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Modern Witchcraft Combines Self-Love, Feminism, Self-Help With A Dazzling Array Of Crystals And Spell Casting

Gala Darling looks every bit the Instagram-famous modern witch, with nearly 60,000 followers. Being a professional witch is her full-time job.

Published

8 years ago

July 4, 2017

Geoffrey Grider

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Modern witchcraft combines feminism, self-help, and wellness. But is there more to it than pretty crystals, stunning Instagram pictures, and lucrative business opportunities?

“There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.” Deuteronomy 18:10-12 (KJV)

EDITOR’S NOTE: Over the past year, I have noticed on my Instagram feed a seeming explosion in women posting pictures promoting topics like “self love”, “wellness”, “be good to yourself”, “praying to the Universe” and “boss babe”. Harmless fun, right? Just motivating women to succeed, right? Wrong. Every one of those things I just mentioned are part and parcel of modern-day witchcraft practiced by modern-day witches. You’ve been pulled into witchcraft and don’t even know it. Or maybe you do.

Gala Darling reveals that her “spiritual awakening” was like the moment in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy wakes up, miraculously transported from the sepia world of rural Kansas to the technicolor land of Oz.

Darling is standing beside her altar—a round, pink table laid with energy-charged crystals and magic candles—at The Wing, an all-women social club in Manhattan where 60 members and guests have signed up for her “Radical Self-Love Workshop.”

Gala Darling says how witchcraft changed her life:

Think twice the next time you use the #bossbabe hashtag, it comes from the witchcraft world. And in particular, it comes from Gala Darling, resident witch and spell caster.

A 33-year-old writer and self-help guru, she explains how her years-long fog of depression lifted when she discovered “tapping,” an ancient Eastern healing technique that she describes as “a combination of acupuncture and cosmic psychology.”

The audience is rapt because Darling isn’t just a self-help guru but a stylish, sassy witch who swears often and radiates cool-girl vibes. She used to be “really goth and cynical” and thought tapping was “bull****”—until, she says, it worked. Now she casts spells on Donald Trump.

Darling is tall and striking, with alabaster skin and kohl-rimmed green eyes. She wears a rainbow sherbet-colored maxi skirt, a grey tee knotted above her navel, and a silver pentagon ring. Her black hair is dip-dyed a raspberry, purpley pink shade that almost matches her lipstick. All of this makes for a punk rock-meets-My Little Pony aesthetic, complete with bicep sleeve tattoos and glittering fingernails.

Gala Darling looks every bit the Instagram-famous modern witch, with nearly 60,000 followers. Being a professional witch and self-love priestess is her full-time job. (She declined to say how much she earns through her practice.)

At a time when millennial women are embracing wellness fads and are bent on toppling the patriarchy, the contemporary witch is their enlightened, rebellious role model.

She has seen a resurgence in pop culture over the last few years, from the campy and wildly popular 2013 TV series American Horror Story: Coven to Robert Eggers’ 2015 film The Witch. Gwyneth Paltrow’s website Goop sells tools for female-oriented practical magic like jade and rose quartz “yoni” eggs that purport to do more than just exercise your kegels.

Celebrities like Katy Perry, Victoria Beckham, Cara Delevingne, and Lena Dunham are hooked on crystals’ alleged healing powers and positive vibes (it doesn’t hurt that they’re also pretty). Adele chalked up her lackluster Grammy’s performance last year to misplacing hers.

The ’90s were another heyday of witchiness—of the benign, Hollywood variety—that saw films like Hocus Pocus and The Craft become cult classics, Charmed become a TV smash, while J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone and Gregory Maguire’s Wicked were instant bestsellers (Rowling’s Potter books went on to become the second-highest-grossing film franchise of all time, and a musical adaptation of Wicked was named one of Broadway’s top-grossing shows ever last year).

