Here’s some more info on what’s going on in The Gambia, and a reminder to keep our friend Joanne/Ajissun, her fellow workers, and the entire country in prayer.
” Gambian president-elect Adama Barrow was to take power Thursday, capping weeks of tension over Yahya Jammeh’s refusal to quit which has seen Senegalese and Nigerian troops massing at the border and tourists racing to leave.
With Senegalese troops backed by Nigerian forces and fighter jets gathering, the country appeared on the brink of a military crisis although the army chief insisted his soldiers would not get involved in a “political dispute” nor prevent foreign forces from entering The Gambia.
Despite a midnight (0000 GMT) deadline for the expiry of Jammeh’s term, the situation remained calm in the city overnight, witnesses said following a last-minute mediation attempt by the Mauritanian president.
Jammeh, who has ruled the former British colony with an iron fist for 22 years, initially acknowledged Barrow as the victor in December elections, but later rejected the result, this week declaring a national state of emergency.
With the country in deadlock, hundreds of panicked tourists were rushing to leave after Britain and the Netherlands issued travel warnings, with the small airport near Banjul struggling to handle the influx.
Although Barrow is holed up in Senegal until he can cross the border safely, officials insisted his inauguration would go ahead but there were no immediate details.”
“Senegal’s army spokesman said on Wednesday that its forces are at the Gambian border and will enter at midnight if the veteran president, Yahya Jammeh, refuses to relinquish power.
Jammeh, who lost a Dec. 1 election to opposition leader Adama Barrow, said he would not step down, citing irregularities in the vote. His mandate ends at midnight (midnight GMT).
“We are ready and are awaiting the deadline at midnight. If no political solution is found, we will step in,” said Colonel Abdou Ndiaye, speaking for the Senegalese army.
The Nigerian Air Force said it had deployed to Senegal in case it was needed. Nigeria is part of the West African bloc ECOWAS, which has threatened Jammeh with sanctions or military intervention if he does not step down.
Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo said in a statement Ghana would send 205 combat troops to Gambia as part of a regional mission to enable President-elect Barrow to be sworn in.
Senegal’s statement raised the prospect of armed confrontation between forces loyal to the president, who has ruled Gambia for 22 years, and Senegal, which surrounds the tiny riverside country on three sides.
Senegal circulated a draft resolution to the 15-member U.N. Security Council that would give “full support to the ECOWAS in its commitment to take all necessary measures to ensure the respect of the will of the people of The Gambia”.
Halifa Sallah, spokesman for Barrow, told a news conference at a Banjul beachside hotel surrounded by palm trees that the coalition “did not want to go to power stepping over dead bodies.”
Addressing Jammeh, he said: “The end has come. Accept it.”
Re Michelle’s first link @12:47 yesterday (linked at the bottom)—
I do not condone abuses, but Israel usually conducts itself well. I do not see the necessity of a 2 state solution—I would leave that up to Israel for the most part, as it is a security issue. From a purely practical view, Palestinians are Arabs and there are already plenty of relatively secure Arab nations for them. There is only one Jewish state. I support the nation of Israel in their struggle for a reasonably secure existence, and I want my country to be generally supportive also..
I thought the second essay was the best. And this sums it up pretty well:
The UN resolution Kerry defended assumes Jews should depart from the West Bank—ancient Samaria—where they have lived uninterruptedly for 3,000 years. It’s as unreasonable as insisting that no Arabs can reside in Judea or Galilee, regions where most Jews are happy to live alongside 2 million Arab-Israeli citizens. (Jordan illegally occupied this area in 1948 as its “West Bank,” but formally returned it to Israeli control in 1988.) Just as the world would protest if Jews were to ban Arabs from living elsewhere in Israel, it is a policy of judenrein (Jew-free space) that Christians should forever reject.
That being said, the US is not responsible for Israel’s safety. Israel doesn’t belong to us and they are not our responsibility; they are God’s. I do not think He is finished with them, nor will He be until the end of days. In other words, I do not believe they were simply a conduit for the Messiah—they were and continue to be a type of picture of what He is doing in the earth. He blesses and He punishes as He sees fit. In no way do I pretend to know what His purposes are regarding Israel, but I just would not want my country to be in the middle of that transaction—particularly if negative. No good comes of being an instrument of punishment to Israel.
Ricky, now that poverty has been reduced so dramatically, presumably these countries have the capacity to continue with their economic growth without the artificial support of the captive American market.
Ten years ago, I had trouble finding anything at all that was made in the USA. It is getting easier now that the demand for USA produced products is growing. Of course I still purchase things made in other countries, but as a citizen of the US, I insist on there being a choice of basic goods that are American made vs foreign made.
Free trade is not artificial support. Other countries buy products from the US AND EACH OTHER just as they sell to the US AND EACH OTHER. However, if Trump shuts off or reduces US trade, the rest of the world will continue their economic growth by continuing to trade with each other. Reagan inspired free markets to open up around the world. However, the vast majority of the free trade that produced so much wealth and reduced so much poverty is between countries other than the US.
Not only are other countries not responsible for our problems, we are not responsible for their successes except that Reagan and Milton Friedman showed them the way.
Friedman’s Free to Choose (1980) is a great little paperback that is available on Amazon. I read the book during the 1980 campaign. It took me years to accept some of what Friedman taught, but the book forever changed the way I view economic and public policy issues.
I can see that China has already begun to talk of environmental remediation. However, the American population has already experienced that stage of growth and has protections both for the environment and for our food. The US gov’t policies have allowed products to be sold here that do not reflect either the safety mechanisms or the cost, and therefore have in effect subsidized China’s growth over that of the US.
I am not dogmatic about End Time issues. It is interesting that our Middle East views are often tied tightly to our eschatology. I stopped being dogmatic on eschatology when I learned that dispensationalism with its concept of “the Rapture” and its view of Israel is less than 250 years old.
On The Real’s links, Jammeh has antagonized most of the surrounding West African countries in one way or another. The one thing that is of concern is that if Senegal interferes, Jammeh may try to use that to sway enough public opinion to his side. The Gambians are mostly of the same ethnic tribes as the Senegalese, and speak the same tribal languages, but there is a real cultural difference born of the fact that Senegal was a French colony and The Gambia was a British colony – the French and the British had very different methods in creating local government, with the French removing local leaders and replacing them with their own choice and the British leaving local leaders in place and working with them. In the 1980s, the two countries tried to make a coalition, and it didn’t work. Jammeh may make this about maintaining Gambian independence, in which case things could go very wrong indeed. Senegal has a much larger force than The Gambia and is the wealthier country, but it has it own problems with rebels in the south part of Senegal.
