On January 15, 2022, Eric Rank will present the sermonette, titled, “The Antidote,” and Dave Harris will present the sermon, titled, “So Great a Salvation!”

The live services are available, over video and audio, at http://eternalgod.org/live-services/ (12:30 pm Pacific Time; 1:30 pm Mountain Time; 2:30 pm Central Time; 3:30 pm Eastern Time; 8:30 pm Greenwich Mean Time; 9:30 pm Central European Time). Just click on Connect to Live Stream.

What is the most important decision that we have made in our lives? There may be several different answers we could come up with; however, one “should” be rather obvious, but do we truly believe that? For those of us who made the choice to live God’s Way of Life, and continue to live that Way, do we still truly believe that making this choice was the correct and most important decision in our lives?  Are we convicted of the Truth, for life?  The quality of showing that one is firmly convinced of what one believes is what defines “conviction.”  For those of us who chose to become baptized, we have entered into a contract with God stating to Him that we are committing ourselves to Him, FOREVER.

But God had already been working with us before we made that decision.  God chose us first by calling us and opening our minds to His understanding and revealing His plan for us.  We then responded to His calling and chose Him.

Our personal conviction and how we individually choose to live our lives, our personal relationship with God, is how you and I are going to receive that crown, that final prize, the guarantee of eternal life as a God being. But we need to obey God and not let ANYONE deter us from reaching that goal, for we, individually, are responsible for ourselves as we will give account for everything that we have done in our lives.

When we commit ourselves to do something good, we have to follow through, or else we could be considered dishonest, and even unreliable.  Once we start getting lethargic, it will be a lot easier to continue on that path, unless we make the effort to change. That is why being successful involves hard work and commitment.

Living in this world is difficult and living God’s Way of Life is difficult because we are constantly bombarded with temptations, and some could certainly be considered our greatest weaknesses which we need to overcome by constantly having God involved in our lives.  We commit ourselves to Him by living the Truth; and in return, God is there for us.  We read many examples in the Bible of how God intervenes, how He fights our battles, how we should trust Him and trust in His plan for us (compare Jude 24-25; Ephesians 3:20).

We can have God’s special protection, and we must grow in wisdom and strength, to bring us closer to God’s master plan.  We don’t need to be afraid, and when we doubt, God lets us know that He is there for us, as we read in Isaiah 41:10, “Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”

God is loving and merciful, and we shouldn’t be afraid of what is going on in this world today, but we must be committed to Him, and we can see what He promises us.  We have a responsibility that we must endure, because to live God’s Way of Life, we must fear Him.  What we fear is breaking His commandments, breaking our commitment we have with God.  Since we know these things, we have to ask ourselves, how committed are we to the Truth and God’s Way of Life?

Do we question our faith at times?  Do we have faith that God will protect us during the terrible times we are going through now and which we will experience in the future?  Will God show us mercy?  When God gives us a command, how will we respond?   “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6).

Our faith is constantly being tested, and we know that we need to have a tremendous amount of faith to live as God wants us to.   It “should” be easy for us to do this because we know firsthand what the Bible promises to those who are faithful with diligence.

Our conviction to the Truth should be evident in how we are living our lives, and as we proceed, we must be watchful and ready, always evaluating and examining ourselves, making sure that we are truly convicted.

by Norbert Link

We begin with deeply troublesome and disturbing comments by US Supreme Court Judges regarding the coronavirus; the US Supreme Court’s decision on vaccine mandates; address Australia’s “lunacy” in their treatment of tennis star Novak Djokovic which is somewhat systematic of that county’s “authoritarian insanity” for the last two years; address the world’s “insane persecution of the unvaccinated” with special emphasis on Austria and Germany; and publish and comment on an unbelievably propagandistic article of the Daily Mail. Please view in this context our new message, “The World in Turmoil—Comments on News and Prophecy, January 8, 2022.” 

We continue with reporting on the first anniversary of the violence on January 6, 2021 and the verbal insults between Biden and Trump; and remind our readers of the terrible legacy of Dick Cheney, father of Liz Cheney, who has suddenly become a hero in Democratic circles. We also address the latest spin of the White House pertaining to the job market and unemployment numbers; Biden’s fabrications; and we publish an article wondering whether the USA is really heading for a second civil war.

We speak on Russian troops in Kazakhstan and the concern that the Soviet crushing of the Prague Spring in 1968 and of the Hungarian revolution in 1956 could be repeated. Please view in this regard our new StandingWatch program, titled, “What does the BIBLE say about Russia’s future?”

We conclude with an article about former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s appointment as co-chairman of the European Council on Tolerance and Reconciliation.  

Throughout this section, we have underlined pertinent statements in the quoted articles, for the convenience and quick overview of the reader.

US Supreme Court Judge Spreading False information

Fox News wrote on January 7:

“Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor [who had been appointed by Obama] came under withering criticism Friday after she falsely suggested that upwards of 100,000 children in the United States are hospitalized from COVID-19, many of them on ventilators. During oral arguments on the Biden administration’s mandate on private businesses for employees to be either vaccinated or frequently tested, Sotomayor drastically overstated the number of young people who have fallen severely ill from coronavirus.

“…according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the seven-day average of pediatric hospitalizations [of children] was around 3,700 this week, according to the Washington Post. As with prior strains of the virus, younger people are at far less risk than old ones of severe outcomes from the coronavirus… ‘Inexcusable for a SCOTUS justice to peddle this fear mongering false info,’ the Hudson Institute’s Rebeccah Heinrichs wrote. ‘It’s actually terrifying that a Supreme Court justice can be so misinformed…’ Ron DeSantis press secretary Christina Pushaw chimed in. ‘Justice Sotomayor’s comment on 100,000 children in serious condition with covid is such a flagrantly untrue statement she should have to correct it after the argument. It’s embarrassing for the Supreme Court to allow that factual inaccuracy to occur in an oral argument,’ OutKick’s Clay Travis tweeted.”

Fox News reported on January 9 that CDC Director Rochelle Walensky clarified… that “there are fewer than 3,500 children in hospitals with COVID-19… Walensky also pointed out that numbers of COVID hospitalizations generally include patients who go to hospitals for other reasons and just happen to test positive while they are there, as opposed to those who go to the hospital because they are sick with COVID…”

The left-liberal Washington Post performed what they call “the Pinocchio Test” and gave Sotomayor “four Pinocchios” for her “absurdly high” figure, arguing that “it’s important for Supreme Court justices to make rulings based on correct data” (compare Fox News, dated January 9).

Breitbart added on January 7:

“Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor also claimed that vaccinated people cannot transmit the coronavirus.”

This claim is also false, as set forth in an article below. But this is how the fearmongering propaganda operates, and even US Supreme Court Judges fall victims to its deception. How can we then expect a fair and reasonable judgment?

Fox News reported on January 8:

“Laura Ingraham… noted [in her show] that ‘’even Anthony Fauci admits that most kids are hospitalized with COVID, not because of COVID.’…

“Later she highlighted Clinton-appointed Justice Stephen Breyer claiming a delay in the Biden mandate could lead to thousands of more COVID infections… ‘If we delay [a decision for one day] then 750,000 more people will have COVID who otherwise, if we didn’t delay it, wouldn’t have,’ Breyer, 83, claimed.

“Ingraham responded: ‘Wait, so in Breyer’s warped thinking, if OSHA’s mandate is upheld, all infections would be eliminated? Who said you need basic logic and math skills to be a Supreme Court justice. You don’t. We are repeatedly told that the liberals on the court are some of the brightest legal minds in the country,’ she said. ‘I’m beginning to have my doubts, especially after hearing th[o]se words leave Justice Sotomayor’s mouth.’”

The comments to this article were telling:

“This is potentially a dire situation when we have supreme court justices spreading misinformation over an already politicized pandemic…. The problem here is does she KNOW this is misinformation, or is she simply badly misinformed? Both scenarios are bad, since this woman will be part of a decision that will affect 100M workers, and determine the future of how much a President can mandate…. I still can’t believe the republicans on the judiciary committee voted for her appointment to the supreme court with her past track record. she is more of a social activist than a judge… This was no accident. There is no way she can be this misinformed… And these justices are supposed to be the protectors of the constitution/nation against rogue government. The founders erred in thinking that by giving lawyers a job for life it would somehow ensure their integrity… How long before twitter takes down both Supreme Court justices for misinformation? Don’t hold your breath!… Kagan [the third liberal US Supreme Court Judge, appointed by  Obama] said this mandate/policy is the only thing that can end this pandemic. Wrong and her job is not to assess the policy but how it’s being implemented and by whom and is THAT constitutional.”

US Supreme Court “Decides”

 CNBC wrote on January 13:

“The Supreme Court on Thursday blocked the Biden administration from enforcing its sweeping vaccine-or-test requirements for large private companies… The mandate required that workers at businesses with 100 or more employees get vaccinated or submit a negative Covid test weekly to enter the workplace. It also required unvaccinated workers to wear masks indoors at work. ‘Although Congress has indisputably given OSHA the power to regulate occupational dangers, it has not given that agency the power to regulate public health more broadly,’ the court wrote in an unsigned opinion…. Liberal Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan dissented…

“President Joe Biden, in a statement, said the Supreme Court chose to block requirements that are life-saving for workers. Biden called on states and businesses to step up and voluntarily institute vaccination requirements to protect workers, customers and the broader community…

“In a separate, simultaneously released ruling on the administration’s vaccination rules for health-care workers, a 5-4 majority sided with the Biden administration… Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett, four of the six conservatives on the nine-seat bench, dissented…

“Biden, in a statement, said the vaccine requirement for health-care workers will save the lives of patients, doctors and nurses. ‘We will enforce it,’ the president said of the mandate.”

Australian Lunacy

The U.S. Sun wrote on January 7:

 “TENNIS star Novak Djokovic… was granted a vaccine exemption to compete in the Australian Open before his visa was cancelled following a six hour stand-off at Melbourne Airport and a major U-turn by Australian authorities. He was then banished to a filthy hotel ‘full of fleas and maggots’ to isolate…

“The 34-year-old had been granted an exemption to play despite his unvaccinated status before it was dramatically cancelled. As the athlete attempted to enter Aussie territory, he was ordered into a side-room by Border Force guards after a visa ‘blunder’ was revealed. Djokovic, seeking to win a record 21st Grand Slam title, was stripped of his phone and kept alone in the room, with armed police on patrol outside.

“Even Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic got involved, eventually contacting Djokovic to offer his support and backing and summoning Australia’s ambassador to the country for a dressing down. It emerged that Tennis Australia had granted exemptions to two other players who did not meet strict Border Force rules…

“In another twist, a second Australian Open competitor was detained by Border Force under similar circumstances and sent to the same hotel. Despite already playing in Melbourne earlier this week, Czech Republic doubles specialist Renata Voracova has now been asked to leave the country….”

CNN added on January 8:

“The 34-year-old… was granted a medical exemption to compete in the tournament unvaccinated ‘on the grounds that he had recently recovered from COVID,’ his lawyers said in a court submission Saturday…. Djokovic’s exemption was determined to be invalid under Australia’s BioSecurity Act because his ‘previous infection with COVID-19 is not considered a medical contraindication for Covid-19 vaccination in Australia.’…”

Breitbart wrote on January 8:

“Brexit champion Nigel Farage has backed tennis ace Novak Djokovic against ‘big, bullying, nasty government’ in Australia… Farage… insisted that the sportsman did have an exemption under the relevant regional rules…  ‘The most astonishing thing with all of this is how few people are prepared to speak out, how the broadcasters are making out that somehow Djokovic is a threat to public health — well, he absolutely isn’t,’ Farage asserted, claiming that even if you have ‘one, two, three, or in Israel four injections’ you are still at risk of catching and spreading the coronavirus. The BBC, citing research published in The Lancet, did report in October that people ‘who have had two vaccine doses can be just as infectious as those who have not been jabbed’…

“‘It seems to me that Australia has lost any sense of liberty, any sense, frankly, of common sense,’ Farage added… ‘What has happened to Australia, and what has happened here [in Britain] to us? Why are the majority prepared to allow Big Government, in the name of fighting this virus, to take away our liberties and freedoms?’ he demanded.”

Fox News commentator Will Cain condemned Australia’s “lunacy” and “authoritarian insanity” which has been going on ‘for 2 years.”

On January 10, Deutsche Welle reported:

“Federal Circuit and Family Court Judge Anthony Kelly ordered the government to release [Djokovic from detention] within 30 minutes of the ruling, and return his passport and other travel documents to him…. However, it is still not certain the Serbian tennis star will be able to compete at the Australian Open as the government may yet still order him to be deported.”

Deutsche Welle reported on January 12:

“Djokovic’s form said that he had not traveled anywhere in the 14 days before arriving in Australia, even though the tennis player had been seen at events in Spain and his native Serbia within that time period… Djokovic said his travel declaration was filled in by his support team, and that his ‘agent sincerely apologizes for the administrative mistake in ticking the incorrect box.’ ‘This was human error and certainly not deliberate,’ Djokovic wrote.”

The World’s Insane Persecution of the Unvaccinated

The Los Angeles Times wrote on January 7:

“In one European country after another, public health restrictions are steadily tightening. Italy declared a vaccination mandate for those over age 50…

“Austria plans to enhance enforcement of existing measures banning the unvaccinated from many public venues…[Also, vaccine mandates for everyone will be enforced in February.]

“In Germany, many of those who have chosen to remain unvaccinated report feeling socially ostracized as a result… Many Germans, mindful of their history under communist and Nazi rule, are also squeamish about a prospective national registry of the vaccinated, saying that runs counter to the country’s cherished data-privacy laws.

“And the anti-vaccination movement, while still relatively small, has grown in intensity, with protests sometimes boiling over into violence. On Monday, more than 35,000 people participated in protests that resulted in police being hit by bottles and firebombs…”

It will only get worse. On Friday, Germany foolishly decided the following, according to Deutsche Welle:

“Access to restaurants will be limited to people who are fully vaccinated or considered recovered, who can additionally provide evidence of either a booster shot or a current negative COVID-19 test…. Under the new rules, people who have received a booster shot will no longer have to quarantine if they come into contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19…. The existing rule that private gatherings of vaccinated and recovered persons with a maximum of 10 persons are allowed will remain in place. Those who are not vaccinated will continue to be subject to strict contact restrictions [meetings of only two households are allowed]”

In addition, according to Deutsche Welle, dated January 8, “German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach has insisted vaccine mandates are the only way out of the pandemic… Lauterbach said gaining immunity through infection was a ‘dirty vaccination’ and not the solution… ‘Mandatory vaccination is also important for the future variants that may still develop,’ he told Welt. ‘Omicron infection does not necessarily make one immune to the next viral variant.’ Lauterbach also warned of the possibility that a new, more dangerous variant could start spreading.”

However, ABC News reported on January 9:

“Germany’s ruling parties are hitting the brakes on plans for compulsory coronavirus vaccinations, saying it may take months for lawmakers to properly debate the contentious measure in parliament. Berlin daily Tagesspiegel… reported that implementation could be delayed until June to ensure the technical conditions, such as a nationwide vaccine register, are in place… Among those who oppose a vaccine mandate are some members of the Free Democrats, who are part of the ruling coalition, and Germany’s former health minister [Jens Spahn] who pledged last summer not to introduce a general vaccine mandate…”

To top the irony, it was now revealed by Focus that Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer [loosely translated, “no Hammer”] was tested positive with Corona and is in quarantine, even though he had been fully vaccinated with three shots…

In addition, as Express reported on January 8, “On Friday, [Macron] said he stood by his earlier comments saying he wanted to ‘p*** off’ the five million French people who are still not vaccinated against COVID-19… Macron’s coarse language barely three months before a presidential election was widely seen as a politically calculated, tapping into [an] intensifying public frustration against the unvaccinated.’”

Health Tax and Fines for the Unvaccinated

BBC News wrote on January 11:

“The Canadian province of Quebec will charge a health tax to residents who are not vaccinated against Covid-19…. Starting later this month, Greeks over age 60 are being required to pay a €100 (£85; C$142; $113) fine for each month that they remain unvaccinated.”

Propagandistic Article by Daily Mail

The Daily Mail wrote on January 9:

“A staggering six million people follow UK accounts on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and TikTok that pump out anti-vaccine propaganda, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. Social-media giants have been accused of a ‘moral failure’ for not curbing the torrent of misinformation, which Boris Johnson last week blasted as online ‘mumbo-jumbo’…

“Technology giants claim they are cracking down on anti-vax propaganda but Imran Ahmed, from the Center for Countering Digital Hate, accused them of putting profit before public health… “Among the accounts spreading anti-vaccine misinformation is that of Leilani Dowding, 41, a former Miss Great Britain and Page 3 glamour model, who has attracted more than 90,000 followers… On Twitter, she wrote: ‘I Will NOT be part of their real world experiment‘, and on Facebook she posted: ‘2 years on my unvaxxed self had NOT had Covid!! Not after all the protests I’ve been to, the thousands of people I’ve hugged, having never worn a mask.’ Approached for comment, she said: ‘I absolutely stand by what I said. I’m never going to have the vaccine. I just don’t believe the science behind it.’

“Former reality TV star Jay Gardner, who appeared in Geordie Shore, regularly posts anti-vaccine and conspiracy theories to his 800,000 Twitter followers. Last month, he tweeted ‘These guys telling you to take all these shots have absolutely 0 idea of any long term damage, but we will force you to do it anyway’…

“Anna de Buisseret, 56, a lawyer with 24,000 Twitter followers, last week claimed that vaccinated people had been ‘deceived, lied to, coerced, threatened, intimidated, harassed, guilt tripped and shamed into taking part in this live human experiment’. Last night she said: ‘I am not “anti-vaccine”, I am against the use of experimental gene treatments.’…”

We do not deny, of course, that misinformation by anti-vaxxers is being spread, but are unable to agree with The Daily Mail that the excerpts quoted by the outlet in the article above are necessarily misinformation. Also, it is ludicrous to suggest that the manipulative social-media giants, which have been rightly accused of suppressing free speech, are cooperating with anti-vaxxers. Quite to the contrary, according to their own words, Facebook and Instagram alone have removed accounts of “more than 20 million pieces” of –what they determined to be—”harmful Covid misinformation.”

First Anniversary of January 6, 2021

Newsmax wrote on January 6:

“President Joe Biden, speaking Thursday morning on the first anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, excoriated former President Donald Trump — without ever mentioning Trump’s name — saying he ‘rallied the mob to attack… The will of the people was under assault … for the first  time in our history, a president had not just lost an election, he tried to prevent the peaceful transfer of power as a violent mob breached the capitol but they failed. They failed.’

“Trump, said Biden ‘has created and spread a web of lies about the 2020 election. He’s done so because he values power over principal, because he sees his own interest as more important than his country’s interest and America’s interest and because his bruised ego matters more to him than our democracy and Constitution.’ But Trump… ‘can’t accept that he lost, even though that’s what 93 U.S. Senators, his own attorney general, every battleground state have all said,’ said Biden. ‘He lost. That’s what 81 million of you did as you voted for a new way forward. He has done what no president in the history of this country has ever done. He refused the results of the election and the will of the American people.’

