A series of apparently unconnected military movements observed in Middle East seas and skies in the last ten days have a common factor: introduction of the new US Air Sea Battle (ASB) doctrine, which is designed to make the most of tightly coordinated operations by air, land, sea, undersea, space and cyberspace capabilities for defeating those of the enemy.

Monday, May 14, the day that Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal warned Iran not to meddle in the evolving Saudi-Bahraini union, large US Navy and Marine forces put into Jeddah port for first time in 11 years.

Last week, Israel’s Navy and Air Force and their special operations units – Shaldag, Shayetet 13 and 960 Task Force – carried out their largest combined exercise ever in the Mediterranean. It ended with Israeli surface ships and submarines arrayed in a dense defensive line against enemy vessels armed with unconventional weapons approaching the Israeli coast.

The Israeli exercise, which ended May 13, practiced the new American ABS doctrine of simultaneously massing large-scale sea and air strength against Iran on two seas, in this case, the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf. It also drilled operating in unison with their American counterparts under the same doctrine.

DEBKAfile’s military sources report that Washington timed the unveiling of the new battle strategy for May 10, two weeks before the Six Power nuclear talks with Iran resume in Baghdad.

US Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jon Greenert explained that the ASB concept was developed “to defeat A2AD (Anti-Access/Area Denial) strategies such as the closure of the (Hormuz) strait, cyber attack, mines, cruise and ballistic missiles and air defense systems, threats enhanced by technological advancements.”

Our military sources add: The concept is also closely applicable to American tactics for defending the Persian Gulf nations against possible Iranian aggression as the GCC takes its first unification steps to shore up its defenses against that threat.

Adm. Greenert wrote: “There’s been attention recently about closing an international strait using, among other means, mines, fast boats, cruise missiles and mini-subs.”

DEBKAfile: Those are precisely the systems Iran’s Revolutionary Guards hold ready for a decision to block the strategic Strait of Hormuz to international oil traffic.

ABS concepts include “submarines hitting air defense and cruise missiles in support of Air Force bombers: F-22 Air Force stealth fighters taking out enemy cruise missile threats to Navy ships.”

Adm. Greenert was the first senior American commander to put on public record the measures for repelling Iranian cruise missile attacks on US aircraft carriers deployed in the Persian Gulf. He also spelled out the mission for which a squadron of F-22 jets was stationed at the Al Dhafra air base in late April.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly 539 revealed on May 4 that a second squadron was due to land soon in the Gulf region.

On May 16, Adm. Greenert and US Air Force chief Gen. Norton Schwartz are to discuss the ABS in a public event at the Brookings Institute in Washington.

US and Israeli air, sea and special forces have meanwhile begun operating under the new doctrine in the Mediterranean, the Red Sea and Persian Gulf. Monday, the US Amphibious Ready Group, 24th MEU, led by the USS Iwo Jima put into Jeddah, the Saudi Navy’s Red Sea command port, with 2,200 Marines aboard.

It was the first time since the 2001 Gulf War that the Saudis had permitted US naval and air units of this size to anchor in one of their ports and, moreover, allowed American military personnel to show themselves in its streets.

The GCC summit which began in Riyadh on the same day had three key items on its agenda: Iran’s military, political and covert threat to the region’s stability; the Syrian crisis; and unification steps between Saudi Arabia and Bahrain to ward off Iranian interference in the Shiite-led unrest.

- Prophecy News Watch

Left your phone at home again? A solution is at hand: make sure it is with you at all times by having it implanted in your arm.

But given the opportunity, would you want your gadget to be a permanent part of you? The question may need answering sooner than you think.

Researchers at Autodesk, a software company in Toronto, Canada, checked to see whether the methods we currently use to interface with our gadgets work when the device is implanted in human tissue. The answer was a resounding “yes”.

A button, an LED and a touch sensor all functioned appropriately when embedded under the skin of a cadaver’s arm. The team was even able to communicate transcutaneously using a Bluetooth connection and charge the electronics wirelessly.

