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Federal judges block Texas from using its new US House map in the 2026 midterms

I am glad that, in an era where Texas and other states are trying to wipe all evidence of slavery off the map, racism is being called out,
Texas Senate passed a bill that forbids public schools from teaching history and current events about race that might upset students.
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Average consumer now carries $6,329 in credit card debt. 'People are stretched,' expert says

Not if tendered at the cash register.
That depends on which cash register is chosen.

10% over spot seems like a pretty good deal to me.

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This is but one example of these food stores that I've seen that trade in constitutional money.

If you have difficulty finding such a store; here is another option:

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Chat GPT is amazing for bible history, and Daniel 11:36-45

Rev 13, and last kingdom of Dan 2,7 are still future. Sounds like the first beast in Rev 13 which is a person will survive an assassination attempt.

Here is the explanation of Rev 13


Interestingly enough spiritually satanic leaven of the Pharisees "Israel" had a deadly would 70 AD when God used the Romans to destroy it, and kill the people that killed Jesus but now since the 1900s that deadly wound has healed however that is not what it means as I stated above.
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Trump's history of acts of kindness and generosity

The real Donald Trump?

Remember When Trump Tried to Bulldoze a Widow’s Home to Make a Parking Lot for Limos?



(Donald Trump) has spent two decades trying to evict the Scots who live next to his luxury golf course.
For almost two decades, a small band of Scots has resisted The Trump Organization’s efforts to turn their land into a playground for the super-rich. First he tried to buy them out, and then he tried to intimidate them—but they refused to uproot themselves for the sake of a billionaire’s bank account.

James alleged the non-profit failed to meet as a corporate board, failed to conduct any relevant oversight regarding grants issued and also failed to implement any policy whatsoever which might have protected the charity's funds from being skimmed by the Trump clan.

"In this vacuum of oversight and diligence, Mr. Trump caused the foundation to enter repeatedly into self-dealing transactions and to coordinate unlawfully with his presidential campaign," James said in her filing with the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

Relatively amusingly, James also noted that Trump personally ordered his charity to spend $100,000 in order to settle legal claims over an 80-foot flagpole he had built at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

Last December, the Trump Foundation agreed to dissolve under judicial supervision due to Underwood's initial lawsuit.


Jury finds Trump liable for sexual abuse, awards accuser $5M


SAN DIEGO (AP) — A judge on Friday approved an agreement for President Donald Trump to pay $25 million to settle lawsuits over his now-defunct Trump University, ending nearly seven years of legal battles with customers who claimed they were misled by failed promises to teach success in real estate.

U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel said the agreement represents an “extraordinary amount” of money for customers to recover. Plaintiff attorneys say about 3,730 people will get at least 90 percent of their money back.


Meet the (Many) Small Business Owners Stiffed by Donald Trump


It's not just whatever he was doing with Epstein; he's got a long history of behavior.
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The 2025 Government Shutdown Thread

Yes, the Democrats won't vote for a policy they are vehemently opposed to so the Republicans shut down the Government. Whose "fault" is that?
BOTH sides.
No. "If you don't do what I say, I'll (hold my breath till I turn blue, shut down the government, throw a tantrum)" is not the fault of the person who elects not to cave to the tantrum.
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Hello, beautiful people!

I am an Evangelical Christian looking to love the respectful, beautiful exchange of ideas here.
I heard nice things about this community. I have no expectations, I have no gripes. All I have is compassion for everyone.
And I thank yall, in advance, if yall plan to revere those things about me.
I think I heard the angels sing upon your arrival. Welcome! :angel:
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More Americans are now reading the Bible but fewer believe it’s 100% accurate: study

You’re debating a phrase in a verse- one verse says some people didn’t hear the voice, and then 23 years later, when Paul recounts the event, he says they heard the voice but didn’t see the man.
Where did Luke hear the story? This isn't Paul recounting the story. This is Luke recounting the story. We don't know how long it took him to write from chapter 9 to chapter 22 but it wasn't 23 years. We don't know if Luke made the mistake or someone who copied the book. We don't have an original.
Is this why you claim the Bible is full of errors?
Can you actually read my posts and show where I stated that the Bible is "full of errors"?