“Trump slammed Biden after the speech, saying in a statement that the president is ‘destroying our nation with insane policies of open borders, corrupt elections, disastrous energy policies, unconstitutional mandates, and devastating school closures’… ‘Why is it that the Unselect Committee of totally partisan political hacks, whose judgment has long ago been made, not discussing the rigged Presidential Election of 2020?’ Trump said. ‘It’s because they don’t have the answers or justifications for what happened…’”

Trump also wrote:

“Does anybody really think that Biden beat Obama with the Black population in select Swing State cities, but nowhere else? That he would lose 18 out of 19 bellwether counties, and 27 out of 27 ‘toss up’ House races, but somehow miraculously receive the most votes in American history with no coattails? That he would lose Florida, Ohio, and Iowa and win, even though it has never been done before?

“They spread a ‘web of lies’ about me and Russia for 4 years to try to overturn the 2016 election, and now they lie about how they interfered in the 2020 Election, too. Big Tech was used illegally. Where did all those votes show up from in Georgia, where it was just revealed they sold ballots for $10 a piece, or in Pennsylvania, and Arizona, and Wisconsin. He acts like he’s aggrieved, but we’re the ones who were aggrieved and America is suffering because of it with poisonous Borders, record Inflation, a humiliating surrender in Afghanistan, $5 a gallon gas and higher, empty stock shelves, and rampant crime. America is a laughingstock stock of the world, and it’s all because of the real insurrection, which took place on November 3^rd… Never forget the crime of the 2020 Presidential Election.”

After Biden thanked Trump for the speedy “success” of his vaccinations, Trump said that it would be difficult for him now to say bad things about Biden. Well, that “peace treaty” did not last long.

Dick Chaney’s Horrible Legacy and His Support of His Daughter and the Democrats

The Ron Paul Institute wrote on January 8:

“Former Vice President Dick Cheney visited the House of Representatives yesterday. He and his daughter Liz were the only two Republicans present at a moment of silence commemorating the events of last January 6^th...  the Washington Post wrote that ‘Democrats put aside their fierce and lasting policy divides with the Cheneys to thank them for condemning the attack and Trump’s continued effort to undermine the 2020 presidential election results with his false claims of fraud.’…

“I don’t mean to understate the seriousness of January 6th, even though it’s been absurdly misreported for over a year now. No one… could mistake 1/6 for ‘a coup.’…  a coup is a real attempt to seize power… we saw none of that on January 6th, but it’s become journalistic requirement to use either ‘coup’ or ‘insurrection’ in describing it…

“The endless hyperventilating efforts to describe January 6th as a disaster on the order of Pearl Harbor or even 9/11 has been awesome to behold. Huffington Post… even called it ‘1,000 percent worse’ than 9/11…

“Ted Cruz made a plea for mainstream recognition by denouncing 1/6 as a ‘violent terrorist attack’ before cowering in retreat on Tucker Carlson Tonight, in the process [placing] himself with audiences in all directions…

“It was no heroic storming of the Bastille… Trump [is] always trying out new material, and if he gets the right reaction, he comes back with a bigger delivery next time… The man has no attention span, no interest in planning or strategy, and most importantly, no ability to maintain relationships with the type of people who do have those qualities… Even if he wanted to overturn ‘democracy itself’ — I don’t believe he does, but let’s say — Trump has proven over and over he lacks the qualities a politician would need to make that happen.

“Which brings us back to Cheney. All those things Trump is rumored to be, Dick Cheney actually is. That’s why it’s so significant that he appeared on the floor of the House yesterday to be slobbered over by the Adam Schiffs and Nancy Pelosis of the world. Dick Cheney did more to destroy democracy in ten minutes of his Vice Presidency than Donald Trump did in four years… Even if you find the Trump phenomenon troubling, his opposition is not only authoritarian, but organized and armed with the intellectual tools to understand and appreciate how the technological elimination of democracy might be achieved in the 21st century.

“We’re living through a period where an unpleasantly likely outcome for the ordinary American is the invocation of emergency powers to eliminate basic rights…  have you noticed the total lack of interest among pundits and politicians in distinguishing between anti-vaxxers and people who merely have anti-mandate or anti-passport attitudes?…

“Where have we seen this style of intentional line-blurring to justify the expansion of executive authority before? From Cheney, who took emergency politics to places even a sober Joe McCarthy could never have dreamed of. On the pretense that new powers were needed to combat the sweeping global threat whose existence 9/11 supposedly proved, Cheney institutionalized executive assassination, torture, mass surveillance, secret prisons, secret budgeting, and the wholesale elimination of congressional oversight over most of his programs…

“It was under Cheney’s watch that we turned into a country that snatched people off the streets all over the world, put them in indefinite detention in an archipelago of secret hell-holes, threatened to rape their family members, and resorted to techniques like ‘rectal feeding’ so often that one Guantanamo Bay prisoner had to bring a special pillow to sit in court.

“The core principle of Cheney’s politics was protecting his new bureaucracies of murder and open-ended detention from legal challenge. That meant creating structures that were legally invisible… Courts repeatedly declined to listen to complainants… because the secrecy of the programs made it difficult or impossible to prove they had a cause of action, a perfect Catch-22.”

We should also not forget his terrible role in the misguided Iraq war which was fought under the pretext of Iraq’s “weapons of mass destruction” which were never found. As the Atlantic wrote on August 30, 2011:

“When Vice President Dick Cheney left office, his approval rating stood at a staggeringly low 13 percent. Few political figures in history have been so reviled… President Bush bears ultimate responsibility for the Iraq War, as do the members of Congress who voted for it. But Dick Cheney’s role in the run-up to war was uniquely irresponsible and mendacious. And after the invasion, he contributed to the early dysfunction on the ground…

“Cheney undercut the CIA by instructing subordinates in that agency to stovepipe raw intelligence directly to his office. He also worked with Donald Rumsfeld to establish an alternative intelligence agency within the Pentagon. Both of these actions directly contributed to the faulty information that informed the decision to go to war…”

The White House’ Latest Spin

Fox News reported on January 8:

“… a disappointing jobs report showed hiring had fallen far below expectations in December… Biden defended the economy under his watch on Friday. ‘There’s been a lot of press coverage about people quitting their jobs,” he said from the White House. “Well, today’s report tells you why – Americans are moving up to better jobs. This is the kind of recovery I promised and hoped for, for the American people.’

“While economic experts had expected 400,000 new jobs to be added in the last report of the year, it was a dismal 199,000.”

Biden Keeps Lying

Fox News wrote on January 11:

“Laura Ingraham said that ‘lies that [have] bound’ President Biden the Democrats and the media ‘regime’ together are finally unraveling, and the administration is being exposed as a group of power-hungry bureaucrats who proclaim to be the arbiters of science, while instead continuing to ignore science to further take control and violate the autonomy of the American people…

“She pointed out that President Biden’s long-held public claims that people cannot be infected by the coronavirus if they are vaccinated, as well as his administration’s claim that a third ‘booster’ is effective, are both turning out to be false, as the omicron variant continues to infect vaccinated Americans. ‘On the vaccine mandates, it’s now a proven fact that being vaccinated and boosted neither protects you from contracting the virus nor spreading it. And more shocking is the new data that the vaccinated are more likely to contract omicron than the unvaccinated,’ she said.

“‘A fantastic piece today in the Wall Street Journal correctly notes that one study found that after 30 days, the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines no longer had any statistically significant positive effect against omicron infection, and after 90 days, their effect went negative — i.e. vaccinated people were more susceptible to omicron infection,’ Ingraham reported. ‘Their house of cards is falling in on itself, but courageous medical experts featured here as far back as May 2020 warned that… obsessing over case counts and mandating vaccines would crush our hospitals, our businesses and our schools. And lo and behold, even California now says it can’t go on this way forever. It’s now allowing asymptomatic hospital staff to return to work, calling it temporary flexibility once again,’ the host continued…

“‘But as with lies, they’re eventually overtaken by truth and experience…’”

 Fox News wrote on January 13:

“The Washington Post awarded President Biden its harshest fact-check rating of ‘Four Pinocchios’ over his false claim this week that he was ‘arrested’ for the first time as a teenager while attending a civil rights protest in Delaware. In a Thursday piece headlined, ‘Biden claims yet another arrest for which there’s little evidence,’ Glenn Kessler, The Post’s resident fact-checker, wrote that Biden was ‘not always a reliable source’ when it came to his ‘exaggerated’ stories, and that too many elements of his claim didn’t add up…

“Biden was forced to admit in 2020 he had concocted a tale of once getting arrested while trying to see Nelson Mandela in South Africa.”

“Is the US really heading for a second civil war?”

The Guardian wrote on January 9, 2022:

“It is a question that many inside America and beyond are now asking… A slew of recent opinion polls show a significant minority of Americans at ease with the idea of violence against the government. Even talk of a second American civil war has gone from fringe fantasy to media mainstream… The mere fact that such notions are entering the public domain shows the once unthinkable has become thinkable…

“Although most Americans have grown up taking its stable democracy for granted, this is also a society where violence is the norm, not the exception, from the genocide of Native Americans to slavery, from the civil war to four presidential assassinations, from gun violence that takes 40,000 lives a year to a military-industrial complex that has killed millions overseas.

“Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, said: ‘America is not unaccustomed to violence. It is a very violent society and what we’re talking about is violence being given an explicit political agenda. That’s a kind of terrifying new direction in America… Of course, it doesn’t help in America that guns are prevalent. Anyone can get a gun and you have ready access to explosives. All of this is kindling for the precarious position we now find ourselves in.’…

“And yet the assumption that ‘it can’t happen here’ is as old as politics itself. [Barbara] Walter [a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego] has interviewed many survivors about the lead-up to civil wars. ‘What everybody said, whether they were in Baghdad or Sarajevo or Kiev, was we didn’t see it coming,’ she recalled. ‘In fact, we weren’t willing to accept that anything was wrong until we heard machine gun fire in the hillside. And by that time, it was too late.’”

As can be expected from a left-liberal outlet such as the Guardian, blame for the violence and the potential outbreak of civil war is placed on Republicans and Trump supporters, while ignoring the fact that the real violence with killing, arson and looting has been perpetrated in 2021 by followers of Antifa, Black Lives Matter and other left-wing radical left groups.

Russia in Kazakhstan

Deutsche Welle wrote on January 7:

“The importance of Kazakhstan for Russia can hardly be overstated. It’s the largest and richest former Soviet republic in Central Asia, which also has the closest ties with Moscow… Kazakhs made up the largest group among foreign students at Russian universities in 2020, numbering more than 60,000. In surveys conducted by the renowned Moscow polling institute Levada Center, about a third of Russians repeatedly rated Kazakhstan as the second most friendly country after Belarus. In 2014, it was overtaken by China and has since ranked third….

“Around 3.5 million ethnic Russians live in the northern provinces of Kazakhstan, out of a total population of around 19 million. There has been speculation in both countries for years about whether Russia might annex these territories in a manner similar to Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula… Now there is renewed discussion… about Russia’s actions in Kazakhstan. There is a widespread view that Putin could seize on the deployment of troops as an opportunity to expand Russian presence in Kazakhstan. Russia currently has no military bases in the country…

“In any case, the unrest in Kazakhstan is a nightmare for the Russian president. The Kremlin has called such events ‘color revolutions’ and accused the West of orchestrating them. The last successful uprising was in 2018 in Armenia, which has close ties with Russia. In Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko was able to hold on to power by force in 2020… All of Russia’s major neighbors have been rocked by social unrest…”

The Guardian wrote on January 7:

“The old joke about the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact was that it was the only military alliance to attack itself, after its tanks rolled into Prague in 1968 to crush a reform movement there. With the deployment of troops from the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) to Kazakhstan on Thursday, some heard ‘eerie echoes’ of the so-called Prague spring of 1968, and the Soviet crushing of the Hungarian revolution in 1956.

“Meant as a mutual defence pact, the CSTO has not made any joint deployments since its founding in 1999. Now it has been called upon to quell internal unrest in one of its member states. Kazakhstan’s president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, claimed the revolt was inspired by foreign-backed ‘terrorists’ to justify his appeal, but the call to the CSTO suggests he no longer felt he could trust his own forces. When Tokayev’s request came, the CSTO jumped into action in a matter of hours…

“In a hardline address to the nation on Friday in which he said he had personally approved orders to shoot to kill, Tokayev gave ‘special thanks’ to Vladimir Putin for sending the troops, but said they had not taken part in any fighting…

“One definite similarity with the Warsaw Pact is that although the CSTO is an alliance, the decision to intervene was almost certainly taken in Moscow. It was cheered on by Belarus’s Alexander Lukashenko, who in 2020 was able to crush a huge revolution using his own domestic forces, but Putin will have made the final call.”

Deutsche Welle wrote on January 10:

“Putin has said the Moscow-led… military alliance would only remain in Kazakhstan for a limited time. He also said the bloc’s intervention was a signal that it would not allow any governments in the region to be undermined [or]  overthrown.”

Sweden Warns NATO of Russian Demands

Reuters wrote on January 7:

“Sweden’s security strategy would be entirely undermined if NATO agreed to refrain from expanding further and curb some of its activity in Europe, as Russia has demanded, Sweden’s top military commander said… Sweden… has strengthened ties with the alliance even if it has no plans to join at present…

“‘We aim to become a stronger defence power in all categories and develop overall defence. But that hinges on developed international cooperation,’ the commander said [adding that] Europe’s security order was non-negotiable. ‘In Sweden, we ourselves decide over our foreign and security policy and who we cooperate with.’”

Deutsche Welle wrote on January 8:

“The US said it has no plans to cut troop numbers in Eastern Europe to defuse tensions with Russia. Top diplomat Antony Blinken said Russia is pushing a ‘false narrative’ to justify troop deployments on Ukraine’s border… US outlet NBC News, citing several sources, reported on Friday that Washington was ready to discuss scaling back US forces in Eastern Europe, with Russia also pulling back from the Ukrainian border and other parts of the region.”

Austria’s Former Chancellor Sebastian Kurz Joins Anti-Racism NGO

Deutsche Welle wrote on January 9:

“Sebastian Kurz has been appointed co-chairman of the European Council on Tolerance and Reconciliation, just a few months after leaving office amid a corruption scandal. Conservative politician Sebastian Kurz, who stepped [down] as Austrian chancellor… last year, was announced on Sunday as the new co-chairman of the European Council on Tolerance and Reconciliation (ECTR). The ECTR is an international NGO that describes its goal on its website as fighting ‘such evils as extremism, racism, antisemitism and xenophobia.’

“Other noteworthy co-chairmen of the group are former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Aznar — both of whom were in power when their nations joined the 2003 invasion of Iraq…  “During his time in office, Kurz made efforts to confront Austria’s role in the Holocaust and placed himself firmly on the side of Israel in diplomatic affairs… During his political career, Kurz was also instrumental in forming a coalition with the far-right Freedom Party in 2017 — making Austria the only country in Western Europe to have a far-right party in government. He also opposed the acceptance of refugees from camps in Greece as well as those fleeing Afghanistan after the Taliban came to power. Since leaving office, he has joined the investment firm led by tech billionaire Peter Thiel whom many see as a far-right figure.”

Have we heard and seen the latest of Sebastian Kurz’s political career… or not?

Acknowledgement and Disclaimer

These Current Events are compiled and commented on by Norbert Link. We gratefully acknowledge the many contributions of news articles from our readership. The publication of articles in this section is not to be viewed as an endorsement or approval as to contents or accuracy of the selected articles, but they are published for the purpose of pointing at worldwide developments in the light of biblical end-time prophecy and godly instruction. Our own comments are provided in italics.

Some Scriptures appear to indicate that God can forget at times.

We read passages like Exodus 2:24-25: “So God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them.”  At first thought, it looks like God had, for a time, forgotten the children of Israel and finally realised that they needed help, but is this so?

First of all, what was the covenant that God remembered? A covenant with Abraham or Abram was first mentioned in Genesis 15:18, where we read: “On the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, ‘To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates.”

A second covenant between God and Abraham (Abram) is mentioned in Genesis 17, beginning in verse 1. “When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, ‘I am Almighty God; walk before Me and be blameless. And I will make My covenant between Me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly.’ Then Abram fell on his face; and God talked with him, saying: ‘As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you shall be a father of many nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be called Abraham; for I have made you a father of many nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you in their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and your descendants after you. Also I give to you and your descendants after you the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan, as an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.’ And God said to Abraham: ‘As for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations. This is My covenant which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child after you shall be circumcised; and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you.’”

(Also, this second covenant included a separate covenant of circumcision; compare Acts 7:8). So, God promised everlasting blessings to Abraham. They would include many descendants, nations and kings, and a land in which to live. Abraham assumed that these covenant blessings would pass down through Ishmael, but God said no, they would be with a son, to be named Isaac, born to Sarah in her old age. Ishmael would be greatly blessed, but the everlasting covenant blessings would pass down through Isaac. This is mentioned in Genesis 17:18-20, which says that God would establish His covenant with Isaac.

In Genesis 26:3-5, God told Isaac not to go to Egypt but to “Dwell in this land, and I will be with you and bless you; for to you and to your descendants I give all these lands, and I will perform the oath which I swore to Abraham your father. And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven; I will give to your descendants all these lands; and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charges, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.”

God here is repeating the covenant promise He made with Abraham to Isaac, and He explained that it was because of Abraham’s obedience that God had made that covenant with him. When we come to the next generation, the covenant promise was to pass down through Jacob, rather than the firstborn Esau.

As we explain in our free booklet, “And Lawlessness Will Abound,” on pages 25-29, technically, God made separate covenants with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but they all included the blessing of inheritance of the Promised Land. We state this:

“In Genesis 17:21 God promised Abraham that He would make a covenant with Abraham’s son, Isaac: ‘But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.’ And so He did, and subsequently, God made another covenant with Jacob whose name was later changed to Israel. It is important to recognize that God made these covenants with Isaac and with Israel on an individual basis, just as He had entered into different covenants or agreements with Abraham. This again shows what a covenant is—simply a contract or an agreement, based on law, but not identical with the law.

“Notice the following Scripture that tells us about the covenants that God made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: ‘I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and My covenant with Isaac and My covenant with Abraham I will remember; I will remember the land’ (Leviticus 26:42). Although the subject matter of these three covenants was identical, God still made individual covenants with Abraham, his son, and his grandson, as the parties were different.”

When God says, in Exodus 2:24, that He will remember His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob, He is using the word “covenant” as a summary term, as all these covenants include the same blessing of inheriting the Promised Land.

