If you have your Bibles and hopefully you do, why don't we turn to 2nd Kings chapter 9 and what I'm going to attempt to do and for all you guys who come to Tuesday morning, you've probably heard a little bit of this, but it's going to have a little bit of different twist on it, a little bit of refried manna with some manteca. You know that God's promises are always true. You know, when anytime that we're going through a difficult time, we can turn to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for the hope that we need. We know that God's promises are faithful and are always at work in our lives, even though it may not seem like it. I know this evening, many of us are going through a very difficult time. Some of it might be emotional crisis, some of it may be financial crisis, but whatever it is, just know that God's word is always working in your life. In Isaiah 55 verses 8 and 9 and 11, Isaiah says, For my thoughts are not your thoughts nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. So shall my word that goes forth from my mouth, it shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper for the thing which I sent it. In tonight's passage, in 2 Kings chapter 9, we're going to take a closer look on how God's word is effective in our lives and how his word will always come forth. Sometimes a lot of times when we're in a midst of a difficult time or we're in the midst of a great time, it's oftentimes that we can see that have a difficult time seeing God's work at work in our lives. And here in this passage this evening, we're going to see that God's word is faithful even to the minute timing. See, I don't know what you guys are going through this evening. Whatever it is, just know that God's word and his promises are working in your lives this evening. I love what it says in Romans 8, 28. We all know this passage and we know that all things work together for the good, to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. And yet in all of this, we as believers do have a responsibility when it comes to God's promises. I think a lot of times that we think we can just sit back and reap the fruits and the benefits of God's love, we can, but there's a responsibility that we must also as believers have to do to see the work of God's promises in our lives. We must always be ready and available to be used by the Lord. We must always be ready to be used by the Lord. We must never get too comfortable in our walks with the Lord and we must not get distracted in what God has called us to do. In 2 Kings chapter 9, we're going to get a firsthand look on God's work, even though it's against evilness, we're going to see how his word is faithful, his word is true, and his promises are yes and amen. So now here's going to be the difficult thing. I'm going to try to put three studies into one. So Jared said, New Year's, we should be done by then, you guys. I'm going to do my best to summarize. I'm going to do my best to hit the main points and because I think in this passage here, there's some great applications that we can only see God's word moving and God's promises at work, but there's a responsibility as believers that we have as well so that God's word and his promises can flow through us. In 1 Kings, have you guys ever heard of Elijah? We all know of Elijah, right? The showdown in Mount Carmel, 450 prophets of Baal were destroyed, and Elijah, who was the prophet at that time, has been giving three instructions up to this point in 2 Kings. These instructions have been given from God himself to anoint Elisha as his protestors, his protege, to anoint Heziel, king of Syria, and the last thing is to anoint Jehu, king of Israel. And so we see these three things that God has instructed Elisha to fulfill in his ministry. But when you look at the Old Testament here in 2 Kings, we see that only one of those things take place. Elijah anointed Elisha to take his place in the prophetic ministry. It was Elisha who anointed Heziel, king of Syria, and it was Elisha who anointed Jehu to be king of the northern kingdom. So we see here in verses 1 through 10, and I'm going to do a little bit of a summary, is that Elisha, the prophet of God, in verse 1, and one of the sons of the prophet said, get yourself ready, take this flask of oil in your hand, and go to Ramath Gilead. So let me provide a little bit of a context for you of what's going on so far in 2 Kings. Well, all the way back in 1 Kings, there has been this division of the kingdoms. Jeroboam, who has been by a prophet of the Lord, was told that you will be taken over 10 of the tribes of the north, and there will be two of the tribes in the south, which is referenced of Judah.  So this prophet has this robe, and he comes up to Jeroboam, and he rips his robe into 10, into 12 pieces, gives 10 to Jeroboam, and says, you will oversee the northern kingdom. The two other kingdoms will belong to Rehoboam, who is currently the king of Judah. And Jeroboam says, this is great. I'm going to follow all the Lord's ways. I'm going to follow his statutes, because I want to be a good king. There has not yet been a good king out of the north. And Jeroboam began to think in his heart. That's where we all go wrong. God's promises are a yes and a mineralized. He tells us that we are more than conquerors, that he'll never leave us nor forsake us, that when we walk through the valley of the shadow of death that he will be with us, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. We have all these promises of God, yet we can lift up on our own hearts, our own version of what God told us. And Jeroboam begins to think if the people in the north go all the way to the south to worship in the true place of worship, they're going to come back and they're going to kill me. That prophet never mentioned anything like that to Jeroboam. But Jeroboam began to listen to the narrative of his heart. He began to listen to the voice of his heart. And we all know that when we begin to do that, we're in trouble. When we begin to listen to our heart more than we listen to God's word, we will find ourselves in a place that is upside down. And this is what Jeroboam does. He begins to listen in his heart and he begins to fabricate things of that God instructed him to do. All God said was to walk in my ways, walk in my statutes, and my name will be on your kingdom.   I don't need Levitical priest. I'm going to appoint my own priest out. And then he says, and instead of going all the way to Judah, I'm going to get a little bit close to Judah, and I'm going to set up another town place to worship, and it's going to be in Bethel. But instead of worshiping the Lord, I'm going to set up some golden calves there. The people need to see who they're worshiping. They need to see that they're actually worshiping the Lord through these golden calves. So I'm going to set these golden calves up, and the Lord, and they're going to worship the Lord, my priests are going to prophesy to them, and we're going to have this amazing kingdom. That's where the Northern Kingdom began to spiral down. Because all the way now here in Second Kings, we have seen nothing but destruction from one king after another in the Northern Kingdom. All the kings that have come from the North have been treacherous. And they continued in the ways of Jeroboam, building up idol worshiping, going to the place of worship. And what's so interesting about these places of worship is that it looked like the place of worship. It sounded like the place of worship, but it was not the true place of worship. And oftentimes if we are not mature in God's Word, we can fall for the subtleties of the lie of the enemy that we're worshiping the true God. And up to this point here, we have seen Elijah consistently confront these kings and saying, you are wrong, you are leading the people of Israel into idolatry, you will be judged. And the king that comes after Jeroboam, there's a series of kings that come. And the next king that is mentioned, that we will look at here, whose house, they call it, his kingdom will be dealt with. And that's King Ahab. Ahab was considered the most wicked king outside of Jeroboam in the Northern Kingdom. And yet he was bent on idol worshiping. He brought his dear wife into the picture, Jezebel, never name your kids Jezebel. Not even your dog. And they introduced a new worship into the idol worshiping. They began to worship Baal. Baal was the God of the Sidonians, who would actually take baby sacrifices and the people of Baal, or the people of Sidonia, would put these babies on these heated arms of Baal, or molek, and they would heat them up until the bronze turned bright orange, and they would lay their live babies on these arms. Imagine the screams. And they were given their families over to these false idols. But oh my gosh, John, that sounds so treacherous. Yes, it does. But we do the same thing today. We worship our children, we sacrifice our children for many things on Sundays. What's the difference? And so we see that this idol worshiping of Baal has infiltrated the Northern Kingdom, and it has turned the nation of Israel into a nation that is worshiping false gods. And we know that any time there is a worshiping of false God, that Jehovah God is going to deal with it. So God's word now begins to work in this amazing way to see his word be fulfilled. And so as we see here in verse nine, King Jo Ram, who is the son of Ahab, Ahab had been killed in the battle with Ramath Gilead by a king named Ben Haddad of Syria. Syria and Israel have always been at war. And Ahab was pretending to be a soldier, and as he goes out to war, the Bible says that a random arrow was drawn back to its full force and it was let go and it struck him between the joints of his armor. Pretty interesting that he was struck randomly by this arrow that was shot by a random person, and it struck him between the joints of his armor. What are the chances? See, this is another illustration for us, and I'll get into this in a little bit when we talk about the importance of being in God's word.  And all it took was one arrow to kill King Ahab. Now we're here in 2 Kings chapter 9 and Jo Ram, his son, is king of Israel, and in the south his cousin is named Azahaya, who's the king of Judah. And what is going on right now is the second thing or the third thing that was given up to Elijah to do is, Jehu is now being anointed to be king of the north to fulfill God's word. So who's this Jehu guy that we see here in chapter 9? Well, before we get into that, one of the first things that I want to point out to you is that in verse 1, as we are talking about the three things as God's word and his promises are to be faithful in our lives, in which they are, there are things that we must do. And the first thing I want to point out here that is a responsibility that we must have as believers is found in verse 1. It says, in Elisha said to the sons of the prophet, get yourself ready. How many of you are here tonight are ready to serve the Lord? If God has called you tonight for a specific mission, would you be ready? Or would you have too much of the world in your heart that Lord, I cannot be ready? I heard of a man that was struggling with drinking as an elder in the church. And the Lord was telling him, you keep messy with my grace. I will not use you. And this man says, but Lord, your grace is sufficient. I have freedoms in you. And so he would drink and drink and drink and drink. And one day he was called to a hospital deathbed to minister to the family.  Are you ready to be used by the Lord tonight? What has gotten in the way of your life for God to call you at any specific time to complete a mission for him? What have you allowed to get in your way? Or in the way for the Lord to say, I want to use you because I have a specific mission or a call in your life. But sometimes we aren't ready because we allow so many things of the world to infiltrate our hearts that we begin to compromise in a lot of ways. So if God was to call you tonight for a specific purpose, would you be ready? Because this man here who's unmentioned, he's called the sons of the prophets, he's given a task to go to this man named Jehu who is a commander. And it tells us here that when you're to go there, take this flask of oil and anoint it on his head and then run. Run. Would you be willing and are you willing to take on a task that is dangerous for the Lord? But you know, John, I need to grow more spiritually. You know, that's telling me that you want to get in shape first before you go to the gym. We always must be ready for God's call in our life. Or to never allow ourselves to get in a place where we're comfortable, where we think that we're doing good. And in reality, we've been being rocked to sleep by the world. We must always be in a place where God can say, I am calling on you this evening, because there's a specific task and a purpose that I want you to fulfill. Are you willing to go and are you ready to go?  