It’s Thursday, January 26th, A.D. 2023. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard at www.TheWorldview.com. I’m Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com)
By Jonathan Clark
100,000 Armenian Christians facing genocide
Over 100,000 Armenian Christians are facing a humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh, a landlocked region between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Last month, Azerbaijani protestors blocked the only road into the region, cutting off the area from food, supplies, and medicine.
Christian aid and humanitarian organizations signed a joint statement of concern, warning conditions are now present for genocide.
The statement said, “The current Azerbaijani aggression against the Armenians of Nagorno Karabakh conforms to a long pattern of ethnic and religious cleansing of Armenian and other Christian communities in the region.”
Japan facing population crisis
Japan’s prime minister issued a dire warning to the country’s lawmakers on Monday regarding their population crisis.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said it is “Now or never when it comes to policies regarding births and child-rearing. … Japan is standing on the verge of whether we can continue to function as a society.”
Japan has the second highest proportion of people aged 65 or older of any country in the world. And their births last year fell below 800,000 for the first time.
Kishida hopes to double funding for child-related programs as the nation of 125 million faces demographic decline.
Psalm 127:3-5 says, “Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from Him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one’s youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them.”
Canada drops charges against pastor who held “drive-in” services during COVID lockdown
Last Monday, prosecutors in Canada dropped charges against an Ontario pastor for holding worship services during COVID-19 lockdowns.
Pastor Henry Hildebrandt led his congregation in drive-in services during a stay-at-home period in 2021. Police gave him an $800 ticket, claiming he did not have the right to do this despite there being exceptions for drive-in religious services.
Hildebrandt said, “There comes a time when we as Christians have to stand for what is right regardless if it is popular.”
Acts 5:29 says, “We must obey God rather than men.”
Connection between decline in church attendance and despair deaths
The National Bureau of Economic Research released a new study on the connection between declining American church attendance and despair deaths.
Deaths by drugs, alcohol, and suicide are known as deaths of despair.
The researchers wrote, “We show that the initial rise in deaths of despair in the US was preceded by a large decline in organized religious participation … states with high levels of religiosity have suffered less from mortality due to alcohol, suicides, or drug poisonings. … The impact that we witness seems to be driven by the decline in formal religious participation. … These results underscore the importance of cultural institutions, such as religious establishments, in promoting well-being.”
Dept. of Justice arrested two pro-abortion vandals
The U.S. Justice Department announced yesterday it finally arrested abortion activists following hundreds of attacks on churches and pro-life centers last year.
A federal grand jury indicted 27-year-old Caleb Freestone and 23-year-old Amber Smith-Stewart for vandalizing pregnancy centers in Florida. The two of them spray-painted threats on the centers including, “If abortions aren’t safe, than neither are you,” “YOUR TIME IS UP!!,” and “WE’RE COMING for U.”
If convicted, they could face up to 12 years in prison and fines of up to $350,000.
Ecclesiastes 8:11 says, “Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil.”
The monarch butterfly reflects God’s creativity
Have you ever seen the tiny yet beautiful monarch butterfly and marveled at the colors and the grace of this little creature?
Kayla White, the author of the 78-page hardback entitled Melody: A Monarch Miracle, captured the dramatic transformation from caterpillar to butterfly with vivid pictures and detailed descriptions.
Stay tuned for a Worldview Special Report immediately following the newscast.
A slight increase in U.S. children living with married mom and dad
And finally, a report from the Institute for Family Studies identified a positive trend for families following the COVID-19 pandemic.
The share of children living in a married, two-parent household is up slightly.
The percentage of kids living in intact families fell from over 85% in the 1960s to under 65% by the 2010s. However, that proportion has increased by about 1.5 percentage points since 2014.
The report noted, “All in all, the decline in intact families in America appears to have bottomed out for now. The reasons for this are many [including] declining divorce and falling nonmarital fertility.”
Close
And that’s The Worldview in 5 Minutes on this Thursday, January 26th in the year of our Lord 2023. Subscribe by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldview.com. Or get the Generations app through Google Play or The App Store. I’m Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldview.com). Seize the day for Jesus Christ.
A Worldview Special Report: A closer look at the monarch butterfly
Time now for a Worldview Special Report by Emily Munday. I’m Adam McManus
Have you ever wondered how a monarch butterfly came to be?
The Worldview spoke to Kayla White, the author and photographer of Melody: A Monarch Miracle about this glorious representation of God’s creation.
WHITE: “One of the things I learned about the wonder of who God is through writing Melody is that the Lord can create a very ‘simple’ creature, yet it can confound the smartest human minds on Earth. The monarch alone displays enough of the genius of our Creator to keep men busy mining the depths of His design for literally decades. We still don’t understand or know everything there is to know about the monarch!”
She marvels at the intricate details which God fashioned in the monarch butterfly.
WHITE: “One of my favorite surprising facts about the monarch butterfly is that parts of the butterfly such as its wings proboscis (what it uses to drink nectar), and eyes actually start growing inside the caterpillar. We call them imaginal discs at this stage, and they finish developing inside the chrysalis.”
Taking the photographs of the monarch butterfly’s transformation herself transformed White spiritually.
WHITE: “Taking pictures of the butterflies taught me more patience—I had to wait for quite a while to get some of the pictures, especially of the butterfly emerging from the chrysalis. Taking pictures of each stage of the butterfly’s lifecycle also illustrated the power of prayer to me again.
“I had several friends praying for me and the chrysalis that is used in the book as I worked on getting the pictures. It only takes a few minutes for the butterfly to emerge, so I had a very short window to get good photographs. The lighting and focus must be exactly right for them to turn out well since I only had one chance!”
She said that she wanted to convey the power of God to children through her documentation of this tiny butterfly with a four-inch wingspan.
WHITE: “One thing I want to convey to children about God is His power to create something from nothing, to make a new creation. He is the God who works miracles. Watching the caterpillar form a chrysalis is something unlike anything I’ve ever seen—it literally completely changes form before your eyes, with the change being fully completed once it emerges as a butterfly.
“A beautiful butterfly that flies thousands of miles and drinks nectar is so completely different from a worm that can’t travel very far, inches around, and spends its whole life chewing on leaves. It really is truly a miracle.”
White revealed how she captured the vivid pictures of the butterflies.
WHITE: “I use a variety of methods for photographing the butterflies at the various stages of development. Most of my pictures of the egg, the larval, and the pupal stages come from raising them in captivity. I captured the caterpillar as it emerged from the egg while indoors because the egg is so small that the only possible way obtain such shots is by being in a very still environment.
“I bring the caterpillars to special photography sites once they start molting or forming a chrysalis to capture those stages. The easiest way I’ve found to photograph the butterflies is to take a few pictures just after releasing them into the wild.”
Pick up a copy of Kayla White’s 78-page hardback book entitled Melody: A Monarch Miracle. It’s on sale this week for $16.14.
This has been a Worldview Special Report. I’m Adam McManus.