The Persistent Road - Bicycle Adventure - by Tim Bishop

 

Water hastened to the corners of his eyes. The music ended, returning the group to its isolated nocturnal surroundings, where silence captured the indescribable. Try as he might, Doug could arrest the tears no longer. He turned away to wipe them.

He turned on the radio. “Let It Snow” fit neither the sunny day nor his mood, so he jabbed the power button. Enough of Johnny Mathis.

Thirty years of loyal service and hard work have come to this?

A few days ago, when you were at work, she told me again how much she was looking forward to heaven.” The pastor’s pause allowed Doug to digest what he’d said. He didn’t want to hear any of it. What made Rev. Long the gatekeeper to heaven? Doug would rather choose life for Ruth. What would he do without her?

Carmen, his half-sister seemed to be the only other person that kept in touch with him... His beloved wife had died, he'd lost his job after 30 years, and money problems began to grow and grow. Doug Zimmer was at the edge and often wondered just what he had to live for...

Until he found the letters... Carmen had come to help prepare for the funeral and while they were busy, Doug remembered that Ruth had mentioned that she'd left something for him... Right then he needed to find whatever it was! Hands shaking, he pulled out a cover letter:

Dearest Douglas,

I’ve not felt well in quite some time, but only last week was I diagnosed with cancer. It’s so sad to think of leaving you. Though life is ending for me, that doesn’t mean it is for you too.

Inside this envelope you will find notecards, each labeled with a destination. When you’re ready, I want you to travel to each place, unseal its envelope, and read what’s inside. Please don’t read them beforehand because they’ll lose all meaning. I wrote these notes to encourage you after I’m gone.

I’m so thankful for the years we spent together. May you find this “scavenger hunt” liberating. I love you so deeply.

 Affectionately, Ruth 

A tear dropped from Doug’s cheek onto Ruth’s stationery. He pressed the sheet of paper against his pant leg to absorb the moisture before placing the note and unopened envelopes back into the drawer. Traveling was the furthest thing from his mind. Then he burst into sobs.

It would take quite some time for Doug to again think of the packet that Ruth had left for him. How could he even think of just taking off, on his own, at the age of 60... And on a bike!