Second Timothy chapter four verse two says, Preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and teaching. See the Lord will not use any of those who have not fully surrendered their lives to Christ. Oftentimes we're wanting to be used, but there sometimes can be so much or too little or a little bit of flesh in us. Psalm 142 says the Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men to see if there are anyone who understand who seek God. So what's interesting here is that this man named Jehu or this man of the sons of the Prophet is to go and anoint this man named Jehu so that God's word will be fulfilled. And what's interesting here is as Elisha instructs the son of the Prophet to go speak to this man named Jehu, he's given specific instructions to speak to him. He tells him that when he sees them that you're to take this flask of oil in verse three and put it on his head and say thus says the Lord I have anointed you king over Israel and then open the door and flee, do not delay. What a dangerous mission.  Imagine that. But it's interesting here when you take a look a little bit closer to this, he goes up he anoints him and he says in verse four in verse five I have a message for you and listen to what he tells him. When you look at verse seven here is the the the mission that Jehu is going to be given by the sons of the Prophet that's going to fulfill the third thing that was commissioned by Elijah. Listen to what he says here in verse seven you shall strike down the house of Ahab your master that I might avenge the blood of my servants and prophets the blood of all servants of the Lord at the hand of Jezebel for the whole house of Ahab shall perish and it will cut off from Ahab all the males in Israel both bond and free. So I'll make the house of Ahab like the house of Jeroboam son of Nebet and like the house of Baasha the son of Haisha. Now look at verse 10 says and the dogs shall eat Jezebel on the plot of ground at Jezreel and there shall be none to barrier and he opened the door and he fled. Would you be willing to do something like this for the Lord? No Lord send me to Hawaii send me to Hawaii that would be easy but see in order for the Lord to use us in situation like this we must be in God's word we must allow his Holy Spirit to permeate in our lives we must allow Jesus Christ to take a hold of our lives and have our hearts surrendered for him. Are you available? The second point I want to point out and the responsibility that we must do here is found in verse 15 look what it says here the king of Joram had returned to Jezreel to recover from the wounds which the Syrians had inflicted on him and when he fought with Hezal king of Syria and Jehu said if you are so minded let when let no one leave nor escape from the city so go and tell it in Jezreel. So Jehu verse 16 wrote in the chariot and he went to Jezreel for Joram was laid up there and as a high king of Judah had come down to see him. See we can look at this and we can pass this very easy very easy to read over. See remember with me Joram the king of Israel Ahab's son has been fighting against Hezal and Ben Haddad in Syria. When you look at chapter 8 verses 28 and 29 it says that King Joram was wounded in this battle and he was inflicted by him by the Syrians. So what's the point here? I'm glad you asked. See friends there can be a place where we feel it's a safe place. See what's going on here in verse 15 is that Joram has left the heat of battle against the Syrians and he is now going back to Jezreel because it's a safe place for me to go so I can recover from my wounds. You notice that it says here in verse 15 that he was to recover from his wounds. These were wounds that were inflicted in battle. The Bible is not clear in what type of wounds they were but it was so bad that he had to leave battle and find himself at a safe place and he goes to Jezreel. Now what's interesting about this is that he goes and he leaves the battle and he goes to this place to recover. What's interesting about this is how God's word is always at work. Jehu gets word of this. Remember he's been appointed now to destroy the whole house of Ahab. Joram is the son of Ahab. Jehu has been instructed now to wipe the entire kingdom of Ahab out. How did Jehu know that Joram was there? What's interesting about this whole thing is that God's timing is always perfect because if Jehu would have left any time sooner or left any time later he would have never met Joram in Jezreel. I'm going to get there in a second. What's so important about Joram going to Jezreel? He comes to the safe place to recover from his wounds but in order to be healed from his wounds he had to remove his armor. He had to go to a place where he was safe. His all his military captains and all his advisors and everybody's in battle at Ramath Gilad in the heat of battle with the Syrians and he's thinking okay I'm going to go to this place. I'm going to recover. I need to take off my armor so my wounds can heal. Sometimes we think that there's a safe place in our lives. Sometimes we think that we can go somewhere where we can take off the armor of God. Sometimes we think that you know what I've been doing pretty good now. I don't really need to take the armor of God on. I can just take it off because I'm doing good right now. I'm going to relax a little bit in my walk. You know what I'm going to give up reading the Bible every day. I'm going to stop praying for a few days. You know it's getting a little boring and we think that we're going to a safe place to rest and every time we go to these places to rest and we think it's safe we have a tendency of removing the armor of God in our lives and this this became fatal for Joram. We can begin to think that my walk is strong. I went to church on Wednesday night saw this boring speaker and then I listened to K-wave in the morning. I'm good. I don't need to go to church. I listened to seminary 24-7. I think that's their jingle right. I don't need to go to church. I don't need to go lying tamers. I don't need to go to the men's study. I don't need to go to the women's study. I watched it online. I listened to it on the radio and we think we can go to those safe places because we think we're doing well and in reality we're removing the armor of God from our lives. We begin to allow compromise to creep into our lives and and our armor begins not to fit. We begin to think that I don't need to do this anymore than the helmet of salvation becomes a little looser. We begin to feel that I'm in a good place now and our breastplate of righteousness begins to fit a little looser. Well you know what I've been watching other teachers and you know yeah they may be a little bit different and they're and they're considered false prophets and but you know what it's making me feel good. It's making my ears feel good. I love what I'm hearing and the belt of truth becomes a little looser and the next thing we know we have removed our armor. Going to that safe place for Joram to recover he didn't think he need protection at all because he was going to this very safe place. You know that the enemy is always in pursuit of you. He wants you to think that you can let your guard down and when we know that the enemy is thinking one thing from you is he's seeking to devour you. I love what it says in 1st Peter 5.8 be sober be vigilant because your adversary the devil walks around like a rowing lion seeking whom he may devour. Friends we must stand guard. Have you examined your armor lately? Have you looked in the places where there has been some compromise that has come in? Has there been a little bit of pride? Has there been a little bit of self that has come in that has caused our armor not to fit because when it tells us in Ephesians it says that God has given us his armor to fit perfectly on us but we allow compromise. We allow these things and those things and we next thing you know we have areas of our armor that are exposed if not removed. For the word of God to be effective in our lives we must always be ready for the task. We must always be vigilant in our walk and now and not allowing compromise to take place. When's the last time you examined your armor? For me I have to examine it every day because I know me.  I begin to think weird things and my helmet of salvation in my head is not fitting right and these are open targets for the enemy.  He wants to devour you. He's seeking and pursuing you.   You deserve it. Never fall for that because it's a setup. When you look at verses 16 to 20 you see that as Jehu finds out where Jo Ram is at and Jo Ram sees this man driving fiercely from a chariot. It tells us here in chapter 9 verse 20 that he drove fiercely on a chariot. This dude must be from Tijuana. He drives fiercely. But the word of God to fulfill what was called by Elijah is starting to be fulfilled. So remember friends, God's word is always at work in your lives. You may not see it. You may not feel it but you're to know that our Lord Jesus Christ is always making things good in your life. I don't mean good like you're going to flourish but to work out for His good. So when you look at verses 16 through 20 it's interesting because once Jehu finds out that Jo Ram is in Jezreel, Jo Ram begins to send out messengers to him. And Jo Ram and Jehu tells him, are you for me or against me?  You need to follow me. And he gets on. These people say, we're going to stay with you. And they don't go back. And Jehu, Jo Ram begins to think, I send out one messenger. I send out a second messenger. You know what? I'm going to go out myself and see what's going on.  Mount up my chariot. And I'm going to go out there. And so we see in verse 21 that Jo Ram says, make my chariot ready. And then Jo Ram, the king of Israel and as a high king of Judah went in the chariot to meet Jehu. What's interesting here is that we see that Jo Ram has here, Jo Ram become the third attempt to meet Jehu before he arrives in Jezreel. Now what's interesting in verse 21, you guys, that I want to point out really quickly. There's a couple of points that I want to tie together. But what's interesting about verse 21 is that he says that they met him on the property of Naboth, the Jezreelite. When you go back to 1 Kings chapter 19, there was a time where Ahab, Jo Ram's father, saw a vineyard in the city of Jezreel. And this vineyard was pleasing to his eyes. It was a picture of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Because he sees this vineyard and he tells Naboth, I want to buy your vineyard. And Naboth says, you know what? My vineyard's not for sale. It belongs to my forefathers. I cannot sell that. And he says, I want your vineyard. So what does he do? Ahab goes and cries to his wife, Jezrebel. And Jezrebel says, you want that vineyard? Yes, mama, I want my vineyard. Jezrebel goes and she has Naboth set up and he's killed.  And so interesting that they are now meeting at the exact same spot. Look at the timing of God's word again that I want to bring out. Jehu gets this commission to wipe out the house of Ahab. He's going to go and wipe it out. Jo Ram and Azahaya, king of the north and king of Judah, are going to go to Jezrebel to recover. Now if Jehu would have left 10 minutes earlier, he would arrive 10 minutes sooner and would have not seen Jo Ram. If he would have made it 15 minutes later, he would have never got there in time because they probably would have left knowing that he was on their way. But you see that God's timing is perfect. And whenever you're going through this evening, my friends, just know that God's timing in your lives is always perfect. It may not fit our timeline. It may not fit the way we see things, but his timeline is always perfect. So they meet in this area where this man was killed, where his vineyard was at. And Jehu says, and Jo Ram says, Jehu, do you come at peace?  