Stop Blaming Esau: The Karmelo Anthony Verdict Is a Mirror

Yesterday a Collin County jury convicted Karmelo Anthony of murder and sentenced him to 35 years for the fatal stabbing of Austin Metcalf at a Frisco track meet last year. The deliberation took three hours. The defense argued self-defense. The prosecution said you do not meet a shove with a stab. No Black jurors were seated. Trial participants were doxxed. GoFundMe pages collected donations on both sides. Talking heads were waiting at every cable network door before the gavel fell.

The grief is real. The anger is real. The exhaustion is real.

Before anyone reading this dismisses the racial dimension of the trial, let me say plainly: the racial dimension is real. And it was promised.

And you will become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations where AO shall lead you. — Deuteronomy 28:37

The trial was a spectacle. The community was made a spectacle. The defendant became a national symbol, the victim became a national symbol, and millions of strangers argue about race. We've seen this script before. Rodney King, OJ Simpson, Trayvon Martin. That is what a byword and a proverb among the nations looks like. AO wrote the description thousands of years ago.

The byword is the curse. The curse is the diagnosis.

The diagnosis is not Esau.

There Is No Justice in This World

The first thing Israel has to understand is that there was never going to be justice. Not in this courtroom. Not in this country. Not in this age. AO Himself testifies to it, speaking of the day of vengeance when His own arm — the Messiah — executes His counsel:

And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore My own arm brought salvation to Me; and My fury, it upheld Me. — Isaiah 63:5

If AO Himself, looking at the day of vengeance, finds none to help, none to uphold — and must send His own arm to bring salvation — why would Israel expect Collin County to be on its side? The expectation that the system would deliver equity is the first lie. Esau is not going to deliver Israel from Esau.

That is not how covenant works. That is not how dominion works. That is not how the world Israel is living in is structured.

And AO your God will bring you to Egypt again in ships by a route that I said you {should} never see again. There you will be sold to your enemies as male and female slaves and no one will save you. — Deuteronomy 28:68

Israel is in captivity. The courts of the captivity are not Israel's courts. The juries of the captivity are not Israel's juries. The prosecutors of the captivity are not Israel's advocates. None of that should be news. AO told Israel — in Deuteronomy 28, in Leviticus 26, in every prophet — that this is what life under the curse looks like.

The point is not that the verdict was unjust. The point is that justice was never on the menu.

Thus said AO; "Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from AO." — Jeremiah 17:5

Why Esau Is in Charge

Here is the harder part. The community response to the verdict has been the same response Israel always has. Blame the system. Blame the jury. Blame the white man. Blame Esau.

I laid this out plainly in Episode 5 — Day N' Night of The Honor of Kings podcast:

The children of Israel today do not repent for the sins that they have committed. They do not repent for the sins their fathers have committed. They complain about Esau and the white man and all the things that white man did to him and they make the white man the enemy instead of focusing on the truth that the only reason the white man was able to do anything to the children of Israel was because they forsook the ways of the Most High.

Read that again. Slowly.

The reason Esau has dominion over Israel right now is not because Esau is uniquely wicked. Esau is doing what Esau was given dominion to do. AO Himself raised him up as the rod of His anger against Israel's rebellion — the same way He raised up Babylon, the same way He raised up Assyria, the same way He raised up Egypt. Esau did not take the kingdom. AO handed it to him — because Israel walked away from the Torah.

So when the community looks at the Karmelo Anthony verdict and says "this is Esau's fault," Israel is reading the wrong line of the script. The question is not "why did Esau do this?" Esau was always going to do this. The question is "why is Esau still in charge?"

And the answer to that question has never changed.

You Shall No More Be a Prey

The promise of release is in Ezekiel:

27 And the tree of the field shall yield her fruit, and the earth shall yield her increase, and they shall be safe in their land, and shall know that I am AO, when I have broken the bands of their yoke, and delivered them out of the hand of those that serve themselves of them.