“That’s the bottom line,” says Christian Holz of the Autodesk team, who presented the work this week at the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Austin, Texas. “Traditional user interfaces work through the skin.”

Would anyone want a piece of consumer electronics inside their body? There is something intrinsically creepy about the idea. Plus there is a risk that the device could malfunction and need to be removed, or that it could infect the surrounding tissue, not to mention the dystopian vision of a society in which our phones become tracking devices that we can never be free of.

Yet there are reasons for thinking that the cyborg future will come to be. The team, who worked with University of Toronto anatomist Anne Agur, says that medical risks such as infection need to be better understood before a device can be implanted into a living person. But it is a problem that manufacturers of existing implants, such as stents and replacement hips, have successfully tackled.

There are also clear benefits to implanted electronics. “The device is always there,” says Holz. “You cannot lose it.” And implants provide new interface methods. A gadget similar to a smartphone could provide a calendar alert by means of a gentle sub-skin vibration, for example.

And that creepy feeling? It is a common reaction now, but may lessen as people become familiar with the technology. The idea of using a machine to assist a human heart was once deemed unnatural, for example, but the insertion of a pacemaker is now a routine procedure.

“In general, the trend has been that people are more and more willing to incorporate bits of the machine world into themselves,” says Sherry Turkle, a sociologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“The perception [of this technology] 10 years ago would differ from today and from what we would get in 10 years’ time,” agrees Holz.

Turkle wants society to think seriously about the potential downsides of implanted electronics, including tracking. But she has also studied how people relate to their cellphones and notes that some talk about them as if they were cyborgs.

“People literally cannot be without this device,” Turkle says. “They don’t feel the same when they are not connected. We live with our phones as if they are part of our body.”

If we feel that way, perhaps having a phone implanted isn’t unnatural at all. It may just be the obvious thing to do with a device that we already feel highly attached to.

- Prophecy News Watch

Today’s reading: 2 Samuel 4:4

Generations of scribes, working for the most part in anonymity, have faithfully rendered the Bible as the best preserved work of the ancient world. Although each pen stroke was the result of a scribe’s action, there are in fact very few places where a scribe appears to have intentionally altered the “received” text. Such changes in the Hebrew Bible are identified by the scribal tradition as tiqqune sopherim (“emendations of the scribes”). Various rabbinic lists enumerate specific emendations, ranging in total from seven to eighteen.

Most of these early scribal emendations were introduced based on religious motives in an effort to preserve the sanctity and dignity of the Biblical text. For example, Genesis 18:22 reports that “the men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the LORD.” According to some lists, this verse reflects a deliberate scribal change at the end of a verse that originally read “while the LORD was still standing before Abraham.” This change sought to avoid depicting God as a servant awaiting Abraham’s instruction. Another example occurs in Zechariah 2:8, which warns that whoever struck Israel touched “the apple of [God's] eye.” Scribal lists inform the reader that the original text has a first person suffix, providing the reading “the apple of my eye.” This change sought to avoid the impression that God himself was speaking anthropomorphically, as though he had a physical eye.

Some changes in the Biblical text, including euphemistic expressions (intended, e.g., to express something less starkly), are not explicitly marked. One such example occurs with respect to the proper names that contain the element “Baal.” The noun Baal, which originally meant simply “Lord,” came later to signify almost exclusively the proper name of the Canaanite god. Later readers were apt to be offended by the appearance of this name in the Scripture, especially when associated with an Israelite. Thus, names that included “Baal” were sometimes changed in order to refrain from speaking even indirectly of false gods. For example, in 1 Chronicles 8:34 9:40 the son of Jonathan is identified as Merib-Baal, whereas in 2 Samuel 4:4 he is called Mephibosheth. Similarly, a son of Saul is called Esh-Baal in 1 Chronicles 8:33 9:39 but Ish-Bosheth in 2 Samuel 2:8. In both cases the name Baal has been substituted with bosheth, the Hebrew noun for “shame.” The change does not appear to reflect a negative judgment on the individual in question, but rather was a way of condemning the name of Baal.