Ricky, the Rapture is big business, and it’s big theology around here. My father’s denomination has always been rapture/end of days oriented. I have openly rejected an *undue emphasis* on eschatology as damaging. I know people who will not go to church or acknowledge God because they say they were “scared” as children by unbalanced and terrifying descriptions of rapture abandonment. I sympathize with that, and it’s a shame because God is so gracious and merciful.
My background probably informs much of my thinking about Israel as a country. It is possible that my views on the subject are less dogma and more superstition. But either way, I do see a place for Israel, and respect their right to self-determination in their historic, God-given land.
Debra @ 10:33 We grew up in the same culture and on eschatology we are at about the same place. If we reach some agreement on trade, we may have nothing interesting to argue about.
Debra, I grew up among family who were (and still are) strongly dispensationalist. What changed that for me was reading the Bible for myself, especially in Galatians and Ephesians, where Paul makes clear that the old covenant is completely finished and only through Christ can Jew or Gentile come to God. In other words, there is nothing that is any more special being born a Jew than any other ethnicity. Recall that Paul was a Jew, and he was writing to Gentiles, telling them that he was no better than they were. The historical interpretation of Old Testament visions like Daniel’s 70 weeks, which are now labeled eschatological, was that Daniel’s vision was completely fulfilled by Christ’s death and resurrection, and then the subsequent destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.
The whole creation of modern Israel was always a case of foreign interference. In some ways, its creation has simply been a continuation of the anti-Semitism which keeps cropping up in the West. The countries of the West still didn’t want the Jews, but they were revolted by what happened in the Holocaust. So they decided to artificially revive the nation of Israel. Only, the British had, during the war, also made promises to the Palestinian inhabitants [they are not all necessarily of Arabic descent, though they may speak Arabic – for example, Saladin, who reconquered the area from the Crusaders, was Kurdish, and before the spread of the Islamic empires, the Byzantines had possession of the area] who had lived there for the nearly two millennia since Rome destroyed Jerusalem and carried away its inhabitants to slavery. So the brand new U.N. decided on a compromise, granting territories to both the Jews and to Palestinians. They fulfilled the first grant, but never the second. The areas in which the Palestinians live were supposed to be their state. So from the beginning of the modern state of Israel, the two state solution was supposed to be the solution, but politics and conflict have prevented it from happening.
Mobilization is underway for the big women’s march Saturday in L.A. — where Jane Fonda and others will make appearances. They’re expecting 70,000. Van pools and parking strategies are being plotted on FB.
I wonder what Friday’s inauguration will bring? LA schools have jumped into it all as well, led by teachers upset by Trump’s win. So much of this (over) reaction strikes me as unprecedented, at least in our lifetime. Strange days.
Do you believe the Scriptures teach that OT Israel is the NT Church? If so, in what sense? Do you believe God’s promises and blessings for Israel that have yet to be fulfilled have somehow been transferred to the Church? Given what you’ve said about Daniel’s vision, do you believe that the events of Mt 24 have already been fulfilled?
Before 1948, the word ‘Palestinians’ was used for Arabs and Jews living in the land of Palestine. It wasn’t until after Israel was born as a nation that the ‘Palestinian’ people claimed an identity and an ethnicity that they had never claimed before. The concept of a future Palestinian state would consist of people who are not content to live peacefully in the nation of Israel. The idea is that the new state would actually be a Jew-free state. Why should we support carving out a new state along ethnic lines?
Aside from what happened at the UN, do you not believe that there weren’t Biblical prophecies that Israel would become an independent nation?
Tychichus, I’m not Roscuro, and she is better versed in world events than I am, but it seems to me that modern day Israel is not God bringing them into the land. Further, the New Testament makes very clear that the promised to Abraham find their fulfillment in Christ. I know of no promises to Israel that remain unfulfilled other than that Christ will someday return for His bride–which consists of Israel as well as the Jewish people who believe in Him.
I mean, of course, “Gentile believers” as well as Jewish believers. I was trying to finish my sentence since my husband was ready for me to make him lunch. 🙂
On budget cuts, eventually the federal government will only be able to afford to pay for four types of expenditures:
1. National defense;
2. Benefits “due” to the participants under the twin Ponzi schemes of Social Security and Medicare;
3. Just enough welfare (of all types) to keep the recipients from burning down the cities; and
4. Interest on the national debt.
“How does “fake news” travel around the nation and the world? First, a source has to publish false stories, and then like-minded people already inclined to believe it have to transmit it through other sites and social media. In fact, as T. Becket Adams and Mollie Hemingway both point out today, it looks something like … this:”
“All of this comes from a passage in a New York Times article about Rick Perry, one that uses one quote from an energy lobbyist to paint the incoming Secretary of Energy as ignorant of the actual job, without any other corroborating direct evidence or testimony. Supposedly Perry just thought he’d be an ambassador for American energy production:
When President-elect Donald J. Trump offered Rick Perry the job of energy secretary five weeks ago, Mr. Perry gladly accepted, believing he was taking on a role as a global ambassador for the American oil and gas industry that he had long championed in his home state. In the days after, Mr. Perry, the former Texas governor, discovered that he would be no such thing — that in fact, if confirmed by the Senate, he would become the steward of a vast national security complex he knew almost nothing about, caring for the most fearsome weapons on the planet, the United States’ nuclear arsenal. …
“If you asked him on that first day he said yes, he would have said, ‘I want to be an advocate for energy,’” Michael McKenna. “If you asked him now, he’d say, ‘I’m serious about the challenges facing the nuclear complex.’ It’s been a learning curve.”
The only other testimony to the proposition that Perry “misunderstood” the job he accepted comes from a poli-sci professor at Southern Methodist University, who complained about Perry’s qualifications:”
“Let’s get back to their single source for Perry’s supposed ignorance. As both Hemingway and Adams point out, McKenna wasn’t even around when Perry got the appointment in December, having left the transition team on November 16th — eight days after the election. In fact, as a quick scan of our own archives shows, Perry didn’t meet with the transition team until December 12th, four weeks after McKenna’s departure, and was appointed the next day.