And when he says, when Jo Ram, Jehu says that to Jo Ram, Jo Ram makes a U-turn. And look it, we know that Jo Ram wasn't Mexicano, right? We know he wasn't a Mexican because if anybody talked about his mom like that and he was Mexican, he probably would have threw down, right? What are you talking about? It's my mom.  And Jehu takes his arrow and pulls it back at full strength and strikes him between the shoulders and it comes out of his heart. Pretty gruesome. So as he's recuperating from these wounds, he's not wearing his armor. Jehu draws back his arrow and strikes him and he is killed. So now we see God's word being fulfilled. Ahab's house is slowly being destroyed. A Jo Ram was going to be killed on the vineyard of Naboth. God's word told us that. And now there's one more person to go after. But when we look at verses 25 to 29, I want to summarize this here that when they pick Jo Ram's body up, they throw him in the field of Naboth. And he says here in verse 27 that now as Ahaya, King of Judah also takes off and Jehu goes and kills him. Now I don't remember when I read to you earlier that there was an instruction to kill as Ahaya, King of Judah. That was never mentioned. But because as Ahaya was related and was introducing idol worshiping, Jehu took it upon himself to wipe him out as well. So now the King of Israel, Jo Ram is dead and the King of Judah, as Ahaya is dead. And there's one person to go after. And I want to spend some time of this here.  Jo Ram, they throw him in the field of Naboth where Naboth, when the vineyard of Naboth, when he was murdered. And we come up to verse 30. Look what it says, when Jehu had come to Jezebel, Jezebel heard of it. Now Jezebel has been very wicked up to this point. She killed prophets of the Lord. She went after Elijah. She is a picture of sin itself.  Pretty much all of you. You guys have friends named Jezebel? Anybody act like Jezebel? One more person in this chapter for Jehu to kill, for God's word to become fulfilled. You know, it's interesting when you look a little bit at, before the first Kings chapter 21, verse 23, Elisha says that Jezebel, the dogs that shall eat Jezebel within the city walls. That's a pretty gruesome prophecy. But we're told here in verse 30 that Jezebel heard of it. What does she hear? She heard that Jo Ram, her son, was killed. She heard that Azahaya was killed and that Jehu's coming after her. She hears that. And so what does she do? Well, it's interesting. I don't know if this is a woman thing.  She put her makeup on. What's interesting here is that there's a couple of commentators that differ on this view here. One commentator says she's going to go out like a queen. She's putting paint on her face. She's putting makeup and then she's adorning her hair.  Other commentators are saying, well, she's trying to seduce Jehu. She thought that if she can seduce him and get him to join her forces, then they'll have an unstoppable force. Another commentator says that she was there to distract him. I believe more of that. See, what's interesting about this situation here is that she painted herself up. She made herself look pretty and she was now presenting herself to Jehu, who was there to kill her. And she looked down from a window and was looking at him. And one of the things that we have to understand is that when we are to be used by the Lord, it is our responsibility not to be distracted. There are many Jezebel's that will distract us from being used by the Lord in what she's called us. She can put her makeup on and adorn her hair, and a lot of times we see people that are distracted by the things of the world and they become sitting ducks. Jezebel was serving as a distraction for Jehu fulfilling the work that he was called to do from the Lord. So it's our responsibility to always be ready. Even when it's difficult. The other responsibility is that we're to examine our armor and to never take off the armor of God. To never find our place, self in a place where I feel good, now I'm going to take my armor off because it's a lie from the enemy. And we're to never be distracted, especially from the things of the world that can take us away from what God has called us to do. And what's interesting is that when Jehu in verse 31 looks up at the gate, she answers the gate, it's interesting what she says to him in verse 31. Is it peace, Zimri, murder of your master? Zimri, who's Zimri? Not only she put her paint on, but she might be a little crazy. No, what she was saying was something very, very derogative to him. See Zimri, some many years before that, about 50 years, Zimri killed his king.  And that's what she's saying to him.  This was a pretty clever taunt because Zimri murdered his master. She was being sarcastic and she's also saying that your victory is going to be short-lived. But Jehu knew his call from the Lord. He wasn't distracted by her looks, her charm, her sarcasm, her taunts. He wasn't distracted like that and that's the same way the enemy distracts us. He will taunt us He'll adorn himself. He will criticize us. He will say, you're worthless, you're that, you're this, you're that and we're not to be distracted from that because we're to know who we are in the Lord and what Jesus has called us to do. And so what he does, it's interesting is that in verse 32 it tells us that all he did is look about the window and he said to these eunuchs that are there, who's on my side? And he said, throw her out the window. Now the Bible doesn't tell us how high this fall was but the fall was big enough as we see here in verse 33 that she was thrown down and her blood spattered. Spattered on the wall and on the horses and not only that, Jehu trampled her underfoot. I'm going to make sure you're done. Now imagine the sound and the next thing you know there's spatter of blood on the walls and on the horses. What's interesting about this is that you see these faithful eunuchs that all that Jehu had to do was look at them and they threw her down. See God's word is at work here and you see that not only is he bringing judgment to the evilness of idolatry but his word is being fulfilled. And again it reminds me of what we must be going through that knowing that God's word is at work in your lives. And so as we see that her death is obviously a, is justice. She has been so ruthless but her blood spattered on the wall and and Jehu got his horse and rode over her body until she was he was sure she was dead. This is how gangster Jehu is because after he's done that in verse 34 he goes in eats and drinks. I mean I would be right. He kind of see his confidence. He goes in and and he has a banquet and he begins to think you know what her dad was a king. Her dad was a king in the Sidonians. His name was F Baal.  Well just like God's word said that she will be eaten by dogs within the city gate. Well they went to bury her in verse 35 and look what they found in her. They found no more of her than skull, feet and palms of her hands. The dogs came and ate her. Amazing how God's word is faithful to the point of that she was going to be eaten by dogs. They told her to go bury her body but it was too late. The smelling of human blood and wild dogs showed up and ate her body leaving her skull her feet and the palms of hands. Imagine that that scene. Pretty crazy. So why all of this? To point out that God's word never fails but will always accomplish his purposes on earth. But as my question to you this evening is that will you allow God's word to work in your life? Are you ready to be used by him? Or have you allowed your armor to fit a little loosely? Are you willing to do the thing even if it looks dangerous? Are you allowing God's word to work in your life? Are we taking the time to make ourselves useful for the Lord? Are we taking our time to examine our hearts and examine our armor? Are we taking the time or are we taking the time to allow compromise to enter into our lives? Have we been distracted by the Jezebel's who try to keep us from being used by God? Or how we become like Jehu who know God's call, who knows that he is called to do a work for him and will not be distracted? See what's amazing friends is that we are already victorious through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. When he came and he died for our sins and he shed his blood for the forgiveness of our sins and that he rose from the grave three days later and he's given us that same power to that same resurrection power to tread on scorpions and to tread on snakes and to be overcomers and to be conquerors but sometimes we do not walk in that. And I'm here to tell us that we have been called. Are you willing to be used? Are you willing to be used? I've closed with this story many times and I'm going to make it very short of a man and a son and I think of the hat fields because they know that they know that story. Of a man, a father and a son who were into pieces of art and they would spend time in the room they would look at these pieces of rare art that was Picasso and Van Gogh and all these rare pieces that were extraordinary rare and they would spend time talking about them. Well then the son went off until the military and ultimately went off to war and the father would go into that house while he was gone and he would say my son liked that piece there, my son liked that piece there, how he'd like this piece here. And then one day he got the dreaded news that any parent could give can get is that his son was killed in action and no longer did the father want to go into this room to spend time because it reminded him too much of his son and it just was too painful. So he lost interest. Well one day there was a knock on the door and a young man there was dressed in his military uniform he comes and says sir you don't know who I am but I want to tell you that it was because your son is that I have life today.  And the father gets this portrait and it's obviously an amateur painting but it really captured the contours of his smile the way his lip would turn when he smiled and the father got that picture and he held it to his chest and he wept.  Well eventually he died and because there were so many pieces of rare art there and so many pictures there that there was an estate that was going to go on there was going to be a auction of all these fine pieces of art and paintings and an auctioneer comes up and he says all first order of business that he hits the gavel and all these connoisseurs of art people are there from all over the world they come to bid on these pieces of art and the first order of business that man gets up there hits the gavel and he says the portrait of the sun and there's a little bit of murmuring and laughter in the in the in the audience and finally the guy says going once and now people are getting upset well somebody just buy this junk so we can get to the real stuff and a man in the back says $20 and the man says $20 once $20 twice sold slams the gavel down old man walks up takes the picture looks at it gets it presses against his chest and walks out the auctioneer gets back up there and says this concludes our auction and everybody was up in arms what do you mean what do you mean this concludes our auction what do you mean we're done with everything he says we're done he says we demand an explanation and the auctioneer the auctioneer says whoever has the son gets everything whoever has jesus has everything are you willing to be used by him because he gave you everything whoever has the son gets everything amen father we thank you


I'm Carol. I'm Karen. We met on a Sierra Club outing 10 years ago and we've been friends ever since. We're curious in different ways and I think that's what's great. She's kind of got the big picture and I'm detail-oriented. Just works. Ha, ha, ha. Oh, nice. That's nice. We've done things that I never imagined I'd be doing. Like Aurora hunting. Staying in the fire tower in West Virginia. Snowmobiling. Dog sledding. I never fed a bird before I met Karen. We went to Brooks Falls with a grizzly bear's capture salmon. It is true that you can find new friendships at any stage in life. I know we'll always be there for each other.


