I mean, I can see it from both viewpoints.....but if these kids are graduating from the school and are leaving it forever, what good does it do to punish them NOW? It just seems sort of snotty, to me.

When October 23, 1844, dawned and the little group of Millerites huddled in Edson’s farm had managed to check the first outpouring of grief, Edson led the way to his barn. Here they gathered and spent the morning in prayer. After this season of prayer, Edson, accompanied by his friend Owen Crosier, decided to make a trip across his cornfield. They wanted to visit some of their Millerite neighbors and encourage them. As they were making their way across the field Edson stopped short and seemed to stare straight ahead. Puzzled, Crosier pulled to an abrupt stop behind him calling out “Brother Edson, what are you stopping for?”

To which Edson replied, “God is answering our morning prayer, giving light regarding our disappointment”. Edson later explained that as he was walking he felt as if a hand was laid on his shoulder and he seemed to have a vision of the heavenly sanctuary where he saw that Jesus had that very day entered into the Most Holy Place of the Heavenly Sanctuary to begin the work of judgment."

https://lineagejourney.com/read/hiram-edson-the-farmer-in-the-cornfield/


I am skeptical that there is any good "Biblical" justification for this vision that becomes the inspirational source for the "Investigative Judgement" of Seventh Day Adventism. Specifically speaking in the Bible, Christ is seated on the Throne in Heaven with the Father, and the Holy Spirit. While he does act as a mediator and Intercessor that is likely less literal or metaphorical, but if it is literal that can be done from "The Throne Room" that we see in Revelation, Ezekiel etc. The Throne room doubles as a temple it literally is depicted as having an altar and the incense smoke that wafts up are "the prayer of the saints" per the book of Revelation.


Now there are scriptures related to the Tabernacle and Temple, where saint Paul and God in the book of Exodus mentions that the original tabernacle and temple "were a copy of the original heavenly one." But I don't see why this would be a major reason for putting together a Doctrine like the "Investigative Judgment". Not when such duties are likely to be metaphorical or if literal, could be taking place some place "off camera" so to speak from the Throne Room that we see in the visions of biblical prophets.


Where am I biblically wrong in my assumptions and interpretations asserting the basic traditional Christian Meta Narrative regarding the priesthood role of Christ? (Christ stays in the Temple / Throne Room till he returns to Earth at the end of the Age in the Second Coming to Judge the Living and the Dead).

I am actually wondering if this foundational vision is more rooted in the soul of Hiram (his emotional / psychological state) as a kind of "Confirmation Bias" stress relieving hallucination because of his emotional state from "the Great Disappointment" or maybe from a diabolical source that wants to lead people astray because the confirming Biblical evidence seems weak.

Police in Pennsylvania arrested two parents after finding their seven children living in what authorities described as “unsanitary” and “unsafe living conditions” – which included caged rats and feces on the home’s floor.

The mother, Crystal Robertson, told police she had to lock the refrigerator because the children were “‘stealing’ everything and referred to the children as ‘garbage disposals with legs,’” according to the affidavit.

A later investigation revealed none of the seven children had attended school and lacked basic knowledge, according to authorities.

Authorities said medical evaluations concluded the children were “clinically underweight and malnourished.”

"A new study suggests that ancestors of comb jellies, not sponges, were the first to break off from the common ancestor of all animals"

Comb Jellies May Be the World's Oldest Animal Group

If unconditional election is truly unconditional, how is it good for God to personally choose who goes to heaven or hell irrespective of any aspect of a person’s being, sinful behavior or spiritual belief?

What are some inspiring streaming platforms, shows, channels or websites that are designed to teach and keep Christians connected to their faith? Like some others I'm always falling out of the proper lane because I'm too easily distracted by world events, or fall to temptation. I've realized I have to go all in or nothing, and I need some inspiration. I got rid of cable TV and I stream on Amazon Fire TV, I have Amazon Prime, Paramount +, Peacock and a couple others.

