Sunspots 899

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

The Arts: Gizmodo  describes 13 streaming services, ranging from free to ad-supported to paying, that you have probably never heard of.

Tor.com has published an article on Galadriel, as Tolkien portrayed her. (Note that the article isn't based on the upcoming Rings of Power video series.)

Christianity: (or something) A Conversation writer discusses the role of dragons in religions.

A Christianity Today writer writes about the possibility of having artificial intelligences as worship leaders and preachers.

Health: NPR on how sweat that smells stinky protects us.

Politics: FiveThirtyEight reports on Republican election deniers who won their elections.

Science: (or something) CNet tells us about things that make us more attractive to mosquitoes.

*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 141

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.’ As a Christian grows in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus, he is often surprised to find how the words of God grow too, in the new and deeper meaning with which they come to him. He can look back to the day when some word of God was opened up to him and he rejoiced in the blessing he had found in it. After a time some deeper experience gave it a new meaning, and it was as if he never had seen what it contained. And yet once again, as he advanced in the Christian life, the same word stood before him again as a great mystery, until anew the Holy Spirit led him still deeper into its Divine fulness. One of these ever-growing, never-exhausted words, opening up to us step by step the fulness of the Divine life, is the Master’s precious ‘Abide in me.’ As the union of the branch with the vine is one of growth, never-ceasing growth and increase, so our abiding in Christ is a life process in which the Divine life takes ever fuller and more complete possession of us. The young and feeble believer may be really abiding in Christ up to the measure of his light; it is he who reaches onward to the full abiding in the sense in which the Master understood the words, who inherits all the promises connected with it.

Sunspots 898

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

Christianity: Christianity Today reports on the openness to women in various leadership roles, in Protestant churches.

Education: A Conversation article on violence against teachers by students. About 10% of teachers have been so attacked.

A Conversation writer discusses some ways that the Metaverse (the author doesn't know how to define or describe it) is helping college education.

Finances: NPR reports on how prisoners earn income behind bars, and what the income is.

Science: The Scientist on the energetics of chewing, (It takes a lot of energy.) and the possible relationship to humanoid evolution.

NPR reports that a company is planning to bring back the Tasmanian "tiger," which has been extinct for over 80 years. There are questions about trying to do this.

NPR also reports on some interesting (and possibly dangerous to humans) behavior by orcas/aka killer whales.

A Conversation writer discusses his own research, which indicates that dolphins use "signature whistles -- brief sequences of noise that the animals emit," which are not copies of those emitted by other dolphins, to identify other dolphins.

*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 140

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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, and it shall be done unto you.’—John xv. 7.
In all God’s intercourse with us, the promise and its conditions are inseparable. If we fulfil the conditions, He fulfils the promise. What He is to be to us depends upon what we are willing to be to Him. ‘Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.’ And so in prayer the unlimited promise, Ask whatsoever ye will, has its one simple and natural condition, if ye abide in me. It is Christ whom the Father always hears; God is in Christ, and can only be reached by being in Him; to be IN HIM is the way to have our prayer heard; fully and wholly ABIDING IN HIM, we have the right to ask whatsoever we will, and the promise  that it shall be done unto us.
When we compare this promise with the experiences of most believers, we are startled by a terrible discrepancy. Who can number up the countless prayers that rise and bring no answer? The cause must be either that we do not fulfil the condition, or God does not fulfil the promise. Believers are not willing to admit either, and therefore have devised a way of escape from the dilemma. They put into the promise the qualifying clause our Saviour did not put there—if it be God’s will; and so maintain both God’s integrity and their own. O if they did but accept it and hold it fast as it stands, trusting to Christ to vindicate His truth, how God’s Spirit would lead them to see the Divine propriety of such a promise to those who really abide in Christ in the sense in which He means it, and to confess that the failure
in the fulfilling the condition is the one sufficient explanation of unanswered prayer. And  how the Holy Spirit would then make our feebleness in prayer one of the mightiest motives to urge us on to discover the secret, and obtain the blessing, of full abiding in Christ.