Today’s witchy sweet spot lies somewhere between the mind-body wellness movement and intersectional feminism. Embracing all things witchy and “magical”—believing that visualization rituals can help you manifest your dreams; that tarot cards can tell you something about your life which your logical brain might otherwise ignore; that wearing a crystal pendant necklace will protect you from negative energy—has become a way for women to feel empowered and trust their instincts.

The Wing is an appropriate setting for a witchy workshop on self-love and empowerment. The club describes itself as a “coven not a sorority,” and many of its 650 members—a politically progressive group of women, most of them in their twenties and thirties—work in creative industries.

Darling kicks off the “Radical Self-Love Workshop” with an exercise in “connecting to our intuitive selves” that requires dabbing her coveted “gratitude oil” on our wrists (“it has tiny crystals inside and smells am-a-zing”) and telling each other what we’re thankful for.

Next she hands out “Witchling Oracle Cards”—a whimsical take on tarot cards—and encourages us to decipher some personal message from cutesie illustrations of Witchlings like “Dreams” and “Abundance.”

Later, we write down what “spirituality” means to us (I’m tempted by Darling’s reassurance that “it’s OK to draw three big question marks!”).

We whip up “happiness recipes,” or lists of feel-good rituals that fall under “mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual” categories. “I’d like everyone to write ‘orgasm’ under the physical category, because sex magic is the best magic,” Darling says to whoops and cheers.

We also make note of things we want to “leave behind,” in the metaphysical sense, post-Summer Solstice—which, per Darling’s instructions, we must “ceremoniously burn” when we get home.

Finally, we break off in groups to create “wishing circles,” an exhausting exercise that involves blowing a wish into your hands, vigorously rubbing them together for several agonizing minutes (the witch’s equivalent of Tracy Anderson’s arm workout), then joining scalding palms with your circle neighbors and, per Darling, blowing your wish “up to the sky like a little baby birdie.”

Admittedly, I expected something called a “Radical Self-Love Workshop” to be ripe for parody: a hipster witch rhapsodizing about the healing powers of crystals to a group of spellbound, modern-day Stevie Nicks impersonators. But Darling’s tactics for cultivating self-love are relatively practical, as these things go, and dispensed with casual humor. (On reliable ways to achieve an orgasm: “While you’re working up to that moment—you know, the moment—visualize yourself beaming it out into the universe because that stuff works! Try it this week and then tag me on Instagram. Don’t make me a video, but tell me what happened because I want to know.”)

She’s not excessively moony or self-serious about the spiritual stuff (“I define spirituality as whatever makes me feel alive, thankful, and connected”). And the witchcraft-lite she weaves into her teachings—feminine power, sexuality, creative enrichment, astrology—is broadly appealing to many young women.

The Babe Collective movement is firmly rooted in witchcraft

My introduction to the occult scene in New York City was in 2015, when I attended a “goddess circle for curating extraordinary confidence” organized by three women in Brooklyn who called themselves the BABE Collective; “BABE” being an acronym for “Badass Beauties Elevating Society.”

It was a workshoppy event similar to Darling’s at The Wing: a description advertised “bringing a heightened awareness to what being confident means in the spiritual, practical and personal sense.”

It was part coven and part 12-step program: Roughly a dozen women gathered in a teepee in Williamsburg and meditated while eating expensive, organic dark chocolate—an “offering to ourselves” and an exercise in “taking time to savor something.” We prayed to Kali, the Hindu goddess who is worshipped as the Mother of the Universe.

“I haven’t focused exclusively on creating a community of witches, though that’s kind of happened indirectly,” said Robin Lee, 28, who has grown the BABE Collective into a global community with $47-a-month membership rates. “Tons of women from all over the world are just awake and curious about understanding themselves on a deeper level. When you get down to the route of witchcraft, magic, alchemy—all these things are about the Wild Feminine and using your own energy and power to change your consciousness at will.”

