Monday, November 12th, in the year of our Lord 2018
By Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldView.com)
Filipino Government Harasses Journalist
The Philippine government said on Friday that it would charge a veteran journalist, Maria Ressa, with tax evasion by the government of President Rodrigo Duterte, reports The New York Times. Ressa is facing up to 10 years of imprisonment.
Ressa denied the charges, calling the case a “clear form of continuing intimidation and harassment,” and accused the government of trying to silence critical coverage.
Dutch Doctor Death in Trouble
Dutch authorities are prosecuting a female doctor for euthanizing an elderly woman with dementia in the first case of its kind since the practice was legalized in 2002, reports AFP.
The unnamed doctor allegedly put a sleeping drug into the 74-year-old woman’s coffee and had to ask her family to hold her down when she began to struggle.
California Wildfire Kills 5, Threatens Celebrity Homes
A rapidly moving wildfire in Northern California killed five people when flames engulfed their vehicles as they attempted to flee the mountain town of Paradise, reports Reuters.
Nearly 500 miles to the south, a blaze forced the evacuation of the upscale oceanside city of Malibu and threatened the beleaguered town of Thousand Oaks, where a gunman killed 12 people this week in a shooting rampage in a bar and dance hall.
Since it broke out last Thursday, the so-called Camp Fire has more than tripled in size to 70,000 acres after leveling parts of Paradise, with a population of 26,000 people, and was only 5 percent contained by Friday.
About 2,000 structures were destroyed in the area.
Celebrities including Lady Gaga, Kim Kardashian, Rainn Wilson and Melissa Etheridge are among the thousands forced to flee their homes as fires continue to threaten Malibu, Calabasas, and Thousand Oaks, reports Variety.com.
Amazon’s Echo Might Hold Key Audio Evidence of Murder
A New Hampshire judge ordered Amazon to give Echo recordings in the 2017 murder case against Timothy Verrill accused of stabbing two women to death in Farmington, reports WMUR.
Prosecutors said they believe the Echo device, which listens for Alexa voice commands, might have recorded audio of Sullivan’s death, as well as anything that happened before or after it.
Experts said the case reveals some of the implications of having such devices in people’s homes.
Christian Singer Lauren Daigle Appears on The Tonight Show, Ellen
Grammy-nominated singer Lauren Daigle made her late night debut on NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon Wednesday evening where she showcased her new Christian music.
FALLON: “Making her late night debut and performing her title track from her new album Look Up, Child, Lauren Daigle.”
After the performance, Fallon said, “You are fantastic. That was great!”
That follows a recent appearance on NBC’s The Ellen DeGeneres Show.
DEGENERES: “Our next guest has been compared to everyone from Adele to Amy Winehouse. Her new CD just debuted at number one. She’s amazing. Here to perform “Still Rolling Stones”, Lauren Daigle.”
Some have questioned Daigle’s appearance on Ellen’s show in particular since Ellen is a lesbian, but Daigle argued that they have “completely missed the heart of God”, telling the Christian Post that she is remaining true to her call of going outside the walls of the church to share the Gospel.
The 27-year-old Louisiana native said she’s not afraid to appeal to the world with her message of hope, which some fear might lead her astray and to abandon her worship roots to become a secular artist. Daigle, however, said her faith and mission in life has never been clearer.
In Mark 16:15-16, Jesus said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.”
Christian Professor Exonerated for Biblical Views
A professor punished by his college for his so-called “dangerous” Biblical views has won a legal battle that lasted nearly two years.
The Pacific Justice Institute said an arbitrator has ruled in favor of Eric Thompson, a conservative sociology professor who had obtained tenure at Moreno Valley College, east of Los Angeles, reports WorldNetDaily.com.
Thompson introduced to his students conservative thought dealing with homosexuality, marriage and gender roles, even circulating the film “Understanding Same-Sex Attraction” which suggested homosexuality might be a choice rather than hard-wired.
Pacific Justice Institute President Brad Dacus asked,“How many other voices of reason are being squelched in academic institutions by the far-left?”
Sneak Peek: Why should Christians adopt?
Since November is National Adoption Month, we take a closer look at the joys and
stresses of adoption in a World View Special Report following the newscast today.
God Healed California Man with Brain Tumor
And finally, doctors of a Lodi, California man are amazed that a suspected malignant brain tumor vanished without treatment, reports CBS13 in Sacramento.
Several months ago, Paul Wood was suffering from massive headaches, unable to walk down the hallway without holding on to the walls.
Wood’s primary physician sent him to a neurosurgeon at UC San Francisco who thought he had a brain bleed, although radiologists saw signs of a tumor.
The day before surgery, Wood’s operation was canceled because his suspected tumor was gone, prompting him to say, “It’s a miracle and that is the way God planned it.”