28 And they shall no more be a prey to the heathen, neither shall the beasts of the land devour them; but they shall dwell safely, and none shall make them afraid. — Ezekiel 34:27–28

No more be a prey. That is the destination. That is the end of the captivity. That is what every grieving mother in this community is praying for whether she names it or not.

But notice the trigger in verse 27 — when I have broken the bands of their yoke. The yoke breaks. The prey condition ends. But it does not end because Israel won a court case. It does not end because Israel built a better protest. It does not end because Israel raised a better GoFundMe. It does not end because Israel elected the "right" politicians.

It ends when Israel returns to AO.

That is the whole machine. Israel is prey because Israel forsook the covenant. Israel will stop being prey when Israel returns to it. Esau does not have the keys to that lock. AO does. And the only thing AO is waiting on is repentance.

The Only Path Out

The path is the path Daniel walked in Babylon. Daniel did not file a grievance against Nebuchadnezzar. Daniel did not organize his people to march on the palace. Daniel went to his upper room, opened the window toward Jerusalem, and repented for his sins and the sins of his fathers. Three times a day.

And I prayed unto AO my God, and made my confession, and said, "O AO, the great and dreadful God, keeping the covenant and mercy to them that love Him, and to them that keep His commandments; we have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have done wickedly, and have rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and from Your judgments." — Daniel 9:4–5

That is the prayer Daniel prayed: confession of Israel's own iniquity, and the iniquity of Israel's fathers. Not a catalog of what was done to Israel. Not a list of grievances against Babylon. Israel's own sin, confessed before AO.

And until that prayer is on the lips of the children of Israel — until Israel is confessing its own sins and the sins of its fathers instead of cataloging Esau's sins — the yoke will not break. The prey condition will not lift. The byword status will not end. Another verdict will come. Another GoFundMe will fund another defense. Another talking head will explain Israel's condition to the nations who already knew it was promised.

Israel is not a victim of Esau. Israel is the chastised son of AO, and AO has told Israel what to do about it for thirty-five hundred years: keep His statutes, His commandments, and His judgments. Walk in His Torah. Stop cleaving to Christianity and Islam — the two religions Esau built — and then asking why Esau's courts ruled against Israel. Israel cannot serve false gods Friday-Sunday morning in Edom's mosques, synagogues and churches and then wonder why Israel is still a prey.

Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god: — Psalm 16:4

The words of AO are true.

The Karmelo Anthony verdict is not a wound. It is a mirror.

And the question AO is asking Israel through it is the same question He has been asking through every loss, every locked door, every closed jury, every byword headline:

Woe to you, O [Israel]! will you not be made clean? — Jeremiah 13:27

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FAQ

What was the Karmelo Anthony verdict?

On June 9, 2026, a Collin County, Texas jury convicted Karmelo Anthony of murder and sentenced him to 35 years in prison for the fatal stabbing of Austin Metcalf at a Frisco high-school track meet in April 2025. The jury deliberated for about three hours. The defense argued self-defense; the prosecution said Anthony pulled a knife in response to being shoved. No Black jurors were seated. The case drew intense national attention, social-media protest, GoFundMe campaigns on both sides, and doxxing of people connected to the proceedings.

What does the Bible say about the verdict?

The Bible does not say anything about this verdict. What the Bible says is that Israel in captivity will be made a byword and a proverb among the nations (Deuteronomy 28:37) — and the spectacle around this trial is exactly that. The trial is a symptom of the curse Israel is living under, not the cause of it. The cause is rebellion against AO's Torah.

Is the racial dimension of the trial real?

Yes — and AO said it would be. The all-white jury, the doxxing, the national spectacle, the disparate treatment — these are not bugs. They are the description of life under the curse of Deuteronomy 28. "And you will become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations where AO shall lead you." The racial pattern is real. Acknowledging it does not change the prescribed response: repentance, not blame.

Why does the post say "stop blaming Esau"?

Because blaming Esau does not break the yoke. Per the Honor of Kings podcast Episode 5 (Day N' Night), the children of Israel today "complain about Esau and the white man… and make the white man the enemy instead of focusing on the truth that the only reason the white man was able to do anything to the children of Israel was because they forsook the ways of the Most High." Esau is doing what Esau was given dominion to do. AO gave him that dominion as the rod of His anger against Israel's rebellion. The way out is not protesting Esau. The way out is repenting before AO.