The thoughts just kept coming back and finally he went to a bike store to consider and learn what that type of adventure would actually require. And while he considered what was ahead for him, he began to again enjoy taking his bike out for rides on a routine basis... In fact, riding had become the only joy that he had left, it seemed...

~~~~

My brother was the only one of four children in my family who had a bike. He had won it at an annual company picnic which we all attended as invited by our favorite uncle... We were too poor to actually buy a bike. For me, I'd rather enjoy long walks anyway, where I could stop and read a little, LOL, before I headed back home. But times were different back then and I lived in a small town where it was safe to be out roaming the hills or walking along the Monongahela River near the New Geneva lock...

Doug, too, had a regular bike like my brother but when he started thinking about riding long distances, he wasn't sure his age would allow it for him, so he bought a new one just for the trip! He refused, when he finally decided to go, to tell anybody where he was going or what he would be doing--after all, his plans were all concealed from even him. He had a new bike which he felt he could manage and so he was ready. And opened the first destination to discover the destination toward which he would start his adventure! And arrived at the Santa Monica Pier toward evening!

That afternoon Doug cycled toward the Santa Monica pier. He and Ruth had enjoyed a sunset ride on the Ferris wheel there several years ago. A resurgent longing for his wife wrestled with the anticipation of breaking free from his sorrow. He crossed the busy street and entered the pier parking lot. The glistening waters of the Pacific Ocean lapped the beach, seagulls cawing overhead. From the seat of a bicycle, the ocean seemed more spectacular than he remembered. Adrenaline shot through his body. He could wait no longer. After leaning his rig against a concrete abutment, he dove into a pannier, pulled out Ruth’s first card, and fumbled to tear it open. 

My Dear Douglas,

Our first date. I remember vividly how the Ferris wheel stopped when we were at the very top, rocking back and forth as we looked out over the ocean, the full moon’s reflection twinkling on the waters. When you put your arm around me and pulled me close, my heart leaped for joy. It was the beginning of a beautiful journey. 

Thank you for that special beginning, Douglas.

Beautiful things in life have a beginning but also an end. Yet they can live on in your memory. Savor them but don’t allow them to hold you hostage.  Let the wheel before you represent your inner circle. Sometimes the wheel stops, and someone gets off. In time more will climb aboard. Welcome your new passengers. Carmen is a wonderful person already occupying the next seat down. Cherish her—and others who are forever connected to you, even though they may be several seats away. You’re not alone, Darling.

Yours always.

Lovingly, Ruth

 Lord, thank You for the loved ones You have given and will give Douglas. May he embrace them with joy and appreciation. Amen.

I had thought, at first, that I might take the entire trip on my blog for all of you, but decided that was too personal a story to be revealed unless you read the book. This was such a thoughtful and meaningful act for Ruth to make, don't you think? I remember in th past, at least with one friend, I got little note cards and wrote something for everyday that he would be away on a trip. There are so many ways to show your love for others, isn't there? Does it really have to wait until a farewell of death? I don't think so.

“I’m not sure. I know God is real, and He does love us. The Bible says ‘God is love.’ I read it every day. It helps me understand God and what He expects of me.

He looked in his mirror and doubled down on his grips. The accompanying pickup truck approached quickly, its blaring music getting louder and louder. The driver goosed the accelerator as he passed within a foot of Doug, leaving him coughing in a black cloud of noxious fumes. The driver waved in his rearview mirror before his head flew back in laughing hysteria, his right arm flailing. Doug vented with a few choice words for the idiot. Trailing up the hill behind the pickup were echoes of “Flirtin’ with Disaster” by Molly Hatchet, one of Doug’s party songs from yesteryear. Rather than give in to fear or anger, this time the near miss reinforced a call to vigilance. Doug squeezed the handgrips and checked his mirror frequently for whatever vehicles would overtake him.

And that proved to be true for Doug because as he started traveling further and further, he learned that there were many bicyclists on all kinds of bikes that he would routinely meet in placed where biking was allowed and of interest. I must admit that I help my breath as Doug encountered his first big rig flying by him while he was riding near a main road. This adventure can, actually, be very dangerous and will occur before the end of the book...

But the first friend he found was a young woman who carried her violin on her bike with her... So, of course, when I found her playing a song I love, I had to share it! Apparently there are many bikers who take off as a single or in groups and Doug was to meet this young lady several times as they traveled either together or moving on and meeting later... But nobody expected the accident that would occur as the book near its ending... And the violin was part of the rescue work. And Doug was right there helping...

If you are a individual who is a bicyclist,  enjoys watching reality shows, or are sentimental about somebody you love, this just may be a book you'll enjoy! Do check it out! Me, I was in to it for the memories of lost love.

GABixlerReviews

Looking Backward From a Murder to Test Power - Minnesota - Forward to War in Iran - Harold Michael Harvey With Response - Open Memoir

 

The killing of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis has already become a national flashpoint, not only because of the violence itself, but because of what it reveals about the fragility of truth when power feels threatened.

My own experience in Hancock County, Georgia, nearly thirty years ago, taught me that this fragility is not new. It is woven into the American legal fabric, appearing whenever authority senses a challenge and the system feels compelled to choose between accountability and self-protection.

But if the first essay was about what happened, and the second about how the law bends, and the third about why escalation occurs, then this companion piece must ask a different question:

What must we do now?

Because the story cannot end on a note of outrage, it cannot end with analysis. It cannot end with grief.

This moment demands something more complex:  reform, accountability, and civic courage, not as slogans, but as commitments.

Reform is needed to change the structure that enables abuse. Reform is not a matter of tweaking policy. It is a matter of restructuring the conditions that allow violence, distortion, and impunity to flourish. Independent investigations must be just that, independent and non-negotiable.

When federal agents kill a citizen, the investigation cannot be controlled by the same agency that pulled the trigger. Minneapolis exposed the danger of allowing federal authorities to seize evidence, restrict access, and shape the narrative before facts can breathe.

Reform requires:

• independent state-level investigative
• automatic recusal of involved agencies
• transparent release of evidence

Without independence, justice is a performance, not a process. Local courts must be insulated from local power. Hancock County taught me that justice collapses when law enforcement and the judiciary share bloodlines, alliances, or political debts. Reform must address:

