Author: Lee Ardis

Nearly 100 congregations in Ohio have left the United Methodist Church amid the denomination’s ongoing debate over homosexuality, joining thousands of other churches in the United States that have done the same.

At a special session of the UMC West Ohio Conference held last weekend, 96 churches were granted their request to disaffiliate from the mainline Protestant denomination.

The session was held at Ginghamsburg United Methodist Church in Tipp City, with around 800 clergy and laity in attendance. Bishop Gregory V. Palmer presided over the gathering.

In addition to the 96 disaffiliations, the session also dealt with budgetary issues, recommending the sale of two camping properties and electing additional delegates to the UMC General Conference.

“We were empowered to make some challenging decisions,” said Palmer in a statement. “We brought glory to God by the patient, honest, and respectful way we engaged one another. In spite of the challenges, we have come through, our future is open because God is able.”

In June, the West Ohio Conference voted to allow 172 congregations to disaffiliate from the UMC, having allowed 80 churches to leave the denomination last year. It is estimated that, at present, the regional body covering over 50 counties has a little over 600 member congregations remaining.

“Our calling is to serve this present age, even if there’s a storm … in the midst of passing over. One of our storms is disaffiliation,” Palmer said in a June statement.

“That’s not a blame thing; it’s just the way it is. It’s in the book. We’ve given a lot of attention to it. Let me be clear. It is not our mission. We gave attention to it. We’ll finish up what there is to be finished up.”

Over the last couple of years, more than 6,600 congregations have voted to leave the UMC amid the debate over whether to change the denomination’s rules to allow for the blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of clergy in same-sex relationships.

Read more at: christianpost.com

For those of us who call the United States home, we have—for the most part—lived a life of religious freedom. We have not had to fear for our health or our family as we have worshiped our Savior.

This is not the case in other areas of the world. I’ve met a pastor in India whose skin is scarred from an acid attack. In Nigeria, Christians are regularly killed for their faith. In some parts of the Middle East, you can be murdered by your own family if you profess Christ.

In some ways, even the freedom of religion in our country feels like it is slipping away, as “cancel culture” seems to take ever-greater precedence over the First Amendment.

Some might debate me on this, but it certainly feels like we’re entering a new era in the United States, where there will be a cost to following Jesus.

This is nothing new, of course. Approximately 2,000 years ago, shortly after Jesus physically walked the roads of Jerusalem, Christians were already suffering for His Name.

In 1 Peter 4:12-19, we are told how we should respond when the world attacks us for our faith.

As Christians, we must expect sufferings (v. 12). Peter advises us to expect and anticipate suffering. It is unavoidable.

We occasionally act like we should get a free pass because we’re Christians—even questioning God’s goodness when bad things happen—but God promised that difficulties would come our way.

In John 16:33, Jesus says, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

If God promised us that we’re going to go through hard times, we shouldn’t be surprised when it happens.

We can rejoice when we go through trials (vv. 13-14). It sounds odd to say we can rejoice during suffering, but there are several reasons why we should:

1. First, we can rejoice because when we suffer we are identified with Christ. This is exactly what the disciples did in Acts 5:41: “So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name.”

2. Second, we can rejoice because we share in God’s glory. Just as we suffer with Him, we will also share in God’s glory when He returns in the near future.

3. Finally, we can rejoice because when we are reviled, insulted, persecuted or mocked, God’s Spirit will rest on us.

Our suffering will be a result of following Christ (vv. 15-16). We often want to play the victim, and claim we are being attacked when we’ve actually brought the suffering onto ourselves by our own actions (and it has nothing to do with our faith).

There are consequences for our sin. If you are a thief or a gossip, you brought the punishment upon yourself.

Peter makes it clear that we should not suffer in that way, because—as followers of Christ—we should live a life set apart for Him. Rather, we will suffer the wrath of the world because of our faith.

We should glorify God in our suffering (vv. 16-18). We are not to be ashamed if we suffer for Christ. Rather, Peter instructs us to glorify God instead.

Why? Because the suffering we endure on this earth in our service to Christ pales in comparison to the hope of eternity that awaits us in Heaven. On the other hand, “those who do not obey the gospel of God” must still face eternal judgment.