What does Ezekiel 34:27–28 actually promise?

It promises that Israel "shall no more be a prey to the heathen" — that the bands of the yoke will be broken and Israel will dwell safely. But verse 27 names the trigger: "when I have broken the bands of their yoke." The yoke breaks at AO's initiative — and AO initiates when Israel returns to His covenant. The Ezekiel promise is conditional on repentance. It has not been fulfilled yet because Israel has not returned.

What does Isaiah 63:5 have to do with this?

Isaiah 63 is AO speaking — describing the day of vengeance and the year of His redeemed. The voice is AO's. The Messiah is His arm — the executor of His counsel — not the speaker. On that day AO looks for help and finds "none to help… none to uphold," and must send His own arm to bring salvation. The point for this moment: if AO Himself finds no help on the day of vengeance and has to use His own arm — why would Israel expect the courts of the captivity to deliver equity now? There is no justice in this world for Israel until AO Himself delivers it. The current systems were never going to.

What does Jeremiah 17:5 mean for Israel right now?

Jeremiah 17:5 — "Cursed be the man that trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from AO" — names the exact reflex Israel keeps committing. Every protest that puts hope in Esau's courts, every GoFundMe that puts hope in Esau's lawyers, every campaign that puts hope in Esau's politicians is trusting in man. The curse Jeremiah names is not waiting somewhere in the future. The curse is the condition Israel is already living under because Israel keeps reaching for flesh instead of returning to AO.

What is Deuteronomy 28:68 about?

Deuteronomy 28:68 — "And AO your God will bring you to Egypt again in ships… you will be sold to your enemies as male and female slaves and no one will save you" — is the most specific verse in Scripture about Israel's transatlantic captivity. The promised land is North America. The "ships" were the slave ships. The "Egypt again" is the system of bondage Israel was brought into. And the final clause — no one will save you — is the line every Israelite community needs to read again before the next GoFundMe campaign launches. No one was promised to save Israel from the captivity except AO Himself.

Why does the post cite Psalm 16:4?

Psalm 16:4 — "Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god" — names the mechanism. Every Sunday Israel spends in a Christian pew, every Friday in a mosque, every Saturday under Talmudic rabbinic doctrine, is hastening after another god. The sorrows are not random. They are the multiplied consequence of the covenant violation. Stop hastening after another god and the sorrow stops multiplying.

What does Jeremiah 13:27 ask?

The post closes with Jeremiah 13:27 — "Woe to you, O Israel! will you not be made clean?" That is the question AO has been asking for thousands of years. Not "will the world apologize?" Not "will Esau hand back the kingdom?" Not "will the courts rule in your favor?" The question is whether Israel will be made clean — washed of the covenant violations Israel and its fathers committed. The Karmelo Anthony verdict is one more occasion for AO to ask the same question.

What did Daniel do in captivity?

Daniel prayed three times a day toward Jerusalem and repented for his sins and the sins of his fathers (Daniel 9). He did not file a grievance against Nebuchadnezzar. He did not protest. He did not pursue equity in Babylon's courts. He confessed: "We have sinned, and have committed iniquity, and have done wickedly, and have rebelled." That is the prescribed posture of Israel in captivity — and it is the posture this community has refused to take.

What should the community do now?

Repent. For Israel's sins and the sins of Israel's fathers. Walk in AO's Torah. Keep His statutes, commandments, and judgments. Stop calling on the names of the twin flames — Christianity and Islam — that Esau built to keep Israel bound. Honor the Sabbath AO ordained. Read the scripture that has not been corrupted. Pray as Daniel prayed. The yoke breaks when Israel returns.

The trumpet has sounded. The watchman has spoken. What you do with this is between you and the Most High.

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Sources: CNN — Karmelo Anthony Texas verdict murder, KERA News — Karmelo Anthony 35 years Frisco track meet, Fox News — Karmelo Anthony guilty murder trial.