Musing about The Rings of Power, based on J. R. R. Tolkien's works

The Rings of Power, based on the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, is to be available for streaming on Amazon Prime in a couple of weeks. I have not seen it. I have heard that Amazon has spent a billion dollars or so on the series.

I have read much of Tolkien's work. I have appreciated it. My report on the last book in the Lord of the Rings is here. There are links, in that post, to my musings on more of Tolkien's work.

Tolkien had a large influence on later writers, for example, Elizabeth Moon. The films based on his books were among the most popular of all time.

Tolkien was a Christian. He worshiped regularly as a Catholic. His friendship with C. S. Lewis was one aspect of the conversion of Lewis, one of the most influential Christians of the 20th Century. But some aspects of his work are troubling. There are many gods, for one thing. Evil is often associated with blackness, and good with white. Women are mostly of secondary importance. (There are exceptions, such as Galadriel.)

Was Tolkien a Christian novelist? See here. I don't expect that The Rings of Power, any more than Tolkien's other work, will be preachy, at all. I expect that there will be important moral choices in The Rings of Power. Will there be a Christ-figure, submission to a good Creator, hope in a supernatural being, and other aspects of a Christian world view? I hope so. Will pride, like that of Fëanor, be punished? Punishment for pride is perhaps the main theme of Tolkien's work.

Thanks for reading.

Sunspots 897

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

The Arts: NPR has posted photos of lots of fireflies in action.

Politics: A Conversation writer discusses access to White House documents.

Another Conversation writer tells about partisan news consumption. (In other words, getting news from one side of the political divide.)

Yet another Conversation post discusses political activity by members of the military.

Science: Gizmodo reports that a newly discovered species of isopods (aka pill bugs, wood lice, roly polys, and more) can grow up to a half meter or so in length.

The Scientist reports on why doing work that requires thinking makes you feel tired.

The Scientist also has an article about dreaming in animals, and its possible ethical implications.

A Conversation article tells us why animals have tails.

*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 139

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.

Blessed Lord Jesus! I come again to Thee. Every lesson Thou givest me convinces me more deeply how little I know to pray aright. But every lesson also inspires me with hope that Thou art going to teach me, that Thou art teaching me not only to know what prayer should be, but actually to pray as I ought. O my Lord! I look with courage to Thee, the Great Intercessor, who didst pray and dost hear prayer, only that the Father may be glorified, to teach me too to live and to pray to the glory of God.

Saviour! To this end I yield myself to Thee again. I would be nothing. I have given self, as already crucified with Thee, to the death. Through the Spirit its workings are mortified and made dead; Thy life and Thy love of the Father are taking possession of me. A new longing begins to fill my soul, that every day, every hour, that in every prayer the glory of the Father may be everything to me. O my Lord! I am in Thy school to learn this: teach Thou it me.

And do Thou, the God of glory, the Father of glory, my God and my Father, accept the desire of a child who has seen that Thy glory is indeed alone worth living for. O Lord! Show me Thy glory. Let it overshadow me. Let it fill the temple of my heart. Let me dwell in it as revealed in Christ. And do Thou Thyself fulfil in me Thine own good pleasure, that Thy child should find his glory in seeking the glory of his Father. Amen.

Sunspots 896

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

Christianity: Ken Schenck writes about what the Bible says about gender and sex.

Education: A Conversation post on why there is a teacher shortage.

Food: (and Science) Gizmodo reports on developments in lab-grown fish sticks.

Health: (or something) Gizmodo reports that a surgery-performing robot is about to be tested in the International Space Station.

Gizmodo reports that UPS drivers are enduring dangerous heat. There's no A/C  in the trucks, and the rear part of the trucks (where most of the packages are) can get really hot.

Science: A Conversation writer tells us about coyotes in urban environments.