Discrepancies like these can be found throughout all four gospels.
Okay, but I didn't even say that many. Some can be explained.
I'm sorry, but it seems you're more focused on proving your point, even if that means you consider the Bible to be full of errors.
What do you think my point is? You've been incorrect thus far.
Have a nice day.
You too.
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Struggling with scrupulosity

You may be right Mari17. The narcissism could be some of the ocd. As far as the pain meds I feel I began to use them for the wrong reason. Sure I would have a surgery and need them but I would continue to use them for psychological reasons and not for pain. I felt I was was choosing my flesh over what God wanted or expected. I feel that I hardened my heart through that and God had just had enough and it put me beyond repentance. I wonder if choosing my flesh was rejecting Christ. I never felt I was but the more I read I wonder if Jesus looked at it that way. No one really knows but God.
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Walking that Straight narrow path.

If we truly love God, then we will obey "Every word" that proceeds out of his mouth (Matthew 4:4). Baptism is one of those words. In order to be baptized, certain events must take place: You must repent, give up a lifestyle where sin has dominion, (ruler ship) over you. Sin according to 1 John 3:4, Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression (breaking) of the law. You must be taught "The Word", before you can adhere to God's commandments (judgments\statues). These laws are found in the Holy Bible; beginning with Genesis and ending with Revelation. You must believe what the bible says and finally, you must confess that Jesus is Lord.

Once this has been accomplished, you are qualified to be baptized in the name of Jesus.

"And he said unto them, go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned." (Mark 16:15-16).

"And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John. But the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, being not baptized of him." (Luke 7:29-30). People, if you are in a position to be baptized, why reject the counsel of God? Rejecting God's counsel will get you eternal life in the burning flames (lake of fire) with the scribes and Pharisees. "For I say unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, Ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5: 20).

Anyone that is not baptized is a person with their sins yet upon them, because it is the baptism that washes away our past sins. "And now why tarriest thou? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord." (Acts 22:16): Remember, before his crucifixion, Jesus told his disciples that his time (death) is not yet come; He also informed them that their time (death) can come at any moment.
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Anyone attempt to start a Bible Study with the people you evangelize who are mostly homeless?

Some suggestions in regards to daily prayers for improving my private spiritual life with Christ:

Thanksgiving: Father, I rejoice in Your love for me. You thought of me and so loved the idea of me that You created me. Each moment You are at work, loving me into existence. Thank You, Father for accepting me as I am. (Here, thank God for any special gifts received this particular day e.g. the weather, a good book, a holy desire, a good joke, the ability to hear His voice and/or see Him working ... etc).

Petition: Father, You know me better than I know myself. Please help me be aware of how You worked in and around me today. I wish to respond to Your call for me, with obedience and love. However, for me to follow Your will, I first need to know it. Please help me listen and hear the voice of Your Spirit in me that I may see how You see me.

Reflection: In this section ask yourself some questions as you go through the previous few hours since your last examen. The answers will come as you are guided by the Holy Spirit. Examples of these questions could be as follows: 1. How am I feeling right now? Why? 2. Is this leading me to God or away from God? 3. How did God manifest His love for me in the last few hours? How did I respond? Was there anything lacking? 4. What did I do to show my love for God?

Contrition: Father, thank You for Your care and guidance in the last few hours. I am sorry for the ways in which I was not sensitive to Your Spirit in me. I love You, Lord, and You know where and how I need healing and forgiveness. I surrender myself to You completely (Here, ask for the grace to see specific areas the Lord is showing you). Together looking to the future: Father with hope I look to the future. You accept me the way I am and You allow me to grow. You give me time and grace, opportunity, and space. I place the time between now and my next examen in your hands. I ask you to make me more sensitive to Your Spirit in me. May my life between now and then be united to the life of Your Son, my Lord and Savior, Jesus (Here one is to be specific as well: What is in the coming hours I want to discuss with the Lord, to lift up in prayer, ... etc.).
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DHS confirms arrest of Afghan man in Texas after bomb threat video surfaces online

It is? It sounds like every call for revival and evangelism that I've ever heard. I guess that could be considered aggressive, but that strikes me as an odd thing for a Christian to throw shade at

That's nice. But I'm not an Evangelical, and I'm not discussing Evangelical Christianity... So.
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Left-Wing Terrorism Is on the Rise

The 1971 bombing was carried out by the Weather Underground, she wasn't associated with that group. She was associated with the group that splintered off from the Weather Underground, which carried out a bombing at the Capitol in 1983, but even then, she wasn't found to be directly involved.
Oopsies. Man what a psycho girl though. Crazy that there were multiple leftist bombings of the capitol. I was never taught about that in school but I am willing to bet school will indoctrinate kids about January 6th in the future as if it were some national tragedy.
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Proper Progression

“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1Co 15:3, 4). This seems to have been the first truth preached by the Apostle Paul. It is plain that such a truth does not in itself clear us from the world, nor give us the realization of our union with Christ on high. It is something done for us (if we accept it—NC), and does not in itself reveal relationship, although it is marvelously suited to show the love of God, the measure being the gift of His Son.