In a moment when feminism has escaped the academy and captivated the popular imagination, it’s fitting that the witch—a radical and dangerous figure who can’t be controlled by stuffy and uptight men—has been recast as a symbol of resistance.

“The timing makes perfect sense: Spiritual hunger, environmental concerns, and gender politics all combine here,” Stacy Schiff, author of The Witches: Salem, 1692, told The Daily Beast of the witch’s trendy resurgence. “Plus witches are subversive, something which our political times demand. We’ve little vocabulary for female power, or at least few words of which we can be proud. It’s all the more enticing to reclaim imagery and nomenclature that has been used against you for hundreds of years.”

The witch’s taboo appeal is a double-edged sword, and Schiff suggested it could be more empowering for women to identify with real women, or at least a mythological figure who didn’t have such a fraught history.

“In a perfect world it would be lovely if women could reach to more nonfictional role models, as boys are able to. If we’re in the world of myth, why witches rather than Athena? I suppose she’s part of the establishment, and she doesn’t come down to us with a long list of martyred forebears. Plus, we know that Athena is wholly mythical. It seems at least some men are still concerned there might be sorcerers among us.”

Indeed, the witch remains a threatening figure, particularly to the Alex Jones’ and Rush Limbaugh’s of the world. Days before the 2016 election, Jones ran a story on his alt-right website, Infowars, claiming Hillary Clinton “‘regularly’ attended witch’s church,” and citing a “Clinton insider” as his source. After the first presidential debate, Limbaugh called Clinton a “witch with a capital B.”

Right-wingers wielded rhetorical pitchforks at rapper Azealia Banks when she came out of the broom closet in January 2015 (“The truth is I’m a witch”) in one of her infamous Twitter rants.

“The most magical people are the ones who have to deal with oppression, because the non-magical are jealous,” Banks wrote. “That’s why Jews and Blacks have been persecuted over and over again throughout history… all I’m trying to say is that black people are naturally born SEERS, DIVINERS, WITCHES AND WIZARDS.”

Witches band together to cast a binding spell on President Trump

Last February, Lana Del Ray took to Twitter to promote dates for a series of online “binding spells” to prevent President Trump and his administration from doing harm. Gala Darling was among the self-identifying witches who orchestrated an anti-Trump binding spell on Facebook live, though hers wished harm on the president.

“120,000 people from around the world signed on with pictures of Trump and wrapped them in string while I said an incantation,” she told me, speaking on the phone the day after the workshop. Most of the online participants were women between the ages of 25 and 34, according to Darling (geographically, California, Texas, England, and New York saw the highest volume of participants).

The hex wasn’t as harmful as participants hoped. Indeed, casting spells can seem hokey and ineffective—even to other patriarchy-defying witches.

“People always assume I do that stuff, but I just help women who want to have their witch awakening, which is just an awakening to their feminine energy and the cause of healing Mother Earth,” said Sarah Wilson, 37, who lives in Martha’s Vineyard and organizes online covens.

But for others, channeling their feminine energy in massive online spells offers a sense of community.

“There was some pushback on Facebook from people saying things like, ‘The most effective thing you can do is vote,’” Darling said of her Trump binding spell. “But why not do both? I believe in marrying the physical and the metaphysical. Obviously the spell didn’t work in the sense that he’s still alive. But have you looked at his life right now?” source

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BIBLE BELIEVERS SUNDAY SERVICE: What Your King James Bible Has To Say On The Doctrine Of Hell

Published

20 hours ago

December 7, 2025

Geoffrey Grider

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People go to Hell not because God failed to save them, but because they refused the Saviour and His precious payment for their sins in His own blood

Make no mistake about it, when you die you will go to one of two places, either Heaven or Hell. All people born into this world have the same starting point, this is the true equality of all men. Let me be crystal-clear about one thing. People do not wind up in Hell because God failed or refused to saved them, not at all. People wind up in Hell because they have refused the salvation God provides us in Jesus Christ on the cross. Preached live this morning at the Bible Believers Church at the Bookstore.

