Watchman on the Wall

Southwest Radio Ministries: Welcome to Watchman on the Wall, a daily outreach of Southwest Radio Ministries and swrc.com. Today, we have the latest headlines from the end times with author and speaker Josh Davis.

Josh Davis: Friend, when was the last time you visited swrc.com? If it’s been a while, you’re missing one of the most valuable Bible prophecy and Christian resource websites available today. At swrc.com, you’ll find daily Watchman on the Wall broadcasts, Prophecy in the News television programs, timely articles, podcasts, conferences, books, DVDs, and resources all designed to help you understand God’s Word and the times in which we live.

For more than 90 years, Southwest Radio Ministries has been proclaiming the Gospel and equipping believers to stand firm in an increasingly uncertain world. Whether you’re looking for trusted biblical teaching, insights into current events through the lens of Scripture, or resources to strengthen your faith, you’ll find it at swrc.com. Visit today, explore all that’s available, and see why thousands of believers turn to Southwest Radio Ministries every day. That’s swrc.com.

During America’s 250th anniversary, New York’s mayor sat at George Washington’s desk, claiming that our founding fathers would agree with his communist concepts. Plus, a Chinese tech company is developing a stunningly human-like robot as an AI companion. Josh Davis details these stories and reveals why they subtly attack the biblical worldview on today’s edition of Headlines from the End Times.

Greetings fellow Watchman on the Wall and welcome to another Headlines from the End Times, helping you to connect dots between what’s happening in today’s world with God’s timeless Word. During this month of July, we’ve been featuring special programming that is patriotic in nature, looking back to our nation’s founding and understanding the biblical basis upon which this nation was built.

But we’re also looking at the present day and giving some insight and analysis on what is happening in America today. We’re not stopping there. We’re looking to the future and understanding what is God’s role for America in Bible prophecy. If you’ve missed any of the episodes, I encourage you to go check it out. You can listen to it on a variety of platforms, including at our website, swrc.com.

I’ll share more about that in a little bit, but I want to get to our first story because it speaks about the spiritual battle that America faces this very day. We understand the signs of the times and the spiritual deception that is in this world. So many young people are buying into bad ideas. Among those is the idea of socialism and communism.

And of course, we know that New York City elected a socialist mayor. During the 4th of July, he was seated at President George Washington’s desk, this historic desk. Mayor Mamdani sought to tear down the biblical foundations that America’s first president built. This story comes to us from the Harbinger’s Daily and author and editor Brianna Clawson.

The story writes as the United States marked its 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, a stark contrast was illuminated in the nation like never before. As one side emphasized the biblically grounded roots of America’s founding and the freedom that a godly beginning produced, cheering for the nation and recalling the stand taken by the founders that made America distinct among the nations, the other side viewed history through a dark lens, smearing the Judeo-Christian values and painting a path forward that would steer this nation into further rebellion against God and toward the ideological prison of socialism.

And that’s so very true. It’s this real dichotomy, this battle between two choices that we see in the United States of America this present day. Which way will this country go? Which direction will it head? Will we see a return to common sense, or will we see people give in to socialism and step-by-step go into, could it be, full-fledged communism?

Well, that latter group was led by the Islamic communist mayor of New York City, Mayor Mamdani, who was no doubt emboldened by the recent slew of socialist election victories by candidates that he endorsed. During this 15-minute speech, he attempted to resemble a presidential address to the nation. Mayor Mamdani was even seated at a desk formerly owned by the first president of the United States of America, George Washington.

While President George Washington used his platform to establish the United States on biblical principles, Mayor Mamdani’s aim was to tear those principles down and tear them apart. His address attacked capitalism and it even called the duly elected president, President Trump, a tyrant. Mayor Mamdani praised uprisings against authority. He demanded open borders. He demanded unchecked mass immigration. He even went so far as to urge the redistribution of wealth from the wealthy to the state.

Through a stunning contortion of reality, Mamdani insisted that early American leaders endorsed these ideas. Can you imagine that he would have the gall to say that early American leaders endorsed these very principles? Either he’s ignorant of history or he’s intentionally distorting and twisting and lying about history. Nothing could be further from the truth, dear friends.

Our friend who you’ve heard right here on Watchman on the Wall numerous times, Bill Federer, has outlined this so well in some of his books, including his books on socialism. In fact, did you know that even before the formation of America, our pilgrim forefathers attempted a version of socialism? That’s right, they did. They wanted to have everything in common and have everything in one big pile, all the food, all the money, all the resources in one big pile, and people could take what they needed when they needed.