I'm not even sure if I posted this in the proper forum.

Medley of older Petra songs.

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The Taliban and Iran exchanged heavy gunfire Saturday on the Islamic Republic’s border with Afghanistan, killing and wounding troops while sharply escalating rising tensions between the two countries amid a dispute over water rights.

Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency quoted the country’s deputy police chief, Gen. Qassem Rezaei, accusing the Taliban of opening fire first Saturday morning on the border of Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province and the Afghan province of Nimroz. IRNA said Iran inflicted “heavy casualties and serious damage.”

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I don't want to credit the US government with actually planning this, but I guess that if you leave a lot of weapons in a country that's surrounded by your enemies, sooner or later those weapons might get used against your enemies.

Will the Sabbath be a 'test of loyalty' in the end times? Will the Sabbath be the defining factor in ones salvation?
Many believers who are God fearing and upright do not observe Saturday as the Sabbath, will the Sabbath be the only litmus test that sets Gods people apart in the end?

The products are advertised online as a kind of golden ticket that will help propel Trump’s 2024 bid and make the “real patriots” who support him rich when cashed in.

[But it's a scam.]

No evidence suggests the alleged scammers are connected to Trump or his re-election campaign.

Those who buy these items, the ads from Patriots Dynasty, Patriots Future and USA Patriots suggest, will be rewarded when Trump unveils a new monetary system that will turn these products into legal tender worth far more than the purchase price.

Invest in a TRB membership card “issued by Donald Trump,” the ads from Patriots Dynasty, Patriots Future and USA Patriots claim, and the purchaser who spent, say, $99.99 on a “$10,000 Diamond Trump Bucks” bill will be able to cash it in for $10,000 at major banks and retailers like Walmart, Costco and Home Depot.

In AI-generated promotional videos shared on social media and in chat groups, celebrities and politicians, including Trump, appear to endorse the scam.

One 75-year-old Alabama grandmother, who consented to having her picture taken but asked not to be identified by name for fear of internet harassment, told NBC News the message she got from watching the pitches on the internet was that Trump was going to make her rich.

“Now I realize, well, that was stupid,” she said. “But I bought them because I believed President Trump, because he knows all about finance, and he was going to help the real Trump Patriots get rich.”

I always thought populism was a good thing, because it infers it is "for the people." I have never been able to wrap my mind around the idea that politicians who want to usurp power from the people (while seizing it themselves) are "populists," but I often hear them defined as such.

This article describes how authoritarianism merged with populism, and the dangers this presents. After all, what is more dangerous than a would-be dictator saying he's "for the people," and yet they're all over our country.

In the United States, the appeal of authoritarian populism has gone hand in hand with a decline of trust in government and a rise in partisan polarization. Increasingly in the United States, the government is seen as unresponsive to citizens’ concerns and captured by well-organized special interests. Voters are also acutely aware of Washington’s growing political dysfunction and the federal government’s inability to “get things done” and respond to the public’s policy preferences. At the ballot box, however, voters often re-enforce the extreme partisanship that contributes to this dysfunction.

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I was wondering if our life is an chain of decision-making events, from childhood on, in that our "personhood" or "self" is just a collection of millions or biillions of premade decisions based on these previous events - and we are merely the compilation of all those *choices*?

Or are we individual beings who possess a phenomenon known as "consciousness" - something not well understood in it's self? But none the less is us satisfying and orchestrating our own lives through ideas and activities that make us genuinely feel good?

That is why insects can eat it, the very trunk of a tree, or a plant, is the body itself, and then the soul is in the root, you have probably seen the man on which a tree grows, it is the same protein, and the roots of trees, and plants, talking to each other, it is a kind of vein from which all life originates, a kind of consciousness from which everything that lives comes, a bit like the tree of life in avatar, it is wiser than all life, since it has been here the longest, rages comes and goes, but this vein is there all the time, trees, and plants, you feel it when you, for example, cut off branches, but it's a bit like when a cat bites the neck of a mouse, the pain is muted so you feel almost nothing , numbed in a way, if one misbehaves, for example, then trees and plants will pick it up, and then the birds sit on branches and sing so all the animals hear it too, influenced by the tree it sits on, it's quite really cool

This guy needs a new hobby. Or maybe that jail needs some new occupational therapy choices.