“And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Matthew 10:28 (KJB)

SUNDAY SERVICE STUDY NOTES: On The Doctrine Of Hell

On The Doctrine Of Hell

“Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:” Matthew 25:41 (KJB)

Make no mistake about it, when you die you will go to one of two places, either Heaven or Hell. All people born into this world have the same starting point, this is the true equality of all men. Heaven is a literal place, and so is Hell. People don’t go to Heaven because they are good, neither do people enter into Hell because they are bad. You are either saved or lost. Saved people go to Heaven and the unsaved into Hell.

Let me be crystal-clear about one thing. People do not wind up in Hell because God failed or refused to saved them, not at all. People wind up in Hell because they have refused the salvation God provides us in Jesus Christ on the cross.

Things that are everlasting:

God’s covenant with Noah Genesis 9:16
God’s covenant with Abraham Genesis 17:7
God Himself Genesis 21:33
God’s Statutes Lev 16:34
God’s sabbath Lev 24:8
God’s arms Deut 33:27
God’s throne Psalm 93:2
God’s righteousness Proverbs 10:25
The everlasting life of the believer John 3:16
The everlasting punishment of the unbeliever 2 Thess 1:9

Kirk Cameron reveals last week that he no longer believes in ‘eternal conscious torment’ for the wicked, which he suggests is “cruel and unusual punishment.” Instead, he leans heavily towards annihilationism, saying: “It fits the character of God.” Does it? Let’s open the Bible and find out.

Why do people go to Hell?

First and foremost, Hell is the place where people go because they have a sin debt with God because all sin is primarily against God.

“BETH. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word. With my whole heart have I sought thee: O let me not wander from thy commandments. Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee. Blessed art thou, O LORD: teach me thy statutes.” Psalm 119:9-12 (KJB)

Jesus paid this debt for the whole human race on the cross, and it is offered freely to all people.

“Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.” Romans 5:9 (KJB)

“And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven. And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled” Colossians 1:20,21 (KJB)

What is Hell like?

The Bible says it is a place of outer darkness, torment, everlasting punishments, and filled with eternal Hell fire. Here is the first mention of Hell in your King James Bible.

“For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains. I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them. They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat, and with bitter destruction: I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust.” Deuteronomy 32:22-24 (KJB)

When you run the references, this is what you see about Hell. It is taught in both Testaments, is present in every dispensation, and will be the end state for the Devil, his angels, and all those who refuse God’s salvation.

“Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.” Job 26:6 (KJB)

“For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell.” Psalms 86:13 (KJB)

“Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.” Isaiah 14:15 (KJB)

“The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.” Psalms 9:17 (KJB)

“Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it.” Isaiah 5:14 (KJB)

“And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Matthew 10:28 (KJB)

Paul doesn’t mention the word ‘Hell’ but he doesn’t have to. It’s quite obvious he’s referring to it right here.

“And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power; When he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe (because our testimony among you was believed) in that day.” 2 Thessalonians 1:7-10 (KJB)

Perhaps the most pointed reference to Hell is found here:

“And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried; And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.” Luke 16:22-25 (KJB)

Hell is not a contradiction of God’s love — it is the proof of His holiness and justice.

If God allowed sin into Heaven, He would cease to be holy.
If God ignored sin, He would cease to be just.
Because God is eternal, the punishment for sin is eternal.

“Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Genesis 18:25)

Hell is real, Hell is eternal, but Hell is avoidable.

“Christ died for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3).
“Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13).

God’s heart is clear:
“Who will have all men to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4).

People go to Hell not because God failed to save them, but because they refused the Saviour.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Headline News

New York’s New Muslim Socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s First Order Of Business Will Be To Bring Back Open Air Homeless Encampments

Published

2 days ago

December 6, 2025

Geoffrey Grider

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Muslim Socialist Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani on Thursday said he will end the clearance of homeless encampments in New York City.

