Bible Doctrine for the Days Ahead (2025)

Scripture-based teaching for spiritual maturity, leadership, and endurance in adversity.

Bible Doctrine for the Days Ahead explains how believers are to think, pray, grow, and respond as global instability, deception, and pressure increase. Rick Hughes walks through timeless biblical principles that strengthen spiritual maturity, develop effective prayer, discipline emotional reactions, and reinforce divine institutions—equipping believers to live with confidence while serving Christ behind enemy lines.

⬇Download Transcript: https://rhem.pub/1062-transcript

Episode Transcript

(00:08):
Welcome to the Flat Line with your host Rick Hughes.
For the next 30 minutes you'll be inspired, motivated, educated
but never manipulated. Now your host, Rick Hughes.
Good morning and welcome to the Flat Line.
I'm your host, Rick Hughes, and for the next few minutes, please

(00:28):
stay with me. It won't be long, only about 30
minutes of motivation, inspiration, education, and of
course, no manipulation because we don't try to con people out
of money. We're not soliciting funds,
we're not trying to sell you something, but we are offering
you something free and that's the Word of God.
Hopefully I can verify and identify through the word of God

(00:49):
His plan for your life. If you'd like to Orient and
adjust to the plan, you have thefreedom and the privacy to do
that. So we leave it up to you.
But this is Rick Hughes, host ofthe Flat Line.
FLOT stands for the foreign lineof troops.
No, it's not a military show. It's a military analogy of what
the Christian life is really like. 10 unique problem solving

(01:13):
devices and divine designed by God to carry you through any
type of adversity that you may be facing in your life.
You know, as we round the bend and head into the year of our
lower 2026, you might wonder what surprises are going to lie
ahead in 2026. The events we've seen in 2025
seem to predict that 2026 will be much the same.

(01:34):
There's social unrest as the progressive ideology pushes its
agenda to remake America and allof its traditional values.
Political struggles as members of Congress continue to push
party politics and military conflicts across the globe as
nations seek to establish domination of their adversaries.
Will we face new conflicts with foreign universities?

(01:57):
Who knows, but how about your personal situation?
Is this going to be the year that you discover some life
changing illness and will you lose loved ones due to sickness
or an accident in this year? What about you?
Is this the year God may call you home to the office front
office? Let's look at some scriptures

(02:17):
concerning questions like this and try to get a handle on what
2076 has for us as far as wars and going on in military
analogies. Listen to Matthew 24, six and
seven and you will hear of wars.This is the Lord Jesus Christ
speaking and rumors of wars. See that you be not trouble, for

(02:38):
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 pestilence and
earthquakes in many places. Our Lord spoke these words when
answering questions that the disciples brought to Him.
Here's what the question was. In Matthew 24, as He said upon

(02:59):
the mount of all His teaching, the disciples came to Him
privately saying, Tell us, when will these things come to be,
and which shall be the sign of thy coming in the end of the
world? And that's what He told them.
There will be wars and rumors ofwar.
Don't be troubled. These things must come to pass
first. The question is still being
asked today. Christians like yourself wonder,

(03:21):
will this be the year that the Lord Jesus Christ comes back?
It's called the rapture of the church or the exit resurrection.
That's taught in First Thessalonians 413 through 17.
This is what it says. But I would not have you to be
ignorant, brother, concerning them which are asleep that's
passed away, that you sorrow noteven as others which have no

(03:44):
hope, that's the ones that are unbelievers.
For if we believe, and you do, that Jesus died and rose again,
Even so them also which sleep inJesus will God bring with him.
That's the ones that are in heaven right now.
For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which
are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not
prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall

(04:07):
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
Archangel or the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall
rise first, and then we which are alive and remain, shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in
the air, And so shall we evermore be with the Lord.
That's an event coming right now, soon, who knows?

(04:28):
Fortunately, no man can predict when that will occur.
Many people tried to do it. Some people have even written
books predicting when this was going to happen, and some sole
possessions. I even heard about people that
sold everything they had and ascended up on the mountain to
await the event. But no such thing actually
happened. I can assure you of this that it
will occur, and more than likelywhen you least expect it.

(04:53):
The thing that shocked the disciples most was what he said
concerning their own personal safety.
And I think you need to listen to this.
It's very important in Matthew 24, nine through 11.
Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and they will
kill you. Uh oh, and you shall be hated of
all nations. Uh oh, for my name's sake.