The passage is summed up in 1 Peter 4:19, which says, “Therefore let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good, as to a faithful Creator.”

Read more at: harbingersdaily.com

Weeks after its international launch, Worldcoin is drawing the attention of privacy regulators around the world, with the Kenya’s government going so far as to shut down the service indefinitely.

The international ID startup, backed by big names in Silicon Valley, is now having to defend itself in investigations over whether the biometric data that the company is collecting is truly secure.

Here’s what to know about Worldcoin and the concerns its raising:

Worldcoin is the creation of Sam Altman, best known as the CEO of OpenAI, the company that has gained widespread recognition with its artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT.

The goal of Worldcoin and the company backing it, Tools for Humanity, is to give people a form of identification that could never be stolen or duplicated. Worldcoin creates a “World ID” by scanning someone’s eyeballs through “orbs” — a device that captures an image of their irises, the colored parts of the eyes.

One possible use for such an ID would be online services, where oftentimes people are having to remember multiple passwords and usernames for various websites they have signed up for.

The security of those sites can be flawed, however, and there have been numerous security breaches where usernames and passwords have been stolen. Instead of using old technology like passwords, a person could just sign up using their World ID.

Read more at: apnews.com

Over 100 Christians were burned alive after a fire broke out during a Christian wedding ceremony in Iraq on Oct. 3, 2023; another 150 attendees were seriously injured. Nearly 60 of those killed in the inferno were directly related to the bride and groom.

To quote from one report:

Tragedy struck the Assyrian Christian town of Hamdaniya in Nineveh province … during a joyous wedding when scenes of celebration and laughter soon derailed into a hellish nightmare when the banquet hall caught on fire. At least a hundred died and over 150 were also injured.

The town of Hamdaniya, it is worth recalling:

…is one of Iraq’s only Christian-majority districts, located in the Nineveh Plains near Mosul, a historic Assyrian region. Like many Christian towns in the Nineveh Plains, it was taken over by Islamic State (ISIS) jihadists during their brazen sweep of northern Iraq, where they declared a so-called “caliphate” and inflicted grave atrocities on minority groups, including Christians.

In a press conference held on the same day of the tragedy, the Iraqi government announced that its investigation had “conclusively concluded” that the fire was “accidental” and “not intentional at all.”

Minutes later, the Syriac Church slammed the announcement: “We reject it [the results], we don’t accept it,” said the Archbishop of Mosul Benedictus Younan Hanno, adding that “political conspiracies” might be afoot.

The archbishop especially rejected the idea that the fire was caused by fireworks: “there are tens of videos,” he said, “showing that they were not the reason.”

The archbishop is voicing the opinion of most Iraqi Christians. After also categorically rejecting the fireworks claim, the groom of the wedding, Rivan, 27, strongly implied arson:

We demand the rights of those whose blood was spilt. Why did their blood have to be spilled? We demand their rights and we demand the perpetrator of this action, him and all who are behind him. We demand an international investigation, not a local or federal investigation.

It is worth noting that this scenario — a fire claims Christian lives only for Muslim authorities to say it was “accidental”—has played out many times in the Middle East. Take Egypt, for example, where the region’s largest Christian minority resides.

Most recently, on Mar. 29, 2023, a massive fire broke out and completely consumed an ancient church in Assyut. Even before a proper inspection could be carried out, the fire was immediately blamed on a “leaky gas bottle.”

The most tragic of all examples, however, occurred on Sunday, Aug. 14, 2022, when the Church of Abu Seifein in Cairo caught fire during morning mass. At least 41 Christians — 18 of whom were children — were killed in the flames. As usual, minutes after it broke out, officials immediately attributed the fire to faulty wires, etc. Arson was, without any real investigation, ruled out.

Indeed, in just that same month of August 2022 alone, a total of 10 other Coptic churches “caught fire” in Egypt.

There appears to be no shortage of examples. On Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023, a fire broke out in and “devoured” a church in the Giza Governorate. It was blamed on a small candle left on a votary stand. However, images from surveillance cameras clearly show that “the candle ignited suddenly and in an unusual way.”