In 2014, Timothy H. Findlay was sent to federal prison for threatening to kill a sitting Democrat president and detonate the White House, threats he made from within a Michigan jail. Years later and not having learned his lesson, a yet-again-jailed Findlay opted to repeat history by threatening to kill another Democrat president by blowing up his house.

Findlay was in the Arenac County Jail on a state charge of possessing less than 25 grams of a controlled substance when he made his latest threat on April 28, 2022. He wrote a letter to President Joe Biden stating that when he was out of custody, he and others “are going to bomb the White House and kill everyone with cyanide. Rape your wife [and] kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer, tie her up and leave her on Lake Michigan. Then kill everyone with cyanide.”

LINK

President Biden on Thursday released the country’s first national strategy for combating antisemitism, a landmark lauded by Jewish and anti-hate groups as progress toward addressing the increasing instances of violence and bias toward Jewish people in the United States.

But Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) saw the effort as an attack on those of her political persuasion. “When they say stuff like this, they mean they want to go after conservatives,” she tweeted. “Their tactics are straight out of the USSR’s playbook.”

Her comments quickly attracted criticism from detractors who accused her of conflating a straightforward campaign against antisemitism with an assault on the right — and, by implication, equating conservatives with antisemites.

“If anyone finds opposition to hate threatening, they need to look inward,” [Deputy WH Press Secretary] Bates said in a statement. “Congresswoman Boebert should also Google the Soviet Union’s long, repulsive history of antisemitism.

Biden on Thursday announced a four-pillar strategy to confront hate in a video address, outlining a plan that includes more than 100 steps for the government to take. The goals include increasing awareness and understanding of antisemitism, ramping up security for Jewish communities, reversing the normalization of discrimination, and improving on collective efforts to counter hate.

DAILY PRAYER SHIELD​

Prayers For Our Persecuted Family.
Sometimes it can be difficult to know what to pray for our persecuted family so we produce a daily prayer shield which gives a specific need that you can pray for each day. You can see today’s prayer, plus those for the last 6 days, below. You can also sign up using the form above to receive our Email Prayer Alert which we send out whenever we become aware of a specific and immediate situation which requires urgent prayer.

Children’s Prayer Sheet
It’s not only adults who can pray for our persecuted family. Every month we produce a prayer sheet aimed specifically for children. Each sheet has specific activities and prayers which will help children learn more about how persecution affects children in other countries. You can visit our Children’s Prayer Sheet page here.

Nigeria​

Pray for Henry Monday Adeh and his family, whose home was burnt down by Fulani militants in Nigeria. Thank God that Release International partners were able to rebuild their house.

China​

Pray that God will sustain Hao Ming, an elder of Early Rain Qingcaodi Church in Deyang city, who was recently charged with fraud. He has been detained in China since late-2021.

China​

Praise God for the witness of Early Rain Covenant Church members in Chengdu, Sichuan province, China. They provided quilts and winter clothes for guards keeping watch over the home of their preacher Dai Zhichao.

China​

Lin Xuesui was arrested in Sichuan province, China in 2022 and accused of involvement in ‘illegal gatherings’, apparently in connection with his ministry work there. Thank God he was released on bail in January: pray charges will be dropped.

China​

Thank God that elderly Sun Jinhuan was able to visit her son Pastor John Cao in prison in Yunnan province, China for the first time in three years. He is serving seven years for ‘illegal border crossing’ into Myanmar.

China​

Give thanks that after nearly a 4 year journey for religious freedom the Shenzhen Reformed Holy ‘Mayflower’ Church have settled in Dallas, Texas, USA.