We haven’t talked in a little bit about the Cloward-Piven Plan to destroy America, but now that we have a Muslim Socialist mayor in New York City, Zohran Mamdani, perhaps it’s time to dust off our files and remind you of the Socialist plan that Cloward and Piven devised for our nation. The idea was simple: overwhelm the system until it breaks, then rebuild it in a new image. That is exactly what Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven openly proposed, and it is exactly the trajectory we are watching in real time.

“The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” John 10:10 (KJB)

Do you know why they took down the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center? Because it was the perfect symbol of America’s global financial dominance, and watching those towers fall is a stunning harbinger of the fate all of America will soon suffer. In the meantime, now we have a Muslim Socialist mayor who will turn New York City into a sweltering, infested rat hole all the while bringing in Sharia Law through the backdoor. And contrary to what ‘President of Peace’ Trump thinks, America’s greatest threat is not drug boats from Venezuela. It’s Islam.

YOU BETTER LOAD UP ON THESE, CHRISTIAN, BECAUSE YOU”RE GOING TO NEED THEM IN AMERICA IN 2016. CLICK TO ORDER!!!

Everyone in the city will suffer from Mamdani’s foolish decision to end homeless camp sweeps

FROM THE NY POST: The inevitable result of this decision will be more crime and disorder on the streets — and more deaths among the homeless themselves. Mamdani claims that encampment clearances are cruel because they aren’t “connecting homeless New Yorkers to the housing they so desperately need.” But such complaints ring hollow when New York City has the most expansive “right to shelter” laws in the nation. Those sleeping outside have the option to get inside. They just don’t want to take it.

A major reason the homeless refuse shelter is because shelters have rules, including rules forbidding alcohol and drug use. The largest national survey of the unsheltered homeless found that about three-quarters had a substantial substance abuse problem, far higher than the rate of the sheltered homeless. The more the homeless are outside, the more they will be abusing drugs and alcohol.

Other cities saw dire consequences when they stopped enforcing rules against homeless camping.

Austin, Texas, saw a nearly 50% increase in unsheltered homelessness after it voted to decriminalize street camping and sleeping in 2019. Although some claimed this was the result of the homeless coming out of hiding, that wouldn’t explain why the number of the homeless in shelters dropped by 20%. When the homeless are given an option to sleep outdoors, more of them will take it.

Clearing encampments works. In 2006 Los Angeles Police Department Commissioner Willie Bratton, a former and future New York City police commissioner, began the “Safer Cities Initiative” to clear LA’s notorious Skid Row.

Within one year homeless overdose deaths in the area were down by 50% and homicides by even more. A later study found substantial drops in crime in the area. Even very liberal cities faced with spreading encampments, crime and disorder are moving in the opposite direction of Mamdani.

Austin voters in 2021 forced their city to ban homeless camping once again, and after the US Supreme Court in the Grants Pass case in 2022 declared that criminal penalties for street sleeping and camping were constitutional, states and cities in the Western United States increased enforcement. Even California Gov. Gavin Newsom began advocating and personally participating in encampment clearances.

Mamdani claims clearances won’t be necessary because the city will create more permanent housing for the homeless. But building sufficient new housing could take years, if not decades. READ MORE

Mamdani says he’ll end homeless encampment sweeps in NYC

Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani said he will end the Adams administration’s practice of removing homeless encampments from city sidewalks, but critics argue it will be a step backwards for the city’s quality of life.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

European Union

NATO Jet Fighters Scramble In Poland While Russia Unleashes A Hellish Fury Upon Ukraine As WWIII Begins Knocking Loudly On The End Times Door

Published

2 days ago

December 6, 2025

Geoffrey Grider

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NATO fighter jets were scrambled and air defense systems put on alert in Poland in response to Russia’s latest overnight drone and missile strikes in Ukraine

NATO fighter jets roared into the midnight sky over Poland last night as Russia unleashed hundreds of drones and missiles into Ukraine, this is more than just another headline in the endless drumbeat of war. The birth pangs are becoming impossible to ignore. What we are watching unfold in Eastern Europe is yet another reminder that the global stage is being prepared for the time of Jacob’s trouble, the rise of Antichrist, and the reshaping of world powers exactly as foretold in the King James Bible.