• conflicts of interest
• judicial selection processes
• small‑county vulnerabilities

A courtroom cannot be a family reunion. It must be a forum for truth.

The use‑of‑force standard must be rewritten for the 21st century. The legal standard of “reasonable fear” has become a loophole wide enough to drive a tank through. Reform must redefine:

• What constitutes a threat
• When deadly force is justified
• How officer perception is evaluated

Fear cannot be the sole arbiter of life and death.

Accountability is the most challenging work in a system built to resist it. Accountability is not punishment. It is the recognition that power must answer to the people it serves.

For instance, there must, of necessity, be narrative accountability. We must understand that before legal accountability comes narrative accountability; therefore, the willingness to confront falsehoods, distortions, and official stories that collapse under scrutiny.

In Minneapolis, the rush to label Renee Nicole Good a “terrorist” was not just rhetoric. It was an attempt to foreclose accountability before it began.

Accountability requirements include, but are not limited to:

• challenging official narratives
• elevating eyewitness accounts
• refusing to let the state define the victim

Truth must not be outsourced to those with the most to lose.

Also, narrative accountability must be followed closely by institutional accountability. Institutions, like all entities, protect themselves. They always have, and perhaps, always will.

Accountability requirements include, but are not limited to:

• civilian oversight with real power
• consequences for obstruction
• transparency in disciplinary processes

A system that cannot discipline itself cannot be trusted to discipline others. The inability to discipline itself is a guiding principle and trumps all others.

Lastly, there must be a sense of cultural accountability. Law enforcement culture must be confronted, not with hostility, but with honesty. The warrior mindset, the group loyalty, the reflexive escalation: these are not individual failings. They are cultural norms.

Accountability requirements include, but are not limited to:

• training that prioritizes restraint
• leadership that models humility
• a shift from dominance to service

Culture is the soil from which behavior grows. As an old farm boy myself, bad soil makes cultivation a waste of time and a no-hope proposition for a productive yield.

There is one overriding salient fact. Civic courage is the ingredient without which reform fails. Reform and accountability are structural. Civic courage is personal.

Reform is the willingness of ordinary people to:

• speak when silence is safer
• question when obedience is expected
• stand firm when power rushes toward them

I learned a lesson about standing firm when power rushes toward you in Hancock County when I turned around on that courthouse staircase. I am certain the Sheriff and his posse would have pushed me down that staircase and lied about having no choice but to send me tumbling down three flights of stairs.

The people of Minneapolis are learning it now as they demand answers amid federal resistance. Civic courage is not dramatic. It is steady. It is persistent. It is the refusal to let fear dictate the boundaries of justice.

There must be courage to follow the example of James Baldwin and bear witness, to be willing to tell no better than one has seen. The videos of Good’s killing exist because several people dared to record it. The truth survived because law-abiding citizens refused to look away.

There must be courage to challenge military action on U.S. soil. Reform begins when citizens challenge the systems that claim to serve them. It starts when lawyers file motions that anger sheriffs, when families demand transparency, when communities refuse to accept official stories that contradict what they saw with their own eyes.

Notwithstanding the above, the United States citizens must have the courage to imagine something better. Civic courage is not only resistance. It is imagination. The belief that a different kind of justice is possible. A justice not built on fear, not built on dominance, and not built on institutional self-protection. A justice built on truth.

There is much work ahead. The killing of Renee Nicole Good is not just a tragedy. It is a test. A test of whether we will allow the old patterns to repeat, the escalation, the narrative distortion, the institutional shielding, or whether we will insist on something better.

Reform is the blueprint. Accountability is the mechanism. Civic courage is the fuel. And if we commit to all three, then perhaps the next time power feels threatened, the reflex will not be violence, but restraint. Not distortion, but truth. Not impunity, but justice.

This moment, this precious liberty, demands nothing less.

You know folks, I will be eternally thankful that I met and became friends with Harold Michael Harvey through his books. He is one of the most knowledgeable, intelligent, and caring individuals I have ever known... He has much to teach each of us who come into his sphere of legal coverage--this time, it's murder... I refuse to call it anything but the real meaning of what has been happening during the last months in the United States... Discrimination, threats, DEI mandates, and more has already costs millions of lies. I, of course, include the very first act of selfishness when the USAID part of the government was eliminated and money transferred to destructive actions initiated by this president... The cruelty has been outstandingly obvious and aimed directly to those he hates most. We all know who they are, don't we?

I started with this first murder so that I could move forward from it to the set of almost 180 teachers and female students who were murdered in Iran. Let's be clear. I do not see those children any differently than those children who are being separated from their parents or used to capture their parents, or thrown into "death" camps for no legal reason. We have also lost citizens by this war that was called for No Reason... No Reason that is accepted by anybody other than those MAGA that still supports a man who...has...no...heart...

The first video shown above illustrates exactly what happens when he is caught--he lies... He claims that he knows nothing about the death of those children through the use of out-of-data maps for Iran! Yet, it is very clear to all of us that on another whim he decided to set another war in motion! A war that evolved since Trump, himself, pulled out of the Iran Accord that had been in existence during his first term...

People like DJT think that we do not remember all of his sins... We do... So don't even think that anybody else made the decision to add to the ongoing war between Israel and Iran/Hamas et.al. When he changed the Defense Department to War, we all feared what was to happen... And it didn't take him long to move into destruction in parts of the world as well as in the United States... 

I wonder, really wonder, did the Supreme Court Justices and others who supported Trump in his madness, know what was to happen? But then there is this...

And, of course, ending with another Last Word

So...why does Trump continue to support Putin who has supposedly been giving Iran the location of the Americans...who have been killed or are now in the hospital from injuries!?

May God Be With All His Children Everywhere!

GABBY

Roger Stelljes Presents Silenced Girls: An Absolutely addictive mystery thriller - Agent Tori Hunter Book 1 - A Personal Favorite for 2026

Tori held up the newspaper article. “This is an invitation. My sister’s killer wants to play a game, so… game on.” 

“You may have broken off contact with everyone here, but someone kept track of you. Watch your back.”