SciTechDaily reports that human genes have been transferred to yeast cells, and apparently work just fine.

Sports: C. Vivian Stringer, first African-American college coach to win 1000 games, has retired.

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

Thanks for reading.

Could there have been animal death before the Fall?, 2nd edition

It is often said that the earth must not be very old, because death could not have occurred before the Fall of Adam and Eve, as told in Genesis 3. When this is said, it means death of non-humans, such as the many generations of animals that would have been needed for, say, the origin of birds from reptiles, by natural selection.

A search has led me to some web pages, all arguing, using the Bible, that there could have been, or even must have been, death of non-human creatures before the Fall. (There are also posts that deny this.)

Here they are:
"No Physical Death Before the Fall?" by Glen Kuban.

"Death Before the Fall: God Created Cellular Death Codes," by Glenn Morton.

"Creation Science Issues: Death Before the Fall of Man," by Greg Neyman. 

 "Animal Death Before the Fall: What Does the Bible Say?" by Lee Irons.

"Was there animal death before the fall?" by Jay Wile.

"Did death occur before the Fall?" by BioLogos.

I have previously posted on a related matter.

None of these take the view that there couldn't have been death before the Fall, but some of them also present reasons why some people believe that there was no such death.

See my posts on David Snoke's book, A Biblical Case for an Old Earth. Snoke argues that the Bible allows the death of animals before the Fall. Here's one such post. Click on the "David Snoke" label at the end of the post to see all of them.

This post is a revision of one from January 2008.

Thank you for reading!

 

With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray, excerpt 138

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.

The Father accepts the will, the sacrifice is well-pleasing; the Holy Spirit will seal us within with the consciousness, we are living for God and His glory.

And then what quiet peace and power there will be in our prayers, as we know ourselves through His grace, in perfect harmony with Him who says to us, when He promises to do what we ask: ‘That the Father may be glorified in the Son.’ With our whole being consciously yielded to the inspiration of the Word and Spirit, our desires will be no longer ours but His;  their chief end the glory of God. With increasing liberty we shall be able in prayer to say: Father! Thou knowest, we ask it only for Thy glory. And the condition of prayer-answers, instead of being as a mountain we cannot climb, will only give us the greater confidence that we shall be heard, because we have seen that prayer has no higher beauty or blessedness than this, that it glorifies the Father. And the precious privilege of prayer will become doubly precious because it brings us into perfect unison with the Beloved Son in the wonderful partnership He proposes: ‘You ask, and I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.’ precious because it brings us into perfect unison with the Beloved Son in the wonderful partnership He proposes: ‘You ask, and I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.’

‘LORD, TEACH US TO PRAY.

Sunspots 895

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

The Arts: (and Christianity) a Tor author discusses the fate of Susan Pevensie in the Narnia books, by C. S. Lewis.

Christianity: (and Politics) Christianity Today examines the question of how behavior changes in Southern whites who have stopped going to church.

Finances: Gizmodo reports that the oil industry has received lots of profit over the past few years, but has cut its workforce drastically.

CNN reports on how Russia is financing the war in Ukraine with African gold, and propping up African dictators.

Science: The Scientist on why a humpback whale recently collided with a small boat.

NPR reports that, although the moon has been thought of as divided into two regions, one too hot, and one too cold for living things, certain geological features on the moon are habitable throughout the lunar cycle, neither too hot or too cold.

*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 137

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.

He that seeks God’s glory will see it in the answer to his prayer, and he alone.