“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” Matthew 24:6-8 (KJB)

The prophet Daniel saw a final form of world government, a revived Roman system — strong in places, weak in others, but unified under one global ruler (Daniel 2:41–43). What is NATO if not the lingering iron of the old Roman Empire stretching across Europe? And soon a man will arise who will promise peace, stability, and safety — and the world will hand him everything. All of this points in one unmistakable direction: The Age of Grace is closing, and the time of Jacob’s trouble is approaching. The world cannot sustain this level of geopolitical tension without breaking. The Bible says it will break — spectacularly, after the Rapture when God turns His focus back to Israel and pours judgment on a Christ-rejecting world. If you’re saved, this should stir your soul and remind you that the ‘voice like a trumpet’ is close to sounding. If you’re lost, the window of mercy is still open — but not for long.

NATO fighters scrambled in Poland as Russia bombards Ukraine

FROM ABC NEWS: “Fighter jets have been scrambled and ground-based air defense systems as well as radar reconnaissance systems have reached a state of readiness,” the command said in a post to X. “These actions are of a preventive nature and are aimed at securing the airspace and its protection, especially in areas adjacent to the threatened regions,” it added. The alert lasted for just under four hours, after which the command said the fighters and air defense systems had “returned to standard operational activities.” No violations of Polish airspace were observed, a follow-up post to X said.

The Spanish and Czech air forces were involved in the response, the command said, as were German and Dutch air defense systems. Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 653 drones and 51 missiles — 17 of them ballistic missiles — into the country overnight. The air force said 585 drones and 30 missiles were shot down or suppressed.

Drone and missile impacts were reported across 29 locations, the air force said.

The attack — which consisted of 704 air attack weapons — was Russia’s largest overnight bombardment since it launched 705 munitions on the night of Oct. 29, according to Ukrainian air force data analyzed by ABC News. The largest attack of the war to date took place on the night of Sept. 6 and involved 823 air attack vehicles. The latest overnight attack is only the fourth of Russia’s full-scale invasion to date in which the number of air attack vehicles used surpassed 700.

NATO forced to scramble fighter jets as drones from Russian attack on Ukraine cross the border into Poland. #WWIII pic.twitter.com/T8q0g7XZ4b

— Now The End Begins (@NowTheEndBegins) December 6, 2025

Ukrainian Minister of Internal Affairs Iho Klymenko said in a post to Telegram that 10 regions of the country came under attack, with direct hits to residential buildings, railways and energy infrastructure. More than two dozen houses in the Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Zhytomyr and Lviv regions were damaged, according to Klymenko. At least three people were injured in the Kyiv region, another three people were injured in the Dnipropetrovsk region and two people were injured in the Lviv region, Klymenko said.

In the Black Sea port city of Odesa, regional Gov. Oleh Kiper said an energy facility was damaged, resulting in disruptions to the supply of power and heating. Some 9,500 customers were without heating and 34,000 without water as of 9:30 a.m. local time. There was also damage to energy infrastructure in the Chernihiv, Zaporizhzhia, Lviv and Dnipropetrovsk regions, according to authorities there.

The International Atomic Energy Agency — the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog — said in a post to X that Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant also temporarily lost all off-site power during the Russian strikes.

IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi “reiterates call for military restraint to avoid a nuclear accident,” the post said. Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said she had “convened an emergency coordination meeting” with the ministers of internal affairs and energy as well as the leadership of the state-run energy companies and all services responsible for recovery operations. READ MORE