The massive stack of mail had collapsed and fallen to the floor. “Naturally.” Exasperated, Tori walked over and dropped down to her knees. She started pulling all the pieces of mail together, finding miscellaneous bills, junk mail, a donation solicitation for Boston College, her latest Vanity Fair and Vogue magazines, and then a yellow envelope that she flipped over to make sure it was addressed to her. There was no return address, but the postmark was for Manchester Bay. Tori exhaled. She hadn’t received a piece of mail from Minnesota, let alone Manchester Bay, in years. Pushing herself up from the floor, she went to her desk and reached for her letter opener. 

She sliced the top open, reached inside, and pulled out a single piece of paper. “What the…?” It was a photocopy of the front page of the Manchester Bay Chronicle, dated July 5, 1999, and the headline read: Hunter Girl Missing. In the lower left-hand corner, secured by a paper clip, was a typed note that read: Check the Manchester Bay Chronicle. It will look familiar. She’d seen the clipping before, although it had been years. A copy of it was stored in a box in the closet. “It will look… familiar.” Tori went to her desk and powered up her laptop. She typed ManchesterBayChronicle.com into the search bar. On the home page the first headline was blunt: Genevieve Lash Missing. The sub-headline read: On Twentieth Anniversary of Jessica Hunter Disappearance. 

As Tori scanned the article on the website, she learned that Genevieve Lash was last seen by a friend she dropped off at home early in the morning of July 5. In his press conference, Shepard County Sheriff Cal Lund reported that Lash’s car was found abandoned and locked along the side of a county road with a flat right front tire. “Cal…” Tori murmured.

Manchester Bay always went big on the fireworks for the Fourth. Synchronized to music, they were launched from the end of the long fishing pier at the opposite end of the beach. A massive crowd gathered in lawn chairs or on blankets on the beach and in the park and then along South Shore Drive, which was barricaded for several blocks to allow for more seating. A flotilla of speedboats and pontoons were anchored in the placid waters of the bay, as well as in front of Mannion’s on the Lake, a restaurant farther northwest up the shoreline. As they settled into their seats on the bench, Jason casually put his right arm gently around Tori’s shoulder. Self-conscious to a fault, she almost always held back her emotions and affection. Yet, in this moment, she was… content. For once, she stopped caring what anyone else thought or saw. Instead of keeping just a little distance between them, she snuggled closer to Jason and then turned her face to his. Rarely the initiator, she almost surprised herself as she leaned up and kissed him, first just a little peck on his lips and then a second, softer kiss that she held for an extra moment as the fireworks show began. It was a long show, lasting nearly forty-five minutes before there was a rapid-fire launching up into the sky. “I think this is the grand finale,” Jason observed as one rocket after another shot up into the sky, exploding loudly into a kaleidoscope of colors over the waters of the bay. With his arm wrapped lightly around Tori’s shoulder, he pulled her a little closer and then leaned down and kissed her again. “Do you want to get out of here? Just you and me?” Tori froze. She knew what this question meant, to go off alone with him, and where it was leading. She’d talked about this with Jessie, who’d already taken the plunge. Tori had openly wondered whether she was ready. It had been a frequent discussion topic between the two of them. “You are,” Jessie had assured her. “You’re ready.” “How do you know? How do I know?” “Because you’re asking the question. If you ask the question, this question, the big question, then you know⁠—” “—the answer,” Tori finished the sentence. Her body was a jumble of nerves at the thought of… sex.

Tori was aware as she came home from another case completion that the annual holiday that haunted her each year had come and gone. She'd never forget that it was during that celebration she had lost her virginity, but, worse, lost her twin sister... Sure, they had talked about it before going to the town event; but, now, it was a heavy load of regret, knowing that she had not been around her sister, as she normally was, when she had, for some reason, disappeared... Not ever discovering what happened was part of the reason she had become a FBI Agent, specializing in lost children...

Nothing, however, could have prepared her for getting a notice in her mail postmarked from her home town--a place she had not visited since she had buried her father.  That was now twenty years ago!

Traveling back to where she had lived for most of her life was hard. But when she checked in with the local police, she was pleased that she knew the now chief and one of the officers was still there.  She was sure that the new detective, who was handling the death of Genevieve Lash, would not easily welcome her desire to participate, so she went to Cal first and  let him know she was back and showed him the message that she'd received. There was really no choice, having an FBI agent with expertise in tracking missing people, would be an asset to the case that could not be ignored.

“Yeah, but then you showed up with that article and note,” he replied. “We either have a situation where they are connected, and your sister’s disappearance was not random, or someone is using the disappearance of your sister to deflect and hide some other agenda.”

Tori was surprised and grateful that she also was able to reconnect with quite a number of her high school gang. It was to prove an advantage as they all realized that with the message that was sent to Tory, which had spotlighted the 20th anniversary of her sister's disappearance, a merge of the two cases would be required to investigate where Genevieve might have been taken...

Interestingly, the two cases which were the first to be pulled together showed many parallels between the two... And, it was a natural assumption to believe that if somebody was still active 20 years later, that there were more victims between this period and possibly even before... But what they discovered to be the reality was shocking. Soon Tori was seeking help from a friend from the FBI... 

But right in the middle of the investigation, Tori was called by her boss at the FBI to travel to where a two-year-old child had been kidnapped... Another case within the larger case!

Tori tried sleeping in an easy chair in the office of the Taylors’ home. With the number of times she’d done this in various houses, buildings, and offices over the years while working a kidnapping, she ought to have trained her mind and body to be able to sleep anywhere and on anything, no matter its size or level of comfort. Yet every time it was a struggle. And now, while loath to admit it, especially with a two-year-old child kidnapped, her mind was elsewhere. No matter the lengths she went to bury it, the memory of her sister and her disappearance was always there, lurking in the back of her mind. Thoughts of Jessie were ready to be triggered by the littlest thing from 1999, like if she heard “Scar Tissue” or “Californication” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Or if she happened to stumble across a Friends episode,

something she and Jessie always watched. If Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me was on, the last movie they’d gone to before she disappeared, it would all come flooding back. They’d spent three weeks