Exodus 15:26 says, “For I am the Lord Who heals you.”
Close
And that’s The World View in 5 Minutes on this Monday, November 12th in the year of our Lord 2018. Subscribe by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldView.com. I’m Adam McManus. Seize the day for Jesus Christ.
Special Report: How God Can Use You to Adopt American Children
Time now for a World View Special Report by Emily Swanson. I’m Adam McManus.
By Emily Swanson
November is National Adoption Month, and Sunday was Orphan Sunday.
James 1:27 says, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”
According to an article from Conversation.com, foreign adoptions had declined by 72% since 2005.
Christian Alliance for Orphans, a Christian ministry that stands for the protection of the fatherless, started an event every November called Orphan Sunday. The purpose of the event is to encourage “Christians to stand for children who’ve lost the protection and care of family. We are a people called to defend the fatherless, to protect the vulnerable, to visit orphans in their distress.”
In light of the decrease in foreign adoptions, The World View talked with Shari McMinn, mom of 10 children — four of whom were adopted out of foster care — about the need to offer foster care and adoption to American children. McMinn is the author of Adoption, Encouragement and Advice for a Hopeful Journey. McMinn told The World View why she is seeing an increase in the need for foster care and domestic adoptions.
“I am seeing a huge increase in the need for foster care and domestic adoptions through child welfare. That’s primarily my knowledge and background. Of course, there are always infants available through private adoptions. But in the child welfare realm, we’re seeing a large increase in dysfunctional families, drug increase, human trafficking increase. There are a lot of kids going into the system that need to be provided for by foster parents. And sometimes parental rights are terminated. Sometimes the children go back to birth families or birth relatives, and that can be a heart break for foster parents.”
McMinn said that people in foster care should go into it knowing that the goal of it is to reunite families. She also said that children who cannot be reunited with their families do need mommies and daddies who have a heart for adoption.
“Then there are children who become legally free. Generally, that’s going to be an older child, or at least a child who is in their late toddler years. There are a number of families that go into foster care with the hope that they can adopt the children they care for, and that is just a wonderful thing, because their children are coming at a young age to their home, and if the parents can be patient and work within the system, which can be very frustrating, they’ll have the blessing of the child staying permanently in their home.”
McMinn said that the best way to know what to expect through a local adoption is to ask others who have gone through bringing that child into their home.
“Well, I think the first thing you do is that you ask other parents who have done foster care or child welfare adoptions, what their experiences were in their particular county. There are states that oversee the child welfare system, but then each county is responsible for the children that come into care.”
McMinn talked about their experience with their adoptions.
“When we did our two adoptions, we worked with a county that was friendly to Christians, friendly to homeschoolers. There were a number of Christians in the human services department. We let them know that we had loss issues, because one of our children had died as an infant. So we wanted to care for children that hopefully could stay with us. If there were children who were close to having parental rights terminated, that’s who we would like to be matched with, and our case workers were really, really great. They helped that work out for us, so we adopted a 5 and a 7-year-old that came into care, and three years later, a 1, 2, and 3-year-old that came into care.”
McMinn said that though the system could use a lot of improvements, it is better than what most nations could provide. She talked about the challenges that parents might face.
“It is better than probably any nation has, yet it’s just inherently difficult. You’re dealing with people that have traumatic issues. You’re dealing with children that have traumatic issues, with case workers who don’t know whether they can trust you or not, social workers who may not tell the truth, because they don’t have the integrity of a Christian background that you do, judges who on any day can disrupt a case, send a child back to the birth family, or say, ‘We’re terminating parental rights, and your family can adopt these children.’”
McMinn said that, in hindsight, she thinks the process is long and really tests whether or not you will stick with it for the long haul in adding precious souls to your home.
“It is a long ongoing process that takes a lot of patience, and in hindsight I think part of the process is to weed out people who don’t have the fortitude and patience and to say, ‘This is an important aspect of our family’s life. We’re going to cut back on our work hours. We’re going to rearrange our home. We’re going to maybe change churches in order to go to a church that is friendly toward orphan care and will treat children with open arms and be supportive of a family who is undergoing the stress of orphan care.”
McMinn said that if parents are called to it and they embrace the fires that come with adopting a child, they will see how Jesus walks with them in the fire.
“If people will embrace it; I say that when the three men were in the fiery furnace, Jesus went into the fire with them. He didn’t pull them out. He went in with them, and that’s what He does for Christians, I believe, who decide to adopt whether it’s internationally or privately or the child welfare system here in the United States.”
Daniel 3:25 says, “He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”
McMinn talked about how adoption is a powerful way of showing the redemption Christ Jesus brings.