In Genesis 27, Jacob pretended to be Esau in order to deceive Isaac, and Isaac gave him physical blessings. However, Genesis 28 is quite enlightening. At this time Jacob was about to leave Canaan, both to find a wife in Padan Aram, and also because Esau had threatened to kill him. This time Isaac knew that he was blessing Jacob; there was no deceit involved. Reading Genesis 28:3-4, “May God Almighty bless you, And make you fruitful and multiply you, That you may be an assembly of peoples; And give you the blessing of Abraham, To you and your descendants with you, That you may inherit the land In which you are a stranger, Which God gave to Abraham.”

Thus, the covenant blessing of Abraham was being passed down from Isaac to Jacob. Again, this included a multitude of nations and the land of Canaan. This blessing was repeated in Genesis 35:9-12. “Then God appeared to Jacob again, when he came from Padan Aram, and blessed him. And God said to him, ‘Your name is Jacob; your name shall not be called Jacob anymore, but Israel shall be your name.’ So he called his name Israel.  Also God said to him, ‘I am God Almighty, Be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall proceed from you, and kings shall come from your body. The land which I gave Abraham and Isaac I give to you; and to your descendants after you I give this land.’”

From here the blessings were no longer mentioned until we read that God remembered them when the children of Israel were in slavery in Egypt. So, had God forgotten them? Forgotten something that He had said was everlasting? Actually, no. It was all within God’s plan, part of which He had revealed to Abram and which is recorded in Genesis 15:12-14. “Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, horror and great darkness fell upon him. Then He said to Abram: ‘Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in the land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they will serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions.’”

So, this was all a part of God’s plan to greatly increase the number of the children of Israel and to provide them with a great abundance. Returning to Exodus 2:24, the expression “God remembered His covenant” to English speakers would appear to mean that for a time God had forgotten His covenant. However, the Hebrew can also mean “To be mindful of” or “think upon”. The Soncino commentary explains it as “Not that He had forgotten it, but that now the opportunity had come for the fulfilment of His merciful purpose.”

Some of the qualities of God are described in Psalm 147:5. “Great is our Lord, and mighty in power; His understanding is infinite.” He knows exactly when is the best time to perform His promises. Also, in Numbers 23:19, “God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?” God does not have the frailties of man and has the power to do all that He says He will do.

So, when we read in Jeremiah 31:34 (quoted in Hebrews 8:12), “For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more,” Barnes’ Notes on the Bible informs us that “It cannot mean literally that God forgets that people are sinners, but it means that he treats them as if this were forgotten. Their sins are not charged upon them, and they are no more punished than if they had passed entirely out of the recollection. God treats them with just as much kindness, and regards them with as sincere affection, as if their sins ceased wholly to be remembered, or which is the same thing, as if they had never sinned.”

We should emphasize that God’s forgiveness and His willingness to “forget” are based on repentance.  But even this does not mean that God will erase certain (repented) sins from His memory. We discuss this entire subject in our Q&A, “What Will We Remember as God Beings?”

We point out that God did not forget the sin of David in the matter of Uriah, even though David deeply repented of it.

“Please realize that God saw to it that certain sins of David were recorded, for everyone to read. In addition to David’s sin in the matter of Uriah, some of his other sins were recorded as well, such as his fighting in war and numbering his army. Furthermore, sins of other righteous men and women were recorded: Moses’s sin of murder and his later outburst before Israel, which prevented him from entering the Promised Land; Aaron and Miriam’s murmuring against Moses; Abraham and Isaac’s lies; Abraham and Sarah’s adultery because of lack of faith; Jacob’s deceit towards his father Isaac; Rachel’s theft of her father’s idol; Peter’s sin of lying and denying Christ three times, and his hypocrisy towards Gentile Christians; and Paul’s persecution of Christians when he was still known as Saul. The list could go on and on. We also believe that Solomon came to repentance at the end of his life, but his prior terrible sins were included in the Bible…

“But in every case, God casts all repented sins behind His back and into the depths of the sea, so that when they are sought for, they shall not be found IN THE SENSE that God will never charge us with them. He does not retain them in His mind in the sense that He will not revisit what has passed…

“German Bibles translate Jeremiah 31:34 as, ‘I will not think of [or: about] their sins anymore.’ The New Jerusalem Bible and the Revised English Bible say that God will never more ‘call’ their sin ‘to mind.’… Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible adds this comment in regard to Isaiah 43:25: ‘God will not remember the sins of his people against them; having forgiven them, he will never punish them for them, which is meant by remembering them…’

“… Under the New Covenant, God will ‘take away’ our sins (Romans 11:27)—He will not hold them against us, if we repent of them. Jeremiah 50:20 tells us that ‘… The iniquity of Israel shall be sought, but there shall be none; And the sins of Judah, but they shall not be found; For I will pardon those whom I preserve.’”

So, referring to the original question, “Does God forget?,” we understand that God is not a man with the accompanying frailties of man. God does not forget in the sense of being forgetful as we tend to be, but God is able to deliberately put out of His mind things that He will never bring up against us. When He makes an everlasting covenant, He will perform it at the appropriate time. Likewise, when He says He will remember our sins no more, He will deliberately do so in the sense as explained herein, and of that we can be very grateful.

Lead Writer: Paul Niehoff (Australia)

compiled by Dave Harris

“What Does the BIBLE Say about Russia’s Future?” is the title of a new StandingWatch program, presented by Evangelist Norbert Link. Here is a summary:

What are Russia’s real goals in Kazakhstan? What is the importance of the military alliance between Russia and four other Russian-controlled nations? Will Russia succeed with Putin’s desire to resurrect the former Soviet Union? What does the Bible tell us about a collaboration between Russia and other Far Eastern nations, including China? Who will be behind these developments? What is the significance of a huge army from the East, prophesied in the book of Revelation?  Who is actually ruling today all the kingdoms and nations of this world? Why are we to pray to God the Father: YOUR Kingdom come?

“Was sagt die Bibel über Russlands Zukunft?” is the title of our new AufPostenStehen program, presented by Norbert Link. The topic of this video covers in German the same material as described above in English.

A Tech Team meeting was held on Sunday, January 9, 2022, via Google Meet. Hosted by Eric Rank, special emphasis was given to our plans for reaching out with advertising in the near future. Other aspects included discussing technical issues regarding our broadcast of Live Services.

“Oh, Oh!” is the title of last Sabbath’s German sermonette, presented by Johann Schell. Title in English: “Oh, Oh.”

“The World in Turmoil—Comments on News and Prophecy, January 8, 2022,” the first message presented last Sabbath by Norbert Link, is now posted. Here is a summary:

Europe and especially Austria, France, Italy and Germany are becoming more and more autocratic and dictatorial, but this is also true for other democratic nations, including Australia, Canada and the USA. While Russia has been anxious to “help” the dictatorial government of Kazakhstan by sending troops into the troubled region, controversial information and opinions are being disseminated from many different sources within the USA, including from some US Supreme Court Judges. Further, after a relatively short calm, the fight and exchange of strong accusations between Biden and Trump have again reached dangerous proportions.

“Who Is Your Father?”, the sermon presented last Sabbath by Kalon Mitchell, is now posted. Here is a summary:

We all had or have physical fathers. We all have grown up under their rule. There is another father though of whom we are children. What effect should this have on us now? How do we allow our Heavenly Father to train us as His children.

On January 8, 2022, Norbert Link will present “Comments on News and Prophecy—January 8, 2022”, and Kalon Mitchell will present the sermon, titled, “Who Is Your Father?”

The live services are available, over video and audio, at http://eternalgod.org/live-services/ (12:30 pm Pacific Time; 1:30 pm Mountain Time; 2:30 pm Central Time; 3:30 pm Eastern Time; 8:30 pm Greenwich Mean Time; 9:30 pm Central European Time). Just click on Connect to Live Stream.

The calculation of profit is an easy one. Simply subtract costs from total revenue to tabulate the margin of profit. When considering any kind of endeavor, counting the costs to evaluate whether it is worth the investment is essential. We don’t want to waste our resources on pursuits that will not bring us the kind of return that we seek. But the question is, what is the unit of measure that we use to calculate our profit?

Pharmaceutical companies are raking in record profits for the year — calculated in units of money. For example, prior to the Covid 19 pandemic, Moderna was a relatively small pharmaceutical company, typically making about $100 million in annual revenue. By way of contrast, their 2021 profits are projected to be $10 billion. This makes their profits one hundred times larger than their average revenue before the pandemic. Undoubtedly a financial success story, at least on the face of it. But this is only true if we consider the financial costs. When considering the collateral damage done to the percentage of people who have physically suffered or even died as a result of taking their vaccine, the costs are much more material. One wonders how God calculates the profits of pharmaceutical companies when considering the cost of unnecessary harm done to people desperately seeking safety. I doubt the numbers would be very impressive.

To some, an endeavor that appears to waste money or time might in fact produce value that is meaningful to us individually. Volunteering time or donating money are examples of giving away valuable resources that may not appear at first to bring in a profit by the same measure. The profit of those activities may be inherent in the joy of helping others. What appears to be a fruitless dedication of time and money can yield great returns when the unit of measure is not so material. As Christians, we ought to understand this clearly, as we are admonished to seek our treasure in heaven (compare Matthew 6:20). We also understand, of course, that giving to others with the right motivation will result in physical as well as spiritual blessings (Luke 6:38; Malachi 3:10; compare also Mark 10:29-30)

God wants us to profit, but only in the right way. “Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, The Holy One of Israel: ‘I am the LORD your God, Who teaches you to profit, Who leads you by the way you should go. Oh, that you had heeded My commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, And your righteousness like the waves of the sea’” (Isaiah 48:17-18). Our methods and measures for achieving a profit must be guided by God. We are to make our investment with a spiritual return as our motivation, knowing that He will hold us accountable in our time of judgment. In whatever way we choose to invest the resources that God bestows upon us, the targeted product must not compromise with His commandments. He is the one who teaches us to profit through obedience, measured by the fruit of the Spirit that we are able to produce (compare the above with Galatians 5:22-25).

When we become baptized into the Family of God, we are given a measure of the Holy Spirit. It is not something that we can feel in any physical way, but it has the power to produce immense positive change in our lives. However, the power of God the Father and Jesus Christ will only work within us when we put it to use. If we choose to continue in our worldly ways, seeking a material profit by worldly measures, we will quite ironically become unprofitable (compare Matthew 25:30, Luke 17:10). Not only does God want us to be profitable with our lives, we have a responsibility and duty that we MUST be profitable. This, of course, according to our spiritual growth.

The measure of our profitability lies in the way that invests our resources spiritually. The proverbial “good life” is not identified by luxury. Rather, if we want to live the good life, we dedicate our resources to obedience, loving the way of life that God commands, with joy. Love for Him and our fellow man lead us into the kind of profits that are most valuable in the long run. If our costs are the sacrifices that we make to leave the desires of this world behind, and our revenue is spiritual fruit, then our profit is the reward promised by God to those who remain diligent in their commitment to the Work (compare Matthew 16:27).

by Norbert Link

We begin reporting on the ongoing desire—especially by Germany and France—to create a sovereign “United States of Europe,” which will turn out to be anything but democratic; speak on the 20^th anniversary of the euro;  and report on Austria’s frightening dictatorship which is being compared with developments prior to World War II, as well as frightening developments in Germany and France. In this context, please view our new StandingWatch program, titled, “The Pandemic of the Unvaccinated”. We also speak on the danger of the Ethiopian war for Europe and China’s hoarding of the world’s grain.

We point out dangers TikTok poses for our children; the make-believe insanity in Switzerland; and an area where Putin has it right.

We address the second phone call between Putin and Biden, which accomplished little, and the ongoing threats Russia is launching against Europe and NATO, especially focusing thereby on Ukraine, Sweden and Finland. We also report on the violent turmoil in Kazakhstan, one of Russia’s allies.

We continue with the leading cause of death [which is not COVID 19 by a long shot]; Dr. Fauci’s “clarification” of former lies; the United States of America’s division as never before in the recent past; and the last two years of America’s terrible dictatorship; as well as other deeply disturbing developments pertaining to governmental restrictions and mandates to the coronavirus pandemic in Canada and the USA; and we address the historic wildfires in Colorado.

We speak on spectacular UFO sightings and Israel’s possible intention to attack Iran with or without Biden’s support; and the growing desire to build the biblically prophesied third temple which opens up interesting questions regarding the fate of the Al Aqsa mosque. We also address the growing friction between American Jews and the State of Israel.

Throughout this section, we have underlined pertinent statements in the quoted articles, for the convenience and quick overview of the reader.

Germany and France for a more “Sovereign” Europe

Breitbart wrote on January 1, 2022:

“Annalena Baerbock, the foreign minister of Germany’s new left-led coalition government, has pledged that her country will support France in making ‘a more sovereign Europe’ — that is, one with more power over its member-states’ national governments. The declaration comes as France assumes the European Union’s rotating presidency for the next six months. ‘Our French friends can count on our support from the first to the last day to lay the right foundations within the EU: for a sustainable economic recovery, in the fight against the climate crisis, in digitization and for a more sovereign Europe in the world,’ Baerbock said…

“The German minister went on to say… that Germany and France as ‘the closest friends at the heart of Europe, bear a particular responsibility for a united European Union, capable of acting and oriented towards the future’.

“France’s President Emmanuel Macron has already promised that the nation will aim to increase the power of Europe on the world stage during its presidency of the bloc, which kicks off on January 1^st… As France begins its presidency of the EU, Germany will begin its presidency of the G7 on the same date, with Berlin to host a summit of the seven nations in June…

“The [German] coalition — led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz — has declared that it will push for a so-called ‘United States of Europe’ during its lifespan. In the document outlining the government’s goals, the three coalition members commit to ‘lead developments to a European federal state’, with the document noting the move is Germany’s ‘special responsibility’ as the EU’s ‘largest member-state’…

“Germany has even been accused of using the EU to create a ‘Fourth Reich’, with Polish deputy prime minister Jarosław Kaczyński making comparisons between the bloc and the Holy Roman Empire. The French government has also repeatedly backed the call for stronger European ties, with one government source even saying that Macron was willing to surrender its seat on the UN Security Council to the bloc in exchange for the establishment of an European Army.”

Comments by readers to this article are telling:

“Makes it easy for another Hitler or Stalin leader to appear… Germany still trying to create its own army & take over Europe… the next three years will be perilous indeed, as there will be no one in the White House calling out Brussels and its policies… The Reconstitution of the Roman Empire continues…”

20 Years of the Euro

The Local wrote on January 1:

“The euro on Saturday marked 20 years since people began to use the single European currency… European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen called the euro ‘a true symbol for the strength of Europe’…

“Euro banknotes and coins came into circulation in 12 countries on January 1, 2002, greeted by a mix of enthusiasm and scepticism from citizens who had to trade in their Deutsche marks, French francs, pesetas and liras. The euro is now used by 340 million people in 19 nations, from Ireland to Germany to Slovakia. Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania are next in line to join the eurozone…

“While the dollar still reigns supreme across the globe, the euro is now the world’s second most-used currency… Von der Leyen, in a video statement, said: ‘We are the biggest player in the world trade and nearly half of this trade takes place in euros.’”

We have emphasized time and time again that the euro is here to stay, as it is the glue which holds European member states together.

Austria Reliving its Past Dictatorship?

Breitbart wrote on December 31:

“On Thursday, Austria’s National Council decided to extend the lockdown for the unvaccinated until at least January 10^th… The new measures are the fourth amendment to Austria’s COVID-19 Protective Measures Ordinance and were passed in parliament by the ruling Austrian People’s Party (OeVP), their coalition partners the Greens, as well as the Social Democrats (SPOe)… the new amendment states that private New Year gatherings must not exceed ten people. A curfew for all restaurants has also been set for 10 p.m.

“The EU member-state has also decided that any vaccine certificates that involved a single dose inoculation will expire on January 3rd. Those who took a one-dose vaccine will be required to take a booster shot for their health passport to remain valid.

“Unvaccinated individuals in Austria have been under a general lockdown since late November, which ultimately included fully vaccinated residents as well — but the government lifted restrictions for the vaccinated earlier this month. The new amendment is just the latest time the lockdown for the unvaccinated has been extended by the government, which will meet on January 10th to possibly extend the lockdown yet again. The new year will also see Austria make the vaccine mandatory for all citizens. Those who do not comply could face large fines as well as possible prison time beginning in February.”

Comments to this article are telling:

“… everybody in my family who took the vaccines are sick ! The ones of us who didn`t take the shots are working very hard to take care of them, that`s the facts around this family…  the actual science actually says that the ‘vaccinated’ are at greater risk of catching and getting ill from Omicron than the unvaccinated… The mind boggles at the stupidity of these silly restrictions… Same here. Vaccinated daughters got the virus, non-vaccinated parents didn’t…. I know of several families where everyone is vaccinated and everyone is now sick. Unvaxxed…. no one sick… I got horribly ill from the second Moderna vaccine I will not be taking the booster!… Austria, original home of the Nazi menace, has truly returned to its roots…. It makes one wonder if the spirit of the 1930s ever really died in Austria….

Imagine, a lockdown over a bad cold. Now we know why Hitler was able to march in and take Austria over without firing a shot…. Austrians learned NOTHING from history…”

It appears that most Austrians did NOT learn from their history. However, the anger of a vocal minority against governmental restrictions grows in parts of Austria and Germany. Dictatorial reactions of the governments can be expected.

 The Western Standard wrote on January 2:

“Close to 350,000 people took to the streets in Vienna, Austria this weekend to protest some of the most Draconian COVID-19 restrictions in the world. Austria was the first country to announce mandatory vaccinations for all citizens 14-years-old and up. This week it was announced the mandate comes into effect February 1 and will cost the unvaccinated up to 3,600 euros… every three months.”

Breitbart wrote on January 4:

“A number of protests have taken place in Germany, with estimates putting the number of anti-lockdown protesters attending events at over 100,000 in total nationwide… 50,000 turned out in Baden-Wuertemberg, ‘tens of thousands’ in Saxony, and 17,000 in Thuringia.  While a number of protests took place in the country with the permission of relative authorities, others went ahead despite non-compliance, with thousands attending so-called ‘unannounced’ rallies despite being threatened with fines by police. Monday night ‘strolls’ have a history in Germany reaching back to the Communist era where protesting could be a dangerous occupation…

“While protests in a number of regions last night remained relatively peaceful… others did experience some levels of violence… East German members of the ruling Free Democratic Party (FDP) have expressed a desire for security authorities to clamp down on violent protesters. A strategy paper by the group’s eastern head, Hagen Reinhold, has called for better coordination between security authorities in dealing with internet bubbles and chats that he claims are used to mobilise people… Reinhold calls out Telegram in particular as a potential source of problems, the encrypted messaging service having already drawn much institutional ire in Germany over recent months.

“German authorities have already launched legal proceedings against the app last month over claims that it did not abide by laws requiring social media to police the actions of users on the platform. ‘Should Telegram fail to react to the European and German legal situation, our security policy will increasingly begin in the chat groups in the future,’ wrote the FDP politician in the paper.”