saying: Oh be-have and Not if I can help it or Felicity Shagwell. Shagwell by name. Shag-very-well by reputation. It was the little moments and memories like that which, in a flash, brought her sister’s case out of the dark corners of her mind. That memory was no longer the lurking, occasionally painful distraction that would appear and then fade. Now it was once again all-consuming. She had the taste of reopening her sister’s case—of Manchester Bay, of walking the stretch of highway where Jessie was abducted, cruising the streets of their old hometown knowing, knowing that somewhere nearby the killer was skulking, maybe even watching, and even possibly hunting her. More than anything, that was why she was wide awake in the pitch-black of the night. Instinctually she reached for her phone and checked her text messages and emails. There was an email from Tracy Sheets from late last night indicating she was working on the project and thought she’d have something to share later tomorrow, which was now today. Later in the day—how much later? How long would she have to wait? And if Tracy had something, what did she have? And even if Tracy did have something, Tori wondered what she could then turn around and do with it. She’d considered calling Braddock but then thought better of it. They were on good terms now and she didn’t want to do anything to distract or, knowing herself, annoy him before she heard from Tracy. Besides, she had no idea when she’d be able to get back to Manchester Bay. Trying to sleep in the chair was worthless. As if her own insomnia wasn’t enough, it was a cloudless night with a full moon, and the light filtered in through the six tall and lightly curtained windows of the office. Turning on a light was not required for her to inspect the many pictures on the shelves of the long, built-in bookcase. There were family pictures, several of the Taylors with Ava over her two years. A high shelf contained a set of photos of Jake Taylor with what appeared to be college friends, and on another lower shelf was pictures of Erica Taylor and what looked to be several of her friends. A shelf in the middle of the bookcase contained pictures that were perhaps ten years old, of Jake with three people, who Tori presumed to be his sister Cindy and their parents. There were also several pictures of just Jake and Cindy. She quietly made her way down the wide corridor dividing the main level of the house. To the left she glanced into the living room to see Jake, his back turned, sleeping on the couch. In the kitchen she could see a red light illuminated on the coffee maker. There was half a pot of warm coffee left. If she was going to be awake, she might as well do it with coffee. She took a ceramic coffee cup out of the sink’s drying rack and filled it halfway. Blowing to cool the coffee, she stepped to her right to look out the side window of the kitchen into the neighbor’s backyard. As she raised the cup to her mouth, she caught a flash of light and then looked up to the second floor of the neighbor’s house. In a narrow window, she saw a man who she recognized as the neighbor. She’d seen him in the driveway putting the garbage out earlier. He was holding his cell phone and appeared to be typing a message. After a moment, he looked up and to the Taylors’ house, waving the phone. Tori leaned forward over the sink, trying to peer out the kitchen window to look up to her right but she had no angle to see up to the second floor. She was aware of only one person being up there. Tori set her cup softly on the counter and walked back to the front of the house, quietly opened the front door, slipped out onto the front stoop, and then pulled the door gently closed. She turned to her right, stepped over some bushes and flowers that were planted along the sidewalk and front step, and then made her way around the south side of the house and into the backyard. Jutting out from the northwest corner of the house was an expansive deck. Crouching down low, using the spindled deck railing as cover, she picked her way along to the corner of the deck and then peered around it and up to the second floor of the Taylor house. As she’d expected, she saw Erica in the window with her phone, looking over to her neighbor.

Will Braddock, chief detective for the Shepard County Sheriff’s Department, had already done the onsite stop to where they have found evidence of Lash. At that time he had begun his routine lead of the two additional officers who would work the case with him. Readers learn more about Will as Tory does, later in the book, as she realized that she had given little notice to his credentials and background because of her intense desire to begin to compare the two cases. And, BTW, this book follows true on a romantic interest becoming a part of their lives, although, it was not a primary part of the plot.

“Cal, he can’t⁠—” “Victoria, please sit down.” “Cal!” “Sit down and shut up, now!” Tori froze, stunned. In the entirety of her life, she’d never heard Cal raise his voice like that to anyone. Sheepishly, she did as she was told...

Tori mumbled, “What are we going to do?” “Go back to my place and strategize while we still have some time before we have to sing “Ave Maria” in five-part harmony.”

This became a personal favorite for me for a number of reasons. As the subtitle indicates, it is addictive even though I was unable, because of my fall, to read as long as I normally do. But perhaps, from that, I was able to ponder exactly what was so intriguing about the story--for surely abuse of girls is nothing new, sad to say... For one, the book was written by a man; I wanted to see how he treated the topic that was routinely covered by women writers. I found little difference, thankfully, because I don't think this is a topic that is in any way, sexist in nature, meaning that I believe that most men are as concerned about ridding our world of such terror as women are. It was, however, by reading at this time when so much news is in the headlines about the release of the Epstein files, it created a comparison of the villain in this book against those that have thus far been identified as active participators in this cult-like crime wave that has gone on for so many years and included a documented number of over 1000 victims, thus far.

The tenacity exhibited in those characters working on the cases within this book certainly supports the caliber and intensity of those congressional and other men (and women) who are working diligently to provide some semblance of justice for those innocents who were taken into a world in which they were forced to be involved. I, for one, continue to read such books in the hope that one day we can figure out just "why" some choose to use force against those who should be loved and cherished...

This book certainly deserves your attention!

GABixlerReviews

What If They Are Wrong? Prophecy Whisperers, Armageddon Theology and the Souls of American Soldiers by Michael A. Smith, Ongoing Contributor

 

WHAT IF THEY ARE WRONG?

Prophecy Whisperers, Armageddon Theology, and the Souls of American Soldiers



Michael Smith




WHAT IF THEY ARE WRONG?

There is a question that ought to be reverberating through every church, every seminary, every Pentagon briefing room, and every chamber of the United States Congress right now, and it is not being asked nearly loudly enough: What if they are wrong?

What if the men and women who have convinced themselves — and, far more dangerously, convinced the President of the United States and the commanders of the American military--that we are living inside the last chapters of the Book of Revelation--have simply gotten it catastrophically, irreversibly wrong?

The reports now surfacing in the aftermath of American and Israeli strikes against Iran are not merely troubling. They are, to anyone who takes both theology and democratic governance seriously, a five-alarm crisis. According to multiple accounts, American military commanders read to their troops on the eve of the attack a message framing their mission not in terms of national security, not in terms of international law, not even in terms of alliance obligations--but in terms of cosmic destiny. The soldiers cheered. They were told they were fighting a righteous battle to hasten the return of King Jesus.