“Well, we serve a great God who has redemption in mind, and I feel like it is a huge call for Christians to provide care for children in the child welfare system, because, first of all, they can learn about Jesus through you. They can also learn they were created for a purpose; they have great hope if they turn to the Savior, and their background does not define them. It adds to their story. It complicates their lives, but their hope is in Plan B with Christ in foster care or with their adoptive family because Plan A failed with their birth parents. Our big God is a big Redeemer. That’s the entire reason He sent His Son.”
McMinn said that though it is hard, there are so many redeeming elements to adoptions and joyful experiences for these children.
“When you work with children who have been so traumatized that they are unable to receive love, they spew hatred in your face because they don’t know how to express their emotions in any other way. But yet the next day they can be laughing and having fun with you on the jungle gym or enjoying a park or getting to go to a restaurant as a family which they’ve never been able to do, going to the zoo. All the cultural enrichment things that we as middle class Americans, including Christians, enjoy, these children have not been exposed to.”
McMinn said that even at bedtime, she has seen the joy that God has given one of her adoptive children, through the whole time of showering her with the love of Christ.
“I have a 17-year-old daughter who sleeps with the lights on, because something in her past traumatized her at night, but she goes to sleep with a smile on her face and gives me a hug, which for years she was not able to give me a hug, and she can receive a hug back from me. That is the redemptive love of Christ.”
Praise God for Christian families who are able to show the love of God for the fatherless as Psalm 68:5 describes our God. “Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in His holy habitation.”
McMinn talked about the challenges of international adoptions, having friends who had adopted internationally.
“I have never adopted internationally, but I have friends who have. One of the things about adopting internationally is that you may or may not get a lot of facts about the child. You may not know much about them when they come to live with you. They might have witnessed a lot of war, violence, poverty. You have to help them embrace a Christian capitalist lifestyle, which can be great if they love McDonalds, but it can be really hard if they’re not used to rules and routine.”
McMinn said there are similarities in domestic adoptions.
“On a similar basis, child welfare, foster care, and adoption; kids have come out of really hard places, maybe domestic violence or severe neglect which is even worse than abuse. They’ve not been taught how to use the restroom or to have social skills and manners or how to eat properly. I remember when we first got our one set of siblings the first meal we had with them, they literally grabbed their food off their plate and gulped it down in two seconds because they did not know where their next meal was coming from, and that can also be said of foreign adoptions.”
McMinn said that with international adoptions there is not much follow-up after the adoption, but foster care adoptions have more follow-up.
“Foreign adoptions have a long lead up to them, and then, once they’re consummated, you’re kind of on your own. With domestic adoptions, there is a long lead up, and there’s also a long follow up. I think that is good, and I think with domestic adoptions you’re offered Medicaid for your children, and you can accept that based on your income level. If you live very modestly, you are often offered a subsidy which can help pay the extra food and things that you’re going to be burdened with for the blessing of caring for the children.”
McMinn said that each person who wants to adopt should really seek the Lord as to whether they should pursue an international adoption or a domestic one.
McMinn encouraged those looking into adoption to be ready to change their lives drastically to welcome in a new member.
“Be ready to really slow down their life, to embrace a child, who really knows nothing of your life together as a family. So whether that’s through child welfare or international, there’s different things that happen and occur. Of course, with domestic adoptions, hopefully everybody is speaking English, and that’s better communication. A lot of kids are so delayed in their speaking skills and in their conversational and relationship skills, that if you can at least have a language in common, that’s going to really be helpful to you.”
McMinn also addressed the concern of being investigated by social services.
“If you’re a conservative, you take Ronald Reagan’s approach. If someone from the government is here to help, they’re not going to be helpful. But, on the other hand, people that work for child welfare have the best interest of children and families in mind. They may be jaded because they’ve worked with such a dysfunctional people. So what our family tried to do is that we just tried to be real and we tried to be honest. I think any case worker wants to enter a home and see that there is peace and not chaos, that there is organization over clutter, and that parents maybe are already experienced parents, or they’re willing to learn more. They’re willing to be flexible and to be teachable.”
McMinn said that when the case worker interviewed their children, they encouraged them to be truthful.
“We prompted our kids and said that the case worker is going to interview you individually and these are some questions he or she might ask you. They just want to know if we’re a loving family that wants to welcome more children into our home and how you feel about it. And if you have concerns it’s perfectly fine to voice those concerns.”
McMinn said that even if you don’t have the best case worker, it can give Christians an opportunity to show the grace of God and patience.
“But you can show them the grace of God and be patient and let them know that you are for them and not against them, just like you’re for the child and not against the child.”
The World View asked McMinn to share her heart about what are the right motivations for adoption.
“Any Christian could adopt a child, but I think if you have a few qualities it really helps. I think, first of all, that if you’re a single person, then make sure you have some other family, relative, or friends that can help you because you will need a break. If you’re a married couple, you both need to be on the same page. There are a lot of wives that would like to adopt children, because they have a heart for kids. But the husbands are not on board. And so that wife needs to pray for her husband to come on board and not proceed further.”