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And then shall many be offended and shall betray one another and
turn hate on one another. And many false prophets shall
rise and deceive many. I can just hear the disciples
saying, wait a minute, I didn't,I didn't sign up to be murdered.
And the Lord is telling me here that people are going to kill
me. It's still going on today.
There are people that would killyou, gladly kill you, if you

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profess the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And this is the power of Satan in this universe today.
You, you, you just can't forget that we are behind enemy lines.
Christians are always behind enemy lines.
The deception is a satanic strategy to confuse and confound
believers. He likes to confuse people.

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False prophets will rise up and deceive many.
Do you hear that verse? Matthew 2411?
Many false prophets will rise upand deceive many.
Don't forget that deception is one of his policies, one of his,
one of his strategies to to confuse and confound people like
you and I. If we hope to glorify our Lord

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Jesus Christ, we must know and we must understand the mechanics
to the spiritual life. That's why you constantly hear
me encouraging you to get into the ministry of a well qualified
pastor. A lot of listeners have written
and asked is where is this person near me?
Where is there a qualified pastor in my vicinity?
Well, unfortunately, more than likely there's not such a person

(06:42):
near you. There is, however, access to
solid, sound, systematic Bible teaching as near as your
Internet or your phone. If you would like to know how to
access that information, simply drop us a note, Rick
hughesministries.org or write mean e-mail
[e-mail] and we'll tell you how to access

(07:07):
the messages, the information, the studies, all absolutely free
of charge. Now, do you make New Year's
revolution? I want to ask you that question
as we get ready to bump into this new year.
Do you make a New Year's resolution every year?
Do you keep them or do you forget about them in a month or
two like I usually do? Well, please allow me to make

(07:28):
some simple suggestions for yourNew Year resolution to consider
in the coming year. I'm going to offer about 5
different suggestions and I hopethey make sense to you.
Here's the first one. It's in second Peter 318.
But grow in the grace and in theknowledge of our Lord and our
Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and

(07:52):
forever. Now why do I suggest you take
this verse seriously? That's something I suggest.
Grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ. And by the way, that that verb
grow is not a request. That's an order.
Well, I'm suggesting this as your new year, if you would make

(08:12):
this one of your New Year's resolutions, that you're going
to grow in grace and the knowledge of your Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ. Well, the reason I say that is
have you grown spiritually the past year or is it possible
you're the same person struggling with the same sins
and the same failures? Is it?

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Listen to what the writer of Hebrews had to say about lack of
spiritual growth and what it means in Hebrews 511 through 14
of whom we have many things to say, and they're hard to be
uttered since you're dull of hearing.
In other words, when the Bible'sbeing taught you fall asleep for
when for the time you ought to be teachers you have need that

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one teach you again what ought to be the first principles of
the oracles of God and then you are become as such that needs
milk and not strong meat. That's a bottle you'd eat your
bottle for everyone that has owned the bottle or everyone
that uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness.
He's still a baby, but strong meat.
That's teaching of the word of God systematically doctrinally

(09:17):
teaching of the word of God. It belongs to them that are of
full age and those who by reasonof use have their senses
exercised to discern both good and evil.
So is that you, have you grown last year?
Are you not the same person you were last year?
And I'm talking about age, I'm talking about spiritually.
Have you grown spiritually in 2025?

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Because this passage says you ought to be a teacher.
And now you need somebody to come back and teach you again
the basics. Unfortunately, that's true in a
lot of churches that I visit. A lot of believers go through a
lot of emotion, but no one growsin a worship service.
I can tell you that right now you may enjoy singing and
praising God and raising your hands and worshiping God, but

(10:00):
you don't grow that way. You grow when you are fed the
Word of God, when you are taughtthe Word of God, when you digest
the Word of God. So that's my second New Year's
suggestion. Number one, that you grow in
grace #2 I recommend that every day you find time to feed on
God's word. Every day you find time to feed

(10:23):
on God's word. What do I mean by that?
Well, Jeremiah 1516 said it for me.
Your words were found, and I dideat them, and your word was unto
me the joy and the rejoicing of my heart, For I am called by thy
name, O Lord God of hosts. If you are spiritually

