slam into our world and alter the trajectory of our world forever. It is amazing that 600 years before Jesus Christ came to Earth for the first time, Daniel was told that the time before Jesus’ second coming to Earth, two of the signs would be that people would be travelling a lot and knowledge would increase. This must have sounded strange to Daniel as he had no concept of air travel and the internet, AI, and quantum computing.
“But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.” Daniel 12:4
After reading JD Vance’s first speech following his appointment as VP at the Republican National Convention, I was sufficiently convinced Vance and Trump will be elected VP and President at the November election to write this post. It will be interesting to see if I am right. How things have changed so dramatically in just 24 hours. Trump is a different person following the assassination attempt on his life. He acknowledges that he is still alive only because God wants to use him to unite the nation.
Donald Trump’s vice presidential pick JD Vance took to the stage at the Republican National Convention to deliver his first address since being announced on the ticket, hailing the former president’s “fight” and call for unity.
“Tonight is a night of hope,” Mr Vance said. “A celebration of what America once was and with God’s grace, what it will soon be again.
“And it is a reminder of the sacred duty we have to preserve the American experiment, to choose a new path for our children and grandchildren.
“But as we meet tonight we cannot forget that this evening could have been so much different. Instead of a celebration, this could have been a day of heartache and mourning.
“And what did he call us to do for our country? To fight. To fight for America. Even in his most perilous moment, we were on his mind. His instinct was for us, for our country, to call us to something higher, for something greater, to once again be citizens to ask what our country needs from us.
“Now consider what they said – they said he was a tyrant. They said he must be stopped at all costs. But how did he respond? He called for national unity, for national calm literally right after an assassin nearly took his life.
“And then President Trump flew to Milwaukee and got back to work.
“Now that’s the man I’ve gotten to know personally over the last few years. He is tough – and he is – but he cares about people. He can stand defiant against an assassin one moment and call for national healing the next. He is a beloved father and grandfather, and of course, a once-in-a-generation business leader.”
Mr Vance is invoking his small-town roots as he accepts his party’s nomination for vice president.
“I grew up in Middletown, Ohio, a small town where people spoke their minds, built with their hands, and loved their God, their family, their community, and their country with their whole hearts,” he said, arguing that President Joe Biden has supported policies that damaged his community.
Mr Vance said it was the kind of place that had been “cast aside and forgotten by America’s ruling class in Washington”.
“When I was in the fourth grade, a career politician by the name of Joe Biden supported NAFTA, a bad trade deal that sent countless good jobs to Mexico.
“When I was a sophomore in high school, that same career politician named Joe Biden, gave China a sweetheart trade deal that destroyed even more good American middle-class manufacturing jobs.
“When I was a senior in high school that same Joe Biden supported the disastrous invasion of Iraq and each step of the way and at small towns like mine in Ohio or next door in Pennsylvania or Michigan, in states all across our country, jobs were sent overseas and our children were sent to war.”
Mr. Vance said the GOP of the next four years would be “united in our love for this country and committed to free speech and the open exchange of ideas”.
“And so tonight, Mr Chairman, I stand here humbled and I’m overwhelmed with gratitude to say I officially accept your nomination to be vice president of the United States of America!”
Mr Vance made a pitch to the “American heartland”.
“For these places to thrive, my friends, we need a leader who fights for the people who built this country,” he said.
“We need a leader who’s not in the pocket of big business, but answers to the working man, union and non-union alike.
“A leader who won’t sell out to multinational corporations but will stand up for American companies and American industry.
“A leader who rejects Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’ green new scam and fights to bring back our great American factories.
“We need President Donald J Trump.”
Will God give America one last chance to repent and return to Him? Even if God does, I do not think it will change anything. Millennials and Gen Z are lost generations due to schools and universities teaching evolution, not creation. They do not believe God exists therefore the Bible is a book of myths and legends. Biblical prophecy confirms this view. The Antichrist arises from the Middle East to dominate the world. Russia and China are featured as end-time empires, but not America.
This is an abbreviated version of the article by Suzanne Bowdey which appeared in The Washington Stand on July 15, 2024 – MikeJohnson (Speaker): Trump ‘Seems to Have a Very Clear View of What This Meant. God Spared His Life.’
Americans woke up Sunday morning to a very different world. In the aftermath of Donald Trump’s literal brush with death, campaigns, Congress, and even political conventions seemed secondary to the deep horror at what we’ve become as a nation. And for once, after years of being at each others’ throats, a sober country has stopped to reflect: Is this really who we are?
In the days and hours since the bloody president emerged from the stage, fist in the air, everyone seems to understand the gravity of this moment. America was, as so many have pointed out, less than a quarter of an inch away from a national crisis from which we may never have recovered. “Sometimes the course of history depends on margins just that small,” the editors of the National Review remind us solemnly.
The miracle of his survival was not lost on Trump, who acknowledged, “It was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening.” In an interview less than 24 hours after the assassination attempt, the reality of what might have happened “is just setting in,” the former president told the Washington Examiner’s Salena Zito. “I rarely look away from the crowd,” he admitted. “Had I not done that in that moment, well, we would not be talking today, would we?”
As he boarded a plane for Wisconsin, the former president also clarified that he understands this pivotal moment. “It’s a chance to unite the country,” he said solemnly. “I was given that chance.” God is giving Americans one more chance to repent and acnowledge Him as Lord over the nation. Will they respond? Based on the fact that America is absent from end times Biblical prophecy I doubt it.