It should also be noted that sometimes after officials conclude that a church fire was due to some accident, it comes out that arson was indeed the true cause — not that the authorities will admit it. On Aug. 16, 2022, the Church of Saint Mary the Egyptian in Alexandria caught fire. Although it too was instantly attributed to “natural causes,” at least one eyewitness saw someone on the balcony of a residential building adjacent to the church hurl some combustible substance onto the church, starting the fire.

Considering the severe persecution of Christians in nations such as Egypt and Iraq and the willful targeting of their churches — hundreds of Coptic and Assyrian churches have been torched in recent years — it is, of course, difficult to automatically rule out terrorism or arson in all of these “accidental” fires.

Read more at: pjmedia.com

Students at Princeton University, often considered the most prestigious university in the nation, chanted “Long live the Intifada,” a call for murdering Jews.

The First Intifada started in 1987 and lasted nearly six years. According to the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, during the Second Intifada, which began in 2000, 887 of the 1,137 Israelis murdered in attacks from September 2000 — 2005 were civilians.

Just between May 2001 and May 2002 there were the following massacres: five Israelis murdered by a suicide bomber at the HaSharon Mall in May 2001; 21 Israelis murdered by a suicide bomber at the Dolphinarium Discotheque in June 2001; 15 Israelis murdered by a suicide bomber at Sbarro’s Pizza in August 2001, including six children and a 31-year-old woman who was the only child of her parents and was five months pregnant; 11 Israelis murdered in a bus bombing on Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem on December 1, 2001; 15 more Israelis murdered the very next day in a Haifa suicide bombing; 11 more Israelis murdered in a bus attack 10 days later in Immanuel; six Israelis murdered in an attack at a bas-mitzvah in January 2002; 11 more Jews killed in an attack on a yeshiva in March 2002, including a five-month-old child; 11 Jews murdered in a bombing at Café Moment in March 2002; 30 Israelis killed as they celebrated Passover in Netanya on March 27, 2002; 16 Israelis murdered in a suicide bombing four days later at the Matzah restaurant; and 16 Israelis murdered in Rishon LeZion in May 2002.

At MIT, another highly prestigious university, students at a campus protest chanted “One Solution, Intifada, Revolution” at a rally.

Read more at: dailywire.com

Hollywood personal security companies said that requests from Jewish stars and those in the entertainment industry have definitely increased following the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel that resulted in the deaths of more than 1,400 Israelis.

New York City and L.A.-based Global Threat Solutions CEO Kenneth D. Bombace told the Hollywood Reporter that they have “had a sharp increase in requests from our Jewish clients. They’re afraid they could be a target.”

He noted that his company provides real-time “geofencing” data that alerts clients “to an assault, to shootings, even hostile social media posts” in the area. Bombace — whose list of clients includes stars and billionaires — said “We provide detailed reporting on protests that could potentially turn violent — and where they are in relation to where our clients’ offices are.”

A recent report from the Anti-Defamation League Center on Extremism showed that in the two weeks since the Hamas attacks, a total of 193 antisemitic incidents have occurred in the U.S., 77 of which were directly linked to what is happening in Gaza.

The man suspected of gunning down people in the shootings in Lewiston, Maine, Wednesday night faces eight counts of murder but remains at large, police said Thursday morning. Authorities identified eight victims and are working to identify 10 more people who were killed.

Robert Card was initially referred to by police as a “person of interest” as they began a manhunt for the 40-year-old trained firearms expert, who they said was “armed and dangerous.” During a press conference Thursday morning, police named Card as the suspect in the shootings.

Maine Democratic Governor Janet Mills said that at least 18 people have been confirmed dead after the shootings when Card allegedly fired upon groups of people in two different locations. Police responded to reports of a shooting at Schemengees Bar and Grille and Sparetime Recreation, a bowling alley 10 minutes away. Eight victims were found dead at the bar and grille, and another seven were found dead at the bowling alley. Another three people were pronounced dead at area hospitals.

Card, who has served in the Army Reserves since 2002, was committed to a mental health facility for two weeks over the summer, according to law enforcement who said that the suspect “recently reported mental health issues to include hearing voices and threats to shoot up the National Guard Base in Saco, ME.”