(10:45):
malnourished, then you're going to lack the endurance to handle
the test that you may be facing in your life because a
spiritually malnourished individual finds himself asking
what others should do. In other words, something
happens in your life, it's a critical situation.
You're going to go to somebody else and say what should I do?
What should I do? But the mature believer, the

(11:09):
spiritually mature believer knows what's to do and he's
autonomous. This type of individual brings
maximum glorification to God when they're in the arena of
contention. In other words, when it happens
into his life, since he's been studying the Word of God and
learning those problem solving devices and growing spiritually,
then the training kicks in and then they're able to lead the

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way, which is much like the famous Army Ranger motto.
My pastor was a former Army Ranger and I hear that often
Rangers lead the way. In Isaiah 68, Isaiah said also I
heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and
who will go for us? Then I said, here is, here I am,

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send me, here I am, send me. That's the person who's going
first. That's the person that's going
to lead the way. And if you're spiritually
malnourished, you're not going to lead the way for anybody
because you're going to be running around asking other
people what you should do. The third suggestion that I make
to you in the coming new year isthat you develop a strong prayer

(12:14):
life. Now listen, Remember that any
prayer you offered must be presented in the filling of the
Holy Spirit. Any prayer you offer while you
have unconfessed sin in your life is completely ineffective
and not answered in Psalm 6618. If I regard iniquity in my
heart, the Lord will not hear me.

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Could not be any more plain thanthat.
So if you've been maligning and running down your neighbor, and
you've been doing something you shouldn't do, and then you're
going to bow your head and pray,Listen to this analogy.
I've given it before, but take aSunday morning service and the
pastor calls on the Deacon to get up and pray and he praised
this godly holy sounding prayer.And yet just yesterday he was

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mad and cussing and fussing about somebody owed him money
and wouldn't pay. Well, those mental attitude sins
were never confessed. They he never went to God and
used rebound. And so that prayer that he just
offered that sounded so eloquent, sounded so spiritual,
didn't go any higher than the ceiling.
Unfortunately, very few ministers ever going to tell you

(13:19):
that because many many, many prayers never get past the
ceiling. I watched the 126 Army Navy game
this this month and I heard bothChaplain, Chaplain of the Navy
and Chaplain of the Army offer prayers before the game.
And I'm sad to say that neither chaplain offered their prayer in

(13:42):
the name of Jesus Christ, the anointed Son of God.
Should you do that when you pray?
Absolutely. And John 1413 and whatever you
ask in my name, that will I do so that my Father may be
glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in my name,
I will do it. So why would you pray to God and

(14:04):
say Amen in the name of the LordJesus Christ?
I, I request this Father, I cometo you before your throne in his
name, in Christ's name, Amen. Now there, there, there is one
exception. The one exception is a lost
person asking God to save them. Romans 2013 says Whosoever

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should call upon the name of theLord shall be saved.
When I did that, I knew nothing about prayer, the mechanics of
prayer. I didn't understand any of that.
I just understood I was going tohell and I was lost and I wanted
to be saved and I prayed and I asked God to save me.
Then I had to learn how to have an effective prayer life and
that's what I'm telling you. You have to learn how to develop

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an effective prayer life, a strong prayer life because any
prayer you offer in the next year, at the coming year, 2026,
if you offer that prayer and youexpect it to be answered, then
you better not be doing that with sin in your life or it's
not going to be answered. The 4th suggestion that I'd like
to bring before you today is a resolution that you learn how to

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control your emotions. Emotions are a wonderful thing
when they're used the correct way, and they are exactly what
gives us genuine appreciation for the beautiful things God
created. They are essentially the
appreciator of the soul when they are responding since to
some kind of beauty. It may be music, maybe art,

(15:33):
maybe literature, maybe scenery,maybe your favorite sports team
winning even your spouse. You may get emotional about your
spouse, but what you cannot allow is for your emotions to be
a reactor factor. By that I mean you can't let
your emotions take over. Genuine humility is a result of

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authority orientation and all arrogance rejects authority and
and and reacts to unfair circumstances, while humility
responds to unfair circumstancesby using those ten problem
solving devices. Listen to this passage that
describes an emotional meltdown.Here Paul describes what it is.