Art is for everybody. No matter who you are or where you're from, art and culture should be an expected and accepted part of everybody's life. But, depending on the type of person you are or where in the country you live, this is not always easy to find. So say hello to the Cultural Spring, an exciting and ambitious project here to get more people in Sunland to experience and be inspired by the arts. With the help of £1 million of National Lot refunding, the Cultural Spring creates programmes of art activity that are both relevant and resonate with the people that live here in Sunland. And what bigger effect do you think this has on the greater community? We can be scientists, we can be photographers, we can be artists and I think that's important because we all need a little bit of hope otherwise what happens to aspiration. And how does art in particular bring people together? It takes a very special type of artist to do a lot of participatory work like Jo, who's involved in the way you're experimenting project. She's been great at learning from others and what they're interested in and seeing how that develops. So we've got exhibitions like this which not only features Jo's work but also the work of people within the community. One of the most important things I would say that comes out of it is the fact that people get to work together and get to kind of understand other people's ideas or other people's position. Which I think is important isn't it to have a little bit of crossover so we can all have a little bit of empathy for each other. The Cultural Spring has engaged over 40,000 people in arts activities, events and workshops in Sunland and the surrounding areas since 2014. Encouraging those who don't normally see art as a big part of their lives to be inspired by the city's creative culture. And why do you think projects like this is so important for cities like Sunland? Just seeing people, even elderly people who might think that there isn't a place for them anymore. Just seeing them get engaged and just enjoying the experience and working together with younger people and students and volunteers. It's just been lovely just to say that Sunland is a place for everyone.


Had to go back and check and see which installment this is. This is installment number six of drugstore beauty brand superstars Hi friends, I have another installment of drugstore beauty brand superstars for you guys. I put together what I feel like is the best products from certain brands. This time we're tackling LA girl and NYX and we're going to go through those and we're gonna find the very best out of that brand that I have tried. Now I do realize that both of these brands have a ton in them So I am not claiming that I've tried every single thing and if you have something that you absolutely love from this brand that I Don't talk about you definitely need to leave it in the comment section for me so that I know that I love NYX But it is an enormous brand and so I would love to hear your input there Let's get into talking about the very best from the drugstore from these two brands. Alright, we're starting with LA girl I feel like LA girl has some fantastic Complexion products they have two foundations if you like more of a matte foundation This particular one might not be for you, but this is the LA girl pro coverage high definition long wear illuminating foundation and I Have loved this for a really long time I think I put this in a video like when I very first started my channel because I felt in love with it This is a really good color for me Even though it's not the perfect color for me But it's a good color for me when I'm self tanning and let me find out what it is called. This one is called 642 and it says fair, but it's not fair Anyway, this foundation is very luminous So if you're somebody that's oily you might not like it But if you're somebody that's normal to dry you might absolutely love it And the other thing about it that I like is that it is a very nice coverage, but it's not thick So you can build it from medium up to super high coverage if you need that But it also can be sheared out if you want to put a little bit of maybe a moisturizer in it Or you want to put a primer in it you could wear it more of the tint It is a really beautiful foundation and I really have liked it and it wears a long time throughout the day as well Now I also have it in white and the reason that I have it in white is because this is a good color for me When I am self-danned, but it's not a great color for me in the winter time so this is a great mix in medium and I really like this one particularly because in the winter time if I'm trying to lighten up a foundation it does a great job of it and you can see how white that is it just Really is a fantastic mixer for me with my dry skin Especially in the winter now They also have their mixing pigments and this one is in more of a matte formula And this is a lot more thick than the other one is this one will change your foundation really quickly I really like this it is a really good mixer But again, you can tell how much more pigmented it is then the one that is more luminous So I kind of trade off if I'm going for summer when I want to lighten something up I would go for the more matte one and in the winter I go for the more luminous looking one But these are great mix in pigments, and I also have the blue one I've talked about this extensively on Other videos if you're somebody that struggles with all of your foundations looking orange or yellow on you way too Warm you mix in just a tiny tiny droplet of this because it's extremely pigmented too And it turns your foundation into something more on the cool side because we know that blue is that cool tone It's really really good, and I really like it now. They do have besides the white and the blue I know that they do have an orange and they do have a yellow So if you're somebody that struggles with not being able to get it to be warm enough for you You might look at either one of those depending on whether you like more orange or whether you like more yellow in your foundation So these are really great now another Complexion product are these concealers, and they have been people's Rider-Dite concealers for years way before anything ever came out high-end or the more expensive brands These were around as far as concealers go and then they developed more of the color correctors And that's what I have here today I have the green one and then I have the peach one my favorite is the peach because I have very dark dark Circles under my eyes. They're almost like bluish purple underneath there and a lot of people have said well Why would you wear peach instead of yellow since yellow is the opposite of purple? But mine are just so deep and so dark I need something that brightens at the same time and so the peach is just great now if you're somebody that has Very like oily underneath your eyes if you're somebody that sweats a lot I do in the summer I sweat a lot underneath my eyes. This is a good one for me over the pixie one I like the pixie one, but it's kind of a little bit more emollient than this one is this one will set down and It won't really break apart if you do have those oily under eyes So just go light on these, you know You can always build them up later if you feel like you need more just start out really light And then this one which is the green this one counteracts redness So if you have a blemish, you know You got a little breakout or maybe some red spots or redness readiness that you're trying to get rid of go ahead Try this one. It's really good now You would want to sheer that out a lot because if you don't you're gonna see that green underneath your foundation because of how Pigmented this is so just remember that a little bit goes a long ways with these two another product that I love from LA girls So much is the luminous glow skin illuminator This one is so pretty if you use it with your primer or underneath foundation It just has a very soft subtle sheen to it I think this one is in moonlight. I believe they have two or three other colors I will make sure that I list all of them down below But this one is great for my fair skin and if you're somebody that again likes that warmth You might really like some of the other colors because they did notice that they were quite warm But what you're gonna notice with this is as I put it on you can see that Illumination and I put way too much on but you can see that illumination if you had put it across your whole entire Face how pretty that would be if you want to mix this in with your foundation if you want to use it under If you want to use it on top of your cheeks You can because it's going to give you just a very very slight subtle glow Now I do have one from NYX that is a liquid as well That is a higher beam that you could use on top of your blush or right underneath your blush That would give you a way Stronger highlight, but this one is just very soft. It's very subtle. It feels very lotion like I can feel it Sinking right into the skin. So it's not going to disturb your foundation. It's just really pretty as you can see right there This is a great product and you get quite a bit So if you wanted to use this like on your shoulders or deglitae wherever you wanted to use this You wanted to put it on your hands arms legs It's kind of a big tube so you could go ahead and use it there another product that I really like from them These are called the velvet Blush contour sticks they have all different kinds So they do have them that are more along the lines of a contour and then they have a bronzer colors And then they get into highlighters, but I like this blush one and let's see I can't see what that one is. I will get my glasses on again. This one is called dreamy I do have this one on underneath another powder product It just makes that powder product grip and it kind of melts together and it just looks so pretty now I'll show you this one on the back of my hand right here. This one is so gorgeous. You can build these up Hi, Ollie You can build these up and so they can be a lot brighter and they do have a bunch of colors This of course is my favorite pink, but you could find whatever color you're looking for if you're looking for more of a neutral blush Coral deeper they have all those and again. They have the highlights too I haven't had that in a long time on the highlights But it's a great formula because it doesn't stay tacky once you blend it in just a little bit It just looks really great on your skin And it looks good on mature skin because it is that cream product and it's not going to show up any texture So I really like that one as well. One of my very favorite things from them is their eye products I just barely did a video about their 16 pan palettes and the 9 pan palettes that Rival any high-end. I will try to remember to throw that up in a card But I will definitely link it down below for you and this fine liner that is in teal is so pretty I talked very recently about using liners to tight line my upper lash line to give that little pop of color without being Overwhelmed by color and if you can see how teeny tiny this is I Just love it. It gives you the most fine little line that I have seen in a long time Hopefully you're gonna be able to see that it is just a really really beautiful liner. It doesn't skip It just glides along it lasts a long time on your eyes personally it lasts for me until I take it off I like that they have this teal color in it. I believe they have a few other colors I think they have a white a brown and a black if I'm wrong on that I'll make sure I list that down below for you But I wish that they would come out with a few other colors with this They might also have a purple in this on the LA girl website I'll make sure I list that for you and then I discovered very recently these glazed lip paints These are so much like the Anastasia Beverly Hills lip glosses if you get certain ones of those They're very opaque. They do have their share formulas, but these are really opaque and I love these They're so pretty so I will look at the colors here in just a second like the applicator on it It's just kind of a little plastic applicator so you can dab it across if you want to and This one the first one was kind of a nude color and then this one is kind of like a bright almost Orchid color and I love orchid is a color in the summertime on my lips I know a lot of people don't they had a lot of different colors But let me tell you what colors these are the first one is whisper So that's the nude one right here and then the second one is whimsical and that was the orchid color right there So pretty I love those and then lastly from LA girl are these two glosses. I love these gloss toppers They're so so pretty they will transform any lipstick you have into something that glistens and catches the light and makes your Pal look super juicy. The first one right here is called flashing opal It is a cross between purple and pink and it just catches the light so it's got a duo chrome to it Oh my goodness, isn't that pretty? It's just so gorgeous and then the other one this one is called Magical and this one flashes between pink and peach and it has just a little bit of gold in it And I hope you guys can see those on camera Let me put a bigger swatch and see if you can just Gorgeous, let me put the magical one in the middle of my lips. I got way too much on But it's just so pretty Can you believe