Therefore, it’s impossible for McKenna to have been a source for Perry’s assumptions either during the meeting or at the appointment. Even without that knowledge, though, it’s clear from the quote that it’s only McKenna speculating on Perry’s state of mind, not actual testimony. “If you asked him on that first day” is nowhere near “I spoke to him on that first day,” or “He told Trump on that first day …” It’s McKenna projecting himself into Perry’s mind.”
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But you know most won’t, because like the dishonest Hollywood stars who promised to run off to foreign lands if Trump won, they rarely keep their word. 😦
“Last October, during the heat of the election, we looked at a survey of federal employees which claimed that 35% of them were actively considering leaving their jobs if Donald J. Trump were to be elected president. At the time I had reservations about how serious this trend was because partisans tend to say all sorts of things during a contentious race. (Just recall all the celebrities who were supposedly fleeing the country during that same period and yet we’re still stuck with every last one of them.) But now the deed has been done and it’s time for everyone to put their resignation letter where their mouth is.
Have things changed? According to the latest rendition of the same survey, not very much. There are still more than a quarter of current federal workers who claim they’re looking toward the exits. And the primary reason given is that they object to Donald Trump’s declared plans to implement a federal hiring freeze and reduce the workforce. (Government Executive)
Less than two-thirds of the federal workforce is firmly committed to staying on the job following the election of Donald Trump as president, according to a new survey.
More than one in four federal workers, or 28 percent, will definitely or possibly consider leaving their jobs after Jan. 20 when Trump is sworn into office and becomes leader of the executive branch, according to a new Government Business Council/GovExec.com poll. Sixty-five percent of feds say they will not consider ending their federal service…
For those who opt to leave government, their jobs could remain vacant for an extended period of time as Trump has vowed to freeze hiring across agencies immediately upon taking office. Just 15 percent of feds said they hold a positive view of that proposed policy, while 67 percent expressed a negative view.
So let me get this straight. You object to Donald Trump’s plan to reduce the federal workforce, so you’re going to protest that policy by… reducing the federal workforce for him?
Well, okay then. Thanks for your service, I guess…”
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😆 😆
rw: I know that you don’t watch films from this generation, but I wonder if you heard of a film from last year called Free State of Jones (Matthew McConaughey). It’s about Newt Knight and the “Soutern Yankees,” set in Miss. during the Civil War and Reconstruction. It didn’t do well at the box office, but I just saw it and found it quite interesting, as I didn’t know that story.
Tychicus, I have heard about the movie. The reports I got are that it is biased against our people and made a hero out of an adulterer and a murderer.
I prefer Gods and Generals which gave an excellent portrayal of Stonewall Jackson’s spiritual life and was extremely historically accurate. For inaccurate but fun movies about that period, I like Belle Starr, Bandit Queen and Santa Fe Trail, both from the early 1940s.
Tych, in an attempt to answer your questions: First, no, if you mean in the sense of what is sometimes called replacement theology, where there are equivalents drawn, for example, between circumcision of children in the old covenant, and baptism of infants in the new covenant (I am of a Baptist persuasion after all 🙂 ). My family’s church recently had a pastor who would refer to the “Old Testament church”, and it annoyed me every time he used the phrase. I simply take what is written in Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, and Hebrews to conclude that the Old Covenant is finished. The Church is not a replacement of Israel. Rather the New Covenant extended to people from every tongue, tribe, and nation, because the original promise to Abraham was that in his seed, all nations, not just the line of Isaac, would be blessed (Galatians 3:16-17). Christ was not a High Priest from the Levitical line of the law given to Moses; he was a High Priest of the order of Melchizideck, King of Salem (Hebrews 7). The writer of Hebrews calls Christ’s New Covenant better and greater than the Old Covenant. Those who are of Jewish ethnic origin must come through the narrow gate of Christ, and there is a sense in which all of us who come through that gate must lay aside our nationality and ethnicity. They are things which are only temporal, and they cannot stand in the way of the love that Christians are to show to one another (Ephesians 2:11-18).
On Matthew 24, there were two question that the disciples asked Christ, and he gave them two answers. The first, about the destruction of the temple, happened in 70 A.D. – there was indeed not one stone left upon another, as what is now called the Wailing Wall was merely a retaining wall. The second, about Christ’s coming, has yet to be fulfilled. We see a similar blending of near and far prophecy in Isaiah chapter 7, where the promise that Judah would be delivered from Samaria and Damascus is combined with a promise of the coming Messiah. The deliverance happened immediately, while it would be several hundred years before the Messiah came.
On the question regarding the Palestinians, it is interesting to think of the patterns of movement of people in the world and how natural human reactions never change. I feel for the Jewish people, who were constantly made unwelcome in the West, being told to go back to where they came from; I have sometimes heard similar statements come from First Nations (Native American) people to those of us of European descent. I also have some understanding of the Palestinian perspective, since I see the negative reaction of some of those already living in North America to recent waves of immigration. Humans are contradictory, sometimes we tell the established inhabitants to accept the newcomers, sometimes we side with the established inhabitants against the newcomers – it all depends on our own biases and opinions. In the case of the Palestinians, they were lied to and double crossed by the West, which didn’t endear them to the people who came from the West to their shores. Also, the exclusivity critique cuts both ways. There is within Israel as racist and ultra-nationalist a group as any far right organization can produce, who consider the Jews as a master race having divine birthright to the land. Such people had and have no desire to allow the Palestinians or other non-Jewish people to become a part of Israel – even groups like the Ethiopian Jews, whose ethnic origins are murky, are unwelcome to those who are looking for a pure Israel (and forget conversion to Christianity, that is a betrayal of one’s Jewish identity). If the Palestinians were to agree to become a part of Israel, there would be many in Israel who would reject them. I don’t agree with either party of exclusivity; my case for two states is based on the premise that two states were promised and the promise should be kept (see my post from yesterday on the subject).
On the final question, no, I do not think there are prophecies looking forward to a reestablishment of the earthly nation of Israel. One day, the earthly land of Israel will be destroyed with the rest of the world and a new heaven and earth will be made. The New Jerusalem of that new creation is the Bride of Christ, which is the Church (Revelation 21:2, Ephesians 5:32).