Let that settle for a moment. The armed forces of the secular constitutional republic of the United States of America — a republic whose First Amendment was written precisely to prevent the entanglement of governmental power with religious conviction--went to war in the Middle East, at least in part because some of their leaders believe they are instruments of biblical prophecy.

The Prophecy Whisperers in the Oval Office

I have spent nearly four decades inside American evangelical Christianity. I know this world from the inside out--its extraordinary generosity, its genuine piety, its remarkable capacity for community and compassion. I also know its shadow side, and nowhere does that shadow fall more darkly than in the world of charismatic prophecy that has encircled Donald Trump since at least 2015.

There is a community of self-styled prophets--figures prominent in charismatic and New Apostolic Reformation circles--who have been whispering into Trump’s ear a narrative of singular destiny. Chief among them is Paula White-Cain, the televangelist prosperity gospel preacher who served as Trump’s official White House faith advisor and who has publicly declared that opposition to Trump is, in her words, opposition to God himself. White-Cain is not a fringe figure operating at the edges of this movement. She held a government title. She led prayer at his inauguration. She has functioned as Trump’s primary ecclesiastical interpreter, the person who translates the language of charismatic prophecy into terms a president can absorb and act upon. The narrative she and her fellow travelers have consistently pressed runs roughly as follows: God spared Donald Trump from assassination not once but twice because he is divinely chosen. He is a Cyrus figure, an instrument of God’s sovereign will, appointed to serve as the vehicle through which the prophetic clock of the end times is finally moved to midnight. The strikes against Iran are not geopolitical decisions. They are the opening movements of Armageddon — the gathering of the nations for the final battle, the very conflict that will compel the visible, physical return of Jesus Christ to the earth as conquering King.

I want to pause here and speak directly to those among my readers who hold dispensationalist convictions themselves--who have read Revelation through the premillennial grid, who find the Rapture a meaningful and scripturally grounded hope, and who may feel that what follows is an attack on their faith. It is not. Sincere, intelligent Christians have held versions of these prophetic views for generations, and the personal hope of Christ’s return is woven through the New Testament in ways no serious reader can dismiss. My concern is not with private eschatological belief. It is with something categorically different: the weaponization of that belief system as a justification for war, the use of prophetic language to override constitutional deliberation, and the subordination of democratic accountability to a theological timetable that no human being — not Paula White-Cain, not any self-appointed prophet — has the authority to set.

This is not a fringe interpretation whispered in obscure corners of the internet. It is being preached from prominent pulpits, broadcast across the largest Christian media networks in America, and — if the reports about pre-combat briefings are accurate — delivered to American troops in the field. The premillennial dispensationalist framework that underlies this thinking has been a staple of American popular Christianity since the publication of John Nelson Darby’s theology in the nineteenth century and its mass popularization through the Scofield Reference Bible and, later, Hal Lindsey’s The Late Great Planet Earth and Tim LaHaye’s Left Behind series. Tens of millions of American Christians have absorbed this interpretive grid as though it were Scripture itself, when in fact it is a relatively recent theological invention with no consensus support in the history of Christian doctrine.

Netanyahu’s Calculation

Benjamin Netanyahu is many things, but he is not a fool, and he is certainly not a premillennial dispensationalist. Polling consistently shows that approximately 93 percent of Israeli Jews identify as secular or only loosely religious. The eschatological dreams of American evangelicals--in which the Jewish people are finally converted to Christianity at the climax of the tribulation period — are, to put it gently, not a vision that most Israelis find flattering or compelling.

Netanyahu uses American evangelical theology the way a skilled contractor uses a borrowed tool: effectively, efficiently, and with no particular emotional attachment to the implement itself. What Netanyahu wants is American political cover, American weaponry, American diplomatic protection at the United Nations, and American acquiescence to Israeli regional ambitions. The evangelical prophecy machine provides the domestic political pressure that delivers those things. The transaction is cynical on one side and sincere on the other, which is precisely what makes it so durable and so dangerous.

Ambassador Huckabee and the Covenant He Did Not Read Carefully Enough

Which brings us to a moment of extraordinary theological carelessness that occurred this week on national television. Mike Huckabee — ordained Baptist minister, former governor of Arkansas, and current United States Ambassador to Israel — appeared on Sean Hannity’s program and declared that God’s covenant promise to Abraham in the book of Genesis establishes Israel’s divine right to possess all the land from the Mediterranean Sea to the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, encompassing much of present-day Iraq and Iran.

One would expect a man who has spent his adult life in the Christian ministry to have read Genesis with slightly more care.

Here is the problem with Huckabee’s interpretation, and it is not a minor exegetical quibble — it is a foundational error that unravels the entire argument. When God made the covenant promise recorded in Genesis 12, 15, and 17, Abraham had no children. None. Isaac, through whom the nation of Israel would descend by way of his son Jacob, had not yet been born. Neither had Ishmael, through whom the Arab nations would trace their lineage. Neither had the six sons Abraham would later father with his wife Keturah after Sarah’s death. The text of Genesis is unambiguous: the promise was made to Abraham’s seed--all of Abraham’s seed--before any of that seed existed.

By Huckabee’s own logic--that the land belongs to the descendants of Abraham--the Arabs have as legitimate a biblical claim to that territory as the Israelis do. Ishmael was Abraham’s firstborn son. The covenant was made before Isaac was conceived. An honest reading of the text does not support the exclusive territorial claim Huckabee asserted on national television. It supports, at minimum, a recognition that the children of Abraham are a far larger family than the Christian nationalist narrative conveniently acknowledges.

This is not merely an academic point. The United States Ambassador to Israel publicly invoked a misread biblical text to justify territorial claims that, if acted upon, would require the displacement or conquest of millions of people across multiple sovereign nations. The theological carelessness has geopolitical consequences of the gravest possible magnitude.

The Question That Must Be Asked

I want to speak now not as a political commentator but as someone who has read the New Testament carefully and takes its warnings seriously.