Well, guess what? That led some of them to become lazy. So, when they reinstilled the concept of private property ownership, that allowed people to flourish. People began to work hard on their own property, on their own land, knowing that they were getting what they put into the property and into the land themselves. You see that system of socialism almost caused them to lose everything.

They realized how failed that system was and that they needed a change of direction very quickly. So our pilgrim forefathers made that course correction, and those who would come after them in following generations understood the dangers of that kind of system. You can travel to any socialist or communist country. I’ve had the opportunity to do that myself on various mission trips and talking one-on-one with people who live there, people who have come out of communism but are still under the yoke of socialism.

You talk about medical care, you talk about all the various things that they see as blessings, but when you compare it to what we have in the United States of America—and I know that our systems are not perfect, I know our healthcare system is not perfect in the United States of America—but it was so much better than some of these socialist countries that I’ve visited that feel like they've got anything and everything that they want.

The government is giving it to them. They don’t realize what it really looks like. I had American missionaries living in those countries as citizens of those nations relate stories like that to me. The American missionary was sort of shaking his head later on in private conversation. He said, they don’t really get the idea and the concept that you have of what American medicine is like. As flawed as it can be on some levels, it is still much better than under systems of socialism.

For Mayor Mamdani to sit behind George Washington’s desk and act like the American leaders endorsed socialistic ideas, nothing could be further from the truth. Either he’s being intentionally deceptive or he is just ignorant of the facts of America’s history. You see, America’s founders believed that borders were biblical according to this article, and that’s so very true. That’s described in Acts 17, that defending them was critical to the nation’s sovereignty.

They established a governing structure that represented the decision of the people on who would be elected into positions of power. They rejected the long history of nations that failed to recognize that God-given rights of personal property, nations that would frequently bail themselves out by stealing from their wealthy citizens. All the ideals argued for by Mayor Mamdani are antithetical to America’s founding.

As a history of communism declares, they strip individuals of the very freedoms that George Washington and his generation fought for. Well, responding to these kinds of things, Franklin Graham, the president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, recently warned against the rising popularity in socialism in America, calling this ideology an atheistic worldview that says government, not God, has the answers for all our problems.

At the end of the day, he’s absolutely correct. It’s like you take that Bible verse that says, "My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory," and say, "My government shall supply all my need." We look to the government to be our savior. We look to the government to be our supplier. We look for the government to give us all the answers that we need.

Josh Davis: Oh great government, would you come and save us? That becomes the prayer of many people, and we’ve seen this attitude at work for decades in the United States of America as people become less dependent on their own selves and more dependent on the government to provide whatever they need. We’re seeing a push for this in some of our nation’s largest cities, including in New York City.

We understand the direction that evil forces are attempting to take this country into. Some of the bad ideas that young people are buying into, they just don’t realize how destructive those bad ideas can truly be. Friends, we’re talking about headlines from the end times, and I thank you for joining me on Watchman on the Wall today. I’ve got another fascinating story I want to share with you in just a second that talks about the rise of robots built to replace human companionship.

That’s right, some leading Chinese tech companies are on the verge of some very surprising and interesting breakthroughs when it comes to AI technology. More about that in just a moment. I want to invite you to connect with our ministry at our website, swrc.com. Again, that’s swrc.com. There you’re going to find all kinds of resources, especially during this month of July, patriotic resources.

Things from Bill Federer that I’ve already highlighted and talked about, his wonderful books and information that he has, including books on socialism available at swrc.com. We also have the Prophecy in the News television show available at the website, Prophecy in the News magazine that you can subscribe to. Oh, so much wonderful content. I do want to remind you that if you’d like to connect with Watchman on the Wall, if you’d like to connect with the Prophecy in the News television show, one great way to watch and listen to all of that great content is through the Southwest Radio Ministries mobile app.

It’s free. It’s available in your app store. All you have to do is open that mobile app store and type in four letters in the search bar: SWRC. Hit search and there you’ll find Southwest Radio Ministries' free mobile app. You can take that and listen to it every day, Monday through Friday, Watchman on the Wall. Every Sunday, the brand new episode of the Prophecy in the News television show is released.

We’ve been interviewing Mark Linstedt recently on that television show talking about some of the possibilities for a future third temple and where could it be located? Could it be in a different spot that some people are not considering there on the Temple Mount? It’s interesting. Check it out at swrc.com, at the Prophecy in the News YouTube channel, or on the free SWRC mobile app.