Nigeria​

Forgiving Father, we pray that You will give Your persecuted children in Nigeria the grace to forgive their enemies. Humanly speaking this seems impossible. The scale of hurt and loss is vast. But the gospel calls us to forgive as we have been forgiven and we pray You will enable them to do this.

19ALGERIA​

Persecution has significantly worsened in the past year, with Christians becoming very vulnerable to state pressure alongside the ongoing societal pressures that can come from families and communities.
Most Algerian believers are converts from Islam. They can face discrimination, harassment and pressure to follow Islamic customs from family members as well as the wider community. More recently, Christians have increasingly experienced restrictions and pressure from state officials to renounce their faith; many of these officials come under the influence of radical Islamic teachers.
Laws that regulate non-Muslim worship are also used to quell the influence of Christianity. This includes prohibition of anything that would ‘shake the faith of a Muslim’ or could be used as a ‘means of seduction intending to convert a Muslim to another religion’. These laws are notoriously vague in their wording and are often abused in the courts.
Meanwhile, 16 previously closed church buildings remained sealed, while other churches were ordered to close during the past year. Several other churches have had to cease their activities.

Please pray​

• That the Holy Spirit will help Christians in Algeria to stand firm in their faith.
• That each Christian in Algeria will have opportunities to gather with other believers for fellowship and discipleship.
• For the reopening of closed churches and a relaxing of laws that stifle religious freedom.

How do you pronounce Cicero?

.... and an expert in bible prophecy, if you can grasp all the information on this timeline chart of the 7 year 70th week of Daniel 9 - day 1 to day 2520.

On the chart below, the little horn as the prince who shall come > becomes the Antichrist > then is revealed as the man of sin > then becomes the beast.

Also, the three woes to the inhabitors of the earth, first spoke about in Revelation 8:13, are shown on the chart.

And all of the seals in relation to each other.

My husband and I were married (legally) for 20 years but he chose to commit adultery and left me in 2016. He divorced me in 2018.
I prayed for the marriage and for reconcilliation. He was my closest friend. He didn't want to reconcile and was happy to continue with the relationship with Other women(even though he had a girlfriend) despite being still married to me.
I still love and care for him (in a friendship way). My husband is a christian, although I don't think he married a believer((someone from a non-christian religion). I don't know where his walk is with the Lord, either.
I never see him now.

He continues to email me on my birthday and also he continues to email me on our Wedding Anniversary.
He acknowledges our Wedding Anniversary date(still) and says how much he appreciated being married to me.
I still don't know why he left me though. (but I think he wanted to pursue a love for someone (or others) from a different culture.

The emails that he sends on my birthday end in 'regards'. There is NO love, no romantic talk,
just respectful talk. I have no remarried, nor have I dated any man. The only man I have ever loved is my previous husband.
He shares a little about what he is doing/work etc. He never asks about me, or how I am doing
just says, "I hope you are well".

I still pray for him. He was my best and closest friend.


He emailed me the other day on our WEdding Anniversary - he always says
"Happy Anniversary".

I know he is remarried, so is this wrong that he is emailing me - is this considered 'adultery'? I know he has a lot of women friend outside the marriage as friends( a relative shared that with me)
I don't want this to affect my walk as a believer, and I certainly don't want it to affect his life as a believer,too.

Please don't me harsh in the comments.
I am happy when I do hear from him, at least I know he is safe and well.

Hello, I am not looking for anything particular but would like to fellowship and discuss many topics with anyone.

I’m having a hard time finding a good Lutheran Bible study. Does anyone know of one online I could join?

I love children. Babies especially. I love babies...ant kind. I am a very relaxed personality dn when I come across crying babies I love helping them calm while the frazzled parent gets a break.
So yes I have a bias.

But I look at these two men and how they handle a crying baby and to me, it does speak to their character and values.

What about you?