My wife and I watched Ronald Reagan and Errol Flynn in Santa Fe Trail on an independent TV station in Washington, DC the night before Reagan’s first inauguration in 1981. Those were happy times.
If you just think about how muslim “Palestinians” treat Jewish Israelis, a two state “solution” doesn’t seem reasonable. Eventually there will be a war the Palestinians will lose. “To the conqueror go the spoils.”
Theere were 2 tanks driving toward each other. They ran into each other. The top of the Arab tank popped open and the tankers jumped out with their hands up. “We give up! We give up!” The top of the Israeli tank popped up and the Israeli tankers jumped out holding the backs of their necks. “Whip lash! Whip lash!?”
roscuro: Thanks very much for your response, I think you have a much more balanced view than many covenantalists (not saying that you would characterize yourself as such, but that would be my impression based on your first post) – many of them would argue that (re. Jesus’ second answer) all the events of Mt 24 have already taken place, which I believe clearly doesn’t correlate with history and Scripture (esp. regarding Christ’s coming and “the close of the age”). Also, I believe those things will happen within Daniel’s 70th week.
So you didn’t touch on this directly, but you do believe then that God has given specific promises and blessings for Israel that still have a future fulfillment?
Concerning the Israel-Palestine issue: I’m not sure why people continue to believe that the unsuccessful “Land for Peace” formula can somehow convince Arab states and terrorist groups to lay down their arms and change their minds about their common goal – the destruction of Israel – that they have taught in their schools, preached in their mosques, and reinforced in their media since 1948. (Also, why wasn’t a Palestinian state established between 1948-1967, when Jordan had control of the land?)
Furthermore, Israel is already a tiny, crowded country. To move 80,000 “settlers” into the pre-1967 borders (a suicidal move for Israel that would make their borders indefensible) would be a logistical and political nightmare. The surrounding Arab nations have vast stretches of uninhabited land – the unhappy Arabs of Palestine could possibly move to those areas, and let the Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs have their tiny territory. That would be a clear sign that they actually want peace.
However, because of their hatred of the Jews, those Arab nations will never agree to such a solution. And a two-state racist apartheid will not lead to peace. It seems that the only real chance for peace would be a one-state solution where Jews and Arabs become integrated, like they were before 1948. Segregation only leads to increased hostilities.
Tych, the vast tracts of uninhabited land in the Arabian peninsula are wasteland. Nothing grows there, the sparse wells are often brackish. Not even the most experienced Bedouin would dare to cross parts of the empty quarter in Saudi Arabia, as not even camels could find enough sustenance to survive. Those vast reserves of oil underlie deadly hazards such as tar pits and uninhabitable land such as salt marshes. It would be unreasonable to expect people to thickly populate the deserts of the Southwest U.S., and the deserts of Arabia are far less hospitable than any in the U.S. Furthermore, by what right do we ask the Arabs, both Christian and Muslim, and other Palestinian groups, such as the Druze and the Samaritans to leave the area between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River so that the Jews can live there?
That brings me to the question of whether there are promises in the future for Israel. Yes, there are, but they are fulfilled within the context of the Church of Christ. There is not a physical rebuilding of the nation of Israel, rather the Jews will become part of God’s kingdom by a change of heart through the Holy Spirit. I believe that many Jewish people will come to Christ – I had an uncle and a great uncle by marriage, now both passed away, who were both ethnically Jewish and had come to Christ. In Christ, there is deliverance from exile and captivity, there is restoration and rest – the prophecies of Isaiah and Zechariah of a final kingdom are fulfilled in both Jew and Gentile forming the Church.
In that context, I think that in the emphasis of the future for the Jews, we often forget that there were also future promises made to the surrounding nations of Israel, to the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Moabites, and the Ammonites. In Isaiah 19:24-25, God speaks of a day coming in which he will call the Egyptians his people, and Assyria the work of his hands, and Israel his inheritance. There is an ever ongoing fulfillment of that prophecy, in the early church, the bishops of Alexandria and Antioch presided over what became the Coptic and Assyrian churches, but the gospel is still spreading in those areas. The Moabites and Ammonites, as descendants of Lot, were even closer than the Egyptians and Assyrians to the land of Israel, and much is said in the prophets about their coming punishments, but Jeremiah ends his list of punishments to both nations with the same promise, ‘”Yet I will bring again the captivity of Moab/ the children Ammon in the last days”, says the Lord.’ (Jeremiah 48:47, 49:6). He later does the same with the Elamites, who were Persian, the Iranians. The promise of the kingdom goes to out to all, including the Arabs – in the prophecy of Isaiah 60, which speaks of the New Jerusalem (verse 19-20 is referenced in Revelation 21:23), it mentions Midian, Ephah, Kedar, and Nebaioth, all references to the tribes of Arabians, coming to join in the worship. There were Arab Christians before Muhammed was ever born, and there are still Arab Christians. When I was a waitress in a non-denominational Christian resort centre, I remember serving in one weekend, a large group of Arab Baptists and a smaller group of Coptics. The is the worst of the emphasis on the fulfillment of prophecy only to the Jews, that our brothers and sisters in Christ are often passed over simply because they are of Arabic descent.
As to whether two states will work, that isn’t the point. “He that swears to his own hurt and does not change.” They were promised the land. Give them the land. What they do with it afterward is up to them. If there is war, there is already war. Nothing will have changed and at least we will have kept our word.
Wandering Views 
Here’s some more info on what’s going on in The Gambia, and a reminder to keep our friend Joanne/Ajissun, her fellow workers, and the entire country in prayer.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/african-troops-standby-end-gambia-crisis-191043529.html
” Gambian president-elect Adama Barrow was to take power Thursday, capping weeks of tension over Yahya Jammeh’s refusal to quit which has seen Senegalese and Nigerian troops massing at the border and tourists racing to leave.
With Senegalese troops backed by Nigerian forces and fighter jets gathering, the country appeared on the brink of a military crisis although the army chief insisted his soldiers would not get involved in a “political dispute” nor prevent foreign forces from entering The Gambia.
Despite a midnight (0000 GMT) deadline for the expiry of Jammeh’s term, the situation remained calm in the city overnight, witnesses said following a last-minute mediation attempt by the Mauritanian president.
Jammeh, who has ruled the former British colony with an iron fist for 22 years, initially acknowledged Barrow as the victor in December elections, but later rejected the result, this week declaring a national state of emergency.