Family Research Council, Chairman Tony Perkins, who’s been on the ground as a delegate in Milwaukee, agrees that the weekend’s shocking events have completely “changed the dynamics of the convention.” “It’s time to come together,” he said on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” Monday morning, and “not just for Republicans. It’s time to come together as a nation. It’s time for us to … as Jesus said, [to] love our neighbor. Now, that doesn’t mean that all of a sudden our differences go away,” Perkins underscored. “But you know what? We have an understanding that each and every human being is created in the image … of God. Therefore, they have value regardless of what political party they might be in.”
Trump agreed with Perkins, that democracy is a messy system. Democracy always will be. “[B]ut it’s still the greatest system in the history of the world. And the minute we abandon, try to shut one another down, or stifle debate, the pressure builds.” “You’ve got to allow for that vigorous debate, but it’s got to be within the confines of that system.”
Speaker, Mike Johnson believes the “key”, is to understand that we are all part of the same country. We are all brothers and sisters in that regard. I mean, if you look at it biblically we are supposed to love our enemies, right? Much less our fellow countrymen. You love your neighbor as yourself. If you do that, it solves a lot of problems.” Of course, that doesn’t mean we “change our perspective” or “abandon truths,” he was quick to clarify. “It just means we are civil in our conversation.”
That said, Perkins warned somberly, “I think we’re at a crossroads … a pivotal point. This could be the hinge upon which this nation turns, depending on how … Donald Trump addresses this moment. And he suggested that he’s going to take maybe a path less traveled.”
Frankly, the speaker replied, “I’ve been so heartened to see his thoughts and comments articulated over the last day or so since the assassination attempt. He seems to have a very clear view of what this meant. God spared his life. I mean, it was a miracle. We all saw it. Everyone saw it. It’s hard to deny.” Ironically, Johnson made these statements after very nearly losing his own sons last year after a visit to Mar-a-Lago — something he and the former president discussed at length last Thanksgiving.
“In Johnson’s telling, Will, who was 13, was drowning; 18-year-old Jack, prepared to give up his own life, tried to push his brother back to the surface. A parasailer happened to spot Will’s head from above. He hurried back to shore and alerted the lifeguards, who went out on jet skis to bring the boys in. Johnson arrived at the beach to find medical personnel hovering over his sons, pumping their chests. They would spend four hours in the emergency room before being cleared to go home,” The Atlantic wrote this spring in the first public telling of the near-loss.
“‘President Trump heard about it somehow, miraculously, this never made the news,’ Johnson recalled. The two got on the phone. ‘He was just so moved by the idea that we almost lost them, and we talked about it at great length. And we talked about the faith aspect of that because he knows that I believe that God spared the lives of my sons. That’s how I understand those events, and we talked about that.” Johnson continued: “And he said, he repeated back to me and said, ‘God — God saved your sons’ lives.’”
Eight months later, the former president has experienced the touch of divine providence for himself, and the young speaker who wondered where those conversations about God would go has a very poignant answer. “He said, ‘God has given me a chance here — and that is to unify the country.’ [Those are] his words, not mine. So I’m really excited to see how he articulates that and how we meet it out.”
Note how the media downplayed the assassination attempt: CNN: “Secret Service rushes Trump off stage after he falls at rally”. Washington Post: “Trump escorted away after loud noises at rally”. USA Today: “Trump removed from stage by Secret Service after loud noises, startle the former president..”
This messaging was meant to diminish and minimize the truth that a shooter attempted to assassinate President Trump.
This is part 2 of my review of Martyn Isles’s book WHO AM I? Solving the identity puzzle. If you have not read my first post I suggest you do. It refers to the serious error of all humans being immortal.
This post will deal with the serious omission from Martyn’s book and that is the role the Holy Spirit played in Adam’s life and now plays in believers’ lives.
When God breathed life into Adam he became a living creature.
“then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” Genesis 2:7
Proverbs 20:27 tells us that the “spirit of a man” is the lamp of the Lord. A lamp requires oil to function. The Holy Spirit is the oil required to make the lamp of the Lord function. Hence, Adam received from God the Holy Spirit so Adam’s spirit could function as the lamp of the Lord. Adam was then able to function in the spiritual dimension and communicate with God as he did in the Garden of Eden.
“The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord, searching all his innermost parts.” Proverbs 20:27
What was immediately lost in The Fall is the Holy Spirit departed Adam and Eve’s spirits so they and we as their descendants are no longer able to communicate directly with God.
The good news is that when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour our Heavenly Father will send the Holy Spirit to once again indwell our spirit to be our helper, our counselor, teacher, and comforter.
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.” John 14:15-17
“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name,He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.“John 14:26
“Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.“John 16:7
“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” John 16:13-15
“Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” andno one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit.” 1 Corinthians 12:3
“And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” Ephesians 4:30
“Do not quench the Spirit.Do not despise prophecies, but test everything; hold fast what is good.” 1 Thessalonians 5:19-20
The Holy Spirit produces the fruit of the spirit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, faithfulness, gentleness, goodness, kindness, and self-control. He is also the one who provides the gifts for ministry.
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.“ Galatians 5:22-23
“Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.” 1 Corinthians 12:4-6
“For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.” 1 Corinthians 12:8-11
Jesus told His disciples not to do anything until the Holy Spirit came to indwell their spirits at Pentecost. It was only then that they were empowered to live the Christian life. Likewise for us, unless we have received the Holy Spirit we cannot live the Christian life, it is impossible.
LIVING ETERNAL NOW 