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“China is challenging the balance of power in the Pacific with much greater determination… A symbolic moment was reached in 2014 when the IMF announced that, measured in terms of purchasing power, China is now the world’s largest economy… China’s rise is just part of a larger shift in economic power. According to the IMF, three of the world’s four largest economies are now in Asia” (Financial Times, August 5, 2016).

One hundred years ago this past June, British and French forces unleashed an unprecedented offensive during the First World War, against German forces along the Western Front. Although Britain and her allies won the “Great War,” the Battle of the Somme became, to many, a testimony to the futility of fighting a “War to End All Wars.” By November 1916, the Allies had advanced just 11 kilometers, and over 1,200,000 men had been lost from all armies, making the Somme one of the bloodiest battles in history.

If only Ferguson, Missouri were the end of a terrible, disheartening story. Sadly, it was not. Recent publicized shootings of black men by police officers has ignited waves of protests in the United States, and has resulted in two confirmed retaliatory shootings of police officers in both Dallas, Texas and Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

What is going on? Will there be an end to the divisions in this country? Or are there even more troubling things ahead for America, including race riots? Furthermore, how should Christians respond?

After decades of misrule that has destroyed his nation’s economy and caused widespread suffering, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe is losing the support of his own military.

“A young Japanese man went on a stabbing rampage Tuesday at a facility for the mentally disabled where he had been fired, officials said, killing 19... When he was done, Kanagawa prefectural authorities said, 26-year-old Satoshi Uematsu had left dead or injured nearly a third of the almost 150 patients... It is Japan’s deadliest mass killing in decades” (Associated Press, July 26, 2016).