Friday, February 12th, in the year of our Lord, 2016.
By Kevin Swanson
More reports are surfacing that Sudan is cracking down on Christian churches. Two Sudanese pastors have completely disappeared after authorities arrested them in Khartoum. The only Christian bookstore has been shut down, and foreign Christian workers have been deported, according to World Watch Monitor. Pastors Rasa and Taour apparently have been in the hands of Sudan’s National Intelligence and Security Service since early December.
The Lord told us, “The gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”
Only 1.4% of English citizens attend services in the Anglican Church on the Lord’s Day. Attendance fell another 3% last year, with 1% of that involving deaths of members. Meanwhile, the Bishop of London and the Cardinal of the Catholic Church in England and Wales have announced a reconciliation of the Catholic and Anglican Churches. The Catholics worshipped in the Chapel of Henry VIII for the first time in 450 years. Bishop of London Richard Chartres said, “We are living in a post-denominational era,” and the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby said the church is being affected by an “anti-Christian culture.”
The Oregon standoff is over. The four remaining protesters turned themselves into agents peacefully yesterday after a 41-day holdout on federal lands in eastern Oregon. One of the protesters was acting hysterical at times according to news reports, using the word “hell” in a profane way during the surrender. All four were taken into custody.
A Mexican prison riot caused by rival gangs and the ensuing fire have left 52 inmates dead and 12 more injured, according to Reuters. Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission has reported that over half of Mexico’s most populated prisons are controlled by the inmates, rather than state officials.
We remind Mexico that every person should be subject to the governing authorities: “For there is no authority except from God . . . But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer” (Romans 13).
Suicides are up 13% among young people, and Dr. Keith Ablow from Fox News believes that it is due to disconnection from reality using social media and electronic forms of entertainment. If people already are escaping reality through media, there will be fewer psychological hurdles to suicide.
Chelsea Clinton, Bill and Hillary Clinton’s daughter, said that she left a Baptist church as a six-year-old child because the church spoke to the issue of Abortion. She said, “I left the Baptist church before my dad did.” Six years old! Chelsea says that she was raised a Methodist.
Donald Trump and Senator Ted Cruz are walking away with the evangelical vote in the primaries. Trump took 27% of self-identified born-again Christians and Cruz took 23%, according to a CNN exit poll. In Iowa, Cruz took 33% and Trump took 21% of the evangelical vote. Now the question is, “Will the evangelicals show up at the polls in South Carolina?” The World View spoke with Daniel Horowitz, the senior editor for the Conservative Review. He’s thinking that Ted Cruz will take South Carolina next week: “I believe Cruz . . . just a cursory glance . . . has the best ground game and the best appeal. If you look at the Iowa exit poll, and even New Hampshire, Cruz always wins on values—who shared your values the most. It’s one of the more overlooked aspects of the New Hampshire polling, so when you extrapolate that to South Carolina where you have 3 times as many evangelicals in more of a conservative state, he should be in pretty good shape there.”
Blue chip stocks dropped another 254 points Thursday, and the gold market is taking off. London’s ATS Bullion reports its best week since 2012, with customers lining up around the block to buy gold.
A knife attack at a General Motors plant could have yielded far worse circumstances, had it not been for a registered gun owner pulling his firearm. Didarul Sarder pulled his gun on the attacker and held her at bay until police arrived. Sarder was ordered off the property and thinks that he may lose his job for his pains. The victim is recovering from multiple wounds at a local hospital, according to The Blaze.
Scientists have confirmed the existence of gravitational energy waves, formed during the collision of two black holes. Using a $1.1 billion instrument, Caltech and the Ligo Collaboration have confirmed Einstein’s prediction of gravitational waves. Some call it “ripples in the fabric of space-time.” These collisions make for the most energetic events in the universe . . . a manifestation of the power of Almighty God. That’s an explosion equal to 100 quintillion earths filled with TNT. The lesson here . . . Fear God.
And that’s the World View in Five Minutes.