With the country in deadlock, hundreds of panicked tourists were rushing to leave after Britain and the Netherlands issued travel warnings, with the small airport near Banjul struggling to handle the influx.
Although Barrow is holed up in Senegal until he can cross the border safely, officials insisted his inauguration would go ahead but there were no immediate details.”
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https://www.yahoo.com/news/british-tour-operator-evacuating-1-000-gambia-holidaymakers-071330895–finance.html
“Senegal’s army spokesman said on Wednesday that its forces are at the Gambian border and will enter at midnight if the veteran president, Yahya Jammeh, refuses to relinquish power.
Jammeh, who lost a Dec. 1 election to opposition leader Adama Barrow, said he would not step down, citing irregularities in the vote. His mandate ends at midnight (midnight GMT).
“We are ready and are awaiting the deadline at midnight. If no political solution is found, we will step in,” said Colonel Abdou Ndiaye, speaking for the Senegalese army.
The Nigerian Air Force said it had deployed to Senegal in case it was needed. Nigeria is part of the West African bloc ECOWAS, which has threatened Jammeh with sanctions or military intervention if he does not step down.
Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo said in a statement Ghana would send 205 combat troops to Gambia as part of a regional mission to enable President-elect Barrow to be sworn in.
Senegal’s statement raised the prospect of armed confrontation between forces loyal to the president, who has ruled Gambia for 22 years, and Senegal, which surrounds the tiny riverside country on three sides.
Senegal circulated a draft resolution to the 15-member U.N. Security Council that would give “full support to the ECOWAS in its commitment to take all necessary measures to ensure the respect of the will of the people of The Gambia”.
Halifa Sallah, spokesman for Barrow, told a news conference at a Banjul beachside hotel surrounded by palm trees that the coalition “did not want to go to power stepping over dead bodies.”
Addressing Jammeh, he said: “The end has come. Accept it.”
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Look what the combination of Reagan-inspired free market economics and free trade has done to reduce extreme poverty around the world.
During the 100 years of US world leadership, there were three great accomplishments:
1. The defeat of Germany and Japan in 1945.
2. The containment and defeat of international communism.
3. This great expansion of global wealth and reduction of poverty
Thank you, George Marshall, Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan!
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Re Michelle’s first link @12:47 yesterday (linked at the bottom)—
I do not condone abuses, but Israel usually conducts itself well. I do not see the necessity of a 2 state solution—I would leave that up to Israel for the most part, as it is a security issue. From a purely practical view, Palestinians are Arabs and there are already plenty of relatively secure Arab nations for them. There is only one Jewish state. I support the nation of Israel in their struggle for a reasonably secure existence, and I want my country to be generally supportive also..
I thought the second essay was the best. And this sums it up pretty well:
That being said, the US is not responsible for Israel’s safety. Israel doesn’t belong to us and they are not our responsibility; they are God’s. I do not think He is finished with them, nor will He be until the end of days. In other words, I do not believe they were simply a conduit for the Messiah—they were and continue to be a type of picture of what He is doing in the earth. He blesses and He punishes as He sees fit. In no way do I pretend to know what His purposes are regarding Israel, but I just would not want my country to be in the middle of that transaction—particularly if negative. No good comes of being an instrument of punishment to Israel.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/january-web-only/obama-final-push-two-state-solution-trump-israel-settlement.html?utm_source=ctweekly-html&utm_medium=Newsletter&utm_term=12560051&utm_content=489183123&utm_campaign=email
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Ricky, now that poverty has been reduced so dramatically, presumably these countries have the capacity to continue with their economic growth without the artificial support of the captive American market.
Ten years ago, I had trouble finding anything at all that was made in the USA. It is getting easier now that the demand for USA produced products is growing. Of course I still purchase things made in other countries, but as a citizen of the US, I insist on there being a choice of basic goods that are American made vs foreign made.
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Free trade is not artificial support. Other countries buy products from the US AND EACH OTHER just as they sell to the US AND EACH OTHER. However, if Trump shuts off or reduces US trade, the rest of the world will continue their economic growth by continuing to trade with each other. Reagan inspired free markets to open up around the world. However, the vast majority of the free trade that produced so much wealth and reduced so much poverty is between countries other than the US.
Not only are other countries not responsible for our problems, we are not responsible for their successes except that Reagan and Milton Friedman showed them the way.
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Friedman’s Free to Choose (1980) is a great little paperback that is available on Amazon. I read the book during the 1980 campaign. It took me years to accept some of what Friedman taught, but the book forever changed the way I view economic and public policy issues.
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I can see that China has already begun to talk of environmental remediation. However, the American population has already experienced that stage of growth and has protections both for the environment and for our food. The US gov’t policies have allowed products to be sold here that do not reflect either the safety mechanisms or the cost, and therefore have in effect subsidized China’s growth over that of the US.
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I am not dogmatic about End Time issues. It is interesting that our Middle East views are often tied tightly to our eschatology. I stopped being dogmatic on eschatology when I learned that dispensationalism with its concept of “the Rapture” and its view of Israel is less than 250 years old.
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On The Real’s links, Jammeh has antagonized most of the surrounding West African countries in one way or another. The one thing that is of concern is that if Senegal interferes, Jammeh may try to use that to sway enough public opinion to his side. The Gambians are mostly of the same ethnic tribes as the Senegalese, and speak the same tribal languages, but there is a real cultural difference born of the fact that Senegal was a French colony and The Gambia was a British colony – the French and the British had very different methods in creating local government, with the French removing local leaders and replacing them with their own choice and the British leaving local leaders in place and working with them. In the 1980s, the two countries tried to make a coalition, and it didn’t work. Jammeh may make this about maintaining Gambian independence, in which case things could go very wrong indeed. Senegal has a much larger force than The Gambia and is the wealthier country, but it has it own problems with rebels in the south part of Senegal.
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Ricky, the Rapture is big business, and it’s big theology around here. My father’s denomination has always been rapture/end of days oriented. I have openly rejected an *undue emphasis* on eschatology as damaging. I know people who will not go to church or acknowledge God because they say they were “scared” as children by unbalanced and terrifying descriptions of rapture abandonment. I sympathize with that, and it’s a shame because God is so gracious and merciful.
My background probably informs much of my thinking about Israel as a country. It is possible that my views on the subject are less dogma and more superstition. But either way, I do see a place for Israel, and respect their right to self-determination in their historic, God-given land.
