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Sanctification (2) " But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us . . . sanctification . . . —1 Corinthians 1:30 " The Life Side. The mystery of sanctification is that the perfect qualities of Jesus Christ are imparted as a gift to me, not gradually, but instantly once I enter by faith into the realization that He “became for [me] . . . sanctification . . . .” Sanctification means nothing less than the holiness of Jesus becoming mine and being exhibited in my life.The most wonderful secret of living a holy life does...

The extortion case against Thomas DiFiore, a reputed boss in the Bonanno crime family, encompassed thousands of pages of evidence, including surveillance photographs, cellphone and property records, and hundreds of hours of audio recordings. But even as Mr. DiFiore sat in a jail cell, sending nearly daily emails to his lawyers on his case and his deteriorating health, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn sought to add another layer of evidence: those very emails. The prosecutors informed Mr. DiFiore last month that they would be reading the emails sent to his lawyers from jail, potentially using his own words against him. Jailhouse...

A pregnant Michigan teenager was strangled and her boyfriend was decapitated after apparently connecting with a stranger through the online service Craigslist for a sexual encounter, police said Monday. The police chief in Wyoming, a Grand Rapids suburb, said that 18-year-old Brooke Slocum was held captive before her death. Her body was found Thursday in the trunk of the suspect's car. She was eight months pregnant. Chief James Carmody says her boyfriend, Charles Oppenneer, 25, was found decapitated in a park a day earlier. His head hasn't been found... Police got a search warrant for (31-year-old Brady) Oestrike's home, and...

An execution taking place in Arizona tonight appears to have gone horribly awry. According to a report from the Associated Press, inmate Joseph Rudolph Wood "gasped and snorted" and was still alive more than an hour after the execution began. Wood was not pronounced dead until 3:49PM MT, one hour and 57 minutes after the beginning of the procedure. Wood's lawyers filed an emergency appeal during the execution, noting that he was "gasping and snorting for more than an hour" but was still alive some 70 minutes after the execution began. The whole process should have taken 10 minutes, Wood's...

Valdimir Petrov found evidence of a Russian artillery unit shelling Ukrainian positions from Russian territory, because a soldier from this unit is posting photos on his VKontakte page (the Russian Facebook). Or course immediately after discovering this, his page has been deleted. But the info is still here:

A man believed to have provided the gun used by Boston Marathon bombing suspects to kill a college police officer has been arrested on drug and weapon charges. Stephen Silva made an initial appearance in federal court Tuesday on charges related to heroin trafficking and possession of a handgun with an obliterated serial number.

Important columns by former attorney general Michael Mukasey and Caroline Glick make the point that in Israel’s defensive war against Hamas, the main thing to focus on is not the missiles; it’s the tunnels. Perhaps more significantly, they demonstrate that the Obama administration, in its mulish appeasement of the Muslim Brotherhood-Sunni supremacist axis that even Islamic governments (indeed, even the Saudis) are shunning, is subverting a golden opportunity to achieve decisive victory over Hamas – the necessary precondition if there is ever to be a stable Israeli-Palestinian settlement. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Judge Mukasey explains that Hamas’s strategic...

~ The FReeper Canteen Presents ~ ~ Remembering Our Troops!! ~ K-9 COMPETITION Air Force Staff Sgt. Rocky Thompson takes his military working dog, Aron, through a window obstacle during the K-9 competition on Minot Air Force Base, ND, Aug. 14, 2013. Thompson, a military working dog handler, is assigned to the 319th Security Forces Squadron. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Kristoffer Kaubisch Canteen Mission Statement Showing support and boosting the morale ofour military and our allies' militaryand family members of the above.Honoring those who have served before. ASSAULT EXERCISE Army 1st Sgt. Kevin Mulcahey, left,...

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, urged Palestinian Arabs on Wednesday to keep fighting Israel, according to AFP. “The only way to deal with this savage regime is to continue resistance and armed struggle and extend it to the West Bank (Judea and Samaria -ed.),” the official IRNA news agency quoted Khamenei as saying. Iran, which does not recognize Israel, is a supporter of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror groups that have been at the forefront of the fighting in Gaza. …

Here's an idea the cabinet may find interesting: Within two or three days, when the IDF completes its work on the tunnels leading to Israeli territory, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon will announce that Operation Protective Edge has ended, and that a new operation is underway. From now on, Israel is taking initiative into its own hands: It is removing the ground forces, but if Hamas continues to launch rockets, it will pursue and even intensify the Air Force bombings, or the artillery fire. When it wants to, it will send ground forces back into Gaza....