how that just shines up those lips and brightens them up and then the colors of them Just catch the light as you turn and I just think they're absolutely gorgeous They do have one other one that I haven't tried I think it's just kind of like a more of a clear look or kind of a pearly look But they're so pretty on your lips and they're just yeah, I love those. Okay LA girl done Let's go over to Nick foundation that I'm wearing today is the total control drop foundation They repackaged this just very recently. I had forgotten about it This is when I had before they did repackage it But the formula is still the same because I got a different color, but this color right here is natural I love these. Okay, if you like the catrice HD foundation That's very watery very thin because you like that thin formula I think that you'll like this as well It is super thin and so in the summertime it works so great on your skin Because it has that high coverage just like the catrice, but it doesn't feel super heavy on your skin It feels very very light. I really like this foundation. I'm wearing it on this side I'm testing another one on this side, but it's a great color for me as I am tanning as well And I just it's so pretty it just evens out your skin tone. It wears all day. It's gonna be there at the end of the day It's beautiful. I think this is a little bit more long-wearing than the one I showed from LA girls So if you're looking for something that's super long-wearing that would hold up under the heat This is probably a better bet than that one and even though I'm not an oily person I don't really have combination skin. It's more normal to dry in the summer This one is great for I think all skin types because if you are oily It still gives you a bit of a mattifying effect. So it doesn't have any breakthrough for me You know, I get a little bit sweaty right here and I will get a little creasing in my chin or around my nose at times But this doesn't so I really like it remember a little bit goes a long way and it's beautiful On mature skin, it doesn't show up any texture or anything like that and I really love it I kind of jumped ahead of myself because I wanted to do primers from Nick's first But the primers that I love the most reach for the most I do love my Revlon primer that has the SPF in it but I really like the way that Nick's does primers and one of the ones that way way back I used is the Nick's Angel Veil and I still love that one. I still think it's very perfecting That is a dead-on dupe for the hourglass veil mineral primer and it's beautiful on your skin. It feels in pores It's great, but these two right now I don't have that one by the way my daughter actually stole it But these two are the ones that I am loving right now now this one, which is the honey do me formula This one is the one that I reach for in the winter because it's super hydrating when you look at it I don't know if you're gonna be able to see this or not. It's a little bit messy. I don't like this delivery system It's just got a little paddle right there It is extremely hydrating and it's kind of looks like honey And I think that was the point to making it look like that it is so Moisturizing underneath makeup and it has a little bit of a slip not a lot of slip But it has a little bit of a slip so you can feel it filling in your pores at the same time But it's very very hydrating so when you get done You're gonna have that hydrated feeling on your skin and you won't have your foundation Looking cakey because that is still very hydrated underneath. I really like this one But probably my favorite one that I've ever tried from them is the marshmallow one This one if you don't like fragrance in your cosmetics I totally understand but this one does have a little bit of a fragrant of a fragrance And you know what I should have told you that these glazed lip paints from LA girl They have a mint tea fragrance to them. They're not cooling or any sort of pumping or anything But they do have a little bit of a mint fragrance to them Just so you know that but this one from nyx the marshmallow primer has a very strong fragrance I don't mind it. It doesn't hang around very long. I love the product though It just works so well for me and this is the probably the most perfecting primer that I've ever tried The Revlon one again, it is my runner up But this one has just kind of stolen the show. I wear this one all the time. I do love elf putty primer But I think I like this one more. I think that the properties in it It just feels like it slips across your skin It feels like it really fills in my pores and then foundation just glides across it Does it help with wear time of foundation any primer that you put on that has a little bit of that silicone in it Is going to because the purpose of it is actually to create a barrier between that moisturizer and your foundation Because that's what happens during the day and that's why we wear primers Is our foundation gets sucked into our skin by the moisture and so it can break apart It can look cakey because that moisture is coming through and a primer like this is really good because it holds That at bay now that I've let that sit down and I'm just running my hand across it It just feels fantastic and you can see that both of them were quite perfecting But I still feel like this right here is a little bit more perfected Especially when I'm looking at it up close I will try to get it a little bit closer But that is so hard with these Lights that we use the big ring lights that we use and then another thing is their color correcting palette I actually heard about this from Stephanie Marie She was talking about how this is a very emollient formula. It's a very Creamy formula that she likes almost as well as she likes Charlotte Tilbury She was kind of giving that by this not that I feel like it's a very good dupe for the stela color correcting palette It has a couple extra colors in here But what I love about it is that it's so creamy and if you have very dry and mature under eyes This is one that you might really like the other thing is that you get to try so many different ones Like I was talking about the green from LA girl By the way, that formula would be better if you were a little bit more oily And if you have a lot of sweating or menopausal sweating like I do in the summertime So you have the purple if you don't know what purple is for it's for brightening a very shallow complexion So if you have a very dull complexion that one works really good Be very careful with any color corrector you use I should probably do a color correcting video where I do My whole face and just kind of use every color so that you guys can see how they are used you don't want to Use the color too much. I was going to say abuse the color But you don't want to use it too much because if you're fair It's going to come through in your foundation if you're darker It's going to make your foundation look a little patchy So you just want to find that little happy medium yellow is uh again for the opposite of purple So if you do have those really bad under eyes and yours lean towards purple not blue Then you would want to try that and then these two peach ones You have two different ones to choose from a deeper peach and then a lighter peach and then this one right here I have really been enjoying this since I started self tanning It's one of those ones that I've been using on extra spots that I couldn't cover with concealer Here's the yellow one. Let me just pick that one up. Here's the yellow one You're not going to be able to see that very well because of my silly self tan But you get the general idea of what it's like. I love the formula on it If you just use it light enough, it won't show through any um Complexion products that you do use on top of it. It's just a really nice palette Nick's was the first to have a dupe for the Anastasia Beverly Hills little micro fine tip eyebrow pencil Basically, it is just a uber micro Small tipped pencil. It can be so wispy. It's so nice. The other thing this is called ash brown It's the perfect color for me. My hair is very ashy Dishwater brown normally so my eyebrows are that color on the other side. It does have a spoolie But this is a perfect color for me. It just works out so well It stays really well on your brows as well And I really like that about it and then if you want a brow product that is Keeping your brows in place what few hairs I do have are kind of crazy and they point all different directions But the brow glue from them is so good. I really really like this. This is going to keep your brows in place If you wanted to wear it to bed your brows would be in place in the morning Let's just say that it has a very very small little spoolie down there on the end So you got a precise applicator, which I really like I do have a tendency to kind of wipe it off a little bit because it is a very Sticky formula. The reason that I say sticky is because it acts like glue It just really puts them in place and keeps them and holds them in place. I really have loved this I heard about this one from risa does makeup love that this mascara is what I have on today And if you guys can see what my eyelashes look to look like today I am in love with this when I first got it first use it I was like this isn't that great But what I found that I wasn't doing was creating second coats because normally when I go in with a second coat My eyelashes are going to clump together and just be like two or three little spikes out This that doesn't happen with this I can go back in and tip my eyelashes or even go back in and thicken them up a little bit After the first coat it has a very very small hourglass shape on there It's almost like a straight wand. I don't know why they just didn't do a straight wand I don't mind the shape of that at all It does a really great job at catching every single little hair. This is the waterproof formula I probably didn't even say what this is called. It is called the doll eye mascara And this is the waterproof formula I love the waterproof mascaras in the summer because I will inevitably get smudging almost every single time I can wear it all day and again, I'll have it on when I go to bed. It doesn't flake. It doesn't smudge I really like it It's mascara that I would have never picked up because I haven't had great luck with the nyx Mascaras before but this one is a winner. I really like it a lot. I have forever Forever been in love with the nyx butter glosses and I'm about to show you my collection of them Here they are. I love this formula. I have how many do I have here one two three seven I have seven right here. That's a lot But I like them all fell in love with this formula and these glosses Long before I had my youtube channel. I want to say that it was like 10 years ago So I just want to swatch them all for you. This one is meringue These are an opaque formula as well. They give you a beautiful juicy look to your lips. This one right here is called Creme brulee. It's a nude color That one is kind of that orchid color that we were talking about earlier in the la girl This one is crème brulee very nude color. Really like that one I pair that one with just about any lip liner and it just goes with them so well This next one is called cinnamon roll. This is a very Like almost a raisiny color. I love it. It's a very kind of a deep mauve color I wear it more in the winter because of its color because I like a little bit brighter lip in the summer Like that one a lot. I like the scent on these. These do have a scent, by the way Kind of a vanilla e-scent. This one is vanilla cream pie. This one is kind of a bright pink More along the lines of a true pink Really like that one too. And then the next one is eclair. This one is a very very blue pink It's kind of a lighter version of that orchid that brighter orchid that we're talking about Everybody's coming to say hi And then this one is called marshmallow. This one I have to pair this one With my coloring because I do have such cool coloring. This one kind of gets a little bit Kind of a little bit lost on my lip So I do have to pair this one with something brighter But I really like that one too. And then last but not least is my very favorite tiramisu This one I wear constantly I have it on today underneath everything that you were seeing And it's just one of those ones that again pairs so well with just about any color lip liner Warm or dark and that is all of them right there And that is it for today's video about all of the nicks and the la girl I hope that you did enjoy seeing so many of my products.  So thanks for being with me I love you guys so much. Please give this video a thumbs up on your way out of here I'll catch you all in my next video. Bye friends


This study analyzed the impact of landscape factors on urban particulate matter 2.5, PM2.5 pollution in China at the city level, finding that agricultural activity is a major contributor to PM2.5 pollution and grassland aggregation has a limited but negative effect on urban PM2.5 pollution. The multivariate regression model explained 70% of the arithmetic mean PM2.5 concentration, AMC, PM2.5, for other cities, 32.8% for small cities, 19.2% for medium cities, and 12.4% for large cities. The findings suggest that air quality control strategies should consider both urban landscape factors and social economic variables to effectively reduce PM2.5 pollution in China. This article was authored by Zhou Yili and Xinhuang.