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Listen carefully, Ephesians 431.This is an emotional meltdown.
Let all bitterness, all wrath, all anger, all clamour, all evil
speaking be put away from you along with the desire to hurt
somebody. That's malice.
There is a better way to live according to the next verse.
Ephesians 432 And be kind to oneanother, tender hearted,

(16:42):
forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath
forgiven you. That is the way you're supposed
to live. And that's responding to the
situation, not reacting to the situation.
I'll give you an illustration that I saw happened years ago.
I went to visit a school in South Mississippi called

(17:02):
Centerville Academy. Centerville Academy had a great
headmaster named Lord Lindsay. Mr. Lindsay had a student that
came transferred up from the public schools in Saint
Francisville and he got in trouble and the teacher sent him
to the front office. And Mr. Lindsay said, what are
you doing up here, son? And he said, well, the teacher
sent me up here because I wouldn't read in class.

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He said, son, where you came from, you might not have had to
read in class, but here if the teacher tells you to read,
you're going to read. Mr. Lindsay, by the way, was a
former Marine. He said no, I'm not going to
read, the kid said. Mr. Lindsay was startled.
He said what? He said I'm not going to read.
He said, well then bend over andhold your britches and Wham,
Wham, Wham gave him three licks across the backside.

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Now you get back down there and you read like she tells you to
read. He said, no, I'm not going to do
it. Mr. Lindsay laid him over the
over the desk again. Wham, Wham, Wham.
Now get back down there and read.
No Sir, I'm not going to do it. Mr. Lindsay said, son, what's
wrong with you? Why are you, why?
Why are you acting like this? And with tears in his eyes, this

(18:08):
sweet student named Bobby said, I never learned how to read.
Now he could have got mad. He could have reacted.
He could have said, I'm going togo home and get my dad.
He's going to come up here and beat your brains out for doing
that. But he didn't.
He had enough humility to handleit.
Unfair treatment wasn't his fault that he didn't know how to

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read. He was embarrassed, but he kept
his mouth shut and he took it. And he learned how to read and
he graduated and he signed a four year football scholarship
to play for a major university. That's responding with your
emotions, not reacting with youremotions.
My 5th suggestion for you is that you pray for your leaders.

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Pray for your leaders in First Timothy 21 through 4I.
Exhort, therefore, that first ofall supplications, prayers,
intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for
kings, and for all that earn authority, so that we may lead a
quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.
For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior,

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who will have all men to be saved and to come to the
knowledge of the truth. Oh my goodness, pray for what
kings, and for all that earn authority.
Well, what, what, what? What if I don't like him?
What if he's the president and Ican't stand him?
You want me to pray for him? Yes, I do.
You may ask, what exactly are you to pray concerning these

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leaders? Well, you're going to remember
that each individual has their own volition and it's not
necessarily the government authorities that that Christians
in order. Let me put it this way, it's not
necessarily that government authorities be Christians.
I'm not saying that. I'm not saying that every every
president, every vice president,every congressman has to be a

(20:00):
Christian. I'm not saying that.
But I'm saying in order for us to live a wonderful, quiet,
peaceable life, we have to pray that our leaders function under
the laws of establishment, what we call the divine institutions.
If we don't function under thosedivine institutions, we can
never have peace. We can never have a great life
that that the verses are talkingabout.

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So if you want to pray for something, pray that our
leaders, your leaders, your, your government, your mayor,
your, your, your governor, your president, your vice president,
your congressman, that they all understand the divine
institutions and they stand on them because this is where Satan
will seek to subvert and manipulate leaders and their
people. Basically, there are four divine

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institutions and they include volitional freedom, marriage,
family, and nationalism. So pray this, pray that your
leaders will recognize and allowyour freedom to choose, give you
the freedom to choose which pathin life you want to pursue.

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Everyone has to have that freedom.
If they don't want to become a Christian, that's fine.
People can operate within the system fine and not be
believers. They can be wonderful, kind,
nice people, but they have no future in eternity.
So that's the first thing. Any person in authority must
give free people freedom to exercise their volition.

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We don't want to be living in a country where you're told where
to go to school, where you're told what to say, where you're
told what to wear. And volitional freedom is a key
for national responsibility for the divine institutions.
And then there's marriage. Marriage is a recognized
situation that God ordained. And then there's family.