There are multitudes of persons, to whom we should not deny the Christian name, who reach only to this state (going no further than just believing in Christ—NC). They would mourn over any teaching which did not embody the death of Christ as the only meritorious cause of their acceptance before God—a death to save the lost. Hence they would alike reject as valid the ritualism of the day—the pomp of symbolism, and the intellectual setting up of man, and, if they went so far, would insist of the doctrine of justification by faith alone.

With this class of persons, you will find it difficult to maintain a spiritual conversation. They can talk with real earnestness of the results of Christianity, but they cannot really talk of Christ Himself, since they only know of what He has done, rather than what He is in Himself. Such persons, alive to the necessity of a religious life, are more or less safe as to the properties of conduct.

It belongs to them to cultivate the arts and sciences, and to show a respectable, nay, even a religious hue over everything around them; for ignorant of “the sentence of death” in themselves (2Co 1:9), they must fill up life by embellishing “the old man”; in short, they would get the unrenewed—man out of his sinful ways by presenting a man’s own self to him under a more attractive guise. They are not deeply experienced in the ruin of man, but think that something good may yet be made out of it; and all this without at all meaning to deny Christ.

Now the next step, which ought to be known after the fact of Christ dying for our sins and rising again, is that we died with Him. This is unfolded in Romans 6:6: “our old man is crucified with Him.” To have died with the Lord Jesus is a different thing from Christ dying for us (He died for the world but He was not received by most—NC). A temptation arises, it may be some cast of the eye to which the flesh would give way; but I say I cannot entertain it because I am dead (temptation to a believer is not able to get him to desire to lust because of Phl 2:13—NC). People remain in this state for a long time. Their demeanor is, to a certain extent, doleful. They begin to understand the deeper aspects of Christianity, but they are not yet in the experience of the life that comes out of death.

The next stage is that I am not only dead with Christ but alive with Him from the dead—“If ye then be risen with Christ” (Col 3:1). When I only knew that I was dead, there was divine certainty that the old man was crucified by the death of Christ, but no joy. But to be alive with Christ from the dead not only gives me to see a Person—a glorious Object before me, with all His surroundings—but I learn to enjoy divine fellowship with Him there on high, “for your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3).


—William Wigram (1872 – 1953)




MJS devotional excerpt for December 2

“The believer, having received ‘the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus,’ comes under the influence of the ‘law’ of that Spirit (Rom. 8:2). The operating principle of ‘the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus’ ever works in the direction of profound self-judgment, and of the consciousness that we have in the Lord Jesus not only righteousness, but a divine Source of satisfaction and strength.

“This ‘law’ operates not to give a sense of claim (law), but of divine gift (grace) and resource and support. And thus it makes the one in whom it operates free from ‘the law of sin and death.’ It gives the consciousness that divine goodness is an unfailing resource for our hearts, and that all the treasures of that goodness are stored up in Christ Jesus, that we may learn them there, and find the life of our spirits in the growing knowledge of Him.

—Charles Andrew Coates (1862-1945)



“‘The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus’ made me ‘free from the law of sin and death’ (Rom. 8:2)—not ‘the life,’ but ‘the Spirit of life,’—not our effort, but divine strength; not self-occupation, but occupation with Him in whom we are before the Father, and in whom the divine favor rests upon us full and constant, because on Him it rests.

“There is the substitution of the power of the Spirit for the power of a right will and human effort, the substitution therefore of occupation with the glorified Lord Jesus Christ for occupation with spiritual growth; for then and thus alone is growth obtained.”

—Frederick William Grant (1834-1902

“The Seed” of Christ

This is the beginning of wisdom. With these great truths as the foundation, we go on to learn that there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ (Rom 8:1), that we are joined to the Lord and are one spirit with Him (1 Cor 6:17), that living in the Spirit compels us to walk in the Spirit (Ga 5:25), and that walking in the Spirit is the only way to not fulfill the lusts of the flesh (Ga 5:16-17). We can rejoice in the fact that the law's requirements for righteousness are satisfied in us because new life in Christ has set us free from the law of sin and death (Rom 8:2-4). In short, we are able to stop pursuing righteousness because we already have it in Christ, and we are able to turn our attention to living out what He has already given us. New life in Christ Jesus is truly everything we need for life and godliness.
Hi, and very nicely put! God knows we will always want to "please" Him, even when we ignorantly sin; because He "works" this "in you" (Phl 2:13).
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