The same Bible that contains the prophetic passages these movements cite also contains repeated, emphatic warnings about false prophecy. Jesus himself warned, in the Olivet Discourse recorded in Matthew 24, that “false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.” The Apostle Paul warned the church at Thessalonica against those who would generate a “strong delusion"-- a phrase with terrifying implications when one considers what kind of delusion could cause otherwise decent people to cheer for war in the name of bringing back Jesus.

The tradition of Christian theology has always maintained that not every spirit is the Holy Spirit. The First Epistle of John commands believers to “test the spirits” precisely because the landscape of religious experience is populated by spirits that are not holy, that do not speak truth, and that lead their followers toward destruction while wearing the costume of divine revelation. What are the fruits of this particular prophetic movement? Soldiers going to war with eschatological fervor rather than constitutional clarity. A president whose catastrophic decisions are validated by men claiming to speak for God. An ambassador rewriting Genesis on cable television. A democracy steadily subordinating its secular governance to a theological framework that most Christians throughout history--Catholic, Orthodox, mainline Protestant--have never accepted.

What if the prophecy whisperers are simply wrong? What if they are not hearing from God but from their own ambitions, their own fears, their own intoxication with proximity to power? What if the soldiers who cheered — young Americans who deserve leaders who will never send them into battle for anything less than a constitutionally legitimate cause--were misled by commanders who had themselves been misled by a theological system that has no more claim to biblical certainty than a hundred other interpretive frameworks that history has generated and discarded?

The men and women who go to war carrying the conviction that God has personally appointed their mission do not doubt. They cannot afford to doubt. Doubt is not compatible with the certainty required to pull a trigger. But the rest of us--those of us watching from a distance, those of us who are not in the grip of an eschatological timetable--have not only the right but the obligation to ask the question they cannot ask themselves.

The Responsibility of the Rest of Us

I am aware that my readers grow weary of this subject. I understand the fatigue. There is only so much alarm a person can sustain before alarm itself becomes noise. But I am asking you to resist that fatigue for a few moments longer, because what is happening right now is not a recycled argument about the separation of church and state. It is something qualitatively different and substantially more dangerous.

American military power is being directed, at least in part, by a theology. That theology rests on a specific interpretation of biblical prophecy that is contested, relatively recent, and not universally held even within evangelical Christianity. It is being promoted by self-styled prophets whose credentials are self-issued and whose track record of fulfilled predictions is, to put it charitably, unimpressive. It is being carried into combat by soldiers who were told, on the eve of battle, that they were warriors of the Apocalypse.

History has seen this before. It does not end well. The Crusades were launched on similar convictions, prosecuted with similar certainty, and left a trail of devastation across centuries and cultures that the Christian church is still reckoning with today. The difference is that the Crusaders did not have stealth aircraft, precision munitions, and the capacity to trigger a regional conflict involving nuclear-armed states.

The American republic was built on a foundational principle: that no man, no movement, and no theological system has the right to govern the conscience or direct the sword of a free people by claiming divine authority. That principle is not under slow erosion. It is under direct assault by people who are entirely sincere, often genuinely devout, and catastrophically, dangerously wrong.

We owe it to those soldiers--and to every citizen of the republic they serve--to keep asking the question: What if they are wrong? And to keep asking it until someone in a position of authority is finally compelled to answer.

___

Dr. Michael A. Smith is a historian, scholar, and independent writer with nearly four decades of pastoral ministry experience. He is the author of From Christian Fundamentalism to Christian Nationalism: A Primer Detailing the Danger to America (2024) and is completing a doctoral dissertation at Liberty University. He has published in The Christian Century and Christian Daily International.

Thank you Dr. Mike for sharing this important response to major actions by our Secretary of War, et al...

Gabby

Facing My New Decade - On National Women's Day - With New Thoughts, Concerns, and Joy - Open Memoir

 

As I completed reading my latest book, I found several revelations about myself... I have been picking up too much of the "DJT Syndrome" that many of us have been infected with during the last decade. How did I realize that? I had early on chosen my villain in this book simply because he was rich... I was wrong... My logical mind would not normally have consider this as a point of discrimination for individuals in my life--close or distant--but for the last decade there has been so much garbage assimilated that my thinking patterns have been affected. I must work to ensure that I take some major remedy to ensure I am cured...LOL Know what I mean???

When one man's actions can blind us to the joy of living, we must certainly not allow it to affect us. But, in my opinion, it takes more... We must make sure that we are immunized against future infections! Note how some of the garbage actions are entwined in that recommendation? If we, specifically, women (and men) do not act to rid our world of whatever group of, I am sure, white men who are attempting to move us back to a time when white men were seen as leaders of all things, we need to admit that we have allowed it... and, for some, actually gladly accepted it.

I am not one of those and don't intend to continue to change with still another birthday...

I recently found the abundance of songs by Josh Groban and love this one as well as others I've recently shared. However, I am learning, also, that there is a real meaning behind God's request to love our neighbors... and what that means in our daily lives... I don't think we can sit passively, anymore, as we have done for over 2000 years, and allow wars and violence against anybody else... Yes, it may continue, but if you believe and place your life in God's hands, then you need to also start allowing God into your brain!

Placing videos of Josh Grobin, a video about the Iran/Israel/Trump war, and calling for Christian Soldiers to be marching together does not necessarily mean something different. For instance, here's another song by the same group... SEND the Light!

Now let's look at the totality of the juxtaposition... carefully...

• God sent His Son over 2000 years ago.
• It was said that Jesus Christ was to die for All of Us.
• Jesus died on the cross, Rose Again, and Abides in all of us through the Holy Spirit.  With me so far? Because while I recognize that not everybody in the world has accepted Jesus as their Savior as Josh Grobin and I have, that does not negate the plan that God had made. Indeed, to ensure people KNOW what Jesus had done, we who come to know Him were asked to go across the world and tell of Him and His Love, that He died. And INTRODUCE HIM to those we meet...

• Note that Jesus spoke to a Samaritan to offer His living water--His Salvation... The Samaritan was a NEIGHBOR to whom He was to share God's Love.