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And then there's nationalism. So there are four divine
institutions, volitional freedom, marriage, family, and
nationalism. So if you want to pray for your
leaders, pray that they will recognize and allow these
freedoms to choose whatever pathin life you want to pursue.
And pray that your leaders will recognize the sanctity of
marriage and recognize the importance of the institution of

(22:10):
marriage. God did that in Genesis 218.
And the Lord God said, it's not good that man should be alone.
I will make a helper for him. And he did that for Adam.
God created a perfect mate. In Genesis 221, the Lord caused
the deep sleep to fall upon Adam, took a little nap, and he
slept. And he God, took one of his ribs

(22:32):
and closed up the flesh instead.And the rib which the Lord and
God took from man made he a woman, and he brought her to the
man. And Adam said, This is now a
bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh, And she shall be
called a woman, because she was taken out of man.
Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall

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cleave unto his wife, and they shall be 1 flesh.
That's the that's the institution of the of marriage
and the family and nationalism. I'll show you next.
OK. Marriage is legitimate and we
need marriage to continue. And it is one man and one woman.
No, not anything else. One man, one woman.

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So pray that your leaders will recognize the importance of the
family institution. Why?
Because it's here that authorityorientation is taught, and it's
here that humility is developed.So remember this, that when
Satan attacked Adam and Eve, they attacked the family of
Adam, you know, after they had been escorted out of the Garden

(23:36):
of Eden by Entice and Cain for their sin.
Satan entice Cain to kill his brother Abel.
And you got to remember that wasSatan's work all the way to
destroy the family. Great nations.
Here's a principle. You got to remember this.
Great nations are founded on great families.
So if you want to pray about anything, pray about that, and

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then pray that your leaders willrecognize nationalism.
Nationalism. What is that?
Well, it's opposed to internationalism.
One world government is internationalism.
One world system of money is internationalism.
One world government internationalism.
This is what Satan uses in the Tribulation.

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He would be control of the wholeworld, and eventually, you've
heard about the 666 in the Mark of the beast, by his authority
over every nation in the world, he would demand that all people
receive the mark if they want tobuy or sell or get anything.
So we need nationalism. Tower of Babel is all about
that. In the book of Genesis, where
all the nations spoke one language and built the tower to

(24:43):
heaven. And God came down and scattered
them and dispersed them and put some over here and some over
there and gave them different languages, different colors and
whatever. There's a reason for that.
We're not all supposed to be 1 nation.
We're not international. We have to have nationalism.
So that are Those are my 5 suggestions for you.

(25:05):
I'll back up and review them foryou.
OK. I suggested that you pray for
your leaders and what you shouldpray.
I suggested that you make a New Year's resolution that you learn
to control your emotions. I suggested that you learn to
feed on God's Word every day. I suggested that you develop a

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strong prayer life in your life and pray the right way.
And I suggested that you take the verse seriously about
growing the grace and knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. If you want to make some New
Year's resolutions, those are myNew Year's resolutions that I'd
suggest for you. So I hope you'll take them
seriously and I hope you'll listen to what I said.

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We have a new book coming out. It's called Understanding Your
Soul. It is available now.
We have it, have it in hand, andwe can mail it to you if you
will simply write to us and giveus your address.
You can order it from our website,
rickhughesministries.org, rickhughesministries.org, or you

(26:08):
can write to PO Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama 35054.
I appreciate you being with me and listening to me.
I don't know if you've ever accepted Christ as your Savior,
but that's my number one prayer that you will receive the Lord
Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, that you will believe in
His death, burial, and resurrection.

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And he who knew no sin was made sin for us so that we could be
made the righteousness of God through him.
It is that sacrifice of the LordJesus Christ made on our behalf.
It gives us the ability to have the relationship with God and in
his resurrection from the dead, it guarantees us that we will be
resurrected also and we will have a new body forever, a

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resurrection body. But no more pain, no more tears,
no more sorrow where the old things would be passed away.
OK, thank you for listening today.
I hope this has been encouragingto you.
Until next week, this is your host Rick Hughes saying thank
you for listening to The Flat Lion.
Thank you for listening to The Flat Lion with your host, Rick

(27:11):
Hughes. If you'd like to contact Rick,
please write to him at PO Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama 35O54 or
online at www.rickhughesministries.org.