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President Trump signed a new trade deal with Mexico and Canada on Wednesday. The new U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) replaces the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

This is no doubt a big victory for the president. It’s being hailed as a win for the American worker and is projected to create 600,000 jobs. 

“I keep my promises and I’m fighting for the American worker,” Trump said.

Surrounded by American workers on the south lawn of the White House, President Trump signed the largest trade deal in American history.

“NAFTA ends today and a new era of job and growth begins under the USMCA,” Vice President Mike Pence said. 

It replaces the 25-year-old trade agreement with provisions aimed to strengthen the manufacturing industry, improve labor standard enforcement and increasing market access for American dairy farmers. 

“This is something we really put our heart into,” the President said. “It’s probably the number one reason I decided to lead this crazy life that I’m leading right now as opposed to that beautiful simple life of luxury that I’d led before this happened. But I love doing it.” 

“This is quite a victory and I was one who was skeptical as you know that Trump could pull this off. I thought it was a risky strategy,” remarked The Heritage Foundation’s Stephen Moore. 

But Moore says that strategy paid off and calls it Trump’s biggest bi-partisan victory since taking office, adding the deal comes on the heels of Trump signing the “phase one” trade agreement with China. 

“I guess what this means is Trump is on a roll here and they just announced a few days ago they are looking to finalize a trade deal with Britain. So Trump is really redesigning how we do trade deals,”  Moore said. 

President Trump will tour a manufacturing facility in Michigan on Thursday. There he’ll see first hand the impact the USMCA will have. 

Mexico has already ratified the agreement. Canada is expected to follow suit in the coming weeks. 

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After more than a decade of cultivating a relationship with one of our neighbors, I finally got around to having a conversation with him about spiritual matters.  I’ve been thinking, “why didn’t I do this sooner?”  It’s so easy to get in to a perpetual cultivation strategy and procrastinate about addressing spiritual issues.  Sometimes the timing is just not right, but when we pray and trust the Holy Spirit’s leadership, the time will come.  When we pray and trust Him, He often gives us unique and creative ways we might not think about.

Finding Common Ground

These particular neighbors (a couple from a Middle Eastern country) recently received a diagnosis that the wife had terminal cancer.  When my wife and I learned of the cancer, we started praying for them.  However, it was just this past week that I took the opportunity to pray with the husband.  He was very open as I shared with him the power of praying in Jesus’ name. I asked him if there were any of his family members who were followers of Jesus.  He said, “No they are all Muslim.” Then I was able to share how many people throughout the Middle East and North Africa were experiencing healing, deliverance and salvation through a relationship with Jesus of Nazareth.  The door was then open to share about what the Quran says about Isa Al-Misah and about the Injil.  Of course, that led to sharing more about what the Injil says about Isa.  Finding common ground is so important to gaining trust and building relationships.

Reaching out in Difficult Times

So often it’s the difficult times or crisis situations that provide the most fruitful witness and ministry opportunities.  However, we don’t have to wait until bad things happen to find common ground and bring Jesus into our conversations.  The Lord is faithful to do so as we pray and trust Him for wisdom and direction.  If we consistently sow the Seed of His Word and share our God stories and testimonies, we can have confidence that occasionally we’ll connect with fertile soil.  It’s really about the spontaneous outworking of the indwelling Christ.

Relational Disciple Making

It is encouraging to receive feedback and reports of the work of God in people’s lives we’ve shared with.  I recently reconnected with a man I lead to the Lord more than 30 years ago.  He was a next door neighbor for only one year.  During that time we had multiple conversations about the Lord and spiritual matters.  You could call it a mentoring or discipling relationship.  Since those days, this former neighbor has been instrumental in many family members and friends coming to the Lord.  In fact, some became actively involved in ministry.  It is an example of the reproducing life of the Lord Jesus in and through each of us who follow and trust Him.

SOURCE: Assist News

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Emmy Award-winning TV host Kathie Lee Gifford attended the 28th annual Movieguide Awards Friday where she shared a message of “truth” for Christians entering a new decade.

While walking the red carpet of the popular awards show that celebrates faith and family content, Gifford spoke about her book, The Rock, The Road, and The Rabbi and the importance of Christians knowing the truth of God’s word.