• And, just as the Samaritan, it was ALL of us, just like the Samaritan who was, after learning of His Love, who were to share and tell of His Love! To All Neighbors!
• Instead, what did we do? The great monuments of gods/God which had existed from the beginning of time, were built. Crusaders were sent NOT telling of His Light, but Rather with a sword of violence, of force... You will become a follower of what we call Christianity--or Else... That continued even into the discovery of the Americas when indigenous peoples in these lands started to be forced to accept and attend schools taught by Christians...
• And for over 2000 years, people have continued to divided themselves into this church, or that synagogue, or this mosque, or that street ministry...on and on and on... Further dividing us up into racially centered churches, mandated national religions, or some such similar nonsense as was dreamed up by this man or that man.
• Until we have reached another step of forced division. Again... But, now, we have sophisticated tools of violence that can blow up buildings, with or without people in them...death is considered just a part of war as we have heard since the War on Iran was started... Another war that nobody wanted...  A war that nobody can really explain what it is about... or they attempt to manipulate what it is they are hoping to do without telling you!

Who did We--meaning any autocrat who has initiated war for power for thousands and thousands of years--think we were when we chose to divert from the teaching of Jesus to love our neighbors? Did we not understand that over 2000 years ago, God was once again sharing His Love as Our Creator? Surely wondering why some chose to ignore His wonderful gift of a Greater Love...

Was it out of ignorance that we chose not to listen when He told us to put aside rules and regulations outlined from ancient scrolls, of how to accept and EARN this gift of love that was already available to us as His Children? All we needed to do was Love as He Loves Us... Or was it that, even then, there were some, as Jesus pointed out of the Pharisees, that turned away from His Love to choose their own path, which ultimately led to death not only for the individual but for so many others? 

Or was it simply a matter of allowing our own will to take over, even that part of us where the Holy Spirit was abiding, waiting to talk to us... Had we, in ignorance, not really understood how the parables were meant to guide us as we fumbled through His teachings to guide our lives?

We have advanced in so many ways in this world... So many advances in science and medicine that we are living longer and longer... We have learned how to even go to other planets of our universe. But have we not advanced sufficiently to learn...to...share... to give freely of His love without us "demanding" obedience?

Let me add something that I just learned about this morning that affects all women. Uterine Fibroids are found in a high percentage of all women. 

Uterine fibroids are common growths of the uterus. They often appear during the years you're usually able to get pregnant and give birth. Uterine fibroids are not cancer, and they almost never turn into cancer. They aren't linked with a higher risk of other types of cancer in the uterus either. They're also called leiomyomas (lie-o-my-O-muhs) or myomas.

Fibroids vary in number and size. You can have a single fibroid or more than one. Some of these growths are too small to see with the eyes. Others can grow to the size of a grapefruit or larger. A fibroid that gets very big can distort the inside and the outside of the uterus. In extreme cases, some fibroids grow large enough to fill the pelvis or stomach area. They can make a person look pregnant.

Many people have uterine fibroids sometime during their lives. But you might not know you have them, because they often cause no symptoms. Your health care professional may just happen to find fibroids during a pelvic exam or pregnancy ultrasound.

As of now, doctors can identify it, but nothing can be done... This morning I learned that there will be requests for funding research into both the House and Senate... Did you know that women's health issues were not given priority until the 1990s... And, now with going backwards with the overthrow of Roe and loss of women's health support, plus the DEI mandate, reduction of medical support for things such as measles are now being ignored by our government, we MUST Act to save our people. God's People! Fighting violent wars over abortion should never be a global affair!

How can we worship somebody like movie or tv stars and follow them, encouraging children to enter contests to get money for recognition, when we have, as a nation, also placed the majority of His Children in Harm's way? Children are starving... Being bombed without explanation or reason... Made to appear as if war is just a game to be played

Right now, we are being taken backward. Some group somewhere across the world is wanting to remove all connections of His Creations from one side of the world to the other... They want to divide us by race again. They want to have women only be concerned with having children and meeting the needs of every man's desire... And they want to be Rich! With all the riches that are available across the world... claiming that whatever is "rich, beautiful, and desired" should be in the hands of only THOSE WHO ALREADY HAVE RICHES AND CAN USE IT FOR...STUFF... Yeah. That was purposely written with a bit of sarcasm...LOL

But the cruelest thing about wanting to be richer, is that every once in a while, a claim is made by some man that it is God's Will that they take up arms and destroy all those who are different from them, the Elite... Whoever they are... Perhaps they represent the world-wide secret Epstein Cult who use the name of Baal in their activities? I've refused to follow this trail I learned about because I know that the Great I Am is Greater than any false god or prophet, including those already owning and buying riches of gold, that can be worshipped and used for Stuff of destruction for others! 

But, folks, if we are indeed dealing with the supernatural aspect of power, it will never be overtaken by violence, guns, bombs of destruction. If we cannot replace that Hate that governed Iran for so many years, how do we expect to conquer it through the same type of destruction, murder of children and war after war after war... As Spock would quickly point out "That is Illogical..."

Who gets to "claim" the latest loss of children by bombs of war... How many years will it take to rebuild over $1B worth of daily destructive action that God's children Paid For

and which God's Children Are Dying From?

It has now been announced that it was a bomb from the US that killed all those children! Forgive us Lord; we are fighting to rid those guilty from our government!

Got your kool-aid ready?

Is Christian Nationalist just another Jonestown

THIS TIME WITH BOMBS 

DO YOUR RESEARCH!

Donald J. Trump is NOT God's Light of Love!

His Actions Speak For Him

Choose Endless Worry and Chaos

or Love and Joy

All it Requires is that You Allow God's Love to Flow Freely Through You

Are you willing to allow that to occur to save a child bombed today?

A student murdered by a gunshot today?

A woman to die or a student to die because of reduction of funds for proper medical care already in existence?

Are you able to give up your pride of always being a member of this political party or another and start seeing what devastation occurs through, for example, the implementation of JUST the ICE program now underway, and Say "No More!" And we all know that the majority of Americans have polled AGAINST that violent group...

(And I found this 30-year update of the Second Act!)Have You Chosen...JOY?!!!

Thank All of You for Spending My Birthday With Me!

Gabby!