The more some Germans object to the restrictions, the more the government will respond, especially when it can be alleged that demonstrators, even if it is just a handful, become “violent.” Such problematic governmental reactions will not only be directed at the actual perpetrators, but also at the organizers of demonstrations.

Macron Attacks the Unvaccinated

BBC News wrote on January 5:

 “French President Emmanuel Macron has been accused of using divisive, vulgar language after he used a slang term to say he wanted to make life difficult for unvaccinated people. ‘I really want to p… them off, and we’ll carry on doing this – to the end,’ he told Le Parisien newspaper…. ‘So we need to tell them, from 15 January, you will no longer be able to go to the restaurant. You will no longer be able to go for a coffee, you will no longer be able to go to the theatre. You will no longer be able to go to the cinema.’…

“The airwaves in France are shrill this morning with the sound of angry politicians. From left and right, moderate and extreme, opponents are outbidding each other in condemnation…”

The Sun added on January 5:

“FUMING Emmanuel Macron has vowed to ‘p**s off’ France’s unvaccinated population as he branded them ‘non-citizens’ in a furious outburst… He insisted he would not ‘vaccinate by force’ the minority who had not had a dose, but instead persuade them to get jabbed by ‘limiting as much as possible their access to activities in social life’.”

These terrible tactics by governmental officials have become common in other countries as well. Later on in this section, we report on awful accusations against the unvaccinated in Canada and the USA.

Ethiopian War Danger to Europe

Market Research Telecast wrote on December 31:

“Brussels fears that the armed conflict in Ethiopia will degenerate in 2022 and cause a humanitarian catastrophe and a migration crisis of historic proportions. Community sources warn of the risk that the war will destabilize the entire Horn of Africa, an area where more than 200 million people live and already undergoes the stress of gigantic internal population displacements…

“Brussels fears that the Ethiopian conflict will… end up dragging other countries in the area such as Sudan, South Sudan or Somalia, in addition to Eritrea, already clearly involved. Community sources point out that the outbreak of the area would cause ‘a migratory exodus of historical proportions comparable to that of the breakup of Yugoslavia.’ That dismemberment from 1991 caused population movements that affected more than three million people and almost one million sought refuge in the countries of the European Union…

“Europe was overwhelmed despite the fact that the former Yugoslavia had only 23 million inhabitants. But Ethiopia, the epicenter of the conflict in the Horn of Africa, is a giant of 112 million people. And it is surrounded by countries like Sudan (45 million), South Sudan (16 million) or Somalia (16 million), which already suffer enormous internal tensions… although the geographical distance from the EU is much greater than in the case of Yugoslavia, Brussels considers it likely that part of the migratory flows will move to the old continent through, above all, Libya. ‘Ethiopia is experiencing one of the bloodiest wars that are being fought at the moment on the planet,’ say community sources. And they show their concern for the peaceful subsistence of the area ‘even when the war ends.’ The conflict, according to data from the European Commission, has already caused the displacement of more than two million people and thousands have sought refuge in Sudan…

This could lead to much hostility between Europe and Ethiopia.

China Hoards over Half of World’s Grain

Nikkei Asia wrote on December 23:

“Less than 20% of the world’s population has managed to stockpile more than half of the globe’s maize and other grains, leading to steep price increases across the planet and dropping more countries into famine. The hoarding is taking place in China…

“According to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, China is expected to have 69% of the globe’s maize reserves in the first half of crop year 2022, 60% of its rice and 51% of its wheat.”

TikTok Danger to our Children

Daily Mail wrote on December 26:

“Campaigners have accused TikTok of helping children to be ‘brainwashed’ by hosting viral social-media videos that promote changing sex as ‘cool’. Material posted by transgender influencers on the social networking service – in which they provide advice on transitioning and accessing hormone therapies – has been seen by millions of young viewers. Some parents are concerned the involvement of TikTok, which became the UK’s most downloaded app last year, is fuelling a ‘social contagion’ of pressure on impressionable youngsters and the rise in teenagers who are identifying as trans…

“TikTok signed a partnership earlier this year with Stonewall, the controversial lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights charity, to promote this material.

“One popular transgender TikTok influencer, Bella Fitzpatrick, raised £20,000 from followers in less than three months to fund private gender-reassignment surgery. The 19-year-old has 700,000 followers and explains the process of transitioning, including her experience of bypassing NHS waiting lists.

“Another is Alex Consani, 18, who has more than 680,000 followers. She went viral five years ago when, aged 12, Cosmopolitan magazine featured her life as a trans model. One of her videos, seen 2.3 million times, tells followers they are ‘one oestrogen pill away from a glow up’. A ‘glow up’ is a mental, physical and emotional transformation for the better.

“A channel featuring influencer Jaison Jowett shows the process of transitioning and carrying out reassignment surgery. One video includes the caption ‘Heal with me after top surgery!’ – a reference to a reconstructive chest operation. Another video begins with the words ‘I used to be a good Christian kid’ before showing the transformation to a ‘trans, gay atheist who loves tattoos and chaos’….

“A spokesman for TikTok said: ‘We are honoured that the LGBTQ+ community has embraced TikTok from our very early days, as a platform for self-expression, education, community-building and joy.’ A spokesman for Stonewall said: ‘Our content allows young LGBTQ+ people to know that they are not alone in their experiences.’”

Tik Tok is owned by “Beijing-based technology company ByteDance, founded by the Chinese billionaire entrepreneur, Zhang Yiming. The 38-year-old was named one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2019, who described him as ‘the top entrepreneur in the world’” (The Sun, dated December 18, 2021).

“US President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order announcing that he would ban US businesses and citizens from doing business with or downloading TikTok… The move came after the Trump administration aired concerns about user data being shared with Chinese authorities, a claim that ByteDance denied. However, the ban did not come into effect after a US District Judge ruled to temporarily halt the ban on TikTok downloads… It seems unlikely that Biden will take as drastic actions as Trump did when it comes to China’s tech giants, while he will still be concerned about data security” (Focus, November 20, 2020).

We should note that Trump’s and Biden’s concerns were and are strictly based on data security, not on their questionable and dangerous contents.

Make Believe Insanity in Switzerland

International Family News wrote on December 30:

“Switzerland has now joined a host of nations that allows a person to change gender identity by merely declaring so. Starting January 1, 2022, proof of undergoing hormone therapy or having had ‘sex-reassignment’ surgery, or a declaration from a doctor attesting to a person suffering from gender dysphoria, are not required. Now all one must do to legally change one’s gender is go to a civil registry office and fill out a simple form. It is just that easy.

“Allowing mere belief–no matter how objectively wrong it may be–to determine legal reality is a pathway leading to societal chaos. How this snowball will end can be glimpsed in Mexico, where the state Supreme Court recently ruled that a person’s belief about his age trumps the actual age of that person. With this decision, pedophilia could end as a crime if an adult in good faith believes he is a child. A minor could be allowed to purchase alcohol or visit a strip club if he or she in good faith believes they are twenty-one. With this ‘make believe’ movement gathering steam, a person could soon be able to legally change his race and ethnicity by merely declaring so; and people would be incentivized to do this because of all the quotas and set-asides reserved for minorities. Indeed, what is to stop a person from lying on his resume when applying for jobs, government grants, and colleges if he actually believes that he had the experiences listed on it? Living in a world turned upside where fiction is truth and truth is fiction is where this snowball stops….”

This is indeed insane, but one can see where these ungodly movements are heading…

Where Putin Is Right

IFN wrote on December 24:

“Russian President Vladimir Putin has many flaws and reasons to be disliked. He illegally occupied and annexed the Crimea. He is supporting a civil war in Ukraine. He jails and may even poison political opponents. He repeatedly makes threats against the West. Yet, in one area he should be admired—in thinking clearly about woke cancel culture and the radical transgender agenda…

“In regard to the radical transgender agenda that holds that any biological man can become a woman just by saying so and vice versa, Putin made several common-sense remarks; remarks that all of humanity unanimously agreed with until the last few decades in the West. ‘If someone believes that males and females are the same thing, well, let them believe that, but let’s think about common sense,’ Putin stated. Regarding allowing biological men to compete against biological women in sports, Putin declared: ‘Say, for example, males say they are females and compete in weightlifting competitions [as happened in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics]. This renders the entire area of women’s sports meaningless. I believe that the traditional approach is correct: a male is a male, a female is a female. Mother is mother and father is father.’…

“Putin then discussed the insanity of placing biological men identifying as women with biological women prisoners…

“After hearing Putin’s remarks, you have to ask yourself: Why is Putin, flawed in so many ways, the only current Western world leader courageously confronting the ‘virus’ of cancel culture and the lie that a biological man can become a woman just by saying so? Why are so many officials in the West afraid to defend objective reality and common sense?…”

Of course, Putin is totally correct in this regard, but one must not overlook that he is viciously opposing everyone who does not conform to his ideas, whatever they may be.

Second Putin-Biden Phone Call

Daily Mail wrote on December 31:

“Tensions between Russia and the West have… reached new highs over Ukraine. Putin discussed the soaring tensions in a phone call with US President Joe Biden on Thursday.

“Biden reaffirmed the U.S. threat of new sanctions against Russia in case of an escalation or invasion, to which Putin responded with a warning of his own that such a U.S. move could lead to a complete rupture of ties between the nations.”

It was reported that the call “ended without clarity about Mr. Putin’s intention.”

Russia Warns Finland and Sweden

EU Today wrote on December 29:

“Moscow has warned Finland and Sweden against joining Nato amid rising tensions between Russia and the western military alliance. Maria Zakharova, the Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman, accused the alliance of trying to pull the two countries into its orbit…

 “Finland and Sweden both pursued a policy of neutrality throughout the Cold War and neither country has ever formally applied to join Nato. However, Sweden, which increased its defence budget after Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, introduced legislation last year that would allow it to join Nato in the future if it decided it was in its interests. Swedish troops have held joint military exercises with Nato.

“Finland has also said that it could apply for Nato membership in the future…

‘Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg visited the two countries in October and praised their willingness to work with the alliance amid Russia’s ‘aggressive posturing.’”

Turmoil in Kazakhstan

The Guardian wrote on January 5:

“Kazakhstan’s president has appealed to a Moscow-led security bloc to help regain control amid protests sparked by fuel price rises, after demonstrators took over government buildings and reportedly stormed the airport in Almaty, the country’s commercial capital and largest city.

“In a televised address late on Wednesday, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said he had turned to the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) – a military alliance of Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan – after what he described as ‘attacks’ by foreign-trained terrorist gangs…

“Earlier in the day, there were violent clashes between police and demonstrators in the city and the mayor’s office was set on fire…

“Tokayev accepted the resignation of the government on Wednesday morning and introduced a state of emergency… to the entire country… The protests began in the west of the country at the weekend, after a sharp rise in fuel prices, but have spread quickly and taken Kazakhstan’s authorities and international observers by surprise… on Wednesday, the internet went down across much of Kazakhstan…

“Images of police being overpowered by protesters are likely to cause alarm in the Kremlin, as another country neighbouring Russia succumbs to political unrest. Kazakhstan is part of an economic union with Russia and the two countries share a long border. ‘We hope for the earliest possible normalisation of the situation in the country, with which Russia is linked by relations of strategic partnership and alliance through fraternal, human contacts,’ the Russian foreign ministry said [and that] it was important no foreign countries interfered in Kazakhstan.

“Tokayev spoke to the Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenko, who crushed a huge uprising with brutal force in 2019. Before calling Tokayev, Lukashenko spoke to Putin…

“Kazakhstan has never held an election judged as free and fair by international observers…”

The West is anxiously observing these developments, wondering what Putin might do.

Russia Sends Troops to Kazakhstan

Reuters reported on January 6:

“Fresh violence erupted in Kazakhstan’s main city on Thursday after Russia rushed in paratroopers to put down a countrywide uprising in one of Moscow’s closest former Soviet allies…. The Russian deployment was a gamble by the Kremlin that rapid military force could secure its interests in the oil and uranium-producing Central Asian nation, by swiftly putting down the worst violence in Kazakhstan’s 30 years of independence….

 “Moscow did not disclose how many troops it was sending, and it was not possible to determine if any were involved in Thursday’s unrest…. The swift arrival of Russian troops demonstrated the Kremlin’s willingness to safeguard its influence in the ex-Soviet Union with force… The West has so far mainly limited its response to calls for calm.”

Abortion Leading Cause of Death

Breitbart wrote on December 31:

“As of noon on December 31, 2021, there were 42.6 million abortions performed in the course of the year… while 8.2 million people died from cancer, 5 million from smoking, 1.7 million of HIV/AIDS, 1.3 million from traffic fatalities, and 1 million from suicide.

“Totaling all the deaths in the world from causes other than abortion reveals a figure of 58.7 million, meaning that abortions accounted for just over 42 percent of all human deaths in 2021. By comparison, worldwide deaths from coronavirus in 2021 totaled around 3.5 million, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).”

We dare to say that the number of deaths from corona is highly exaggerated. Note the next article.

Fauci “Clarifies” Prior Lies

Townhall wrote on December 31:

“Chief White House medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci finally acknowledged an important point about Covid-19 case numbers in hospitalized children… ‘many of them are hospitalized with Covid as opposed to because of Covid,’ Fauci admitted… ‘And what we mean by that — if a child goes in the hospital, they automatically get tested for Covid. And they get counted as a Covid-hospitalized individual. When in fact, they may go in for a broken leg or appendicitis or something like that. So, it’s over-counting the number of children who are, quote, ‘hospitalized with Covid,’ as opposed to because of Covid.

“Many pointed out that people were banned from social media channels for making this exact point, which is happening not just for children but adults, too. ‘Fauci acknowledges what others were censored for saying: Many children enter hospitals for reasons unrelated to Covid like broken bones but are registered as Covid hospitalizations simply because they got a + PCR test, thereby inflating the numbers,’ said The Grayzone’s editor Max Blumenthal.”

Still, the FDA just backed Pfizer booster shots for kids ages 2 to 15 (The Week, dated January 3). The money machine must go on…

A Country Divided

npr wrote on January 3:

“One year after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, Americans are deeply pessimistic about the future of democracy… 64% of Americans believe U.S. democracy is ‘in crisis and at risk of failing.’ That sentiment is felt most acutely by Republicans: Two-thirds of GOP respondents agree with the… claim that ‘voter fraud helped Joe Biden win the 2020 election’… Fewer than half of Republicans say they are willing to accept the results of the 2020 election…

“Nearly two-thirds of poll respondents agree that U.S. democracy is ‘more at risk’ now than it was a year ago. Among Republicans, that number climbs to 4 in 5… “More than half of Democrats say the Jan. 6 assault was an ‘attempted coup or insurrection,’ while Republicans are more likely to describe it as a ‘riot that got out of control.’…”

The New York Post wrote on January 3:

“40 percent of Republicans agreed it could sometimes be ‘justified for citizens to take violent action against the government.’ Twenty-three percent of Democrats and 41 percent of Independents also endorsed situational violence. Of those who agree that rising up in arms against the government could be acceptable, 22 percent said it would be justified for invasions of personal liberties, while 15 percent pointed to a military takeover or democratic collapse. Three percent said violence was appropriate if the government did not accept election results…

“The numbers had risen sharply in recent years. In 2015, 23 percent of Americans approved of violence against authorities, researchers said. Five years before that, 16 percent agreed — up from only 13 percent in the mid-90s.

“The same poll found that 92 percent of Democrats thought Trump was largely to blame for the Jan. 6 riot, compared to 27 percent of GOP voters.”

These are dangerous numbers. When so many Americans feel violence is sometimes justified to be used against the government, then it is only a matter of time… To be clear, God condemns the use of violence against governmental officials or governmental institutions. HOW MUCH the nation is divided can also be seen in the next article.

FBI Biden’s Personal Gestapo?

Breitbart wrote on January 4:

“Many U.S. voters think the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is Democrat President Joe Biden’s ‘personal Gestapo,’ according to a Rasmussen poll released Tuesday. ‘Roger Stone, an adviser to former President Donald Trump, has said there is “a group of politicized thugs at the top of the FBI who are using the FBI … as Joe Biden‘s personal Gestapo,”’ the poll report states. ‘Forty-six percent of voters agree with Stone’s assessment, including 29 percent who Strongly Agree. Thirty-eight percent disagree with Stone’s claim, including 25 percent who Strongly Disagree.’

“The results of the poll, which was conducted… on Dec. 29-30, come after the FBI conducted a raid on the home of Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe, looking for information about Ashley Biden’s diary… Voter opinion on whether FBI Director Christopher Wray is influenced by the president has reached a ‘near-complete reversal.’ Now, 50 percent of voters believe Wray is influenced by Biden ‘in his decision making,’ and only 26 percent think he is independent of the administration. Twenty-five percent of those polled are unsure. In May 2017, 53 percent thought the FBI director was independent while 26 percent thought he was beholden to the president. Approval of Wray has also declined since 2020…

“Fifty-seven percent of Republicans and 56 percent of unaffiliated voters have an unfavorable view of the FBI compared to 30 percent of Democrats…”

YouTube Worst Censor of All?

Newsmax wrote on January 3:

“Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., says he won’t be posting to YouTube anymore because the video platform site is ‘the worst censor of all.’ ‘Today I begin my exodus from Big Tech, starting with the worst censor of all, YouTube,” Paul said in a statement… Instead, Paul’s team said viewers can see his content on Rumble.com.

“Paul’s YouTube account was suspended for seven days twice in August and September over videos the platform said violated its COVID-19 misinformation policy. In one of the videos, Paul, a staunch critic of Biden administration vaccination policies and of key COVID-19 adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci, posted a video that disputed the effectiveness of wearing masks to limit the spread of the coronavirus. In the video, Paul says: ‘Most of the masks you get over the counter don’t work. They don’t prevent infection.’ Later in the video, he adds, ‘Trying to shape human behavior isn’t the same as following the actual science, which tells us that cloth masks don’t work.’”

The irony is that now, more and more scientists agree that cloth masks do not work. For instance, the Ron Paul Institute wrote on January 2:

“Germany’s official government health authority reported last week that 90 plus percent of new Omicron variant cases are among vaccinated individuals, obliterating the long-repeated claim that this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Other narratives are also crumbling – former FDA head Scott Gottlieb says cloth masks are useless.”

Trudeau and Biden Malign and Accuse the Unvaccinated

LifeSiteNews wrote on January 3:

“Prime Minister Trudeau maligned Canadians who are opposed to receiving the experimental COVID-19 gene-therapy injections as ‘extremists,’ ‘racists,’ and ‘misogynists’ who deny science. The September interview went viral on social media only late last month and has since attracted strong criticism from politicians and citizens alike… They ‘do not believe in science, who are often misogynists, often racists, too; it is a sect, a small group, but who are taking up space, and here we have to make a choice, as a leader, as a country,’ added Trudeau.