“We have not been taught the truth. And we wonder why we have no power in our lives. We’re quoting scripture that isn’t true,” she passionately declared.

“If we’re not quoting what it actually says in the Greek, actually says in the Hebrew, then we’re not speaking the word and the word is everything,” she stressed.

In her book, Gifford details what she discovered about the Bible after learning what it says by studying the original Greek and Hebrew translations combined with having the opportunity to tour biblical sites in Israel which she describes as “life-changing.”

While on the red carpet at the historic Avalon Theater she shared the Hebrew word for this decade and what it means.

“This decade in the Hebrew is the decade of the pay, the mouth, it’s a breakthrough decade,” Gifford declared.

SOURCE: Christian Post, Jeannie Law

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The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of BCNN1. Opinions expressed are solely those of the author(s).

Some years ago, TobyMac very kindly embraced my idea to hold youth crusades in San Diego and came alongside me to offer his talent, grace and prayers. He worked tirelessly, was great at what he did, and reached thousands of kids for Christ. When one enters into the trenches with you to support your idea, it is very easy to feel a certain amount of fondness and affection for them, and that is certainly how I felt and feel about Toby. I am eternally grateful to him.

That is why Toby’s nightmare, the loss of his son, Truett, hits particularly hard. Toby loved his boy and was a family man. It is my hope and prayer that in this long night of the soul, the one he is suffering through at this very moment, that he finds hope and healing in the arms of our heavenly Father who knows what is like to lose a son.

Truett died of an accidental drug overdose and fentanyl was involved. Opioids are an American tragedy that, I’m afraid, may get lost in these tumultuous, news-heavy times. I’m also concerned that people may feel that the opioid crisis is just an extension of the drug scene that started has been a part of our national conversation since the late 1960s. It is not. This is different.

The opioid crisis is rolling through American communities like a fast-moving plague. More than 47,000 Americans died in 2017 alone. Multiply that by the number of each victim’s family members and it is easy to see the wake of destruction is historic. But it doesn’t stop there. Millions of people are battling crushing opioid addictions right now. In 2015, 1.2 million women and nearly 1 million men addicted. The numbers are likely greater today. The crisis is one of the worst drug crisis in American history, causing more deaths annually than car crashes or guns, and making orphans of thousands of children. The incidents of running into someone who has been affected is growing. A woman who worked at my church’s K-12 academy just recently lost a family member to opioid overdose. It’s everywhere. America is losing nearly 200 people every day.

SOURCE: Christian Post, Mile McPherson

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Christians across China are prohibited from holding religious funerals for their deceased loved ones as the Communist Party continues to tighten its grip on the regulation of religion and religious activity.

Bitter Winter, a magazine documenting human rights and religious freedom abuses in China, reported that authorities throughout the country are enforcing policies that prohibit religious customs and rituals to be used during funerals.

In December, the government of Wenzhou city’s Pingyang county in the eastern province of Zhejiang adopted the Regulations on Centralized Funeral Arrangement.

Under the new rules, “clerical personnel are not allowed to participate in funerals,” and “no more than ten family members of the deceased are allowed to read scriptures or sing hymns in a low voice.”

The new rules aim to “get rid of bad funeral customs and establish a scientific, civilized, and economical way of funerals.”

Similarly, a village official from the central province of Henan told Bitter Winter that the local government convened a meeting for religious work assistants in April, informing them that all religious funerals are restricted.

Soon after, officials issued a document stipulating that clerical personnel should be “timely stopped from using religion to intervene in citizens’ weddings and funerals or other activities in their lives.”

In Wuhan, police stormed the funeral of a Christian member of a government-regulated Three-Self Church and arrested her daughter, who was praying for her mother at the time. The daughter was only released after the deceased was buried without Christian rituals two days later.

Last April, officials broke up an 11-person Christian funeral in the province of Henan that was honoring a deceased member of the congregation. Officials accused attendees of “hiding” their actions in the countryside and threatened them with jail time. The police registered the personal contact information of the attendees and told them that they could be investigated at any time.

“When my father died, village officials threatened to arrest us if we didn’t conduct a secular funeral. We did not dare to go against them,” a villager from Gucheng town in Henan’s county-level city of Yuzhou told Bitter Winter.

SOURCE: Christian Post, Leah MarieAnn Klett

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