The cumulative evidence of the Hebrew Bible shows that such emendations were not carried out systematically. It is also important to emphasize that most early scribal emendations are explicitly identified as such by marginal notations that preserve the text of the original reading. Viewed in this light, such changes provide insight into the religious sensibilities of various readers of the Bible rather than reflecting an attempt to alter the actual wording of the sacred text.

- Bible Gateway.Com

The Man Whose Sin Brought a Curse

In consequence of the improper conduct of Ham when Noah was drunk, the heart of his father was set against him. Without doubt, Ham’s act was the manifestation of an impure heart. Perhaps he had always been a filthy dreamer.

Because every imagination of our heart is defiled (Gen. 8:21), we are all the sons of Ham in this respect. There is none clean, no not one ( Rom. 3:10, 12).

The indignation of Noah found expression in the thrice repeated curse (Gen. 9:25-27 ). How tragic it is that the wickedness of Ham appears to have influenced the whole of his descendants whose history is one of folly and crime. The sin of one man polluted many peoples. Ham sinned, and a curse came upon Canaan. The Hamites were condemned to be hewers of wood and drawers of water.

The Hebrew word for Ham means “hot” and is surely prophetic of the climates that have created the blackness of the skin of the Negro, and the dark complexions of other peoples from the same stock. Egypt is called “the land of Ham” (Ps. 105:23) and the Egyptian word for “Ham” is Kem , meaning black and warm. From Ham we have the Egyptians, Africans, Babylonians, Philistines and Canaanites.

- Bible Gateway.Com

Morning

“In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in him.”
Colossians 2:9-10

All the attributes of Christ, as God and man, are at our disposal. All the fulness of the Godhead, whatever that marvellous term may comprehend, is ours to make us complete. He cannot endow us with the attributes of Deity; but he has done all that can be done, for he has made even his divine power and Godhead subservient to our salvation. His omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, immutability and infallibility, are all combined for our defence. Arise, believer, and behold the Lord Jesus yoking the whole of his divine Godhead to the chariot of salvation! How vast his grace, how firm his faithfulness, how unswerving his immutability, how infinite his power, how limitless his knowledge! All these are by the Lord Jesus made the pillars of the temple of salvation; and all, without diminution of their infinity, are covenanted to us as our perpetual inheritance. The fathomless love of the Saviour’s heart is every drop of it ours; every sinew in the arm of might, every jewel in the crown of majesty, the immensity of divine knowledge, and the sternness of divine justice, all are ours, and shall be employed for us. The whole of Christ, in his adorable character as the Son of God, is by himself made over to us most richly to enjoy. His wisdom is our direction, his knowledge our instruction, his power our protection, his justice our surety, his love our comfort, his mercy our solace, and his immutability our trust. He makes no reserve, but opens the recesses of the Mount of God and bids us dig in its mines for the hidden treasures. “All, all, all are yours,” saith he, “be ye satisfied with favour and full of the goodness of the Lord.” Oh! how sweet thus to behold Jesus, and to call upon him with the certain confidence that in seeking the interposition of his love or power, we are but asking for that which he has already faithfully promised.