“He made the shocking statement that he is unsure if Canada should even ‘tolerate these people’ while telling the host that the unvaccinated ‘are going to block us’ from getting back to the ‘things we like doing.’ Trudeau’s discriminatory and confusing statements had seemed to have gone unnoticed by Canadian society until December 28, when career politician and federal leader of the pro-freedom People’s Party of Canada, Maxime Bernier, posted the clip to social media while labelling Trudeau a ‘psychopathic fascist.’…

“Despite Trudeau and all of Canada’s provincial leaders supporting vaccine mandates and vaccine passports for access to various parts of Canadian society, coronavirus vaccine trials have never produced evidence that the vaccines stop infection or transmission...

“Trudeau’s assertion that those opposed to vaccination are ‘racist’ is at odds with the fact that many of the most vaccine-hesitant people are members of minority communities who have a strong distrust of government due to mistreatment in past generations. In Canada, indigenous groups like the Six Nations community in Ontario have a vaccination rate of only 46 percent as of mid-December, compared to a rate of over 85 percent for the province’s population as a whole.

“In America, the group to report the highest levels of hesitancy is black Americans, with a whopping 50 percent reporting a distrust in the procedure.

“In addition to cultural hesitancy, there are those too who oppose the shots on scientific or religious grounds…”

Sadly, such mean-spirited and hateful comments, as uttered by Trudeau, can be expected to be made by politicians and leaders in other countries as well. Note the article on France above.

Also, even though less offensive in his words than Trudeau, Biden keeps maligning the “unvaccinated” and holds them responsible for the spread of the Omicron virus, as he did on January 4 in a speech to the nation, even though the facts do not support his claim at all. Incredibly, Biden said this:

“The impact from the rising cases depends on the effect on the person based on whether that person — what their vaccination status is… if you’re vaccinated and boosted, you are highly protected… if you’re unvaccinated, you have some reason to be alarmed.  Many of you will — you know, you’ll experience severe illness, in many cases, if you get COVID-19 if you’re not vaccinated.  Some will die — needlessly die.

“The unvaccinated are taking up hospital beds and crowding emergency rooms and intensive care units.  That’s a place that other people will need access to those hospitals… there is no excuse — no excuse for anyone being unvaccinated.  This continues to be a pandemic of the unvaccinated… And for [parents] who still haven’t gotten your kids vaccinated, please get them vaccinated.  Look out for their interests here.  It’s the best way to protect them.

“And for parents with kids too young to be vaccinated, surround your kids with people who are vaccinated.  And make sure you’re masking in public so you don’t get COVID and give it to your kids.”

What absolutely divisive and scientifically false remarks! Fox News, in pointing out the many misrepresentations in Biden’s speech, wrote on January 5:

“But those who have been vaccinated are still getting sick. The U.S. recorded its record number of COVID-19 cases for a single day on Monday, almost doubling the previous record of about 590,000 set just four days earlier. This, despite 73% of the U.S. population being at least partially vaccinated and 62% fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control…. the CDC noted on December 20 that it ‘expects that anyone with Omicron infection can spread the virus to others, even if they are vaccinated or don’t have symptoms…’”

The Past Two Years… a Testimony of Autocratic Insanity

Dr. Ron Paul wrote the following in his weekly column in the Ron Paul Institute on January 3:

“… these past two years have been a bad dream. It seems like we fell asleep in early 2020 and woke up in 1984! They said that if we just put on a mask and stayed home for two weeks, we’d be able to return to normal. The two weeks came and went and instead of going back to normal they added more restrictions. These past two years have been a story of moving goalposts and ‘experts’ like Anthony Fauci constantly contradicting themselves…

“The history of these past two years is that the worst ideas have been adopted by force and anyone questioning those ideas has been suppressed by force…

“As my son Rand said on a recent Liberty Report, thousands of people died because Fauci refused to consider the proven effectiveness of natural immunity against Covid. He and his colleagues were determined to deny any outpatient treatments and insisted on vaccines as the only way out. Now, as we see the vaccines performing so poorly versus natural immunity, their whole strategy lies in tatters. Will anyone apologize to the relatives of all those who died?

“When we look back at these two years, hopefully one thing that will be remembered is [that] the institutions of state power… have been exposed as frauds and worse.

“In a recent massively popular Joe Rogan interview with Dr. Robert Malone – inventor of the mRNA technology that is the backbone of the ‘vaccines’ – Malone discusses the disturbing concept of mass formation psychosis, where fear and manipulation are used to drive a society mad in the service of a group of elites with an agenda. We saw it in Germany in the 1930s….”

Judge Blocks Navy Vaccine Mandate

Thomson/Reuters wrote on January 4:

“A federal judge on Monday barred the U.S. Department of Defense from punishing a group of Navy SEALs and other special forces members who refused COVID-19 vaccines on religious grounds.

“U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor, acting in response to a lawsuit filed on behalf of 35 special forces service members, issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Navy and Defense Department from enforcing the mandate. O’Connor, who was appointed to the federal bench in Texas by President George W. Bush, said the Navy had not granted a single religious exemption to the vaccine rule.

“‘The Navy service members in this case seek to vindicate the very freedoms they have sacrificed so much to protect. The COVID-19 pandemic provides the government no license to abrogate those freedoms,’ the judge wrote in a 26-page decision.”

Ultimately, the highly political US Supreme Court will have to decide these issues.

And Now.. Another Variant?

Mashable wrote on January 4:

“The world is still coping with the rapid spread of Omicron and the previously reported Delta variant. As infection rates surge in several countries, yet another COVID-19 variant has been discovered. Scientists in France have detected a new coronavirus variant called ‘IHU’…

“So far, 12 cases have been reported in Marseille with an initial case being linked to travel history in Cameroon… The researchers revealed that the IHU variant is believed to contain 46 mutations (higher than Omicron) which could mean that it’s far more infectious and resistant to vaccinations. Currently, it is too soon to tell if this is the latest variant of concern. The WHO is still investigating the findings.”

Big Pharma will have a lucrative field day to develop a vaccine against that variant. It appears many mutations might occur because of the vaccinations.

How many more booster shots?

CNN wrote on January 4:

“A leading expert who helped create the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19  said Tuesday that giving everyone in the world booster shots multiple times a year is not feasible. ‘We can’t vaccinate the planet every four to six months. It’s not sustainable or affordable,’ Professor Andrew Pollard, the director of the Oxford Vaccine Group and head of the UK’s Committee on Vaccination and Immunization, told The Daily Telegraph in an interview published Tuesday…

“Pollard also said he thought further evidence was needed before offering a fourth Covid-19 shot to people in the UK… Israel has already begun its rollout of a fourth vaccine dose, offering it to all medical workers and people 60 and older as of Monday. And in late December, German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach told public broadcaster ZDF that Germans ‘will need a fourth vaccination’ against Covid-19.”

What Germany, the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia, Austria, Israel and many other countries need are competent and knowledgeable health experts.

Historic Wildfires in Colorado

Bloomberg wrote on December 31:

“The infernos near Boulder, Colorado, destroyed as many as 1,000 homes, overwhelming firefighters as hurricane-force gusts propelled flames through suburban neighborhoods left tinder dry by months of drought. The blazes dashed erratically from house to house, scorching about 6,000 acres (2,400 hectares) and devouring structures ‘in just a blink of an eye,’ Colorado Governor Jared Polis said… Authorities suspect the grass fires were touched off by power lines that toppled in the 100-mile (161-kilometer) per-hour winds. No deaths have been reported…”

These fires with “historic” winds made it the “most destructive fire in state history.”

“Highly Credible” Unexplained UFO Sightings

The Hill wrote on January 5:

“The Navy has a perplexing mystery on its hands. For several weeks in 2019, unknown objects stalked U.S. warships off the coast of southern California. While the bizarre ‘drone’ encounters remain unsolved, the incidents occurred in an area with a long history of UFO sightings, including two of the most credible encounters on record… The Navy, working with the FBI and Coast Guard, now appears to have ruled out civilian activity or U.S. military operations as plausible explanations for the encounters. This leaves two possibilities, each with extraordinary implications.

“Either a foreign adversary is spying on Navy ships around the Channel Islands (which lie just west of Los Angeles and San Diego), or devices of truly unknown origin are operating with impunity around U.S. (and allied) vessels.

“The implications of a foreign power deploying drones to spy on American warships just off the California coast are immense. For starters, this scenario suggests a monumental U.S. counterintelligence failure. Moreover, such a brazen and technically complex intelligence operation amounts to an enormous gamble for a hostile nation. Any shoot-down – as the Navy reportedly attempted – of a foreign surveillance drone so close to U.S. shores would invite sweeping geopolitical repercussions.

“Importantly, if the UFOs that stalked the Navy warships were part of an adversarial intelligence collection effort, the objects’ operators made little effort to conceal their presence. Videos taken aboard one U.S. vessel show the mysterious craft displaying bright and flashing lights. At the same time, Navy radar operators tracked the objects with apparent ease, even expressing surprise as the craft engaged in anomalous maneuvers. In another video, a spherical object… appears to descend slowly into the ocean.

“To be sure, investigators and intelligence analysts must take seriously the possibility that a foreign power is spying on U.S. warships a stone’s throw from two major American cities. But based on what is known publicly about these bizarre incidents, investigators should also consider the long history of UFO sightings around the Channel islands…

“Now, with Congress forcing the government to take the UFO phenomenon seriously for the first time, investigators must consider whether the objects that followed Navy warships are linked to the long history of inexplicable – yet highly credible – encounters in the waters off southern California.”

The author of the article, Marik von Rennenkampff, served as an analyst with the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation, as well as an Obama administration appointee at the U.S. Department of Defense. Of course, a third and most plausible explanation for these UFO sightings is demonic activities to prepare mankind for Armageddon.

Israel Prepared to Attack Iran?

Townhall wrote on December 31:

“The timing of recent rhetoric throughout the Middle East is directly related to renewed nuclear negotiations with Iran. Nobody thinks the Iranians are honest players or can be trusted. But there are world leaders who think that continuing to negotiate… is a goal in and of itself…

“A large part of the problem and Israel’s justified concern is that the western secular world does not understand religious fanaticism…

“If Israel really believes that Iran is on the verge of a nuclear breakout, is Israel prepared to act on its own assuming others won’t?… Making such a decision to attack Iran will be a historic Jewish decision, like Prime Minister Begin’s in 1981… Israel’s actions will be based on its understanding of the historic enormity of the decision. The more it does, the fewer restraints there will be, militarily and diplomatically. Unless the U.S. is on board from the outset, it’s likely the U.S. may not be informed until planes are in the air… If the U.S. does not participate in an attack, would it support Israel or vote against it in the event of a UN condemnation?

“Between the probable military backlash and the inevitable international pushback, Israel is between a rock and a hard place… As the Jewish sage Hillel said, ‘If I am not for myself, who will be for me.’ The modern application of that in Israel is, ‘If I am not for myself, who will stop Iran?’”

An Israeli attack on Iran is not unlikely. If it happens, it could lead to terrible consequences for Israel.  

Fate of Al Aqsa

Israel 365 wrote on December 28:

“Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz) has always been an outspoken advocate for Israel but he recently went even further when criticizing the recent UN resolutions concerning Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. In his response, Gosar called on the UN to dismantle the Muslim structures in Jerusalem that were built on the ruins of the Jewish Temple… ‘The Jewish Temple, located in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City, is holy ground to Jews and it belongs solely to their faith.  I object to any effort to ethnically cleanse the Jewish people from their sole historic claim to this land and temple… It remains an abomination that a mosque was allowed to be built over this temple. The United Nations should be finding ways to dismantle and move that mosque, which is an affront to all religions,’ concluded Congressman Gosar.

“It is interesting to note that Gosar did not specify which Muslim structure on the Temple Mount he felt should be dismantled. The UN resolution specified al-Haram al-Sharif (the noble sanctuary), a term that refers to the Temple Mount and not to a specific structure. The major structures currently on the site are the grey domed Al Aqsa Mosque (the further mosque) and the gold-domed Qubbat a Sakhra (shrine of the rock) that was built on the site of the Holy of Holies in the Jewish Temples.

“Rabbi Hillel Weiss, the spokesman for the Sanhedrin, does not believe that all of the Muslim structures on the Temple Mount needed to be removed. ‘As long as the Muslims agree to live peacefully with the other religions in Israel, there is no reason to remove the Aqsa Mosque,’ Rabbi Weiss said. ‘An entrance can be set up and pathways arranged so that they can, like the Jews and everyone else, remain in the permitted areas. In fact, the current entrance to the Aqsa Mosque fits that description. Al Aqsa is not in the part of the Temple Mount that was used in the Temples. But by calling the entire Temple Mount by the name Al Aqsa, they are laying claim to the entire mountain with the intent of preventing the Jews from returning the Temple service. This has no source in Islam or benefit to the Muslims. It is simply a political lie that was created by the Palestinians and perpetuated by those who hate the Jews.’…”

It would be difficult to imagine that the Muslims would agree to such an “arrangement,” as proposed by Rabbi Weiss.

Friction between American Jews and the State of Israel

The Associated Press wrote on January 2:

“When Israel’s new government took office last June, it indicated it would press ahead on an egalitarian prayer site at Jerusalem’s Western Wall — a sensitive holy site that has emerged as a point of friction between Jews over how prayer is conducted there. But the plan is coming up against the limits of Israel’s fragile government, which is struggling to move forward on the issue due to its own internal divisions. The inaction has disappointed both Israeli groups that promote religious pluralism and their American Jewish allies, who view the issue as an important test of recognition from the Israeli government…

“The Western Wall is considered the holiest site where Jews can pray. Under ultra-Orthodox management, the wall is currently separated between men’s and women’s prayer sections. Under the more liberal Reform and Conservative streams of Judaism, women and men pray together and women are allowed to read from the Torah, which Orthodox Judaism prohibits. Those streams are a minority in Israel but make up the majority of American Jews. Israel’s refusal to recognize these liberal streams has long been a point of tension with American Jews.

“After years of negotiations, Israel approved a plan in 2016 to officially recognize a special prayer area at the Western Wall. The $9 million plan vowed to expand an egalitarian prayer site and make it more hospitable to prayer and religious events held by Jews who don’t follow Orthodox traditions. The deal was welcomed by Jewish American leaders and seen as a significant breakthrough in promoting religious pluralism in Israel, where the ultra-Orthodox authorities govern almost every facet of Jewish life. But then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu never implemented the plan due to objections from powerful ultra-Orthodox allies who had initially endorsed it.

“He shelved the plan the following year, leading to strained relations with American Jewish leaders that continued until he left office last year. His tight relationship with President Donald Trump further unsettled the heavily Democratic-leaning Jewish community…

“The new government, led by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett — the child of American immigrants — brought hope that the plan may be revived… But Bennett heads an unwieldy coalition of parties from across the political spectrum — ranging from nationalist parties to dovish liberal ones and even an Islamist faction — that was united behind the goal of ousting Netanyahu and very little else. While the Western Wall plan features in agreements that brought the coalition together, its leaders have generally chosen to sidestep divisive issues that might rattle its stability. Moving ahead with the Western Wall plan could spark an outcry from ultra-Orthodox opposition parties, which in turn could exert pressure on more sympathetic elements of the coalition to oppose the move. And while the government isn’t likely to fall over the Western Wall plan, a public brawl over the issue within government ranks could wear down the already delicate ties that bind the coalition.”

 As predicted from the outset, the Israeli coalition won’t accomplish much. This in turn will alienate American Jews from the state of Israel even further.

Acknowledgement and Disclaimer

These Current Events are compiled and commented on by Norbert Link. We gratefully acknowledge the many contributions of news articles from our readership. The publication of articles in this section is not to be viewed as an endorsement or approval as to contents or accuracy of the selected articles, but they are published for the purpose of pointing at worldwide developments in the light of biblical end-time prophecy and godly instruction. Our own comments are provided in italics.

1 Timothy 4:8 is rendered, as follows, in the New King James Bible:

“For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.”

The Authorized Version says: “For bodily exercise profiteth little.”

Commentaries are divided as to the exact meaning of this verse, as is also reflected in the way it is being translated. For example, the Greek states, as explained by some: “… profiteth to (but) a small extent.”

The New American Standard Bible states: “for bodily training is just slightly beneficial.” Weymouth New Testament reads: “Train yourself in godliness. Exercise for the body is not useless, but godliness is useful in every respect.”

The German Luther Bible says: “…does not help much” or “is of little use.” The Menge Bible reads: “… brings only little benefit.”

Barnes Notes on the Bible states: “The apostle does not mean to say that bodily exercise is in itself improper, or that no advantage can be derived from it in the preservation of health.” He also stated that an alternate reading would be: “For bodily exercise profits for a little while,” explaining:

“The Greek will admit of either interpretation [“profits a little” or “for a little while”], and what is here affirmed is true in either sense.”

In comparison to the development of godliness in our lives, physical exercise of any kind only profits a little and only for a little while, while godliness lasts forever and is of so much greater importance.

Some commentaries, such as Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible, even claim that Paul has a particular type of bodily exercise in mind, “not the exercise of the body in the Olympic games, as by running, wrestling, etc., which profited but little, for the obtaining of a corruptible crown at most; though since a word is used here, and in the preceding verse, borrowed from thence, there may be an allusion to it: much less exercise of the body for health or recreation, as riding, walking, playing at any innocent diversion; which profits but for a little time, as the Syriac and Arabic versions read; and the latter renders the phrase ‘bodily recreation’: nor is the exercise of the body in the proper employment of trade and business, to which a man is called, and which profits for the support of life for a little while, intended… but rather mere formal external worship, as opposed to godliness, or spiritual worship.

“‘There ought to be an exercise of the body, or a presenting of that in religious worship before God; there should be an outward attendance on the word and ordinances; but then, without internal godliness, this will be of little advantage: it is indeed showing an outward regard to public worship, and may be a means of keeping persons out of bad company, and from doing evil things; but if this is trusted to, and depended on, it will be of no avail to everlasting life.”

Whatever the case, it is correct to say that in comparison with the acquisition and development of godliness in this life, physical exercise profits just a little, and only for a little while; that is, it must never become more important than the Kingdom of God and His righteousness which we must seek first and foremost.

This also means that physical exercise, and sports in general, must never be intentionally engaged in if they would be harmful for others. This is not to say, however, that competitive sports or exercise must be wrong; it is a question of motivation and intent.

