Sunspots 912

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

Computing: NPR discusses some new social platforms that might substitute for Twitter.

Environment: NPR on TV and internet weather sources usually not mentioning the effect of climate change when discussing weather events.

History: Nature reports that the US Great Depression influences the activity of genes now.

Humor: NPR reminds us that November 26 was the 100th birthday of Charles Schulz, creator of Peanuts.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

With Christ in the school of prayer, by Andrew Murray, excerpt 154

 This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. I do this, not because I'm a powerful prayer warrior, but because I'm not. Murray was. I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this public domain work available. To see their post of the book, go here. His book is based on Mark 11:22-24. The previous post in this series is here. As usual in this blog, long quotations are in this color. Murray's book is based on Mark 11:22-24.

‘If my words abide in you;’ the condition is simple and clear. In His words His will is revealed. As the words abide in me, His will rules me; my will becomes the empty vessel which His will fills, the willing instrument which His will wields; He fills my inner being. In the exercise of obedience and faith my will becomes ever stronger, and is brought into deeper inner harmony with Him. He can fully trust it to will nothing but what He wills; He is not afraid to give the promise, ‘If my words abide in you, ask whatsoever ye will, it shall be done unto you.’ To all who believe it, and act upon it, He will make it literally true.
Disciples of Christ! is it not becoming more and more clear to us that while we have been excusing our unanswered prayers, our impotence in prayer, with a fancied submission to God’s wisdom and will, the real reason has been that our own feeble life has been the cause of our feeble prayers. Nothing can make strong men but the word coming to us from God’s mouth: by that we must live. It is the word of Christ, loved, lived in, abiding in us, becoming through obedience and action part of our being, that makes us one with Christ, that fits us spiritually for touching, for taking hold of God. All that is of the world passeth away; he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. O let us yield heart and life to the words of Christ, the words in which He ever gives HIMSELF, the personal living Saviour, and His promise will be our rich experience: ‘If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatsoever ye will, and it shall be done unto you.’

Sunspots 911

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

Computing: Gizmodo reports on commonly used passwords that are too easy to hack.

Health: The Scientist reports on a study wherein tetraplegics were able to control a special wheelchair by thinking about where they wanted to go.

Humor: (and food and politics) PBS reports on the question of which President started the tradition of pardoning one or more turkeys at Thanksgiving time. The report has lots of bad puns, by and about various Presidents and turkeys.

Politics: (or something) NPR reports that government employees involved in carrying out executions are often traumatized by their participation.

Science: Tired of, or confused by, milli-, kilo-, tera-, and all the others? NPR reports that these prefixes are not enough, and more have recently been added.

Gizmodo reports that the Leap Second (something like a Leap Year, only a lot shorter) will become a thing of the past. (No joke intended there.)

Sports: NPR reports that women are slowly becoming part of major college and minor league men's baseball teams.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

 

With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray, excerpt 153

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. I do this, not because I'm a powerful prayer warrior, but because I'm not. Murray was. I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this public domain work available. To see their post of the book, go here. His book is based on Mark 11:22-24. The previous post in this series is here. As usual in this blog, long quotations are in this color. Murray's book is based on Mark 11:22-24.

‘If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatsoever ye will, it shall be done unto you.’ We see what this means. In the words the Saviour gives Himself. We must have the words in us, taken up into our will and life, reproduced in our disposition and conduct. We must have them abiding in us: our whole life one continued exposition of the words that are within, and filling us; the words revealing Christ within, and our life revealing Him without. It is as the words of Christ enter our very heart, become our life and influence it, that our words will enter His heart and influence Him. My prayer will depend on my life; what God’s words are to me and in me, my words will be to God and in God. If I do what God says, God will do what I say.
How well the Old Testament saints understood this connection between God’s words and ours, and how really prayer with them was the loving response to what they had heard God speak! If the word were a promise, they counted on God to do as He had spoken. ‘Do as Thou hast said;’ ‘For Thou, Lord, hast spoken it;’ ‘According to Thy promise;’ ‘According to Thy word;’ in such expressions they showed that what God spake in promise was the root and the life of what they spake in prayer. If the word was a command, they simply did as the Lord had spoken: ‘So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken.’ Their life was fellowship with God, the interchange of word and thought. What God spoke they heard and did; what they spoke God heard and did. In each word He speaks to us, the whole Christ gives Himself to fulfil it for us. For each word He asks no less that we give the whole man to keep that word, and to receive its fulfilment.

 

Sunspots 910

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

The Arts: or something) Gizmodo reports on the tallest Lego model ever, of the Eiffel Tower.

Christianity: Christianity Today on the 200 millionth Operation Christmas Child gift box.

Computing: Gizmodo tells us how to make our phones less distracting.

Environment: Gizmodo reports on a study that found that honeybees are not living as long as they
used to.

Food: NPR reports on cultured meat (grown in vats). It's coming, like the idea or not.

(and computing) Subway has installed an automated food dispenser, including the AI-enabled ability to respond, on a college campus.

Health: NPR reports that the number of premature babies has been increasing.

Politics: (or something) Gizmodo reports that about 250 Texas prisoners died because of lack of air conditioning, over the last 20 years.

Science: A child has been treated with a normal gene, replacing one that produces an  enzyme that doesn't work properly, before her birth, according to The Scientist.

The Scientist also reports on progress in healing spinal cord injuries.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

With Christ in the School of Prayer, excerpt 152, by Andrew Murray

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. I do this, not because I'm a powerful prayer warrior, but because I'm not. Murray was. I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this public domain work available. To see their post of the book, go here. His book is based on Mark 11:22-24. The previous post in this series is here. As usual in this blog, long quotations are in this color. Murray's book is based on Mark 11:22-24. 