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The buck has got to stop somewhere. I like some of these programs and will be sorry to see them go. The screams will be deafening.
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/314991-trump-team-prepares-dramatic-cuts
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Debra @ 10:33 We grew up in the same culture and on eschatology we are at about the same place. If we reach some agreement on trade, we may have nothing interesting to argue about.
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Debra, I grew up among family who were (and still are) strongly dispensationalist. What changed that for me was reading the Bible for myself, especially in Galatians and Ephesians, where Paul makes clear that the old covenant is completely finished and only through Christ can Jew or Gentile come to God. In other words, there is nothing that is any more special being born a Jew than any other ethnicity. Recall that Paul was a Jew, and he was writing to Gentiles, telling them that he was no better than they were. The historical interpretation of Old Testament visions like Daniel’s 70 weeks, which are now labeled eschatological, was that Daniel’s vision was completely fulfilled by Christ’s death and resurrection, and then the subsequent destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.
The whole creation of modern Israel was always a case of foreign interference. In some ways, its creation has simply been a continuation of the anti-Semitism which keeps cropping up in the West. The countries of the West still didn’t want the Jews, but they were revolted by what happened in the Holocaust. So they decided to artificially revive the nation of Israel. Only, the British had, during the war, also made promises to the Palestinian inhabitants [they are not all necessarily of Arabic descent, though they may speak Arabic – for example, Saladin, who reconquered the area from the Crusaders, was Kurdish, and before the spread of the Islamic empires, the Byzantines had possession of the area] who had lived there for the nearly two millennia since Rome destroyed Jerusalem and carried away its inhabitants to slavery. So the brand new U.N. decided on a compromise, granting territories to both the Jews and to Palestinians. They fulfilled the first grant, but never the second. The areas in which the Palestinians live were supposed to be their state. So from the beginning of the modern state of Israel, the two state solution was supposed to be the solution, but politics and conflict have prevented it from happening.
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Michelle @10:55 Yes, but if he follows through with those cuts, I will gladly call myself a “Trumpkin” and might even dye myself orange.
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Mobilization is underway for the big women’s march Saturday in L.A. — where Jane Fonda and others will make appearances. They’re expecting 70,000. Van pools and parking strategies are being plotted on FB.
I wonder what Friday’s inauguration will bring? LA schools have jumped into it all as well, led by teachers upset by Trump’s win. So much of this (over) reaction strikes me as unprecedented, at least in our lifetime. Strange days.
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And yes, I still sometimes get that sense that I’m living in “The Onion” when I hear the words “President-Elect Donald Trump.”
What!?
Go figure. 🙂
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January 19, 2017 at 11:02 am Mark the date! Some of those cuts would almost be worth enduring if only to see an orange Trumpkin Ricky! 😀
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roscuro: A few ‘light’ questions:
Do you believe the Scriptures teach that OT Israel is the NT Church? If so, in what sense? Do you believe God’s promises and blessings for Israel that have yet to be fulfilled have somehow been transferred to the Church? Given what you’ve said about Daniel’s vision, do you believe that the events of Mt 24 have already been fulfilled?
Before 1948, the word ‘Palestinians’ was used for Arabs and Jews living in the land of Palestine. It wasn’t until after Israel was born as a nation that the ‘Palestinian’ people claimed an identity and an ethnicity that they had never claimed before. The concept of a future Palestinian state would consist of people who are not content to live peacefully in the nation of Israel. The idea is that the new state would actually be a Jew-free state. Why should we support carving out a new state along ethnic lines?
Aside from what happened at the UN, do you not believe that there weren’t Biblical prophecies that Israel would become an independent nation?
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Tychichus, I’m not Roscuro, and she is better versed in world events than I am, but it seems to me that modern day Israel is not God bringing them into the land. Further, the New Testament makes very clear that the promised to Abraham find their fulfillment in Christ. I know of no promises to Israel that remain unfulfilled other than that Christ will someday return for His bride–which consists of Israel as well as the Jewish people who believe in Him.
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Just as I had hoped. Now that Debra and I are twin Trumpkins, we need a good discussion of dispensationalism.
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I mean, of course, “Gentile believers” as well as Jewish believers. I was trying to finish my sentence since my husband was ready for me to make him lunch. 🙂
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On budget cuts, eventually the federal government will only be able to afford to pay for four types of expenditures:
1. National defense;
2. Benefits “due” to the participants under the twin Ponzi schemes of Social Security and Medicare;
3. Just enough welfare (of all types) to keep the recipients from burning down the cities; and
4. Interest on the national debt.
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The NY Times, all the news that’s fit to fake.
CAUTION!!!! SOME BAD LANGUAGE!!!!! because libs can’t Tweet without cussing and name-calling.
http://hotair.com/archives/2017/01/19/fake-news-alert-nyt-narrative-on-perry-blows-up/
“How does “fake news” travel around the nation and the world? First, a source has to publish false stories, and then like-minded people already inclined to believe it have to transmit it through other sites and social media. In fact, as T. Becket Adams and Mollie Hemingway both point out today, it looks something like … this:”
“All of this comes from a passage in a New York Times article about Rick Perry, one that uses one quote from an energy lobbyist to paint the incoming Secretary of Energy as ignorant of the actual job, without any other corroborating direct evidence or testimony. Supposedly Perry just thought he’d be an ambassador for American energy production:
When President-elect Donald J. Trump offered Rick Perry the job of energy secretary five weeks ago, Mr. Perry gladly accepted, believing he was taking on a role as a global ambassador for the American oil and gas industry that he had long championed in his home state. In the days after, Mr. Perry, the former Texas governor, discovered that he would be no such thing — that in fact, if confirmed by the Senate, he would become the steward of a vast national security complex he knew almost nothing about, caring for the most fearsome weapons on the planet, the United States’ nuclear arsenal. …
“If you asked him on that first day he said yes, he would have said, ‘I want to be an advocate for energy,’” Michael McKenna. “If you asked him now, he’d say, ‘I’m serious about the challenges facing the nuclear complex.’ It’s been a learning curve.”