Don’t forget about a couple upcoming conferences. We’re going to be in Minnesota in September. We’re going to be in Bristol, Virginia in October. And we’ve got our 2026 Israel tour coming up November 1st through the 12th. That’s right, 2026 Israel tour, November 1st through the 12th. Signup is still available, although it’s getting extremely limited and the time crunch is coming down.

So if you’re at all interested in traveling with us to Israel this year, please give us a call today. Get more information and get signed up to come with us before registration closes. We would love to have you join us for our Israel tour 2026. Now let’s get into this next story that comes from Prophecy News Watch, "More Than Machines: The Rise of Robots to Replace Human Companionship." This story comes out of China and what one leading tech corporation is doing to bring about humanoid robots.

In my mind, I think about The Jetsons cartoon, how they had Rosie the Robot and she was made out of metal and had on her apron and a vacuum cleaner and was doing all the cooking and the cleaning and all the household chores. That was Rosie the Robot’s job and responsibility as the family caretaker and, in some cases, the caregiver to the children, almost like a nanny. Well, that seems like a cartoon, it seems like science fiction, it seems like a distant dream.

I mean, when are we going to have those floating cars that The Jetsons drove around? Well, these kinds of futuristic dreams that seem to be way out in the distant future aren’t so very far away. Today, they’re sitting in showrooms. They’re taking pre-orders for robots like this. These robots can even hold conversations. They are built to recognize human emotions and are being marketed with a promise that strikes at one of humanity’s deepest longings.

The company says that this new robot that’s being released will love you unconditionally. Unconditional love—where does that come from in the Christian conception? It comes from Almighty God. He is the only one who can truly love us unconditionally. But now they’re marketing this robot as this humanoid that will love you unconditionally. That’s not a line from a Hollywood screenplay; it’s a sales pitch for a new generation of these hyper-realistic companion robots.

The Chinese robotics company UBTECH recently unveiled its U1 humanoid robot, and they described it as a world’s first full-size, ultra-realistic humanoid designed for mass production. Covered in lifelike synthetic skin, complete with expressive faces, realistic eyes, even manicured fingernails and toenails, these robots are engineered to appear as humanly as possible.

Josh Davis: These robots are equipped with cameras, microphones, artificial intelligence, and emotional recognition software. They are designed not merely to answer questions, but to build relationships. If you want to go online and just Google this, again, the company is called UBTECH and it’s the U1 humanoid robot. They have some YouTube videos available and other destinations online where you can see these and understand how life-like they look.

It’s startling when you see this with your very own eyes. You watch them move. You watch them dance. You watch what they can do and how they can interact. The company says the robot can detect stress, fatigue, it can learn about its owner over time, it can remind users to take their medication, it can suggest certain activities, it can provide ongoing conversation back and forth as a human companion.

Buyers willing to spend more can even customize the robot’s appearance to resemble a loved one, maybe a favorite celebrity, or maybe it’s just an entirely fictional person that they want to make their companion in just the way that they want them to be ordered. This is so crazy, it sounds so far-fetched, but friends, they’re already taking pre-orders for these humanoid robots, this Chinese company.

The marketing that they’re using is very revealing. According to this report, UBTECH says the robot will never betray you, will always be loyal to you, and will love you unconditionally. It sounds like this robot is trying to replace a relationship with another human, yes, but also another relationship with God. Didn’t the Bible tell us, and didn’t God promise, "I will never leave you nor forsake you"?

The Bible tells us in 1 John chapter 4 that God is love. We know that God has unconditional love for us and that He will never leave us nor forsake us. Now they’re promising this robot companion will never betray you, will always be loyal to you, and will love you unconditionally. You see, those words reveal far more than advances in robotics. They expose the emotional crisis unfolding across much of the developed world.

The company is targeting two enormous demographics in China. China has roughly 120 million single adults, an estimated 120 million single adults in China. Now they also have more than 320 million elderly citizens. These two demographics that need companionship, and so this company believes that both of these groups share the same unmet need—the need for companionship.

And so more than 13,000 pre-orders have reportedly arrived almost immediately. Get that: 13,000 people, as soon as they heard about this, they jumped at it. You say, okay, that’s not a big deal, but when you factor in the cost, that becomes a big deal. The prices start around, in U.S. dollars, about $18,000. That’s just the entry-level. You could climb well above close to $150,000 U.S. dollars if you want a premium customized version.

It’s like buying a brand-new vehicle. You know, that’s the thing about these companion robots that I don’t understand—the synthetic skin is going to age. The robot is going to have mechanical breakdowns from time to time. You buy any kind of technology, you buy any kind of vehicle, it’s going to wear out. It’s going to malfunction. It’s not always going to do exactly what you want it to do.