This hearing the voice of God is something more than the thoughtful study of the Word. There may be a study and knowledge of the Word, in which there is but little real fellowship with the living God. But there is also a reading of the Word, in the very presence of the Father, and under the leading of the Spirit, in which the Word comes to us in living power from God Himself; it is to us the very voice of the Father, a real personal fellowship with Himself. It is the living voice of God that enters the heart, that brings blessing and strength, and awakens the response of a living faith that reaches the heart of God again.

It is on this hearing the voice, that the power both to obey and believe depends. The chief thing is, not to know what God has said we must do, but that God Himself says it to us. It is not the law, and not the book, not the knowledge of what is right, that works obedience, but the personal influence of God and His living fellowship. And even so it is not the knowledge of what God has promised, but the presence of God Himself as the Promiser, that awakens faith and trust in prayer. It is only in the full presence of God that disobedience and unbelief become impossible.

Living under diverse leaders

My wife and I have had the experience of living under, or being represented by:

the first African-American President

the first female governor of South Carolina, who also came from a family of Asians

the first African-American Senator from the deep South, since reconstruction

the first female Vice-President, who is also from both African and Asian ancestry

the first African-American governor of Maryland has been elected, and will become governor soon, God willing.

All of these have been competent leaders. Not perfect, and I haven't, and won't, agree with them all, but it's a privilege to live in a country where these things have taken place.

Sunspots 909

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

Christianity: Russell Moore, the editor of Christianity Today, is angry about the attack on Paul Pelosi, and about the lies that supported that attack (and still are).

     (sort of) A Christianity Today author reviews the scandals associated with Jerry Falwall, Jr., and Liberty University.

Environment: Gizmodo reports that composting plastics doesn't really work.

Finances: A Conversation writer on insurance fraud, which is described as all too common, and as a low risk crime.

Science: NPR reports on research showing that a lot of animals, not just birds, make noises.

Gizmodo reports on the tallest volcanic plume ever measured.

NPR reports on research that indicates that bumblebees play with objects in their surroundings.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

 

The earth is fixed in place?

Some quotations from the Bible:

1 Chronicles 16:30 Tremble before him, all the earth. The world also is established that it can’t be moved.

 

Psalm 93:1 Yahweh reigns! He is clothed with majesty! Yahweh is armed with strength. The world also is established. It can’t be moved.

 

Psalm 96:10a Say among the nations, “Yahweh reigns.” The world is also established. It can’t be moved.

Psalm 104:5 He laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be moved forever. (World English Bible, public domain)

The Bible seems to say, in at least these four places, that the earth can’t be moved. But it does move! It goes around the sun, and the sun, itself, is in motion through space.  And it rotates. What’s going on? Is the Bible in error? No. The Bible was mostly written according to the culture and world view of the times. If the writers had said something like “The world is traveling in a stable elliptical orbit, and has done so for many years, and will continue to do so,” the readers or listeners, to say nothing of the human author(s), would not have understood what was said, and might well have thought that the speaker or writer was insane. Like most of the Bible, these passages used the worldview of the current speakers, writers, readers and hearers. 

None of these four scriptures were statements about the principles of astronomy. All of them were statements about God's glory and power.

Thanks for reading.

Christians and voting poster

 

With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray, excerpt 151

 This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. I do this, not because I'm a powerful prayer warrior, but because I'm not. Murray was. I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this public domain work available. To see their post of the book, go here. His book is based on Mark 11:22-24. The previous post in this series is here. As usual in this blog, long quotations are in this color. Murray's book is based on Mark 11:22-24. 

Those who have made the deaf and dumb their study, tell us how much the power of speaking depends on that of hearing, and how the loss of hearing in children is followed by that of speaking too. This is true in a wider sense: as we hear, so we speak. This is true in the highest sense of our intercourse with God. To offer a prayer—to give utterance to certain wishes and to appeal to certain promises—is an easy thing, and can be learned of man by human wisdom. But to pray in the Spirit, to speak words that reach and touch God, that affect and influence the powers of the unseen world,—such praying, such speaking, depends entirely upon our hearing God’s voice. Just as far as we listen to the voice and language that God speaks, and in the words of God receive His thoughts, His mind, His life, into our heart, we shall learn to speak in the voice and the language that God hears. It is the ear of the learner, wakened morning by morning, that prepares for the tongue of the learned, to speak to God as well as men, as should be (Isa. l. 4).
This hearing the voice of God is something more than the thoughtful study of the Word. There may be a study and knowledge of the Word, in which there is but little real fellowship with the living God. But there is also a reading of the Word, in the very presence of the Father, and under the leading of the Spirit, in which the Word comes to us in living power from God Himself; it is to us the very voice of the Father, a real personal fellowship with Himself. It is the living voice of God that enters the heart, that brings blessing and strength, and awakens the response of a living faith that reaches the heart of God again.

Sunspots 908

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

Environment: Gizmodo reports that an analysis of what we are doing to control climate change is not doing enough.

Finances: (or something) a Conversation writer tells us about sports betting: who's doing it, and what are the effects on better and society.

Health: Gizmodo reports on a study by the CDC, which indicates that alcohol consumption is involved in 1 of every 8 deaths in the US.

Politics: The Conversation reports on a study that indicates that women on news channels are treated differently than men. (MSNBC, CNN and Fox News were studied.)

Science: A writer for The Conversation tells us that a large majority of Americans say that they trust scientists.

Gizmodo reports on research indicating that cats can tell if a voice is their "owners'," and also pay more attention when the owner is  speaking to the cat.

Naturalis historia argues that studying water, or where water used to be, on Mars shows that Mars is much more than a few thousand years old.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.