The only other testimony to the proposition that Perry “misunderstood” the job he accepted comes from a poli-sci professor at Southern Methodist University, who complained about Perry’s qualifications:”
“Let’s get back to their single source for Perry’s supposed ignorance. As both Hemingway and Adams point out, McKenna wasn’t even around when Perry got the appointment in December, having left the transition team on November 16th — eight days after the election. In fact, as a quick scan of our own archives shows, Perry didn’t meet with the transition team until December 12th, four weeks after McKenna’s departure, and was appointed the next day.
Therefore, it’s impossible for McKenna to have been a source for Perry’s assumptions either during the meeting or at the appointment. Even without that knowledge, though, it’s clear from the quote that it’s only McKenna speculating on Perry’s state of mind, not actual testimony. “If you asked him on that first day” is nowhere near “I spoke to him on that first day,” or “He told Trump on that first day …” It’s McKenna projecting himself into Perry’s mind.”
———————-
Maybe he’s using Jedi Mind Tricks…. 🙂
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DO IT!!!!! 🙂
That’ll show ’em! 🙂
But you know most won’t, because like the dishonest Hollywood stars who promised to run off to foreign lands if Trump won, they rarely keep their word. 😦
http://hotair.com/archives/2017/01/19/survey-13-of-federal-workers-still-considering-quitting-after-tomorrow/
“Last October, during the heat of the election, we looked at a survey of federal employees which claimed that 35% of them were actively considering leaving their jobs if Donald J. Trump were to be elected president. At the time I had reservations about how serious this trend was because partisans tend to say all sorts of things during a contentious race. (Just recall all the celebrities who were supposedly fleeing the country during that same period and yet we’re still stuck with every last one of them.) But now the deed has been done and it’s time for everyone to put their resignation letter where their mouth is.
Have things changed? According to the latest rendition of the same survey, not very much. There are still more than a quarter of current federal workers who claim they’re looking toward the exits. And the primary reason given is that they object to Donald Trump’s declared plans to implement a federal hiring freeze and reduce the workforce. (Government Executive)
Less than two-thirds of the federal workforce is firmly committed to staying on the job following the election of Donald Trump as president, according to a new survey.
More than one in four federal workers, or 28 percent, will definitely or possibly consider leaving their jobs after Jan. 20 when Trump is sworn into office and becomes leader of the executive branch, according to a new Government Business Council/GovExec.com poll. Sixty-five percent of feds say they will not consider ending their federal service…
For those who opt to leave government, their jobs could remain vacant for an extended period of time as Trump has vowed to freeze hiring across agencies immediately upon taking office. Just 15 percent of feds said they hold a positive view of that proposed policy, while 67 percent expressed a negative view.
So let me get this straight. You object to Donald Trump’s plan to reduce the federal workforce, so you’re going to protest that policy by… reducing the federal workforce for him?
Well, okay then. Thanks for your service, I guess…”
————————-
😆 😆
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rw: I know that you don’t watch films from this generation, but I wonder if you heard of a film from last year called Free State of Jones (Matthew McConaughey). It’s about Newt Knight and the “Soutern Yankees,” set in Miss. during the Civil War and Reconstruction. It didn’t do well at the box office, but I just saw it and found it quite interesting, as I didn’t know that story.
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Tychicus, I have heard about the movie. The reports I got are that it is biased against our people and made a hero out of an adulterer and a murderer.
I prefer Gods and Generals which gave an excellent portrayal of Stonewall Jackson’s spiritual life and was extremely historically accurate. For inaccurate but fun movies about that period, I like Belle Starr, Bandit Queen and Santa Fe Trail, both from the early 1940s.
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Tych, in an attempt to answer your questions: First, no, if you mean in the sense of what is sometimes called replacement theology, where there are equivalents drawn, for example, between circumcision of children in the old covenant, and baptism of infants in the new covenant (I am of a Baptist persuasion after all 🙂 ). My family’s church recently had a pastor who would refer to the “Old Testament church”, and it annoyed me every time he used the phrase. I simply take what is written in Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, and Hebrews to conclude that the Old Covenant is finished. The Church is not a replacement of Israel. Rather the New Covenant extended to people from every tongue, tribe, and nation, because the original promise to Abraham was that in his seed, all nations, not just the line of Isaac, would be blessed (Galatians 3:16-17). Christ was not a High Priest from the Levitical line of the law given to Moses; he was a High Priest of the order of Melchizideck, King of Salem (Hebrews 7). The writer of Hebrews calls Christ’s New Covenant better and greater than the Old Covenant. Those who are of Jewish ethnic origin must come through the narrow gate of Christ, and there is a sense in which all of us who come through that gate must lay aside our nationality and ethnicity. They are things which are only temporal, and they cannot stand in the way of the love that Christians are to show to one another (Ephesians 2:11-18).
On Matthew 24, there were two question that the disciples asked Christ, and he gave them two answers. The first, about the destruction of the temple, happened in 70 A.D. – there was indeed not one stone left upon another, as what is now called the Wailing Wall was merely a retaining wall. The second, about Christ’s coming, has yet to be fulfilled. We see a similar blending of near and far prophecy in Isaiah chapter 7, where the promise that Judah would be delivered from Samaria and Damascus is combined with a promise of the coming Messiah. The deliverance happened immediately, while it would be several hundred years before the Messiah came.
On the question regarding the Palestinians, it is interesting to think of the patterns of movement of people in the world and how natural human reactions never change. I feel for the Jewish people, who were constantly made unwelcome in the West, being told to go back to where they came from; I have sometimes heard similar statements come from First Nations (Native American) people to those of us of European descent. I also have some understanding of the Palestinian perspective, since I see the negative reaction of some of those already living in North America to recent waves of immigration. Humans are contradictory, sometimes we tell the established inhabitants to accept the newcomers, sometimes we side with the established inhabitants against the newcomers – it all depends on our own biases and opinions. In the case of the Palestinians, they were lied to and double crossed by the West, which didn’t endear them to the people who came from the West to their shores. Also, the exclusivity critique cuts both ways. There is within Israel as racist and ultra-nationalist a group as any far right organization can produce, who consider the Jews as a master race having divine birthright to the land. Such people had and have no desire to allow the Palestinians or other non-Jewish people to become a part of Israel – even groups like the Ethiopian Jews, whose ethnic origins are murky, are unwelcome to those who are looking for a pure Israel (and forget conversion to Christianity, that is a betrayal of one’s Jewish identity). If the Palestinians were to agree to become a part of Israel, there would be many in Israel who would reject them. I don’t agree with either party of exclusivity; my case for two states is based on the premise that two states were promised and the promise should be kept (see my post from yesterday on the subject).