And yet people think that it’s going to just stay the same forever. I really don’t get a lot of this logic. But let’s get back to the point. That level of demand, thousands of people willing to shell out tens of thousands of dollars, that should make us stop and think. This isn’t just a technology story; it’s a story about loneliness. Across much of the Western world, loneliness has become one of the defining public health challenges of our generation.

Governments have created ministries or positions dedicated to combating isolation. Surveys consistently show growing numbers of people reporting few close friendships, declining participation in churches, community organizations, delayed marriage, fewer children, increasing social withdrawal. We have never been more connected than we are in this present moment.

You carry that smartphone around with you, you can connect to billions of people around the world instantaneously, and yet many people are sitting at home alone, eating dinner alone. They spend the evenings talking only to an algorithm, struggle to find somebody who genuinely knows them. And now into that space steps artificial intelligence as the new companion, as the replacement for the function of God in people’s lives and the function of the body of Christ, the local church.

People are craving belonging, and the local church is a fellowship of brothers and sisters in Christ living life together, going into ministry together, serving the Lord together. Think about the plurals in the New Testament epistles. The Apostle Paul, when he’s writing his epistles, we often think of it as this is Paul’s epistle. He wrote it by himself, but notice how it begins and how it ends.

He’s always including other people there with him as he’s penning that letter. And he’s always writing it to a plurality of people. In some cases, like from Paul to Timothy, that may not always be the case, but other people are mentioned in those books, Timothy, Titus, those personal pastoral epistles. And so we understand that the Christian life is not meant to be lived alone. If we’re doing Christianity alone, we’re not doing it biblically.

Biblically, we are to live this life together in community with one another. This whole concept of the AI chatbots and things that are coming out with these kinds of new companion AI robots are taking humanity in a dangerous direction, in my opinion. This is only the beginning. Around the world, there are companies that are racing to produce increasingly realistic humanoids.

AI-powered dolls in South Korean nursing homes are comforting elderly residents. Interactive companions monitor health, tell stories, play games, offer emotional support. In laboratories from China to the United States of America, there are engineers continuing to refine movement, facial expressions, voice patterns, emotional responses, until interacting with a machine, with a robot, feels almost indistinguishable from interacting with another person.

This U1 robot from UBTECH shows just how rapidly that future is arriving in our world right here, right now. The company says that the robot possesses an astonishing 88 degrees of freedom in movement, making it possible through some of this dual-pivot cervical spine that it has that can allow it to replicate almost 90 percent of normal human bodily movements.

Friends, we understand that God has created us for human companionship. A machine might try to simulate those things, but it can never replicate or replace those things with which God has created us. Don’t allow a machine to fill the emptiness in your life. Seek the Lord number one, but also connect with real human people. Get plugged into a body of believers in your area if you are not. Thank you so much for joining me on Headlines from the End Times today. Please keep in mind, as we often say here at Southwest Radio Ministries, God is still on the throne and prayer changes things.

Southwest Radio Ministries: For more than 90 years, Southwest Radio Ministries has been standing on the frontlines, proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ and declaring the truth of God’s Word without compromise. Through our daily Watchman on the Wall radio broadcast, Prophecy in the News television program, books, DVDs, conferences, podcasts, magazines, newsletters, mobile apps, and digital outreach, we’re reaching believers across America and around the world with biblical teaching, Bible prophecy, apologetics, evangelism, and encouragement for the days in which we live.

But none of this happens without faithful friends like you. This ministry is supported entirely by listeners, viewers, readers, and believers who understand the importance of proclaiming biblical truth while there’s still time. Today, I need to ask for your help. Summer giving has been, well, difficult. But the need for this ministry has never been greater. If Southwest Radio Ministries has encouraged your faith, helped you understand God’s prophetic Word, or pointed you to Christ, would you prayerfully stand with us right now?

Your gift today will help keep the Gospel on the air, biblical teaching available online, and God’s truth reaching the next person who desperately needs to hear it. Please give today at swrc.com or call 1-800-652-1144. That’s swrc.com or 1-800-652-1144. Lord willing, we’ll be back here Monday, ready to once again bring clarity to the chaos. Head into the weekend with the encouragement that God is still on the throne and prayer changes things. Watchman on the Wall is a production of Southwest Radio Ministries and is supported by faithful friends just like you. Please visit our website, swrc.com. That’s swrc.com.