McMinn encouraged those considering adoption that the whole family needs to be in it together.
“When a couple is on board, then if they have other biological children, then they need to make sure those kids understand what’s going on and that they are seen as a team. So that they have ‘buy in’ to the situation. Kids will have doubts. ‘Well, I don’t want to share mommy and daddy with someone else. I don’t want to share my room. I’m afraid I won’t get enough attention.’ And what we always told our kids is that love exponentially multiplies. It’s not that Mom and Dad have only so much love, divided by four kids. We have exponential love that multiples with the more children that we have.’’
McMinn said that it is such a good thing to be humble and teachable as you enter the adoption journey and that you need to be willing to really invest in learning more about children and how to love them well. She also said that flexibility is key for adoptive parents.
“So you have to be teachable. You also have to be super, super, super flexible, because even though you have a plan, God may have a different plan.”
McMinn ended by encouraging Christian parents who adopt to be constant in prayer because it is a spiritual battle.
“The most important thing for Christian parents to understand is that it is a spiritual battle. You are receiving into your home most likely children who did not have the foundation of a Christian home. Therefore, they were in the realm of the enemy. They were his. And now, through the blood of Christ, we’re claiming them to be with Jesus and with our family. And Satan does not like that. He’s our adversary. He’s out to seek and to kill and to destroy. The biggest battle of all is Sunday morning. I mean, I think that’s true in a lot of families anyway. But when you are doing foster care and adoption, and Sunday morning rolls around, and your kids are being so horrible, or their words are so inappropriate, you’re thinking, ‘I cannot take them to my nice, conservative Christian church, so we’re just going to stay home today.’ Well, that’s the last thing you should do. If you go nowhere else the entire week, you need to go to church on Sunday morning. Because those kids needs to hear the word of God. You need to hear the Word of God. They need to be filled with the Holy Spirit that is in the sanctuary. And they need to see that their mom and dad worship the God of all creation who created them for a purpose and wants to redeem their lives.”
May your heart be filled with the glory of your own adoption into Jesus’ family as you’ve listened to these words from Shari McMinn.
1 Peter 2:9 says, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”
Stay tuned throughout November’s National Adoption month for more soundbites from McMinn in honor of taking care of the orphans that God has put in our midst.
This has been a World View Special Report. I’m Adam McManus.
Print stories
Jerusalem Mayor’s Race: Secular vs. Torah Believer
A secular candidate for Jerusalem’s mayor is running against a conservative backed by ultra-Orthodox rabbis in a race to determine the balance of power between the holy city’s Jewish communities, reports The Telegraph.
Secular Jerusalemites and their ultra-Orthodox neighbors have tussled for years over the role of religion in city government, leading to cultural battles over everything from homosexual pride parades to which restaurants can open on the Sabbath.
The debate has become more fraught as the ultra-Orthodox population has grown due to high birth rates, with the average ultra-Orthodox woman having seven children compared to three in the general Israeli population.
Top Democrats Not Eager to Impeach Trump
While impeaching Donald Trump may be the dream of some Democrats like Maxine Waters of California, party leaders poised to take control of the House of Representatives won’t go there even after the president ousted Attorney General Jeff Sessions, reports Bloomberg.
Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No 2 House Democrat, said, “Now is not the time to consider impeachment. Special Counsel [Robert] Mueller must be allowed to complete his investigation.”
Instead, the leaders are emphasizing that once they gain control of House committees they’ll use their power to call hearings and issue subpoenas to investigate possible Trump campaign collusion with Russia and whether the president is seeking to obstruct justice.
Allan Lichtman, a history professor at American University who wrote a book titled “The Case for Impeachment”, said, “This is the time to show some steel in the Democratic backbone.”
Michelle Obama: I Tried to Block out Trump Election Victory
Former first lady Michelle Obama blasts President Donald Trump in her new book Becoming, writing how she reacted in shock the night she learned he would replace her husband in the Oval Office and tried to “block it all out”, reports the Associated Press.
At times, she feared she was damaging her husband’s 2008 presidential campaign, especially after conservatives seized on a line from one of her speeches that for the first time as an adult she was “really proud” of her country.
Florida Governor and Senator Races Going to Recount
Three statewide races in Florida are heading for recounts, reports TheHill.com.
The most closely watched recount is the Senate race between incumbent Democrat Senator Bill Nelson and Florida’s Republican Gov. Rick Scott, who currently carries a narrow lead of roughly 12,500 votes.
The race for Florida governor is also heading to a recount after unofficial results showed Republican Ron DeSantis leading Democrat Andrew Gillum by 80,000 votes.
The other one is the race for Commissioner of Agriculture.