Hope everyone has had a great start to this year’s Holy Days. We are looking forward to the Last Day of Unleavened Bread tomorrow here in Tyler with a potluck planned for after services and an evening of fun and fellowship including Bible Trivia and Karaoke. Like with the weekly Sabbath, it is refreshing to take a break from the chaos of the world and rejoice in honoring God’s commands with like-minded brethren.

Meanwhile, the news has been a regular roller coaster ride. The tariff hubbub has finally crystallized around the primary conflict, the struggle for economic dominance between the US and China. American institutions have found themselves in an uncomfortable position, dependent on cheap foreign goods and government largess with an administration determined to wean the country off both.

If all your hopes and dreams are tied up in the stock market it has probably been a harrowing experience. It has been a scramble to ascertain which companies’ operations will be most affected, which will be insulated, and which have the capacity to adapt. The temporary reprieve given to all markets other than China has offered a preview of what may be coming as well as an opportunity to shift production or negotiate a mutually advantageous alternative. Many are working toward that alternative, and while the media is focused on the fallout there will also be unexpected winners as supply lines shift and new players become competitive or viable.

We are so busy being shocked by market volatility and record highs among safe havens like gold that we forget some of the major, underlying issues. The financial trajectory of the US and the majority of developed Western nations has been abysmal. France has yet to limit itself to a 5% budget deficit without dissolving the government and triggering elections. The sad truth is, there is no good time or easy way to make the kind of changes that need to be made. 

We are seeing the Houthis devastated in Yemen. This as the US pursues high level negotiations with Iran over its nuclear ambitions and role in the region. And it has not been a good year for Iran. Hamas is not gone but there is hardly anything left of Gaza, potential deals to end the war and release the hostages keep breaking down. Hezbollah is all but obliterated in Lebanon. Assad is out of Syria. The Houthis are hurting as we mentioned and even the Shiite militias of Iran are offering to disarm. 

The war in Ukraine also continues to grind on. Headlines continue to tease that a mineral deal is possible or near completion that would vest US interests in the region. Various European nations have voiced a willingness to participate in the security aspect but the reality on the ground has continued to deteriorate. Russia controlling all of the regions it claims to have annexed will be a hard pill to swallow for many capitals that have repeatedly insisted every inch be returned to Ukraine as a prerequisite to peace. Who doesn’t want another uncomfortable geopolitical reality like that between North and South Korea or China and Taiwan? 

My Dad asked me to write the update this week as he is feeling a bit under the weather. Your prayers are appreciated, as they are for all those facing trials. The prayer wall at the ICG site is a good place to keep up with many of the requests we receive as are the various social media pages and groups. And we are always happy to pass them along for those who prefer to call or email. “The prayer of a righteous person has great power…” (James 5:16 ESV) We would also like to acknowledge the passing Mrs. Marsh, who many would know from the Myrtle Beach, SC Feast site, and Mr. Jensen, who others may know from Lake Tahoe. We sorrow over their loss but we rejoice that their salvation is secure and that they will rest in peace until Christ’s return. In hard times, and especially during these Holy Days, we remember that our hope is not in this world but in His Kingdom.

Happy Sabbath,

Michael Armstrong

The post Weekly Update by Michael Armstrong – April 18, 2025 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

As negotiations between Iran and world powers continue in Vienna over potentially reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi said Saturday that Tehran would not back down “an iota” from its nuclear rights.

Speaking on Iran’s Nuclear Technology Day, Raisi said, “For more than the one-hundredth time, our message from Tehran to Vienna is that we will not back off from the Iranian people’s nuclear rights… not even an iota,” according to a Reuters translation of a state media report.

“Our knowledge and technology in the nuclear field is not reversible. Iran’s [continuation of] research in peaceful nuclear fields will not depend on others’ demands or viewpoints,” said Raisi, who came to power in August.

Raisi repeated Iran’s insistence that Iran’s nuclear ambitions are only peaceful — a claim doubted by Israel and the West.

The president attended an exhibit of the National Atomic Energy Organization, to see the latest achievements of nuclear scientists, according to state media, which did not give details on those achievements. Raisi described them as symbolic of self-reliance and self-confidence.

He also said Iran’s work on its nuclear program had accelerated.

The United States and Iran blamed each other this week for a weeks-long impasse that has held up a return to the 2015 deal that sought to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said that the country’s negotiators would not return to Vienna, the site of the year-long talks to restore the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), until Washington settles outstanding issues.

“We will not be going to Vienna for new negotiations but to finalize the nuclear agreement,” Khatibzadeh told reporters in Tehran. “If Washington answers the outstanding questions, we can go to Vienna as soon as possible,” he said, without explaining the specific questions that remained.

“At the moment, we do not yet have a definitive answer from Washington,” he said.

But in Washington, Khatibzadeh’s State Department counterpart Ned Price pushed back, suggesting it was Tehran that was not giving way to make a deal possible.

And Price warned that time was running out, as Iran gets closer and closer to the nuclear “breakout” point when it has achieved the capacity to construct a nuclear weapon.

“Anyone involved in the talks knows precisely who has made constructive proposals, who has introduced demands that are unrelated to the JCPOA, and how we reached this current moment,” Price said.

“We still believe there is an opportunity to overcome our remaining differences,” Price said.

He said Iran’s continuing nuclear development has put it within “weeks” of breakout, which would nullify the benefits of a new agreement.

“Iran has been able to shrink that breakout time from where it started to a point where we can measure it in weeks rather than months. To us that is unacceptable as a long-term proposition,” Price said.

Tehran has been engaged in long-running negotiations in the Austrian capital to revive the JCPOA, with Britain, China, France, Germany, and Russia directly, and the US indirectly.

The JCPOA gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program to guarantee that Tehran could not develop or acquire an atomic bomb.

But the US unilaterally withdrew from the accord in 2018 under then-US president Donald Trump, who reimposed biting economic sanctions that prompted Iran to begin rolling back its own commitments.

Last year, newly elected US President Joe Biden pledged to attempt to revive the JCPOA, blaming Trump for allowing Iran to drop its commitments to the agreement.

In the past month, the negotiations — in which the US communicated with Iran indirectly through other participants and the European Union — have brought the parties close to an agreement.

But the talks halted last month.

Among the key sticking points is Tehran’s demand that Washington remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the ideological arm of Iran’s military, from the official US list of terror groups.

But the US insisted Friday on keeping the elite Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps on its designated list of terror groups.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Mark Milley, had told a congressional hearing on Thursday that in his “personal opinion” the Quds Force should not be dropped from the terror list, which has been one of Tehran’s conditions to renew the deal.

Asked Friday whether that opinion reflected the position of the administration of US President Joe Biden, State Department spokeswoman Jalina Porter seemed to agree.

“The president shares the chairman’s view that IRGC Quds forces are terrorists,” she told reporters.

Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/irans-raisi-says-nation-will-not-back-down-an-iota-from-its-nuclear-rights/

The post Iran’s Raisi says nation will not back down ‘an iota’ from its nuclear rights first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.