New Year's is a time of much celebration and joy. We are leaving the previous year behind and moving on to the year to come. This can be freeing for many people, as some years are better than others. If you had a particularly challenging year last year, rest assured that a fresh start is coming, and you can leave the past behind. A new year is a new chance to start over again and adopt a new approach to life. Sometimes, this is precisely what we need when the New Year arrives: a fresh start. A new start can help us feel more hopeful. We should strive to think positively about the upcoming year, as thinking negatively or assuming the worst can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. To help prevent ourselves from becoming self-fulfilling prophecies, we need to reflect on a few Bible passages to help prepare our hearts for the upcoming New Year.  Here are five Bible passages to study, reflect upon, and pray over as you are entering the New Year. Talk with God about them, consult your Christian mentor, and seek out advice from other trusted Christians in your life as you are approaching the New Year. Think over these Bible passages in your spare time and discern what God might be trying to tell you. They all hold hope and encouragement, which is precisely what we need as we are entering a New Year. iStock/Getty Images Plus/Sergio Yoneda

In living by example, we will raise kind, grateful, empathetic kids who are ready to go out and show the world what being grateful means—making the world a better place.

Jesse Watters Asks Democrat John Fetterman If He’ll Switch Teams As His Party Veers Into Socialism

Speaker Mike Johnson Recalls White House Meeting With Schumer and Jeffries That Led to Sombrero Memes

The J. Paul Getty Museum has acquired a masterpiece of Hellenistic jewelry: an elaborate gold ring with a miniature gold and enamel garden scene in a box-shaped bezel under a domed rock crystal cover. Created around 150 B.C., the ring is in impeccable condition, and one of the finest surviving examples of late Hellenistic box bezel rings. The bezel is oval and outlined around the crystal cabochon with beads of gold granulation. The sizes of the bezel are decorated with finely granulated beads in a lozenge design. The bouquet features one large gold flower with granulation beads in the center, filigree outlined petals and more granulation in the broad leaves underneath the blossom, filigree oak leaves and blue-green enamel accents. Two volutes with flowers in the curled sides form the top of the ring hoop where it connects to the bezel. The hoop is formed of strands of gold wire overlaid with filigree designs shaped like eyes or the knobs of the club of Herakles. The base of the hoop features a small garnet cabochon set on a Herakles knot with ivy leaf-shaped settings on each side that once held gemstones, now lost. It was first published in 1912 in a catalogue of the ring collection of the late Ernest Guilhou of Paris. It was sold at Sotheby’s in London in 1937, and less than a year later was placed up for action by a Lucerne dealer. It subsequently passed through two different private collections, and was sold at Christie’s in London this July by the descendant of the second collector. The pre-sale estimate was £12,000-18,000 ($15,745-23,618), but the ring’s quality (and the Getty’s deep pockets) drove the bidding way up. The final hammer price was £100,800 ($132,260). The Getty plans to do the first in-depth study of this exceptional piece. Despite the ring’s intricate technique, not much study has been done on this specific type of ancient jewelry. This addition to the collection will boost the Museum’s ability to highlight the creative and innovative work of ancient artisans that experimented with precious materials and will also allow Getty to launch a collaborative research initiative into this particular jewelry type. It will be displayed at the Getty Villa alongside similar objects.

The Louvre museum at one point had its own name as one of the passwords to its video surveillance system, French newspaper Libération first reported. The iconic Paris museum in October was the scene…

Typhoon Kalmaegi underwent intensification Tuesday as it slammed into the central Philippines, triggering warnings regarding conditions being “life-threatening.” Huge portions of the Visayas region…

[View Article at Source]William Clouston, leader of the Social Democratic Party of the United Kingdom, sat down with The American Conservative, to talk about foreign interventionism, neoconservatism,…

[View Article at Source]Washington should work with the Jewish state when doing so serves U.S. interests. The post Why Israel Isn’t Really a ‘Protectorate’ appeared first on The American Conservative.…

[View Article at Source]The world has changed since 2019. The post The North Korean Conundrum appeared first on The American Conservative.