Evening

“Afterward.”
Hebrews 12:11

How happy are tried Christians, afterwards. No calm more deep than that which succeeds a storm. Who has not rejoiced in clear shinings after rain? Victorious banquets are for well-exercised soldiers. After killing the lion we eat the honey; after climbing the Hill Difficulty, we sit down in the arbour to rest; after traversing the Valley of Humiliation, after fighting with Apollyon, the shining one appears, with the healing branch from the tree of life. Our sorrows, like the passing keels of the vessels upon the sea, leave a silver line of holy light behind them “afterwards.” It is peace, sweet, deep peace, which follows the horrible turmoil which once reigned in our tormented, guilty souls. See, then, the happy estate of a Christian! He has his best things last, and he therefore in this world receives his worst things first. But even his worst things are “afterward” good things, harsh ploughings yielding joyful harvests. Even now he grows rich by his losses, he rises by his falls, he lives by dying, and becomes full by being emptied; if, then, his grievous afflictions yield him so much peaceable fruit in this life, what shall be the full vintage of joy “afterwards” in heaven? If his dark nights are as bright as the world’s days, what shall his days be? If even his starlight is more splendid than the sun, what must his sunlight be? If he can sing in a dungeon, how sweetly will he sing in heaven! If he can praise the Lord in the fires, how will he extol him before the eternal throne! If evil be good to him now, what will the overflowing goodness of God be to him then? Oh, blessed “afterward!” Who would not be a Christian? Who would not bear the present cross for the crown which cometh afterwards? But herein is work for patience, for the rest is not for today, nor the triumph for the present, but “afterward.” Wait, O soul, and let patience have her perfect work.

- Bible Gateway.Com

Daniel 12:1 “At that time shall arise Michael, the great prince who has charge of your people” (v. 1a).

Central to the biblical description of God is the doctrine of divine providence. Scripture is clear that the Lord did not make the world and then leave it alone to run its course. Rather, He continues to uphold and sustain His creation (Heb. 1:1-4). God’s continuing involvement with creation is according to His design as He works out “all things according to the counsel of his will” (Eph. 1:11).

What is often forgotten when considering divine providence is that the angels are some of the many secondary agents through which the primary agent – God Himself – works out His plan. Angels themselves are not divine; they are creatures who, along with everything else the Almighty has made (Rev. 4:11), have an origin in space and time.

That the Lord uses angels to govern His creation is clear from many places in Scripture. We are familiar with the involvement of angels in certain miraculous events, such as the resurrection of Jesus, when an angel rolled the stone away from the opening of the tomb (Matt. 28:1-10). Yet the Bible seems to teach that angels are involved in everyday events as well, such as the rise and fall of human governments. This is a point made by the twentieth-century Swiss scholar Oscar Cullmann. In a series of essays, Professor Cullmann analyzed passages like Daniel 12:1 and noted that certain angels are apparently linked to certain societies and nations. The influence of the supernatural can be either heavenly or demonic, as illustrated in the conflict between Michael, the one with charge over God’s people, and the prince of Persia (chap. 10). Still, both angels and demons apparently hold great sway and influence over the course of human events, which does not surprise the Father, of course, as He is the Creator.

Scripture also reveals a difference in rank among the angels. Jude 9 refers to the archangel Michael who has a leadership role in the angelic host (archangel means “head angel” or “ruling angel”). Gabriel may also function in this role, though the Bible never calls him an archangel. In any case, this order and rank is not surprising. After all, the angels were created by the God of order.

Coram deo: Living before the face of God

Knowing that the Lord has an army in heaven who wages war against His enemies is very encouraging. Since we are His people, we know that God’s angels are fighting on our behalf and advancing the good plans our Creator has for each of His children. Who knows how many times we each have been rescued from trouble because of the intervention of the Lord’s army? The close calls we experience may just be evidence of God’s angels at work.

For further study:

Joshua 5:13-15

The Bible in a year:

1 Chronicles 8-10

- Bible Gateway.Com

Today’s Truth
Proverbs 14:1 (NCV) “A wise woman strengthens her family, but a foolish woman destroys hers by what she does.”

Friend to Friend
Family means different things to different people. What is a family? Well, I can tell you that a family is no longer simple. Family is complex and has changed to include many different relationships. But the bottom line is that family is a group of persons with whom you are doing life. Family is where we learn about God then live out the very nature and character of God in relationships.  Family is important to God. He created it before He created the church and, as with each of His creations, He made a plan for it to succeed. At the heart of that plan is love. To trust God with our family demands that we first love and trust God in our own lives then allow that love to spill over into our family.