We say this in our Q&A https://www.eternalgod.org/what-kinds-of-sports-games-and-related-activities-are-appropriate-and-inappropriate-for-christians-part-1/

“In 1 Corinthians 9:24-26, Paul draws a spiritual analogy to competition in sports. This passage does not seem to allow for the conclusion that such competition is necessarily wrong. Paul says: ‘Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown. Therefore I run thus: not with uncertainty…’ David draws another analogy in the book of Psalms, comparing the sun with ‘a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, And rejoices like a strong man to run its race’ (Psalm 19:5)…

“But God does not want us to have an attitude of harming or injuring an opponent, or of wishing that he be injured so that ‘our’ team will get an advantage. When ‘competition’ reaches that destructive level, it is wrong. But to want ‘our’ team to win in a game is not wrong. And ‘our’ team had better make every right effort to win, so that it is deserving of ‘our’ support (Ecclesiastes 9:10). But once a game is finished, we are to go on with life and our responsibilities… Some get so involved in the support of their team that they get all upset and can’t sleep at night if their team has lost. They might even get drunk to ‘forget their pain.’ That, of course, is not indicative of a healthy and Christian attitude.

“Sports can be good entertainment. They can contribute to our health and relaxation. They can be exciting. But they must never take first place in our lives… And even though watching sporting events can be good and clean fun, that should be all. In this world, ‘the race is not to the swift, Nor the battle to the strong… Nor favor to men of skill; But time and chance happen to them all’ (Ecclesiastes 9:11)…”

In addition, we also said this in our Q&A https://www.eternalgod.org/what-kinds-of-sports-games-and-related-activities-are-appropriate-and-inappropriate-for-christians-part-2/ :

“Another sport which is mentioned in the Bible and which was engaged in by godly people is wrestling. We read that Jacob wrestled with God—the second Member of the God Family, Jesus Christ  (Genesis 32:24; Hosea 12:2). After wrestling for a long time, God struck the socket of his hip which became out of joint, causing Jacob to limp for a while. One might conclude that it is therefore appropriate to injure an opponent in sports, but this would be a wrong assessment. In this case it was God—not a man—who acted in such a way in order to teach Jacob a particular lesson.

“The Benson Commentary writes: ‘This was to humble him, and make him sensible of his own weakness, that he might ascribe his victory, not to his own power, but to the grace of God, and might be encouraged to depend on that grace for the deliverance [from Esau] he was so much concerned to obtain. It is probable Jacob felt little or no pain from this hurt, for he did not so much as halt till the struggle was over… If so, it evidenced itself to be a divine touch indeed, wounding and healing at the same time.’

“The Matthew Poole Commentary agrees, stating that this ‘was done that Jacob might see that it was not his own strength, but only God’s grace, which got him this victory, and could give him the deliverance which he hoped for.’

“Another distinction needs to be drawn between those sports and activities which one may be engaged in for the purpose of bodily exercise (including in workout programs) and those which one might want to do for the purpose of learning how…  to fight [in the sense of injuring or even killing] another person.”

If we engage in physical exercise so we can learn how to injure and even kill another human being, then that would be clearly wrong. It would violate God’s law of love even for our enemies. As we said, it is all a matter of motivation and intent. To engage in physical exercise for the purpose of “cherishing” our own bodies, rather than abusing them (Ephesians 5:29), knowing that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us (1 Corinthians 6:19; 3:16-17), is quite different from training our bodies for the purpose of becoming fighting machines to hurt, injure and destroy others.

It is also important to realize that we are not to hate our own bodies (compare again Ephesians 5:29), which would include not purposefully harming it by self-mutilation, smoking, eating unclean meat, taking destructive drugs, and so on.

We say this in our Q&A https://www.eternalgod.org/can-you-elaborate-on-education-today-and-in-gods-kingdom-part-5/

“Sickness and disease occur only when nature’s laws are broken… either by the sick person him- or herself or by conditions caused by men leading to a person getting sick… God designed certain foods for good health. Some things that grow are not designed for food. Some are poison… people [need to be educated] in sanitation, hygiene, required amounts of sleep, pure water, fresh air, sunshine, exercise.”

But we need proper balance. Sometimes, “natural laws” of hygiene, sanitation or enough sleep will have to be broken to accomplish the higher purpose of seeking the Kingdom of God. We read, for instance, that Christ sacrificed sleep to stay up all night in prayer with the Father (Luke 6:12-13). We also read that Jesus and the apostles were beaten for doing the Work of God. They were not so concerned about their physical health and well-being and loved their physical bodies so much that they refused to do the Work.

A striking example for the required proper balance and the right priorities can be found in Philippians 2:25-30, where Paul utters these words of recommendation about his fellow servant Epaphroditus:

“Yet I considered it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother, fellow worker, and fellow soldier, but your messenger and the one who ministered to my need; since he was longing for you all, and was distressed because you had heard that he was sick. For indeed he was sick almost unto death; but God had mercy on him, and not only on him but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. Therefore I sent him the more eagerly, that when you see him again you may rejoice, and I may be less sorrowful. Receive him therefore in the Lord with all gladness, and hold such men in esteem; because for the work of Christ he came close to death, not regarding his life, to supply what was lacking in your service toward me.”

Even though Epaphroditus “violated” in some way “natural laws” governing his health, he did so for the overriding purpose of doing the Work of God. Paul did not criticize or condemn him for this; just to the contrary, he said to hold such men in esteem or high regard. Some commentaries tell us that he “hazarded his life”; “the preservation of which with respect to the work he was about, he did not consult…  but made little account of it, yea, did even despise it in the service of Christ, as the original word doth import” (Matthew Poole’s Commentary). He was willing to live and die for Christ (Luke 12:25).

This attitude of service and obedience towards God’s spiritual law of love toward God and man can also be found in 1 Thessalonians 5:12:

“And we urge you, brethren, to recognize those who labor among you, and are over you in the Lord and admonish you…”

The German Schlachter Bible says: “… they labor to the extent of exhaustion.”

Matthew Poole’s Commentary states that the word “labor” implies, “diligent labour, causing weariness.” Their disregard for their body in those circumstances, including their lack of physical exercise, was not something which had to be regretted or condemned. Rather, Paul recommends those servants of God, who toiled and worked hard, adding in verse 13: “… esteem them very highly in love for their work’s sake.”

In our booklet, “Sickness and Healing–What the Bible Tells Us,” we state that “the reasons for sickness and disease are manifold, and they might have nothing to do at all with any ungodly conduct of the sick person.” They may even include proper and godly conduct by a person which, while neglecting physical exercise, which normally profits a little, leads to or even causes his or her physical sickness.

Lead Writer: Norbert Link

compiled by Dave Harris

“The Pandemic of the Unvaccinated,” is the title of a new StandingWatch program, presented by Evangelist Norbert Link. Here is a summary: 

How do governmental officials all over the world try to deal with those who have not been vaccinated against the corona virus? Of course, there have been lockdowns or severe restrictions of movement and access to facilities; there has been the push for mandatory vaccinations, and there have been arrests of unvaccinated persons who showed their faces in public, but this program will address mainly the verbal abuse by governmental leaders and others which has become more and more common.

“Die Pandemie der Ungeimpften,” is the title of a new AufPostenStehen program, presented in German by Norbert Link and covering the topic described above.

“Richten oder nicht richten?” is the title of this Sabbath’s German sermon, presented by Norbert Link. Title in English: “To Judge or Not to Judge.”

“Wie selbstbewusst sind wir?”is the title of last Sabbath’s German sermonette, presented by Manuel Giermann. Title in English: “How Confident Are We?”

“Lasting Impressions,” the sermonette presented last Sabbath by Michael Link, is now posted. Here is a summary:

How do we present ourselves in any situation or environment we are in?  Do we leave a good first impression and do we also leave a lasting impression?

“To Judge or Not to Judge?,” the sermon presented last Sabbath by Norbert Link, is now posted. Here is a summary:

We are told in God’s Word that we are not to judge others. What does this mean, as we are also told to render righteous judgment? How can we solve this apparent conflict, and how do passages like these apply to jury duty?

On January 1, 2022, Michael Link will present the sermonette, titled, “Lasting Impressions,” and Norbert Link will present the sermon, titled, “To Judge or Not to Judge?”

The live services are available, over video and audio, at http://eternalgod.org/live-services/ (12:30 pm Pacific Time; 1:30 pm Mountain Time; 2:30 pm Central Time; 3:30 pm Eastern Time; 8:30 pm Greenwich Mean Time; 9:30 pm Central European Time). Just click on Connect to Live Stream.

Over the past year, powerful images of social bedlam and mayhem have often dominated the news. What is now being called an “insurrection” is the description of what took place in Washington, D.C., on January 6, 2021, as crowds of people turned into a mob of anarchists.

People were injured and people died!

That sad episode hardly begins to represent the breakdown of civil order that is occurring all around us and all over the world. People are now being randomly assaulted, stabbed or even shot in circumstances where safety was taken for granted. Here is how God prophetically describes our time:

“‘By swearing and lying, Killing and stealing and committing adultery, They break all restraint, With bloodshed upon bloodshed’” (Hosea 4:2).

Jesus Christ never allowed Himself to become entangled in the chaos of this world, although He was constantly surrounded by it and even eventually became its victim. His overpowering self-restraint in all that He faced serves as our example—especially, as times grow even more dire.

Our challenge to practice self-restraint in all that we think, say or do, will not be easy. To live as Christians, we need help:

“Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:14-16).

Our “help” is found in following the lead of Jesus, and it involves thinking as He thinks. The Apostle Paul puts it this way:

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ…” (2 Corinthians 10:3-5).

Paul adds:

“Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things” (Philippians 4:8).

Regarding what we should say:

“‘“These are the things you shall do: Speak each man the truth to his neighbor; Give judgment in your gates for truth, justice, and peace; Let none of you think evil in your heart against your neighbor; And do not love a false oath. For all these are things that I hate,” Says the LORD’” (Zechariah 8:16-17).

Jesus taught the kind of self-restraint we should practice regarding what we do:

“‘Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves’” (Matthew 10:16).

Indeed, we do live, as Paul writes, “…in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom [we] shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:15).

As mentioned, the past year has been a time of unrestrained violence, and it will, as we have been warned by God, grow to become the very worst trouble ever experienced or that ever will be again. Against this backdrop, God’s Church will continue to proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God—even as we remain separate from the destructive path of those who continue to choose violence and who continue to break all restraint.

by Norbert Link

We begin with alarming warning signs regarding the worldwide threats to democracy and of “conquest by authoritarian forces, either through military invasion or subversion from within”; speaking especially of China and Russia in this context; publish a grim review of events in 2021 showing the decline of democracy in the USA; address the perceived “need” of many Europeans to establish their own army to deal with overseas crises to avoid having to deal with them “on their own soil”; and report on Poland’s fear of Germany’s ambition to establish a “Fourth Reich.” We also quote a British article to the effect that the UK and Europe are destined to “remain the best of enemies.”

Please view in this context our new StandingWatch program, titled, “2022 in Prophecy.”

We speak on a faux pas (?) of Kamala Harris and Dr. Fauci’s methods of intimidation and coercion; and point out Donald Trump’s controversial and, as some view it, hypocritical stance on vaccination which might cost him the votes of many conservatives, unless he changes his position. We also address the historically bad approval ratings of US Presidents after their first year in office, focusing especially on Biden, Clinton, Obama and Trump.

We address another terrible tragedy regarding the killing of an innocent victim through a police officer in Los Angeles; speak on events in or pertaining to Israel, including an airstrike on Syria and the outbreak of the bird flu; terrible privacy intrusions through Canada’s federal government; and close with a demonically-inspired example of mankind’s waste of energy, time and resources in trying to deal with “extraterrestrial aliens.”

Throughout this section, we have underlined pertinent statements in the quoted articles, for the convenience and quick overview of the reader.

Democracy in Peril Worldwide

Breitbart wrote on December 24:

“Several of the world’s free nations will greet the year 2022 under the immediate threat of conquest by authoritarian forces, either through military invasion or subversion from within.

“The best-known example is Taiwan, an outpost of free-market democracy under the perpetual threat of conquest by the hideous tyrants of China… Last week, the Taiwanese Defense Ministry said it fears China could turn large-scale military exercises near Taiwan into a full-scale surprise attack, while simultaneously deploying naval forces to keep allies like the United States and Japan from coming to Taiwan’s assistance. Chinese officials and state media are increasingly belligerent about threatening to attack any military that attempts to defend Taiwan, including the U.S. military…

“Seizing Taiwan may appeal to Chinese leaders as a bold move that would destroy the credibility of the United States and Europe, frightening other Asian powers into China’s orbit because they can no longer rely on Western security guarantees. The death of democracy in Taiwan could threaten its survival in South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, and elsewhere…

“And then again, democracy could conceivably topple in Taiwan without a military invasion. China invested considerable effort in subverting Taiwanese democracy and nourishing pro-Beijing opposition parties…

“Also living under the threat of invasion from the authoritarians next door is Ukraine. Russia now has over 90,000 troops massed along the Ukrainian border and Ukrainian intelligence believes they could invade by the end of January 2022… Relentless Russian propaganda portrays the Ukrainian government as an illegitimate puppet of foreign interests….

“In South America, there are troubling signs of anti-democratic leftist dictatorships on the rise. The odious regime of Nicolás Maduro appears securely in control of Venezuela, having vanquished a pro-democracy movement even as the national economy comes crashing down in socialist flames. International observers are nervously hoping the new leftist president of Chile, Gabriel Boric, does not follow in Maduro’s footsteps…

“Authoritarian powers like China and Iran are increasing their influence in Latin America, posing both a strategic challenge to the United States and an ideological threat to democracy…

“Democracy in other parts of the developing world is threatened by a string of military coups. The most horrific example is obviously Afghanistan, where the Taliban insurgency swept away the elected civilian government in a matter of days while the Biden administration fumbled through a disastrous withdrawal of American troops. Thanks to Biden’s reckless abandonment of American military equipment and weapons, the Taliban is now the best-armed junta in the world, with plenty of munitions to spare for sale to other anti-democratic forces.

“In Myanmar and Sudan, military juntas seized power… These juntas have survived intense pressure from human rights activists, democratic governments, and the United Nations.

“Libya, transformed into a gruesome wasteland of warlords and jihadis by Biden’s Democrat predecessor Barack Obama and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, is still struggling to hold a nationwide democratic election. Ten years after Obama’s invasion, Libya perpetually teeters on the edge of either disintegrating completely or becoming a military dictatorship…

“2022 will dawn with democracy in peril – not just from the vicious struggle to redefine it being waged across the Western world, but from numerous fragile democracies on the brink of external invasion or authoritarian revolution. 2021 was the year that saw freedom and autonomy die in Hong Kong. Representative government is on the chopping block in far too many other places.”

This analysis is, sadly, very real and true. Dictatorships will increase. There will be more and more wars and rumors of wars, as well as famines, pestilences and earthquakes in various places, indicating the “beginning of sorrows” (Matthew 24:6-8).

Close to Civil War

The Washington Post wrote on December 17:

“Barbara F. Walter, a political science professor at the University of California at San Diego, serves on a CIA advisory panel called the Political Instability Task Force that monitors countries around the world and predicts which of them are most at risk of deteriorating into violence…

“Her bottom line: ‘We are closer to civil war than any of us would like to believe… No one wants to believe that their beloved democracy is in decline, or headed toward war,’ she writes. But, ‘if you were an analyst in a foreign country looking at events in America — the same way you’d look at events in Ukraine or the Ivory Coast or Venezuela — you would go down a checklist, assessing each of the conditions that make civil war likely. And what you would find is that the United States, a democracy founded more than two centuries ago, has entered very dangerous territory.’…

“Walter writes that the United States is now an ‘anocracy,’ somewhere between a democracy and an autocratic state….”

Of course, as can be expected from the Washington Post, this decline of US democracy is blamed on Trump, without mentioning the ongoing autocratic dictatorial measures imposed by the Biden Administration.

2021 in Review

The Rutherford Institute wrote on December 27:

“A simmering pot of political tensions boiled over on January 6, 2021, when protesters stormed the Capitol… It took no time at all for the nation’s capital to be placed under a military lockdown, online speech forums restricted… The subsequent  military occupation of the nation’s capital by 25,000 troops as part of the so-called ‘peaceful’ transfer of power from one administration to the next was little more than martial law disguised as national security…

“On any given day, the average American going about his daily business was monitored, surveilled, spied on and tracked in more than 20 different ways, by both government and corporate eyes and ears… In response to the events of Jan. 6, the tech giants meted out their own version of social justice by way of digital tyranny and corporate censorship… ‘Domestic terrorism’ became the new poster child for expanding the government’s powers at the expense of civil liberties…  the ramifications… are so far-reaching as to render almost every American an extremist in word, deed, thought or by association.

“Political correctness gave way to a more insidious form of group think and mob rule which, coupled with government and corporate censors and a cancel culture determined not to offend ‘certain’ viewpoints, was all too willing to eradicate views that do not conform. Critical race theory also moved to the forefront of the culture wars…

“Government agents routinely violated the Fourth Amendment at will [by invading homes] under the pretext of public health and safety…

“Caught in the crosshairs of a showdown between the rights of the individual and the so-called ‘emergency’ state, concerns about COVID-19 mandates and bodily integrity remained part of a much larger debate over the ongoing power struggle between the citizenry and the government over our property ‘interest’ in our bodies. This debate over bodily integrity covered broad territory, ranging from abortion and forced vaccinations to biometric surveillance and basic healthcare…

“What started out as an apparent effort to prevent a novel coronavirus from sickening the nation (and the world) became yet another means by which world governments (including our own) expanded their powers, abused their authority, and further oppressed their constituents.

“The national debt exceeded $29 trillion. Meanwhile, the government continued to spend taxpayer money it didn’t have on programs it couldn’t afford; businesses shuttered for lack of customers, resources and employees; and consumers continued to encounter global supply chain shortages (and skyrocketing prices) on everything from computer chips and cars to construction materials…

“Owing in large part to the government’s deep-seated and, in many cases, top-secret alliances with foreign nations and global corporations, the US entered into a new world order—a global world order—made up of international government agencies and corporations. Fascism became a global menace…

“Every crisis—manufactured or otherwise—since the nation’s early beginnings has become a make-work opportunity for the government to expand its reach and its power at taxpayer expense while limiting our freedoms at every turn: The Great Depression. The World Wars. The 9/11 terror attacks. The COVID-19 pandemic. Indeed, the government’s (mis)management of various states of emergency in the past 20 years from 9/11 to COVID-19 has spawned a massive security-industrial complex the likes of which have never been seen before….

“There may have been a new guy [Biden] in charge this year, but for the most part, nothing changed. The nation remained politically polarized, controlled by forces beyond the purview of the average American, and rapidly moving the nation away from its freedom foundation. Over the past year, due in part to the COVID-19 pandemic, Americans found themselves repeatedly subjected to egregious civil liberties violations, invasive surveillance, martial law, lockdowns, political correctness, erosions of free speech, strip searches, police shootings of unarmed citizens, government spying, the criminalization of lawful activities, warmongering, etc….”

Sadly, this synopsis does point out convincingly our decline in democracy, freedom and liberties.

More on Russia and Ukraine

The Week wrote on December 22:

“Before this week, I’d never heard of Dmitri Alperovitch or Silverado Policy Accelerator, the nonprofit think tank for which he is co-founder and chair. But Alperovitch is on my radar now, thanks to a viral tweet thread about Russia’s intentions in Ukraine that is at once smart, highly informed, and chilling.