On the final question, no, I do not think there are prophecies looking forward to a reestablishment of the earthly nation of Israel. One day, the earthly land of Israel will be destroyed with the rest of the world and a new heaven and earth will be made. The New Jerusalem of that new creation is the Bride of Christ, which is the Church (Revelation 21:2, Ephesians 5:32).
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They tried to privatize National Public Radio when Reagan was president.
I don’t remember why it happened.
I think I told you that I was watching Gene Tierney in “Belle Starr” when Pearl Harbor was being bombed..
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Chas, Gene Tierney was even prettier as Belle Starr than she was as Laura. I believe it was the Southern accent.
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My wife and I watched Ronald Reagan and Errol Flynn in Santa Fe Trail on an independent TV station in Washington, DC the night before Reagan’s first inauguration in 1981. Those were happy times.
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If you just think about how muslim “Palestinians” treat Jewish Israelis, a two state “solution” doesn’t seem reasonable. Eventually there will be a war the Palestinians will lose. “To the conqueror go the spoils.”
Theere were 2 tanks driving toward each other. They ran into each other. The top of the Arab tank popped open and the tankers jumped out with their hands up. “We give up! We give up!” The top of the Israeli tank popped up and the Israeli tankers jumped out holding the backs of their necks. “Whip lash! Whip lash!?”
How is that for politically incorrect?
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Tomorrow should be interesting.
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Kevin Williamson with the best line of the day.
https://twitter.com/kevinnr/status/822263938159149056
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It’s almost become cartoonish in the overreactions
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roscuro: Thanks very much for your response, I think you have a much more balanced view than many covenantalists (not saying that you would characterize yourself as such, but that would be my impression based on your first post) – many of them would argue that (re. Jesus’ second answer) all the events of Mt 24 have already taken place, which I believe clearly doesn’t correlate with history and Scripture (esp. regarding Christ’s coming and “the close of the age”). Also, I believe those things will happen within Daniel’s 70th week.
So you didn’t touch on this directly, but you do believe then that God has given specific promises and blessings for Israel that still have a future fulfillment?
Concerning the Israel-Palestine issue: I’m not sure why people continue to believe that the unsuccessful “Land for Peace” formula can somehow convince Arab states and terrorist groups to lay down their arms and change their minds about their common goal – the destruction of Israel – that they have taught in their schools, preached in their mosques, and reinforced in their media since 1948. (Also, why wasn’t a Palestinian state established between 1948-1967, when Jordan had control of the land?)
Furthermore, Israel is already a tiny, crowded country. To move 80,000 “settlers” into the pre-1967 borders (a suicidal move for Israel that would make their borders indefensible) would be a logistical and political nightmare. The surrounding Arab nations have vast stretches of uninhabited land – the unhappy Arabs of Palestine could possibly move to those areas, and let the Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs have their tiny territory. That would be a clear sign that they actually want peace.
However, because of their hatred of the Jews, those Arab nations will never agree to such a solution. And a two-state racist apartheid will not lead to peace. It seems that the only real chance for peace would be a one-state solution where Jews and Arabs become integrated, like they were before 1948. Segregation only leads to increased hostilities.
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Tych, the vast tracts of uninhabited land in the Arabian peninsula are wasteland. Nothing grows there, the sparse wells are often brackish. Not even the most experienced Bedouin would dare to cross parts of the empty quarter in Saudi Arabia, as not even camels could find enough sustenance to survive. Those vast reserves of oil underlie deadly hazards such as tar pits and uninhabitable land such as salt marshes. It would be unreasonable to expect people to thickly populate the deserts of the Southwest U.S., and the deserts of Arabia are far less hospitable than any in the U.S. Furthermore, by what right do we ask the Arabs, both Christian and Muslim, and other Palestinian groups, such as the Druze and the Samaritans to leave the area between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River so that the Jews can live there?
That brings me to the question of whether there are promises in the future for Israel. Yes, there are, but they are fulfilled within the context of the Church of Christ. There is not a physical rebuilding of the nation of Israel, rather the Jews will become part of God’s kingdom by a change of heart through the Holy Spirit. I believe that many Jewish people will come to Christ – I had an uncle and a great uncle by marriage, now both passed away, who were both ethnically Jewish and had come to Christ. In Christ, there is deliverance from exile and captivity, there is restoration and rest – the prophecies of Isaiah and Zechariah of a final kingdom are fulfilled in both Jew and Gentile forming the Church.
In that context, I think that in the emphasis of the future for the Jews, we often forget that there were also future promises made to the surrounding nations of Israel, to the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Moabites, and the Ammonites. In Isaiah 19:24-25, God speaks of a day coming in which he will call the Egyptians his people, and Assyria the work of his hands, and Israel his inheritance. There is an ever ongoing fulfillment of that prophecy, in the early church, the bishops of Alexandria and Antioch presided over what became the Coptic and Assyrian churches, but the gospel is still spreading in those areas. The Moabites and Ammonites, as descendants of Lot, were even closer than the Egyptians and Assyrians to the land of Israel, and much is said in the prophets about their coming punishments, but Jeremiah ends his list of punishments to both nations with the same promise, ‘”Yet I will bring again the captivity of Moab/ the children Ammon in the last days”, says the Lord.’ (Jeremiah 48:47, 49:6). He later does the same with the Elamites, who were Persian, the Iranians. The promise of the kingdom goes to out to all, including the Arabs – in the prophecy of Isaiah 60, which speaks of the New Jerusalem (verse 19-20 is referenced in Revelation 21:23), it mentions Midian, Ephah, Kedar, and Nebaioth, all references to the tribes of Arabians, coming to join in the worship. There were Arab Christians before Muhammed was ever born, and there are still Arab Christians. When I was a waitress in a non-denominational Christian resort centre, I remember serving in one weekend, a large group of Arab Baptists and a smaller group of Coptics. The is the worst of the emphasis on the fulfillment of prophecy only to the Jews, that our brothers and sisters in Christ are often passed over simply because they are of Arabic descent.
As to whether two states will work, that isn’t the point. “He that swears to his own hurt and does not change.” They were promised the land. Give them the land. What they do with it afterward is up to them. If there is war, there is already war. Nothing will have changed and at least we will have kept our word.
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