What a crazy day it had been! It was a day probably like many of yours. I was a young mom with two small children. My husband was the youth pastor at a large church in town. I taught a weekly Bible study for senior high girls and directed a youth choir that practiced one night a week and sang for the early worship service every Sunday. We hosted a youth Bible study in our home every Monday night … and, well, you get the idea. My schedule was almost to the point of ridiculous, and I was exhausted most of the time. But this particular day had been crazier than most. Both kids had a cold and were grumpy. The house was a mess, the laundry was piled high, and I had a meeting at church that night. I was counting the minutes until my husband came walking through the front door. I needed rescuing. The phone rang. “Honey, I won’t be able to make it home before church visitation tonight,” Dan said. He sounded so tired that I could not muster up one ounce of anger. Instead, I shifted into overdrive. I snatched both kids off of the backyard swing, plopped them in the bathtub for a quick rinse and impatiently shoved little arms and legs into clean clothes while spooning food into little mouths before firmly depositing both kids in their car seats. Off we went to church for the third night in a row.

At a stop sign, I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw two miserably silent children, tears streaming down their sad little faces. I heard His voice, “Mary, what are you doing and who are you doing it for?” My heart broke. I suddenly realized that I was running the race of life for the wrong audience. Turning the car around, I headed home.

“Hey guys! Would you like to go home, put on your pajamas, make some cookies and watch a movie with me?” Cheers and clapping erupted from the back seat as tears gave way to smiling faces, and laughter and giggles filled the car and my heart. It has been over twenty years and I still remember that precious night of ministry.

Women are so busy. As believers, we delight in finding creative ways to touch hearts and are often passionate about introducing those hearts to God’s love, forgiveness and transforming power – and rightly so. However, I wonder how many of us miss the hungry hearts that greet us each morning across the breakfast table or wait for us to come home each night. Do we overlook a child’s silent longing for the kind of love that is spelled “t-i-m-e?” Do we miss the opportunity to encourage a weary husband who has, once again, returned home without a job? When was the last time you gave your parents a hug and thanked them for everything they have done for you over the years? Do your grandparents know how valuable their legacy of love and wisdom is to you? We make the erroneous assumption that the people in our lives know how we feel about them. Do they? And even if they do know, wouldn’t it be great to tell them again?

It is so easy to lose focus and scramble priorities. We get so busy doing good things and miss one of the highest things God created us to do – family. Our public life is only as valid as our private life. Family is the perfect framing for God’s highest work, the litmus test for authentic service and our greatest opportunity to meet needs in His name.

When our daughter, Danna, was a little girl, one of her favorite activities was to color a page in what she called her “special” coloring book. The book had several “special” pages, one in particular being a dull, gray picture of a butterfly. Frankly, I couldn’t understand her excitement. When I asked why she liked that picture so much, Danna grinned and said, “Watch, Mommy!” She rubbed her little hands together to create warmth; then laid them on the butterfly drawing. The touch of her hand caused the special inks in the printing to react, and the dull gray was transformed into a vivid rainbow of color.

Everyone is hungry for the warm touch of someone who cares – a kind word, an act of compassion, a hug of encouragement. I believe God created the family to be the first place where that hunger is best satisfied. Yet, I am amazed that we can stand in silence, watching homes, marriages and families disintegrate before our very eyes. Silence is agreement. It is time for us, as women of God, to boldly stand against anyone and anything that undermines our marriage or threatens the solidarity of our family. It is time for us to trust God for and with our families.

Let’s Pray
Father, I want to please You by the way I love my family. Today, I choose to see each family member through your eyes of love and mercy. I will wage peace in my family. I will be quick to forgive and slow to condemn. I will encourage my family members with my words, my prayers, my love and my time. I want my home to be a safe place filled with kindness and compassion, a place that illustrates Your presence and power. Today, I choose to trust my family to God.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.

Now it’s Your Turn
Read the following verses of Scripture. Make a list of the action words in each verse. After completing the list, come up with steps you can take to illustrate the character of God in your family relationships.

• Proverbs 31:26-28 (NCV) “She speaks wise words and teaches others to be kind. She watches over her family and never wastes her time. Her children speak well of her. Her husband also praises her.”