The Public Audit Committee has just got power to look across Parliament to see if legislation is working and our first task is to look at the National Fraud Initiative and that's important because that initiative makes sure that there is no fraud or error in our public services. It's important for the Scottish taxpayer to make sure their money is not being wasted and it's important for investment in public services.


A military aircraft 222M3 crashed in the Stavropol Kriy of the Russian Federation just hours after launching missiles towards Ukraine, according to the governor of Stavropol Kriy, Vladimir Vladimirov. An Urgent Message. A jet has crashed in a field in Krasnigvardiyskoye district. According to early reports, there is no damage or casualties, and the pilots ejected he said later, Vladimirov announced that two pilots from the aircraft had been found. They are alive, we are transporting them to the hospital. All emergency services are at the scene, he wrote that he did not provide any other details, but posted a photo of the crashed jet, monitoring telegram channels reported that a 222M3 which Russia uses for strikes in Ukraine crashed, stating that it was downed. The Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed the crash of the 222M3 in the Stavropol Kriy. The aircraft crashed after completing a combat mission while returning to the base. Preliminary investigation suggests technical malfunction as the cause of the crash. Three crew members have been evacuated, and the search for one pilot is ongoing. There were no munitions on board the aircraft, and there is no damage on the ground, the statement said meanwhile, the Ukrainian ground forces reported that footage shows the crash of a 222M3 aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces, which had launched missiles towards Ukraine overnight Russian media released video footage of the burning wreckage. Russian air defense increasingly shoots down its aircraft in Crimea. Russian occupiers increasingly began to shoot down their own aircraft over the temporarily occupied Crimea. The reason for the increased frequency of friendly fire from Russian air defense was the growing tension due to constant attacks by Ukraine on Russian military targets on the peninsula. Fearing explosions, the Russian command ordered air defense crew commanders to respond to any threats despite the fact that the Russian friend-foe recognition system has problems. This was stated in the military movement of Ukrainians, and Crimean Tatars Ateş writes Obozrevotel media outlet, agents of the Ateş movement report that tension is growing among the occupiers in the Crimea due to constant missile attacks and UAV raids that threaten military installations. The top military leadership ordered air defense crew commanders to shoot down threats despite problems with the friend-of-foe target detection and recognition system. However, faced with constant missile attacks and UAV raids, commanders of air defense crews are forced to carry out target designation virtually in manual mode. Thanks to this, strikes often occur against their own air targets. The report noted, Thus, the 12th anti-aircraft missile regiment of the 31st Air Defense Division of the Russian Federation especially distinguished itself in this direction. Over the past few weeks, it shot down two military aircraft of the Russian occupiers. Recent Ukrainian strikes have increased pressure on Russian air defense systems and may be leading to Russian forces shooting down their own planes, the UK Ministry of Defense said earlier. It is noted an incident on March 28, where a Crimean Telegram channel reported that a Russian Sukhoi Su-27 jet had crashed over occupied Crimea after being shot down by its own forces. The UK Ministry of Defense added that the downing of the Su-27 and other similar events if confirmed likely highlights the lack of situational awareness and coordination among some Russian forces while also highlighting the second order impact of Ukrainian strikes.


Welcome everybody to Unfiltered. Pastor David, it's always good to have you join us. Well, thank you, John. I guess it wouldn't be unfiltered if you weren't here with us. Well, I guess not. It could be the John Matta show. Nobody would watch it. That's it. Pastor, today I wanted to ask you regarding a topic that has been recently surfacing throughout social media and through circles of church conversations. And it regards women occupying the pulpit, and I wanted to get your thoughts on this. Well, that's obviously, like you just said, John, that's a contemporary question. I guess there are more and more churches that are having women speakers, women standing there. And I think what they're doing is they're trying to qualify that by saying, while they're not pastoring, they're simply teaching from the pulpit. And so there's a resurrection of the question as to whether that's appropriate or not. And so from biblical perspective, as I have interpreted scripture over time, one of the aspects of that kind of thing is that there are no women pastors, scripturally. I know that people like to argue that they are, and I know from the early 1900s with the Pentecostal movement and all of those things that took place, it became more popular for people to recognize women as pastors. And the problem is, is that I don't believe that Paul ever did. I don't believe that the Lord ever instructed women to be pastors. And so it becomes difficult because there are those who say, well, they're not pastors. What they are is they're speaking under the headship or authority of the church and they're under the submission of the pastor. And therefore it's okay for them to do that. And I think what it really is today is not so much a movement of the Holy Spirit freeing women to hold up or to occupy certain positions, but rather a giving in to the cultural moment where we're saying, all women can do everything that a man can do and sometimes even better. Therefore, but the Bible doesn't teach that the Bible teaches that that when Paul speaks and he's about to give the qualifications of an elder, he speaks concerning the women in the church and I know the arguments related to this, but he does say, I don't allow a woman to teach, nor do you serve authority over the man. And so right after making that statement, he moves into the qualifications of the one who's a teacher. And he begins with the primary qualification of the elder as the overseer of the church and the pastor. And so in our fellowship, I would never have, will not have women teaching the main congregation. I won't have that. It isn't that they aren't qualified to have intellectual knowledge or the capacity through the Spirit to communicate truth. It's that I think positionally, that isn't something that I will yield to a particular woman. I believe that the only ones that I will have in our pulpit, John, and I know this isn't popular, but as the pastor of this church who's responsible, and yes, I do take those responsibilities seriously, I would not have that. I personally would not have that. I don't believe that women have been given the position of exercising that kind of authority over a congregation of believers. And again, I realize there are other things and things that would relate to that. Well, what about professors at school or what about certain subjects that they are doctors in or whatever, highly qualified? I appreciate and love them very much and all of that. But I have a tendency of saying, you know, in any church congregation where I have a mixed multitude of men and women, I'm not going to be yielding the pulpit to somebody to do that. And that's just the way it is. And there's argument, as we were discussing off-camera, about Akila and Priscilla. You know, that's one, I don't want to say slight in, and then they use the home church inferring that they were out of the church. And then there's arguments about culture, and that was for that day, but this is today. And so there's a lot of different arguments for, but the Word of God is the Word of God. Yeah, you know that the argument of Aquila and Priscilla, they'll say, well, notice that her name is mentioned before his, and those kinds of arguments. But the fact is that one is at that moment, for example, when they were ministering to Apollos, they were speaking in terms of discipling him, bringing him up in a further understanding of the nuances of the scripture. He was lacking in certain knowledge, you know. Doesn't say in the passages that relate to them and Apollos that she was a pastor. It speaks about them having doctrinal knowledge that they were able to, because if they walk with the Lord, communicate to him. When they speak about the church in their house, it doesn't list her as the pastor. It simply makes mention of the fact that there was a church that met in the house. And so it's only recently that people have begun to argue that she was the pastor and he was a follower, which is interesting, in that, okay, if the woman is the leader of the church, she has the authority, which would mean that her husband was submissive to her authority in the church. If that's the case, who's the authority in the home? Do they still exercise those roles? Does Apollos have opportunity now to lead the home as God has commanded the man to, or is he to be submissive to her leadership in there too? It just is real convoluted when you begin to argue that the woman was given the position of a pastor. And the pastor is actually acting as a leader, a spiritual leader over congregations in Holland. In the Old Testament, you had the men who were leaders. You don't have any women who were the priests. You don't have women priests. You have one occasion where Deborah, who was a prophetess, or Deborah rather was a judge. And so you have that. Now, why was that? It's because there was a need for someone to stand up at that moment because apparently the male leadership refused to do that. And so, again, you can find scriptures and try to point them out and say, oh, this is the way it should be. But I just have never been convinced by those arguments, John. There are so many beautiful places that God has given to us to serve. We need to discover our gifts. But to take an office that was not designed for us is never proper. Amen. Well, thank you, pastor. I just wanted to get your feedback because, again, it's resurfacing and it's gaining traction in a lot of places. And so I just wanted to get your feedback and thoughts as our senior pastor. So thank you for that. Just a couple of reminders that we have our services at 8.30 and 10.45 this Sunday. And pastor, you've taken us. Last Sunday was amazing. You took us to John 21, but we're in Mark still. And we looked at the restoration of Peter. This week, we're still in Mark 16. We're going to be looking at the Great Commission. Oh, good. Looking forward to that.  So it's going to be a good study. If I had your friends and family to come out, men, Sunday is the last day to pick up your register for a men's fishing trip that will be coming up here in about a week. If you want more information, you can stop by our website and then men again for a men's conference, tickets are on sale. You can stop by the gazebo or you can actually go online and register. So we look forward to seeing you guys on Sunday. Pastor, thank you so much. And just a reminder, next Wednesday is communion. Thank you guys for tuning in and God bless you.