WASHINGTON — The U.S. military will provide housing space for up to an additional 5,000 unaccompanied Central American children who have illegally come across the border, Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren said Wednesday. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel signed the authorization last week at the request of the Department of Health and Human Services. Hagel’s order also extends the housing assistance mission to Jan. 31, 2015. In May, the Pentagon committed to providing space to up to 3,600 children for 120 days. There are 2,500 children being housed at Fort Sill, Okla., Naval Base Ventura County, Calif., and Lackland Air...

Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal op-ed by a potential GOP presidential candidate, Ohio senator Rob Portman, brings to mind a quote from the movie Field of Dreams. At the end of the movie, Ray Kinsella angrily confronts the ghost of Shoeless Joe Jackson when the player refuses to let Ray come with him. “What’s in it for me?” Kinsella cries. I fear that will be the reaction among working-class whites in Ohio and other industrial Midwest states if the agenda the senator lays out is all that’s on offer in 2016. According to exit polls, whites without a college degree easily...

Russia's Federal Penal Service said that the country's inmates would soon be contributing to public works including the construction of the Kerch Strait Bridge to Crimea and a cleanup operation in the Sochi region, the Kommersant newspaper reported Wednesday.

Austin Goncalves, 15, is recovering after going into a coma. He went into the coma after he got fish poisoning from a snapper in the Bahamas. Austin is finally eating food for the first time in week. “I’m on anti-seizure medication,” he told WTSP. Earlier this month, Austin caught a mutton snapper that his mom cooked for dinner. “I couldn’t eat, couldn’t breath,” Austin told the station. “This was very serious,” his mom, Karen Goncalves added. “It could have ended our lives.” Austin, his friend, Karen, and her boyfriend were all suffering from Ciguatera, which is a potentially fatal illness...

LOS ALTOS HILLS -- President Obama hit the Bay Area for a fast cash-and-grab fundraising drive Wednesday, but there were signs that even in one of the nation's most reliable Democratic ATMs, donor fatigue is setting in. There was no listed price for tickets for Obama's morning appearance at a roundtable in San Francisco for the House Majority PAC - the type of intimate gathering for which admission is usually $32,400 per person, the legal maximum. Some donors said tickets had been offered for a deep discount. And in Los Altos Hills, the heart of Silicon Valley big money, the...

Her hearing isn't great, and her legs are weakening too. She doesn't have much appetite either, often finishing only a small portion of her meals. But you will never hear Madam Chua Sua Teh complaining about her age. Indeed, the 100-year-old woman can still play a mean game of Wii bowling. Despite the usual effects of ageing, Madam Chua is simply happy that she has hit the 100-year mark this year. She told The New Paper last Thursday in Teochew: "I don't worry myself with thoughts about death or illness, I simply live one day at a time, and make...

A new book sets out to answer some big questions about the brain and bodies of water. "Blue Mind" explores why so many of us are drawn to the ocean, and how this scientifically connects to our health and happiness, CBS News correspondent Ben Tracy reports. Most of us know that feeling of calm we get when we are on, in or just near the water. "This is what you want if you're in the midst of a stressful week," said Wallace J. Nichols, a marine biologist and conservationist who lives near the central coast of California. "You just want...

A physician at the helm of Sierra Leone's efforts to contain and control the Ebola epidemic has just been diagnosed with the virus, according to reports from Reuters and the BBC. Sheik Umar Khan, a virologist, has treated more than 100 patients with the deadly disease and was admitted earlier this week to a high containment treatment facility, according to a statement released on Tuesday by the government. A source inside the ward told Reuters that the doctor is receiving treatment, though no details were given on his current state of health. Health Minister Miatta Kargbo called Khan a "national...

Gulf emirate is branded the villain behind Hamas belligerence, with PM’s former security adviser saying it funds tunnel diggers and rocket launchers. President Shimon Peres accused Qatar on Wednesday of becoming “the world’s largest funder of terror” due to its financial support for Hamas in Gaza. “Qatar does not have the right to send money for rockets and tunnels which are fired at innocent civilians,” the outgoing statesman told UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in Jerusalem. “Their funding of terror must stop. If they want to build then they should, but they must not be allowed to destroy.” Qatar’s recently...

by Gina Cassini | Top Right NewsIt's all about race.Everything, that is. Just when you think it's ok for your child to enjoy an innocent, wholesome cartoon that has been thrilling little tikes for seven decades, you find out that it's -- what else? -- RACIST! That is, according to the ridiculous screed of Tracy van Slyke, of The Guardian, which is so stupid it just must be a joke. Right? Wrong! She's serious. Check out what she said about the evil Thomas the Tank Engine: For the record, all the “villains” on Thomas and Friends are the dirty diesel engines. I’d like to...