“Alperovitch’s core assertion is simple: The Kremlin has already ‘made a decision to invade Ukraine later this winter.’ The evidence he marshals in defense of this claim is overwhelming. Alperovitch points to Russia’s massive troop deployment to the Ukraine border, increased acts of cyber intrusion into Ukraine, the issuing of diplomatic ultimatums and public demands that would be extremely difficult to walk back, and several other recent moves on Russia’s part.

“He then pivots to listing the reasons he thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin has decided on this bellicose course of action. These range from internal conflicts within Ukraine that threaten Russian interests to longstanding concerns about NATO expansion into Russia’s near abroad [sic], which the Kremlin considers a serious danger, to the waning effectiveness of economic sanctions from the West as a deterrent. All of it builds to a prediction: Putin ‘is unlikely to invade western Ukraine but can relatively easily split the country in half along the Dnieper [River] and establish a permanent buffer zone between Europe and Russia, as well as a land bridge to Crimea.’

“Since we’re making predictions, I’ll propose my own: If Alperovitch is right and Putin launches an invasion of Ukraine, the United States and NATO will raise rhetorical hell about it from Washington and Brussels, but they will do nothing to stop it militarily. And that, as Alperovitch points out, ‘would put a permanent end to all talk of Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus, or any Central Asian states of ever joining NATO.’

“… a Russian invasion of Ukraine would propel the United States and the world into an era of geopolitical risk unlike any we’ve seen in several decades. And if Alperovitch is correct, that era may be poised to begin in a matter of weeks.”

Deutsche Welle reported on December 26:

“Russia announced on Saturday that 10,000 troops had finished month-long military drills near Ukraine and would be returning to their permanent bases.”

Whether this is even true and whether, if true, this is only another ploy by Putin to calm the West a little while secretly planning an invasion will have to be seen. In any event, the Bible prophesies that Russia and Ukraine will “unite” in some way and ultimately fight against a mighty European power bloc .

Russia’s Ambitions in the Balkans

Foreign Affairs wrote on December 27:

“This year marks the 30^th anniversary of the beginning of the Yugoslav wars, Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II…. Now Russian President Vladimir Putin is seizing his opportunity and using the former Yugoslav states as the next battlefield to weaken NATO and the European Union.

“Russia’s goal in the Balkans is to ramp up tensions so that it can position itself as the sole regional mediator and security guarantor. It simultaneously aims to demonstrate that neither NATO, the EU, nor their members are credible partners for any of the Balkan countries. As Moscow also continues its military buildup near the Ukrainian border, its influence campaign in the Balkans serves as another theater to challenge the West.

“Russia’s efforts have been helped immeasurably by the EU’s weak response. Despite the many years and billions of euros spent preparing the Balkans for EU integration, the effort has stalled. Western Europe was asleep at the wheel the last time war broke out in the Balkans—the stakes are too high for it to ignore the region this time around.”

Europeans “Need” for their  Army

Arab News wrote on December 24:

“The EU is once again at a crossroads that requires bold decisions, in the face of severe cracks from within and relentless external challenges…

“One of the recurring ideas that surfaces among European leaders… is the establishment [of] an independent military force [and] that in international affairs it is no longer enough to concentrate on economic and soft power while relying for hard power on NATO, as that organization does not necessarily provide the answers to an increasingly polarized and conflictual international arena…

“The messy withdrawal of Western forces from Afghanistan in August has sent a clear message to EU strategists that it is necessary to lead from the front whenever European interests and values do not coincide with those of friends and foes alike….

“One of the EU’s more immediately pressing vulnerabilities was exposed by the deliberate mayhem instigated by Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko, an ally of President Putin, in orchestrating border crossings by refugees who had been residing in his country into Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. This was retaliation for sanctions imposed on Belarus for its brutal crackdown on opposition activists protesting against Lukashenko’s highly questionable electoral victory last year. The EU’s lack of capacity to adequately respond to this type of cynical, hybrid act of aggression was revealing — and this at a time when Russia has been deploying its troops close to its border with Ukraine in a menacing fashion that leaves little room for doubt about Moscow’s true intentions…

“Ursula von der Leyen, the current European Commission president and a former German defense minister, is one high-profile proponent of the idea of an EU military force. In her State of the Union address in September she emphasized the need to reflect on how the mission in Afghanistan had ended so abruptly, in what was a coded criticism of the US and NATO… For her, it is about recognizing that Europe’s geopolitical vulnerabilities demand that it must itself be prepared to help deal with overseas crises, otherwise it will end up having to deal with such crises on its own soil…”

Ultimately, both will happen, but first, a European army will be established soon at the time when we observe the unification of ten European core nations, including, in all likelihood, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Poland, France, Italy, Spain and others.  

Germany’s Fourth Reich?

The Guardian wrote on December 24:

“The head of Poland’s ruling party, Jarosław Kaczyński, has said Germany is trying to turn the EU into a federal ‘German fourth reich’… the head of the Law and Justice party (PiS) said some countries ‘are not enthusiastic at the prospect of a German fourth reich being built on the basis of the EU’…  Kaczyński is also a deputy prime minister. He added that the European court of justice was being used as an ‘instrument’ for federalist ideas.

“… The EU this week said it was launching legal action against Poland for ignoring EU law and undermining judicial independence. Poland has accused the bloc of ‘bureaucratic centralism’.

“During a visit to Warsaw by the new German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, this month, the prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, said the current Berlin government’s support for EU federalism was ‘utopian and therefore dangerous.’”

Whatever expressions are being used, current developments and biblical prophecy show that Germany and a leader of German or Austrian descent will indeed lead a united Europe under ten nations or groups of nations, and this emerging power bloc will by no means be democratic and freedom-loving. The paradox is that in all likelihood, Poland will be part of that authoritarian and dictatorial beast power.

Kurz Becoming a Global Strategist?

Bloomberg wrote on December30:

“Billionaire Peter Thiel’s investment firm is tapping former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz to become a global strategist. Kurz, who resigned under a cloud of controversy in October and remains under investigation for corruption, is set to start his new role at Thiel Capital LLC in the first three months of 2022, he told the Heute newspaper.

“The appointment comes amid multiple criminal probes into Kurz and his inner circle over allegations that he used taxpayer money to plant fabricated public-opinion polls in newspapers to help build his career. He completely withdrew from politics earlier this month, setting off another change in power. Kurz has denied wrongdoing.

“Kurz long cultivated connections to Thiel, a conservative power broker. The German-born venture capitalist — one of the first investors in Meta Platforms Inc.’s Facebook — has supported Republican candidates in the U.S. and endorsed Donald Trump. Kurz, 35, is looking to move beyond a blitz career in politics that made him the youngest head of government in Europe. He was touted as a pioneer of populist conservative politics on the continent before his downfall.”

“UK and the EU Set to Remain Best of Enemies”

The Guardian wrote on December 25:

“The year 2021 has been marked by a remarkable level of petulance in the UK-EU relationship. The unfortunate reality is that 2022 doesn’t offer much hope of redemption.

“France will hold the rolling presidency of the EU for the first six months, during which Emmanuel Macron will have an election campaign to fight and win against the centre and far-right. Boris Johnson is on his uppers, with a large and vocal wing of the Conservative party frothing over Covid restrictions and a lack of Brexit dividend.

“It is quite hard to imagine a less favourable context for relations to be patched up and mature conversations to be had… New German chancellor Olaf Scholz attended his first EU summit just a week ago, but it is yet to be seen whether a date with the British prime minister is even in the diary…”

The relationship between the UK and continental Europe will not improve.

Kamala Harris: Our Democracy Biggest Threat to National Security

The New York Post wrote on December 25:

“During the interview on CBS News ‘Face the Nation,’ host Margaret Brennan asked her about the one national security threat that keeps her up at night worrying. ​‘​Frankly, one of them is our democracy. There is,​ I think, no question in the minds of people who are foreign policy experts that the year 2021 is not the year 2000​,’ she said…

“Later in the interview, she clarified her earlier comment, saying there is a need to ‘fight for the integrity of our democracy.’”

In light of the desired move of the Biden Administration to replace our democracy with a dictatorship—something which Trump admittedly would also have liked to do—note that Christ said this: “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34).

The article continued:

“Harris also refused to take any responsibility for the debacle surrounding the US military pullout from Afghanistan in August, instead blaming the Trump administration for inking an agreement with the Taliban…”

She said this: ““I strongly believe that had we broken that agreement, we would be talking about the war in Afghanistan and American troops in Afghanistan, and we’re not talking about that. I don’t regret that…”

No, but we are talking about the unprotected tens of thousands of people whom Biden had left behind, not to mention valuable and sophisticated American equipment and armory,  and the terrible atrocities of the Taliban being committed to the women of Afghanistan. Kamala Harris seems to be living in a dream world… and it‘s a dangerous one.

Fauci’s Method of Coercion

Fox News wrote on December 27:

“Fauci said that taking masks off while on an airplane is ‘not something we should even be considering.’… ‘A vaccine requirement for a person getting on the plane is just another level of getting people to have a mechanism that would spur them to get vaccinated; namely, you can’t get on a plane unless you’re vaccinated, which is just another one of the ways of getting requirements, whatever that might be,’ Fauci said. ‘So I mean, anything that could get people more vaccinated would be welcome…”

He is continuing to show his true colors, but many Americans are sound asleep, without recognizing the real danger of his ideas.

Trump’s Push for Vaccines

The Washington Post wrote on December 23:

“In August, Trump called extra vaccine doses a ‘moneymaking operation,’ and in September he said that he ‘probably’ would not get a booster. He also did not make public that he had received his first two doses during his presidency. But this week he became a vocal advocate for the shots — while maintaining an opposition to vaccine mandates.

“On Sunday, during an event with former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, Trump revealed to a crowd of supporters that he had gotten a booster shot. He was immediately booed, but the former president told his supporters to knock it off. ‘Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t,’ Trump scolded, waving his hand dismissively. ‘If you don’t want to take it, you shouldn’t be forced to take it — no mandates,’ Trump said. ‘But take credit, because we saved tens of millions of lives.’

“Then, during an interview published Wednesday by the Daily Wire, Trump told conservative commentator Candace Owens that the coronavirus vaccines are ‘one of the greatest achievements of mankind.’ Owens tried to cast doubt on this, saying that ‘more people have died’ since the vaccines became available and calling their efficacy into question. Trump interrupted her. ‘Oh no, the vaccines work,’ Trump told her. ‘The ones who get very sick and go to the hospital are the ones that don’t take the vaccine. But it’s still their choice. And if you take the vaccine, you’re protected.’

“He told Owens he takes credit for the ‘incredible speed’ with which the vaccines were developed, and he said that ‘people aren’t dying when they take the vaccine.’

“On Monday, O’Reilly said during an interview with NewsNation that the reason Trump had not discussed his booster status before was that he was afraid of alienating his anti-vaccine supporters. O’Reilly said he reassured Trump of his pro-vaccine views ahead of the event, telling him that the fact that vaccines were developed during his presidency should be part of his pitch to voters…

“Trump, however, told Fox News on Tuesday evening that it is tough for him to be ‘overly critical’ of Biden after the president praised his administration for the vaccines’ rollout. Earlier that day, Biden credited Trump with spurring the development of the vaccines, a day after the former president revealed he had gotten a booster… ‘I think he did something very good,’ Trump added. ‘It has to be a process of healing in this country, and that will help a lot.’…

“Still, the former president’s promotion of the shots puts him at odds with a large portion of his base. The widest divide in vaccination rates in the United States is between Democrats and Republicans. Polling from the Kaiser Family Foundation has found that, for every unvaccinated Democrat or Democratic-leaning independent, there are about three unvaccinated Republicans or Republican-leaning independents. Even among those who have already been vaccinated, Republicans are less likely to say they will get a booster…”

Many of Trump’s comments about the effectiveness of “his” vaccines, as underlined in the article above, are demonstrably false or misleading. O’Reilly, no stranger to controversy, also reported that Trump was hurt by the disapproval from the crowd regarding his vaccination push, but that he consoled and encouraged Trump to continue his pitch to voters (compare the Daily Beast, dated December 21). O’Reilly also said that Trump will “definitely run in 2024.” O’ Reilly, who was fired in April of 2017 from Fox News for alleged sexual harassment and other inappropriate behavior, may turn out to be one of Trump’s extremely bad counselors [as Dr. Fauci had turned out to be]. Many wrote on Breitbart that they had supported Trump in the past, but now, they have had it with him.

In any event, it makes no difference as to who is leading the USA, as the prophesied downfall of the USA is inevitable. This is because of the abominable sins of the nation, from the top down, while there is absolutely no sign of sincere and deep repentance of the people and their leaders.

Far Right against Trump

Mediaite wrote on December 26:

“Far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones lit into former President Donald Trump on Saturday for his recent statements supporting the Covid-19 vaccinations.

“‘This is an emergency Christmas Day warning to President Trump,’ Jones said… ‘You are either completely ignorant about the so-called vaccine gene therapy you helped ram through with Operation Warp Speed, or you are the most evil man who has ever lived to push this toxic poison on the public and to attack your constituents when they simply try to save their lives and the lives of others… What you told Candace Owens is nothing but a raft of dirty lies,’ Jones added…

“Trump has angered many on the far-right with his recent comments on the vaccines…”

Trump can’t afford to lose the votes of the “far right.”

Hypocrisy of Trump Hotels

The Week wrote on December 24:

“The Trump Grill, located inside Trump Tower in New York City, refused to allow a group of vaccine mandate protesters to eat at the restaurant on Thursday after they failed to provide proof of vaccination…

“While Trump has come around on promoting the COVID-19 vaccines, he’s maintained that ‘there can’t be mandates and all those things.’ As he further put it to Fox News this week, ‘The mandate will destroy people’s lives — it destroys people’s lives, just as the vaccine saves people.’

“Trump Hotels, however, says on its website that its Manhattan location requires proof of vaccination ‘in accordance with the most recent local government mandate.’”

The Sun added on December 25:

“‘We came to Trump Tower because we thought Donald Trump was supposed to be for America, he said he’s against vaccine mandates,’ one unmasked protester said. ‘I thought as a man, who’s for America, he would stand up, pay a $1,000 fine, and let us eat freely – you know the man’s a billionaire, he can afford a $1,000 fine. It would make him look good. But instead, he’s had his people not serve us and it just exposed him as a fraud,’ the anti-vaxxer said. ‘All talk but no action.’…

“‘Prove to us that we are a threat,’ one protester said to the cop, while another said: ‘The burden of proof is on them because they are assuming that we are a threat because we don’t have a vaccine. Well, prove to me that we are a threat.’ The cop explained that Trump Grill didn’t have to prove anything to the protesters.”

So, it appears that the restaurant even called the police. However one views it, Trump’s position in this matter, which is viewed by some of his supporters as clearly hypocritical, becomes more and more controversial and problematic for him.

Biden’s Approval Rating Really Bad… but not as Bad as Trump’s was

Fox News wrote on December 27:

“Biden’s approval rating hovered in the low to mid 50s during his first six months in the White House. But the president’s numbers started sagging in August… There is a slight uptick in some of the most recent surveys. Biden stood at 47% approval and 51% disapproval in the latest FOX Business poll, 48%-52% in the most recent CNN survey and slightly back above water at 48%-46% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll. But his average heading into the end of his first year in the White House is nothing to brag about.

“The approval rating is a key indicator of a president’s political strength nationwide and… [it] has also long been a much-watched indicator ahead of the midterm elections, and Biden’s flagging numbers could spell major trouble for the Democrats as they try to hold on to their razor-thin majorities in the House and Senate in the 2022 elections…

“Biden’s numbers lag behind recent predecessors at this point in their presidencies. Former President George W. Bush stood at 84%-12% [sic] in late December 2001, with his numbers skyrocketing as the country rallied around the government in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton stood at 50%-45% and 54%-40%, respectively, at the end of their first years in office. The only recent president whose poll numbers were worse than Biden’s at this point during a White House tenure was Donald Trump, who stood at 39%-56% as 2017 was coming to a close.

“The Democrats suffered disastrous midterm elections in 1994 under Clinton and in 2010 under Obama, but both Democratic presidents rebounded and won reelection two years later. House Republicans were shellacked in the 2018 midterms during Trump’s presidency, losing their eight-year-long majority in the chamber…”

Police Officers too Quick to Fire?

The LA Times Newsletter reported on December 27:

“… the Los Angeles Police Department killed a 14-year-old girl at a Burlington clothing store in North Hollywood last week, only a few days before Christmas… The teenager was in a fitting room with her mother trying on dresses for a quinceañera…  Officers were responding to a report of an assault with a deadly weapon at the store. When they arrived, authorities encountered a man they said was assaulting someone, and they opened fire, according to the LAPD. It was not immediately clear what prompted the officers to shoot.

“The man was taken into custody and died at the scene, a spokesperson for the department said. When officers fired their weapons, their gunfire penetrated a wall, which killed the girl in the dressing room. Authorities said that they found a metal cable next to the suspect whom officers were confronting, but that no gun was recovered.

“The case has caused an uproar, with many citing the shooting as the latest example of officers being too quick to draw and fire their weapons…”

In the Millennium, such tragedies won’t occur, as there will not be any police officers with weapons shooting at people…

Canada’s Privacy Intrusion

The New York Post wrote on December 25:

“Canada’s federal government admitted to secretly surveilling its population’s movements during the COVID-19 lockdown by tracking 33 million phones… Canada’s entire population totals 38 million…

“‘Evidence is coming in from many sources, from countries around the world, that what was seen as a huge surveillance surge — post 9/11 — is now completely upstaged by pandemic surveillance,’ David Lyon [said], author of ‘Pandemic Surveillance’ and the former director of the Surveillance Studies Centre at Queen’s University in Ontario…

It can indeed be assumed that the governments of other “democratic” countries engage in the same kind of abominable “Orwellian” conduct.

Israeli Airstrike Sets Port in Syria Ablaze

The Guardian wrote on December 28:

“An Israeli airstrike hit Syria’s Latakia port before dawn on Tuesday, sparking a fire that lit up the Mediterranean seafront in the second such attack on the cargo hub this month, Syrian state media reported. Since the outbreak of Syria’s civil war in 2011, Israel has routinely carried out airstrikes on its neighbour, mostly targeting Syrian government troops as well as allied Iran-backed forces and Hezbollah fighters. But it is only the second time it has hit Latakia port, in the heartland of President Bashar al-Assad’s minority Alawite community…

“Pictures released by Sana showed firefighters hosing stacks of blazing containers that lit up the night sky… the British-based war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said the cargo was ‘arms and munitions’ that had detonated in ‘powerful explosions that were felt across the city of Latakia and its suburbs’… The Syrian government’s other major ally [in addition to Iran], Russia, operates a naval base in the port of Tartus, 53 miles (85km) to the south.