• 1 Timothy 5:8 (NCV) “Whoever does not care for his own relatives, especially his own family members, has turned against the faith and is worse than someone who does not believe in God.”

• Galatians 6:10 (NIV) “Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.”

• Ephesians 1:5 (NLT) “God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.”
• - Bible Gateway.Com

“He only is my rock and my salvation.” Psalm 62:2

Suggested Further Reading: Mark 9:1-8

If God alone is our rock, and we know it, are we not bound to put all our trust in God, to give all our love to God, to set all our hope upon God, to spend all our life for God, and to devote our whole being to God? If God be all I have, sure, all I have shall be God’s. If God alone is my hope, sure, I will put all my hope upon God; if the love of God is alone that which saves, sure, he shall have my love alone. Come, let me talk to thee, Christian, for a little while, I want to warn thee not to have two Gods, two Christs, two friends, two husbands, two great Fathers; not to have two fountains, two rivers, two suns, or two heavens, but to have only one. I want to bid thee now, as God hath put all salvation in himself, to bring all thyself unto God. Come, let me talk to thee! In the first place, Christian, never join anything with Christ. Wouldest thou stitch thy old rags into the new garment he giveth? Wouldest thou put new wine into old bottles? Wouldst thou put Christ and self together? Thou mightest as well yoke an elephant and an ant; they could never plough together. What! Wouldest thou put an archangel in the same harness with a worm, and hope that they would drag thee through the sky! How inconsistent! How foolish! What! Thyself and Christ? Sure, Christ would smile; nay, Christ would weep, to think of such a thing! Christ and man together? Christ and Co? No, it never shall be; he will have nothing of the sort; he must be all. Note how inconsistent it would be to put anything else with him.

For meditation: What candidates for an equal share of the devotion due only to the Triune God do you face? Give them the same answer as Jesus gave Satan (Matthew 4:10).

Sermon no. 80 – Charles Spurgeon
18 May (1856)

- Bible Gateway.Com

An exhortation

‘But David tarried still at Jerusalem.’ 2 Samuel 11:1

Suggested Further Reading: 1 Timothy 5:9–15

Let us watch unto prayer, and be diligent in our Master’s business, ‘fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.’ My dear friends, we do not exhort you to serve Christ, to be saved by it. David was saved. I only speak to you who are saved, and I beg and beseech of you to take notice of David’s fall, and of the sloth that was at the beginning of it, as a warning to yourselves. Some temptations come to the industrious, but all temptations attack the idle. Notice the invention used by country people to catch wasps. They will put a little sweet liquor into a long and narrow-necked phial. The do-nothing wasp comes by, smells the sweet liquor, plunges in, and is drowned. But the bee comes by, and if she does stop for a moment to smell, yet she enters not, because she has honey of her own to make; she is too busy in the work of the commonwealth to indulge herself with the tempting sweets. Master Greenham, a Puritan divine, was once waited upon by a woman who was greatly tempted. Upon making enquiries into her way of life, he found she had little to do, and Greenham said, ‘That is the secret of your being so much tempted. Sister, if you are very busy, Satan may tempt you, but he will not easily prevail, and he will soon give up the attempt.’ Idle Christians are not so much tempted of the devil as they are tempting the devil to tempt them. Idleness sets the door of the heart ajar, and asks Satan to come in; but if we are occupied from morning till night, if Satan shall get in, he must break through the door. Under sovereign grace, and next to faith, there is no better shield against temptation than being ‘Not slothful in business; fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.’

For meditation: ‘Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do’ (Isaac Watts). The more we are occupied with the Lord’s business, the less time we will have for Satan’s business. When busy for the Lord, Nehemiah was tempted to meet his enemies in the plain Ono. His reply? A plain ‘O, no’ (Nehemiah 6:2–4)! Could you do the same?

Sermon no. 450 – Charles Spurgeon
18 May (1862)

- Bible Gateway.Com