Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
— Philippians 4:4-7
Category: Uncategorized
Shepherds
The Responsibility of Spiritual Shepherds
Ezekiel 34
Ezekiel was a priest in Jerusalem before being deported to Babylon in 597 B.C. In Babylon he became a prophet-priest, and his message was often focused on Judah’s leaders—God would hold them accountable for their failures in leading the nation.
It was not uncommon in the ancient Near East for leaders to be called shepherds. God chose an actual shepherd boy named David to become the shepherd-king of His people (1 Samuel 16:1-13): “So [David] shepherded [Israel] according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands” (Psalm 78:70-72). Successive kings and priests of both Israel and Judah did not shepherd God’s people with a heart like David’s. When Jeremiah prophesied about the coming destruction of Jerusalem, he issued a scathing warning against the shepherds of Judah: God would scatter the shepherds just as they had scattered God’s people (Jeremiah 23:1-4).
From Babylon, Ezekiel delivered the Old Testament’s longest oracle against the irresponsible shepherds of Judah (Ezekiel 34). He made the point that God is the ultimate Shepherd who would gather the sheep that had been scattered by their carnal, self-serving shepherds. Ezekiel summed up the shepherds’ failure this way: “Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flocks?” (Ezekiel 34:2). He goes on to point out all the ways Israel’s shepherds had taken care of themselves instead of taking care of God’s people.
David used God as the best example of a shepherd who serves by leading and feeding the sheep (Psalm 23), and Jesus demonstrated the same shepherd’s heart when He lived and served as the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-18; also Mark 10:45). In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus warned against shepherds who were wolves in sheep’s clothing (Matthew 7:15), and Paul warned the elders in Ephesus about the same possibility (Acts 20:29-31). The condition of the flock is a good indication of the condition of the shepherd’s heart.
Dr. David Jeremiah
What Is ‘Disease X’ That the WHO Is Preparing For?
What Is ‘Disease X’ That the WHO Is Preparing For? https://link.theepochtimes.com/mkt_app/article/what-is-disease-x-that-the-who-is-preparing-for-5569752?utm_source=andshare
The economic, physical, and psychological harm from lockdowns as well as business and school closures, is still being felt, long after officials abandoned those policies.
Proverbs
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight.
Do not be wise in your own eyes;
Fear the LORD and turn away from evil.
It will be healing to your body
And refreshment to your bones.
Honor the LORD from your wealth
And from the first of all your produce;
So your barns will be filled with plenty
And your vats will overflow with new wine.
— Proverbs 3:5-10
Quote by AW Tozer
“How completely satisfying to turn from our limitations to a God who has none. Eternal years lie in His heart. For Him time does not pass, it remains; and those who are in Christ share with Him all the riches of limitless time and endless years. God never hurries. There are no deadlines against which He must work. Only to know this is to quiet our spirits and relax our nerves. For those out of Christ, time is a devouring beast; before the sons of the new creation time crouches and purrs and licks their hands. The foe of the old human race becomes the friend of the new, and the stars in their courses fight for the man God delights to honor. This we may learn from the divine infinitude.” AW Tozer
Why Panicked Left-Wing Ruling Elites Fear Revival of Self-Government
Our corrupted institutions fear that the American people are taking back their birthright—that is, taking back the concept of self-government.
A relatively new, but growing media genre highlights that dynamic.
Over the past few years, there have been a growing number of national media stories—really, more like partisan exposés, rather than “X, Y, Z happened”—about local politics.
The legacy media now follow an oft-replicated formula in this new genre.
The first step is to unearth a local political body that conservatives have taken control of through an election or series of elections.
Next, define the newly elected officials as unhinged, right-wing wackos who represent a kind of proto-fascism in America.
Then, find a few squishy, Chamber of Commerce-type Republicans to quote, saying something like, “Everything here was great and reasonable until these mean, unreasonable people showed up.”
Finally, after describing the purported upstarts in the darkest and most threatening way possible, bury what they actually intend to do somewhere near the end of the article. It’s usually something like switching to paper ballots in elections, shaping the curriculums of local schools, or getting sexually explicit content out of classrooms.
You know, stuff that was totally normal until the media said it wasn’t, a half-second ago.
A recent example of this phenomenon would be an Associated Press article on Sunday about how conservatives are winning local county board and commission elections in Tennessee. The AP’s Twitter account referred to the conservatives as “far right.”
What exactly does “far right” mean? The AP Stylebook doesn’t say, but it seems like it means “people who effectively combat the Left.”
The AP reporter wrote that those allegedly “far right” people are “operating outside political norms, inviting lawsuits, and jeopardizing elections and other county operations.”
But the evidence for that is that some of the new county commissioners opposed increased property taxes, sought to change election rules, and—horror of horrors—invoked Christian values in making decisions.
“Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.”
Oh, wait, that’s not from the Sumner County Commission in Tennessee. It’s George Washington’s Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1789.
The Sumner County Commission document that the AP highlighted said that its operations would be conducted in an orderly way and “most importantly, reflective of the Judeo-Christian values inherent in the nation’s founding.”
So, they were referring to the principles of George Washington and the Founders, who must have been “far right” extremists by the standards of the legacy media.
Another story, this one from NBC in early May, detailed how conservatives in Woodland Park, Colorado, transformed a school district.
Again, the rather lengthy report portrayed conservatives as this alien, ominous threat that was changing a nonpartisan school board.
The new elected coalition sought to reshape the curriculum and did away with some “mental health” services they found to be ineffective.
A bunch of staff quit. So what?
If anything, the story revealed that when conservative voters get their act together, vote for candidates who reflect their values, and the candidates implement those values, real change happens.
And this gets to why the Left and their media pawns are in a panic over something seemingly so minor. They are not so mighty yet that they are above fear. Doubt gnaws at them. They fear what you, the people, might become.
In a sense, local stories like these represent a distinct flip of the adage that “all politics is local.” Now, all politics is national. The Left senses an existential threat to its power when there’s even the tiniest successful rebellion against its agenda.
Unquestionably, the Left puts its stamp on our politics through its control of all the big, elite institutions and organizations—whether it’s the federal bureaucracy, multinational corporations, legacy media, Hollywood, foundation philanthropy, academia, and even sports.
For too long, American politics operated on autopilot, allowing the Left to essentially have its way. A vast cultural and political revolution has been taking place in the West with little input from the people who have become used to accepting it.
But the transformation of our institutions in the past few years, from vessels of technocratic incrementalism to active and imperious enforcers of cultural revolution, opened the eyes of many. It appears that our country—at one time founded on the idea of deliberation and consent of the governed—is now being ruled by an out-of-touch managerial class.
This ruling class has become accustomed to being the gatekeepers of what’s considered acceptable opinion in this country and others. They are used to being able to pressure government agencies, corporations, and civil society to do their bidding. That’s why they acted with such hysteria when Elon Musk took over Twitter. Musk wasn’t even a “conservative,” but he also couldn’t be controlled.
But a larger challenge is coming to their oligarchic control than the management reversal at Twitter, or even the boycotts of Anheuser-Busch and Target.
In the past several decades, we have lost much of our exceptional self-government. What we are potentially seeing now—in states such as Florida and Texas, in local school board elections in Virginia and Indiana, and in county commissions in Colorado and Tennessee—is Americans reclaiming that tradition.
No longer can we wait while unelected bureaucrats and multinational corporations determine our fate. We, the people, have the right to define our society.
The Left often talks about how we are “losing our democracy.” That’s not true. We are bringing it back.
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