Hey everybody, Dr. O here. So ADF or OMAD. So ADF or alternate day fasting, also known as 3612 fasting, and OMAD, one meal a day, they're both intermittent fasting programs that can work amazingly well. One of the most common questions I get though is why I chose ADF versus OMAD. I'm becoming known as the ADF, the alternate day fasting guy, but what I really am is the find what plan works best for you. And that can change based on your goals, that can change based on how much weight you have to lose. Your plan may change and should change as you go. I've never tried to talk anyone out of a plan that is working well for them and I never will. A tool is only good if it's the right tool for you and the right tool for the job. So what's the science say here? Scientific evidence of diets for weight loss, different macronutrient composition, intermittent fasting, and popular diets. I want to read a quote here. In the long term, current evidence indicates that different diets promoted similar weight loss and adherence to diets will predict their success. So the plan that's right for you is the plan that you can stick with long enough to achieve success. It's that simple. So here, this is what AD, just real quickly, what ADF looks like at 3612 fasting.  It's a 36-hour fast, though, because you go from after supper on Monday night, dinner on Monday night, so you don't eat the rest of Monday. You don't eat Tuesday and then you don't eat until breakfast on Wednesday morning. So it's not 24-hour fasting, it's 36-hour fasting. So you see here, eat, fast, eat, fast, eat. Again, this is called 3612 fasting. You can modify this as needed. I shared how I did that in my alternate day fasting video, but that's what alternate day fasting looks like. OMAD is different. You see how every day of the week you eat one meal a day or OMAD. I put here between six and seven because most people I know that use OMAD, they do eat dinner. And some people do extend their eating window and do what you would call a 22-to-plan, where they're maybe eating in a two-hour window instead of a single hour, but OMAD can be a great way to be in a calorie deficit every single day. It's also great if you want to lose weight quickly, but you're too lean for 36-hour fasts or you just don't find them sustainable. So it's a wonderful tool for lots and lots of people. So what do they have in common? They're both great ways to get in a calorie deficit. They're both great ways to lose fat. You can see me looking at a five-pound blob of fat in that picture there. To me, fasting is the most sustainable way to consume fewer calories without dealing with constant hunger, right? Long periods of time without eating allow you to eat more when you do eat, which is more aggressive. This is another question I get. A lot of people that use OMAD will say that alternate day fasting is aggressive. And most people do think that, that alternate day fasting is more aggressive than one meal a day. Common sense absolutely says that'd be true, but let's actually look at it. One meal a day actually allows for fewer meals and shorter eating windows than alternate day fasting does. I eat 10 to 14 meals per week on alternate day fasting compared to only seven with OMAD. And I also have 40 hours of eating window per week compared to seven with OMAD. So this actually explains why some people have better success with OMAD because I think it is actually more aggressive in some ways. So here's the list of things I want to cover quickly about why I prefer OMAD. Longer fasting windows, longer eating windows, optimizing protein intake at least sometimes, the benefits of calorie cycling, fits my schedule better, personal things, fits my goals better, and then I'm less likely to overeat. So let's go through some of these or all of them, but some a little more quickly than others. Am I saying OMAD is bad? No, absolutely not. I know how the internet works, right? People think that because I'm saying why I prefer alternate day fasting that I'm saying OMAD is bad? I'm absolutely not. I'm just explaining why it wasn't the right choice for me. I would love to hear why you chose the intermittent fasting plan that you were using. Maybe you're doing 2MAD or 168 fasting or something else. So reach out and let me know. So when do these differences even matter before we dive into them? I think the differences are super small or don't matter at all if you have a lot of fat to lose, right? The differences become a lot more significant as you get closer to your goals, right? I've done several videos, you can see them here, about how to determine when aggressive fasting is safe and when it isn't. So here's a study that I didn't cover in those other videos. So differences in fat, carbohydrate, and protein metabolism between lean and obese subjects undergoing total starvation. So during prolonged starvation, protein loss and the percent of energy that came from protein oxidation are two to three times higher in lean subjects and two to three times lower in subjects that are living with obesity. And the contribution of protein to net glucose production is half as much in someone that's obese compared to someone that's lean. So this means that if you have a lot of fat on your body that can provide lots of energy, your body won't be digging into your lean mass stores. So you don't have to worry about things like optimizing protein if you have a tremendous amount of weight to lose. The little things really don't become the big things until you get pretty lean. Okay, so number one, the benefits of longer fasting windows. So 36 hours of fasting should lead to higher ketone levels and more autophagy or cell repair and renewal than 23 hours of fasting. So you see here, I like to use the biosense breath ketone meter that they use a score called ACE to tell you what stage of ketosis you're in. My ACE score would typically double or triple between hours 24 and 36 of my fasts. It takes a minimum of 16 to 18 hours for increased autophagy from fasting. Several studies actually say that there's no evidence of increased autophagy in humans anyways until 24 hours are beyond. And autophagy can actually increase up to 300% by hour 36. So it's one of the reasons I like the longer fasting windows is I see more ketones and I'm assuming that means there's more autophagy. We can't measure autophagy directly yet. Longer fasting windows also increase growth hormone levels and lower insulin levels even further. So for most people you'd see better ketosis, increased autophagy, higher growth hormone and lower insulin levels if you fasted for 36 hours versus 23. But a 23 hour fasting window will improve all of these. So OMAD has shorter fasting windows but you have them more frequently. Alternate day fasting, you have less fasting windows but each one should be more clinically significant. So I also like 36 hour fast because all I have to do is make it until bedtime and I can turn a 24 hour fast into a 36 hour fast. So it's 6pm, I go to bed pretty early. I made a course about sleep, I think sleep is super important. So it's like if I can just get till 9 or get till 9.30 and go to bed and then I wake up and when I have breakfast my 24 hour fast has now become a 36 hour fast. This is why I chose alternate day fasting but if the longer fasting windows make you miserable then OMAD would be a much smarter choice for you. I would also say that these benefits were primarily talking more about health effects than the actual calorie deficit so keep that in mind if your primary goal is weight loss. Next the benefits of longer feeding windows. So alternate day fasting you have longer fasting windows on one side but then you have longer feeding windows on the other when you do eat. This primarily has to do with protein timing and calorie cycling so let's dive in and see what those things mean. So protein, the weight of the evidence says that you need three or more protein rich meals in an 8 plus hour window if you want to maximize muscle protein synthesis and muscle growth. This means that neither ADF, alternate day fasting or OMAD can satisfy your protein requirements all the time. This is why I have people progress to less aggressive forms of fasting as they get lean. This is also why I recommend 16-8 fasting if muscle building is a top priority. So let's look at the science here. So what does the science say? Dietary protein distribution positively influences 24 hour muscle protein synthesis in healthy adults. So these are two diets, same amount of protein, same amount of calories, that's very important. So they had protein, they had breakfast, lunch and dinner but the even group had let's just say around 30 grams of protein at each meal, breakfast, lunch and dinner. The skew or skewed group ate about 10 grams of protein for breakfast, about 16 at lunch and then 63 or 64 grams at dinner. So that's why it was called skewed. Most of it was skewed to the last meal of the day. The 24 hour muscle protein synthesis rate was 25% higher in the even group that spread their protein out throughout the day more evenly than the skewed group that saved most of their protein for the one evening meal. These differences would be even bigger if they saved all of their protein for one meal. The next study, moderating the portion size of a protein rich meal improves anabolic efficiency in young and the elderly. So the other issue is there's a limit to how much protein your body can use to increase muscle protein synthesis from one meal. I'm not saying there's a limit to how much you can digest or absorb but at some point adding more protein isn't going to stimulate more muscle protein synthesis. So this study compared 30 grams of protein versus 90 grams of protein in one meal. It all came from lean beef so 30 grams of protein from lean beef increased muscle protein synthesis by approximately 50% which is what you'd expect to see. The other group ate 90 grams of protein so even though there was a three fold increase in protein and there was more calories because they were eating three times as much lean beef there was no further increase in protein synthesis following the ingestion of 90 grams of protein. So you can't just keep throwing protein in one meal and expect it to increase muscle protein synthesis. I'm not saying that eating more than 30 grams of protein is bad. There are lots of other things your body can do with protein but if you're trying to maximize muscle protein synthesis it appears to be impossible in a single meal. Another one, myofibrillar muscle protein synthesis rates subsequent to a meal in response to increased doses of whey protein at rest and after resistance exercise. So this one what I wanted to show you here is that muscle protein synthesis increased by 49% when