Read more at: dailywire.com

Is it possible that the war in the Middle East could eventually go nuclear?  If the fighting could have been limited to just Israel and Hamas, I think that there would have been a zero percent chance of Israel using nuclear weapons.  But now it appears that Hezbollah, Syria, Iran and potentially other parties are likely to get involved too, and that means that Israel will literally be fighting a war of national survival.  If it gets to a point where the Israelis think that they could potentially be overrun by their enemies, they aren’t going to leave their most powerful weapons on the shelf.

At this point, everyone knows that Israel has nukes.

According to Wikipedia, it has been estimated that Israel currently possesses somewhere between 80 and 400 warheads…

The State of Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons. Estimates of Israel’s stockpile range between 80 and 400 nuclear warheads,^{[2][5][6][7][8][9]} and the country is believed to possess the ability to deliver them in several methods, including by aircraft, as submarine-launched cruise missiles, and via the Jericho series of intermediate to intercontinental range ballistic missiles.^[18][19] Its first deliverable nuclear weapon is thought to have been completed in late 1966 or early 1967; which would make it the sixth country in the world to have developed them.^[2][20][21]

And it appears that some Israeli leaders have been thinking about potentially using this arsenal.

When asked about Hezbollah entering the war, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that the terror group will be hit “with a force it cannot even imagine” if it does so…

Hezbollah will make “the mistake of its life” if it goes to war with Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned during a visit with soldiers near the country’s northern border with Lebanon.

“If Hezbollah decides to enter the war” the IDF hit it with such strength that “it will long for the Second Lebanon War,” Netanyahu said.

It will be hit “with a force it cannot even imagine” with devastating consequences for both the terror group and Lebanon which hosts it, he said.

Other than using nukes, how could Israel produce such an outcome?

Read more at: endoftheamericandream.com

The United States Navy shot down drones and cruise missiles fired by Iranian-backed terrorists in Yemen that officials say were potentially headed toward Israel.

The USS Carney, a destroyer, was sailing in the northern Red Sea when it detected and shot down three cruise missiles and multiple drones that were launched by the Houthis in Yemen.

“We cannot say for certain what these missiles and drones were targeting, but they were launched from Yemen heading north along the Red Sea, potentially towards targets in Israel,” said Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder, a spokesperson for the Department of Defense.

Ryder said that the U.S. Navy’s decision to shoot down the projectiles was part of “the integrated air and missile defense architecture that we built in the Middle East and that we are prepared to utilize whenever necessary to protect our partners and our interest in this important region.”

No one was hurt or killed during the incident.

The Trump administration designated the Houthis, also known as Ansarallah, as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) and a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) under the leadership of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The Biden administration quickly reversed the terrorist designation after taking over in 2021.

“These designations will provide additional tools to confront terrorist activity and terrorism by Ansarallah, a deadly Iran-backed militia group in the Gulf region,” Pompeo said in a statement at the time. “The designations are intended to hold Ansarallah accountable for its terrorist acts, including cross-border attacks threatening civilian populations, infrastructure, and commercial shipping.”

Biden quickly reversed the Trump administration’s terrorist designation on the Houthis just weeks after taking office because he reportedly wanted to “mitigate one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters,” according to the Associated Press.

Read more at: dailywire.com

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced Thursday that an emergency airlift that he ordered brought home another 200 Americans from Israel following the unprecedented terrorist attacks that occurred in the country last weekend, which killed more than 30 Americans.

The announcement from the Republican presidential candidate comes after he signed an executive order directing Florida resources to help bring Americans home. He welcomed two flights earlier this week that brought home nearly 300 Americans.

“I’m happy to report we had another flight bringing Floridians back from Israel land in the wee hours of the morning,” DeSantis said in a video posted to X. “We’ve been able to help hundreds of people get back from the war zone safely to the United States, to the state of Florida.”

DeSantis highlighted the supplies that Florida donated to Israel, which the country received yesterday.

“And we’ve got another flight coming most likely tomorrow morning,” he added. “So, the federal government dragged its feet, a lot of those folks didn’t have any options. We stepped up, showed the leadership, and are delivering results.”

DeSantis announced on Tuesday that his administration sent two large planes containing 85 pallets of donated supplies.

Medical supplies that were donated included 735 ace bandages, approximately 5,000 hospital gowns, 84 IV kits, 30,000+ needles, 30,000+ syringes, 57 ventilators, and 10,000+ boxes of surgical gloves.

Read more at: dailywire.com