“So far this year, Israel has targeted Syria nearly 30 times, killing 130 people including five civilians and 125 loyalist fighters… On 7 December it carried out a strike targeting an Iranian arms shipment in Latakia, its first on the port since the start of the civil war… According to a report by the Israeli army, it hit about 50 targets in Syria in 2020.

“In the deadliest operation since the strikes began, Israel killed 57 government troops and allied fighters in eastern Syria in January this year. The Israeli military has defended the strikes as a necessary measure to prevent its arch-foe Iran from gaining a foothold on its doorstep… In a shadow war, Israel has targeted suspected Iranian military facilities in Syria and mounted a sabotage campaign against Iran’s nuclear programme.

“Iran has been a key supporter of the Syrian government in the decade-old conflict. It finances, arms and commands a number of Syrian and foreign militia groups fighting alongside the regular armed forces, chief among them Lebanon’s powerful Hezbollah. The conflict in Syria has killed nearly 500,000 people since it started in 2011 with the brutal repression of peaceful demonstrations.”

The violent controversy between Israel and Iran will continue….

Bird Flu in Israel

The Times of Israel wrote on December 27:

“Prime Minister Naftali Bennett met with security officials on Monday to discuss an epidemic of bird flu that has killed vast numbers of wild and domestic fowl in Israel in recent days… The Agriculture Ministry is culling hundreds of thousands of birds [mainly chickens and turkeys], in an attempt to stem the spread of the disease in animals and ‘prevent the infection of the human population,’ the statement said…

“Environmental Protection Minister Tamar Zandberg called the outbreak ‘the worst blow to wildlife in the country’s history.’”

Israel 365 added on December 27:

“On Sunday, avian experts from the Nature and Parks Authority counted some 5,000 cranes at the Hula Lake Reserve in the Jezreel Valley in the north of Israel that had died from an outbreak of the  H5N1 virus, known as the avian flu. Another 250 dead cranes were seen in the Hula Valley outside of the reserve, and a further 30 were documented elsewhere, mainly in the Jezreel Valley. “

More Nonsense—Contacting Aliens

Newsmax wrote on December 26:

“NASA is reportedly hiring two dozen theologians to take part in a program at Princeton University to assess how humans will react if alien life is found on other planets, and how that would impact ideas about creation and God.

“In 2008, the Vatican’s chief astronomer said there is no conflict between believing in God and in the possibility of ‘extraterrestrial brothers’ perhaps more evolved than humans…

“Jose Gabriel Funes, who heads the Vatican Observatory… told the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano in an interview last week… ‘How can we exclude that life has developed elsewhere,’… explaining the large number of galaxies with their own planets made this possible.”

Of course, if one believes in the ungodly and blasphemous fairy tale of evolution, then everything seems to be possible. But all of this keeps the false notion in place that there are aliens on other planets, not realizing that UFO “sightings” do not prove the existence of extraterrestrial aliens, but they could be fraudulent; simply natural phenomena; or, most likely, part of Satan’s attempts to deceive mankind in preparation for his fight against the returning “alien” Jesus Christ. Note the next article.

The Guardian wrote on December 26:

“From mysterious discs over Slemish Mountain in County Antrim to strange images spotted on CCTV, unexplained sightings increased in Northern Ireland again last year.

“UFO sighting reports… include unidentified flying objects (UFOs); aerial phenomena; unidentified aerial phenomena; lights in the sky; and aliens and extraterrestrials.

“Nick Pope, who used to investigate reports of UFO sightings for the Ministry of Defence (MoD), said… he believed the true number of sightings was much higher.”

We can expect that more and more of these “sightings,” “encounters” and “experiences” will be reported as we are nearing the time of the Great Tribulation and Christ’s Second Coming. Compare  Luke 21:11.

Acknowledgement and Disclaimer

These Current Events are compiled and commented on by Norbert Link. We gratefully acknowledge the many contributions of news articles from our readership. The publication of articles in this section is not to be viewed as an endorsement or approval as to contents or accuracy of the selected articles, but they are published for the purpose of pointing at worldwide developments in the light of biblical end-time prophecy and godly instruction. Our own comments are provided in italics.

These words are quoted from Philippians 2:3, in the Authorized Version, but we must read the entire context to understand what Paul is saying.

The entire passage, beginning with verse 2 and ending with verse 8, reads in the Authorized Version:

“Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.”

What does the word “esteem” convey? It can be defined as, “to think valuable. If you are esteemed, then people think you’re a valuable person to have around, and have a lot of respect for you.” It has also been defined as “to regard highly or favorably; regard with respect or admiration and with a certain value.”

The word “better” can be defined as “of a more excellent or effective type or quality”. To be better than others means, to be more skilled or adapt as well as being superior.

“Esteeming others better than oneself” would mean, then, that the other person is being perceived as more valuable, more skilled, and more capable.

Inasmuch as the entire passage in Philippians 2:2-8 draws a comparison between ourselves and the mind of Christ, the translation “esteem others better than himself,” as applying to Christ, could be problematic and misunderstood.

Note how other translations are rendering this verse, and many understand the phrase “lowliness of mind” as “in humility”:

The Literal Emphasis Translation states:  “Do nothing according to rivalrous self-interest and not according to empty conceit, but rather in humble perspective, supposing one another superior to themselves.”

The New International Version reads:  “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves.”

The Berean Study Bible says: “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or empty pride, but in humility consider others more important than yourselves.”

The Interlinear Literal Translation renders the phrase as, “… nothing according to contention or vainglory, but in humility one another esteeming above themselves, not the things of themselves each consider, but also the things of others each.” Another Interlinear rendition states: “surpassing themselves.”

As far as could be ascertained, virtually all German translations, including all Luther Bible renditions, the Elberfelder Bible, the Schlachter Bible and the Menge Bible, render the words in Philippians 2:3  as “higher” [“höher”] and “humility” (“Demut”) (“in Demut achte einer den andern höher als sich selbst”).

Also, the Latin Vulgata renders the phrase in that way (“sed in humilitate superiores sibi invicem arbitrantes”–“superiores” meaning “higher” or “superior.”)

Most Spanish Bibles, including Reina Valera, translate the phrase as “higher” or “superior” (“como superiores a él mismo”) or “more important” (“más importante”).

French Bibles say „above“ or „beyond“ (“étant au-dessus de vous-mêmes”), or „higher“ or „superior“(“supérieurs”) or “more important” (“plus importants que vous memes”).

In the Greek, the word which is translated as “better” in the Authorized Version is “huperecho” and means, according to Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Bible, “to be above, higher.”

It is used in the Authorized Version in Romans 13:1 (“higher”); 1 Peter 2:13 (“supreme”); Philippians 3:8 [“hyperechon”] (“excellency”) and in Philippians 4:7 (“passeth”; “surpassing” in the New King James Bible, in the sense of being “higher”).

And so, we explain in our free booklet, “Paul’s Letter to the Philippians – How to Understand It”, that this phrase, as written in the Greek, actually describes the attitude of humility, considering others and their needs as more important or more significant than our own selfish ambitions.

We state the following in our booklet:

“Paul is pointing out that selfish ambition and conceit are in opposition to love…  God’s way of love and life is a way of give, whereas our human carnal way of life is a way of get. Selfish ambition, which is caused by pride, is detrimental to love and unity. Rather, we need to develop an attitude of lowliness of mind, or humility, and this attribute enables us to look at others as being better or more important than ourselves. The Jamieson, Fausset and Brown commentary explains: ‘… “esteeming each other superior to yourselves.”’… When we do that, then we are not looking at what is seemingly ‘best’ or most advantageous for us, but we also concentrate on what is helpful for others.

“This is the kind of mindset that Jesus Christ had, and we as followers of Christ must develop the same attitude and outlook…

“Gill’s Exposition to the Entire Bible makes the following comments…:

“‘Let this mind be in you,’…. The Arabic version renders it, ‘let that humility be perceived in you’. The apostle proposes Christ as the great pattern and exemplar [example] of humility… ‘which also was in Christ Jesus.’”

This is in fact the correct understanding. The entire context in Philippians 2:2-8 shows the great humility of Christ who was willing to suffer and die for us so that we could live.

We continue with quoting from our booklet:

“In order to develop an attitude of love and humility for others, we must be willing to sacrifice our own preferences. Jesus Christ proved beyond a shadow of any doubt His love for us, in that He was willing to give up His godly attributes, become a man, and live and die in the flesh. This act of love for us was necessary in order for Him to pay the penalty for our sin, so that we, condemned to death, could obtain forgiveness and live, and inherit eternal life in the Family of God, a life of peace, love and complete harmony with God and each other.

“Christ was in the form of God before He became a human being. He was equal with God the Father, insofar as His nature was concerned. But He did not consider it robbery to be equal with Him; that is, He did not want to selfishly grasp and maintain that status for His own good. He was willing to give it up for the good of others… “

We also point out in our booklet that the phrase that He “made Himself of no reputation” should be translated as “He emptied Himself,” in the sense that He emptied Himself of His divinity and became a human being.  We said this:

“We read in Philippians 2:6–7, in the Revised Standard Version: ‘[Jesus Christ]… though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped (better: retained), but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men…’… The New Jerusalem Bible leaves no doubt in its translation as to what Jesus became: ‘… he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, becoming as human beings are; and being in every way like a human being…’ The Bible is very clear that Christ emptied Himself of existing as a Spirit being, and He emptied Himself of the glory that He had before the world was (compare John 17:5). He BECAME a human being (compare 1 John 4:1–3)….”

This is what it means to have the mind of Christ and to treat others and their needs as more important than ourselves and our own needs. We say this in our booklet: “Christ was God Eternal, who BECAME man, so that man COULD ultimately become God! Christ was tempted, He suffered, and He died as a man (Hebrews 12:1–4), so that human beings could become ‘gods’—members of the God Family, unable to die (Luke 20:35–36; John 3:36; 10:28; compare also John 10:34–35).”

No human being could do what Christ did, but it is His mindset which we must emulate. This mindset can also be seen in Paul (Romans 9:1-5) and in Moses (Exodus 32:32-33). 

In general, we read in Matthew 18:4 about the little child which humbles itself. The German Menge Bible states that the phrase „humbles itself“ („ erniedrigt“) can be understood as “to place oneself humbly under others” (“demütig unter andere stellt”).

Luke 14:11 adds that “whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” Also see Luke 18:9-14.

There are many biblical examples where human beings humbled themselves towards others, or gave preference to them, treating them as superior or more important, even when this would not have been necessary from a human standpoint.

We find an interesting example, even in a merely physical matter, in the relationship between Abraham (Abram) and Lot, in Genesis 13:2-13:

“Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold… Lot also, who went with Abram, had flocks and herds and tents… Now the land was not able to support them, that they might dwell together, for their possessions were so great that they could not dwell together. And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram’s livestock and the herdsmen of Lot’s livestock. The Canaanites and the Perizzites then dwelt in the land. So Abram said to Lot, ‘Please let there be no strife between you and me, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen; for we are brethren. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me. If you take the left, then I will go to the right; or, if you go to the right, then I will go to the left.’

“And Lot lifted his eyes and saw all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere (before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah) like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt as you go toward Zoar. Then Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east. And they separated from each other. Abram dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the plain and pitched his tent even as far as Sodom. But the men of Sodom were exceedingly wicked and sinful against the LORD.”

Abraham let Lot choose what land he wanted, even though it would have been Abraham’s prerogative because God’s promises were directed at Abraham, not Lot. And as it turned out, Lot’s choice was very poor, but due, in part, to Abraham’s humility, God blessed him greatly with extraordinary promises (verses 14-17). We also recall that God the Father highly exalted and blessed His Son Jesus Christ for His willingness to become a Man and suffer and die for us (compare Philippians 2:9-11).

We also read that the Apostle Paul became everything to everyone to gain a few. He said in 1 Corinthians 9:19-22: “For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win the more; and to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might win those who are under the law; to those who are without law, as without law (not being without law toward God, but under law toward Christ), that I might win those who are without law; to the weak I became as weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.”

Paul made clear that he was not disobedient to the Law of God, but that he did not cause unnecessary offense, because it was his goal to save some. This included giving up certain personal preferences if that would have prevented him from achieving his goal. The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges comments: “… by the operation of a wide reaching sympathy, which enabled him, without compromising his own convictions, to approach all men from their most accessible side.”

Paul also said in 1 Corinthians 10:33: “… just as I please all men in all things, not seeking mine own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved.” In 2 Timothy 2:10, he explains what the reason for his selfless conduct was: “Therefore I endure all things for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.”

Paul admonished us to follow his example, by having the same motivation of love which he had: “Let no one seek his own, but each one the other’s well-being” (1 Corinthians 10:24).

Matthew Poole’s Commentary states:

“It is the duty of every one who is a disciple of Christ, not merely to look at his own pleasure or profit, but the profit and advantage of others.”

Barnes’ Notes on the Bible adds:

“The injunction… is applicable to all Christians… It does not mean that a man is not in any instance to regard his own welfare, happiness, or salvation; it does not mean that a man owes no duty to himself or family; or that he should neglect all these to advance the welfare of others; but the precept means, that… when a man’s example would have a great influence, he should be guided in his conduct, not by a reference to his own ease, comfort or gratification, but by a reference to the purity and salvation of others. And the observance of this simple rule would make a prodigious change in the church and the world.”

We are not to hate ourselves, but we are to love others as ourselves, with their interests in mind as well.

We can see then that Paul had Christ’s mind. Christ said that he who wants to be great must be a servant (Matthew 23:11). Christ did not come to be served but to serve (Luke 22:27). He considered those whom He served “superior” or “more important” than Himself. He was willing to humble himself in order to exalt or help others. Even at His return, we read that He will serve others by preparing a meal for them (Luke 12:37).

John the Baptist followed Christ’s example, not willing to consider it robbery to be of great reputation—Christ called him one of the great human beings (Matthew 11:11)—but he was willing to make himself of no reputation (compare again Christ’s example in Philippians 2:6-7), as he had the goal and purpose of Christ as the Savior of mankind in mind. He was willing to decrease so that Christ could increase (John 3:30).

Paul’s admonition in Philippians 2:3 applies to husbands and wives as well, who are to submit to one another in the fear of God (Ephesians 5:21). We say the following in our free booklet, “Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians—How to Understand It” 

“Even though it is the foremost responsibility for the wife to submit to her husband as to the Lord (verse 22; Colossians 3:18)—that is, submitting to him when his requests are in conformity with Christ’s teachings and not contrary to the will of God (compare Albert Barnes’ Note on the Bible)—so the husband is to love his wife as Christ loves the Church (Ephesians 5:25).

“And still, Paul introduces this section in verse 21 with the admonition to submit one to another in the fear of the Lord. Even though the husband is the head of the wife (1 Corinthians 11:3), as Christ is the head of the husband, he is not to act selfishly and pursue just his own interests. Rather, he has to have the mind of Christ, and if he does, then he will also look out for and submit to the interests of his wife—as his wife will to the interests of her husband (Philippians 2:5, 4).

“When a husband loves his wife in that way—as Christ loves the Church and gave Himself for it—then it will be easier for the wife to submit to her loving husband. Christ is the Savior of the Church (Ephesians 5:23), sanctifying and cleansing it to present it spotless (Ephesians 5:26–27). It is that kind of love that a husband ought to have for his wife. As Christ has the welfare of the Church in mind, so should the Christian husband look after the welfare of his wife.”

This command is not limited to the husband-wife relationship. Rather, we read in 1 Peter 5:5: “Likewise you younger people, submit yourselves to your elders. Yes, all of you be submissive to one another, and be clothed with humility, for ‘God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.’”

Younger and older people are to submit to one another, which means, parents should look at the interests and needs of their children and, in that sense, treat them in certain circumstances as more important than their own desires and preferences. When we do this, we will be greatly rewarded by God, as, in the ultimate sense, our humility towards others reflects our humility towards God. Verse 6 says: “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time…”

Jacob did not have, at first, the mind of Christ when he deceived his father Isaac to receive or “get” his blessing, but he later learned the bitter lesson that when selfish interests, ambitions and conceit rule us, it will backfire (As Jacob deceived Isaac one time to get his blessing, so he was deceived by his uncle Laban when he gave him Leah rather than Rachel as his wife, and when he deceived and changed Jacob’s wages “ten times”, Genesis 31:7 ). But later, Jacob was willing to share much of his flocks with his brother Esau.

The selfish rich farmer is another example of someone who did not care for others. His ground had yielded plentifully, but rather than sharing his rich harvest with others, he built more storage places and bigger barns for himself (Luke 12:16-21). But he died the same night, leaving his riches behind, while not being rich toward God (compare Matthew 6:19-21; see also Hebrews 13:16).

We might also think of the young man who was not willing to follow Christ as he was not ready to get rid of his great riches (which had become a “god” to him) and to give them to the poor (Matthew 19:16-22). Selfish greed prevented him at that time from developing the mind of Christ in his life. Nothing further is reported about that rich man, and we do not know whether he ever repented of his selfishness.

Considering these good and bad biblical examples, and there are many more, let us allow Christ to develop His mind in us by focusing not just on our own interests, but also on the interests of others. Romans 12:10 puts it quite succinctly: “Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another…”

When we do this, we develop, emulate and acquire the mind of Christ (compare 1 Corinthians 2:16), while continuously applying Paul’s admonition in Romans 12:2: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…”

Lead Writer: Norbert Link

compiled by Dave Harris

“2022 in Prophecy,” is the title of a new StandingWatch program, presented by Evangelist Norbert Link. Here is a summary: 

What are the main developments which we should be watching in 2022 and beyond? What can we know about the USA and the UK? Which other countries, nations, and groups of nations are of great importance, and what does it all mean in the light of biblical prophecy? What are the main developments which we should be watching in 2022 and beyond? What can we know about the USA and the UK? Which other countries, nations, and groups of nations are of great importance, and what does it all mean in the light of biblical prophecy?

“In Demut andere höher achten” is the title of this Sabbath’s new German sermon, presented by Norbert Link. Title in English: “In humility esteeming others higher.”

“So wahr mir Gott helfe!”,the sermonette presented last Sabbath in Germany by Mike Richter, is now posted. Title in English: “So Help Me God!”

“Fear and Control,” a split-sermon presented last Sabbath by Frank Bruno, is now posted. Here is a summary:

This split-sermon will build on recent sermons and will discuss prevailing trends over decades that resulted in fear, a loss of freedom, and the growth of governmental systems and laws designed to control people. As believers in God the Almighty, we have learned that we can insulate ourselves from fear and control by drawing closer to God and His Son. We will review Scriptures that offer these lessons and can prepare us for what is to come.

“Stories of Friendship,” a split-sermon presented last Sabbath by Eric Rank, is now posted. Here is a summary:

From the start when God created man, He highlighted the importance of friendship. What can we learn from the stories of friendship in the Bible?