the study subjects consumed 20 grams of protein and by 56% when they consumed 40 grams of protein. So that means that increase in the protein at one meal from 20 to 40 grams would lead to a 10 to 20% higher increase in muscle protein synthesis. But the main reason I wanted to talk about this is a dose of whey protein higher than 20 grams started to stimulate amino acid oxidation. So what does your body do with protein? If you've maximized your muscle protein synthesis what does your body start to do with protein? Well it oxidizes it and turns it into fuel. So I think that this study is really important though I think it's one of the key studies that shows that 40 grams of protein might be a real ideal number for most people when it comes to in a meal, when it comes to maximize muscle protein synthesis but it's also just a reminder that your body will digest and absorb that protein but it can turn it into fuel just like it can carbs and fat. Okay so OMAD allows you to eat some protein every day which is good news but it's not possible to optimize your protein intake in one meal. The downside with alternate day fasting is that you go longer periods with zero protein but then you can actually optimize protein intake every other day by having three or four protein rich meals during your 12 hour feeding window. So neither are perfect which is why we choose the path that fits best into our lives. For me the choice to optimize protein intake half the time outweighed the choice to get some protein every day. This is especially true because the next thing I'm going to cover here because how I rely on calorie cycling to bounce back and forth between fat loss and muscle building modes. So that's the next reason I like the longer eating windows is the benefits of calorie cycling. So with alternate day fasting I get to take a psychological and the metabolic outbreak from dieting every other day. This has been the key to my sustained success. I was always pretty good at dieting every day for a few months until I fell off the wagon. Now I don't have to because alternate day fasting allows me to eat at maintenance or slightly above multiple days every week. So OMAD is a great strategy for getting into a calorie deficit but you're in a calorie deficit every day. So this calorie cycling up and down the psychological benefits are the main reason I love it but it also does appear to have metabolic advantages. And I've covered this in other places so I'm just going to show you these things quickly. So I will show you a few studies here but check out these videos about calorie cycling if you want to see why I prefer it over being in a calorie deficit every day. So study intermittent versus daily calorie restriction which diet regimen is more effective for weight loss. So they looked at this is a review they looked at studies between three and 12 weeks long and they compared intermittent calorie restriction or calorie cycling like you do with alternate day fasting versus daily calorie restriction like you would do with OMAD. So the weight loss and fat mass loss was almost always really, really similar but here's a quote in contrast less fat free mass was lost in response to intermittent calorie restriction versus daily calorie restriction. So these findings suggest that there's plenty of ways to lose weight but that intermittent calorie restriction or calorie cycling can help you retain lean mass. All right. I'm just going to cover these in those other videos but this study here just showed that refeeds can preserve fat free mass and these studies here all showed that refeeds and diet breaks can help to minimize the metabolic adaptation that comes with weight loss by boosting leptin levels. So this is a video of me being a hormone that regulates satiety.  So there's like, you know, I went into great detail in other places. So again, I will spare you the details here but these are reasons why I like cycling calories up and down. All right. So OMAD keeps you in a calorie deficit every day. That can lead to amazing weight loss but alternate day fasting has you eating it maintenance or above several times per week which is why I like it. I like it because of the psychological break but then also that metabolic So calorie cycling using alternate day fasting also fits my goals much better. Now we're just getting into real personal opinion stuff. I like to do my strength training when I'm in a calorie surplus but I still need to be in a calorie deficit at the end of the week.  So here you see a picture. Nothing impressive about me but again, I'm almost 45 years old. I went at least 20 years without doing any sort of exercise. I think this calorie cycling approach and optimizing protein intake really does explain how I was able to add 15 pounds of lean mass and increase my metabolic rate by 180 calories per day while losing 180 pounds of fat. So I lost 165 pounds, 180 pounds of fat and then I put on 15 pounds of lean mass. So this is the best explanation that I can offer. ADF also fits my personal schedule better. It may not you but fasting on my busy days is way easier than fasting every day. So I have some days at work where I am much busier and I actually love the fact that I don't have to take time to prepare food and eat food and clean up. So it makes sense for me to do all my fasting when I'm super, super, super busy. So that means I can fast less like on the weekends or on days where I'm less busy. So it fits my schedule that way. It also fits my training schedule like I just said. I get to be well fed on my training days. So I fast when I'm too busy to eat anyways. I feed or eat when I'm on my training days. And I also usually train in the late mornings. So if I was doing oh matter one meal a day, I'd basically be training 15 hours after my last meal and six to seven hours before my next meal, which works great for some people but doesn't work well for me. So I get the fast when it's easiest to fast. I get to eat when it makes the most sense for me to eat. And then this one here, I'm less likely to overeat. Now this is again a totally personal thing. You might be the exact opposite of this. But I've done some omad and when I'm eating one meal a day, I'm more likely to overeat. I try to basically stuff in some extra food because I know that it's the only meal I'm going to get. With alternate day fasting, when I'm eating three to four meals in a day, it's a lot easier for me to stick to my plan because I know that I have another meal coming soon. But that's completely personal. So ADF or omad, these are the reasons why I love alternate day fasting for me. These are not reasons why I think you should abandon one meal a day. Absolutely not. So try both and see which one works best for you. I'm beyond happy if omad is helping you reach your goals. You can also choose your own adventure and create a plan that mixes both. I know some people that like to do longer fast during the week and then they do omad on the weekends. Or you can split the difference. Option three is to split the difference and do a modified alternate day fasting or the warrior diet which is or 24 fasting where you have a 20 hour fasting window and four hour eating window. So with modified alternate day fasting, you still eat every day and you still get to have dinner if having dinner with your family is really important. I'll link to the video in the description here for that. And then 24 fasting or the warrior diet or some people call it too mad for two meals a day would give you a second protein feeding. So both of those might be more ideal. They would be less aggressive so you wouldn't lose weight as fast but as you get closer to your goal those might both become smarter ideas for you. Cause both of these are more sustainable long-term options for weight maintenance but that's a story for another video. All right, I hope this one helps. Have a wonderful day. Be blessed.


thank you for checking out this episode of brutal battle beer break today I'm gonna be doing a beer by Gilgamesh Brewing they're out of Salem, Oregon and the beer I have today for them is Vader it is a 6.5% ABV Cascadian dark ale with coffee added for those of you who don't know Cascadian dark ales also black IPA's anyway so Vader yes and it looks like it has stars and everything could this be referring to Star Wars Vader most likely all right let's get this in the glass see what it's looking like tasting like very brown is expecting maybe it would be a little bit more dark Cascadian dark ales tend to be a little darker than this one is this one's very like kind of it looks dark brown but when you hold it up to the light it's pretty light brown honestly with a little tinge of a reddishness to it a lot of the times Cascadian dark ales or black IPA's will be significantly darker because of the dark malts that they use so smell a lot of hops on it to be honest it's actually the first thing I get very citrusy a little bit of a floral aspect to it and as I keep smelling I get that coffee coming through but I'm also getting a chocolatey aspect from the darker malt just really interesting like hoppy chocolatey citrus coffee it's real odd because you just keep you can't just I don't know like they just kind of like you smell those different smells in an order but the order changes every time I smell it's like on some sniffs it's a coffee first on other sniffs it's the citrusy hoppiness first on others it's like the chocolate really interesting intricate there's a significant bitterness on the end for what I was expecting which is probably from like that kind of dark tannic kind of coffee note to it something like bitter coffee very roasty heavy roast type coffee going on in there there's a little bit of that citrusy hoppiness coming through not really getting oh if I look for it I can get like the slightest tinge of that chocolatey note but really not much of anything there in that aspect it's kind of odd to be honest it's very bitter it's a lot more bitter than I thought it would be and it's just bitter like coffee that's not good you know so not really a fan of this one gotta be honest I was hoping for a lot out of this but maybe it's an instance where it gets better as it warms the bitterness is just not so good sometimes bitterness is fine for me if it's backed up by a bunch of other flavors but in this instance it's it's not backed up by enough because all the other flavors are very much subdued in comparison to that bitterness but anyway Gilgamesh brewing sorry this is your only bear I've ever had I didn't really care for it but you know maybe I can find some of your stuff in the future and I'm sure there's something good out there that I like anyway thanks everyone for checking out and go get yourself an awesome beer