And how, we ask again, shall we attain to it? Let us begin with confession. How little has the glory of God been an all-absorbing passion; how little our lives and our prayers have been full of it. How little have we lived in the likeness of the Son, and in sympathy with Him—for God and His glory alone. Let us take time, until the Holy Spirit discover it to us, and we see how wanting we have been in this. True knowledge and confession of sin are the sure path to deliverance.
And then let us look to Jesus. In Him we can see by what death we can glorify God. In death He glorified Him; through death He was glorified with Him. It is by dying, being dead to self and living to God, that we can glorify Him. And this—this death to self, this life to the glory of God—is what Jesus gives and lives in each one who can trust Him for it.
Let nothing less than these—the desire, the decision to live only for the glory of the Father, even as Christ did; the acceptance of Him with His life and strength working it in us; the joyful assurance that we can live to the glory of God, because Christ lives in us;—let this be the spirit of our daily life. Jesus stands surety for our living thus; the Holy Spirit is given, and waiting to make it our experience, if we will only trust and let Him; O let us not hold back through unbelief, but confidently take as our watchword—All to the glory of God! The Father accepts the will, the sacrifice is well-pleasing; the Holy Spirit will seal us within with the consciousness, we are living for God and His glory.

Sunspots 894

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

Christianity: (or something) NPR reports on a movement to pass wedding dresses on to strangers, free

Environment: Gizmodo, and other outlets, report that monarch butterflies are now listed as endangered.

Representative Matt Gaetz claims that immigrants into the US Southwest are responsible for the danger to monarchs. Really.

Politics: (and Christianity -- sort of) CNN has posted a thorough discussion of Christian Nationalism, so-called.

*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 136

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.

And what motive, what power is there that can urge our slothful hearts to yield themselves to our Lord to work this in us? Surely nothing more is needed than a sight of how glorious, how alone worthy of glory the Father is. Let our faith learn in adoring worship to bow before Him, to ascribe to Him alone the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, to yield ourselves to dwell in His light as the ever-blessed, ever-loving One. Surely we shall be stirred to say, ‘To Him alone be glory.’ And we shall look to our Lord Jesus with new intensity of desire for a life that refuses to see or seek ought but the glory of God. When there is but little prayer that can be answered, the Father is not glorified. It is a duty, for the glory of God, to live and pray so that our prayer can be answered. For the sake of God’s glory, let us learn to pray well.

What a humbling thought that so often there is earnest prayer for a child or a friend, for a work or a circle, in which the thought of our joy or our pleasure was far stronger than any yearnings for God’s glory. No wonder that there are so many unanswered prayers: here we have the secret. God would not be glorified when that glory was not our object. He that would pray the prayer of faith, will have to give himself to live literally so that the Father in all things may be glorified in him. This must be his aim: without this there cannot be the prayer of faith. ‘How can ye believe,’ said Jesus, ‘which receive glory of one another, and the glory that cometh from the only God ye seek not?’ All seeking of our own glory with men makes faith impossible: it is the deep, intense self-sacrifice that gives up its own glory, and seeks the glory of God alone, that wakens in the soul that spiritual susceptibility of the Divine, which is faith. The surrender to God to seek His glory, and the expectation that He will show His glory in hearing us, are one at root: He that seeks God’s glory will see it in the answer to his prayer, and he alone.

Sunspots 893

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

The Arts: NPR reports that Mary Badham, who played Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird, is now playing one of the Finch's neighbors in a theater production of the story.

Christianity: (and politics) A Christianity Today writer, along with others, believes that the US is headed for a time of political violence, and in fact is already in one. She says that Christians, of whatever political persuasion, should not participate, following the example of Jesus.

Education: Grammarphobia discusses the expression "weak in the knees."

Environment: Gizmodo tells us that European bison are being re-introduced to the United Kingdom, where they have not been (in the wild, at least) for thousands of years.

Finances: (or something) Gizmodo discusses mishandled air luggage.

Health: Fox News (and other outlets) reports on a study that says that those under 40 years old should not drink alcohol.

A Conversation writer tells us why drug names are so complicated, and explains some of how they are named.

History: (or something) ListVerse shows us some amazing bridges.

Humor: (or something) a cat escaped from a carrier, in the Boston airport, and was finally caught, after three weeks, according to NPR.

Politics: (or something) A Conversation writer says that the Shinto religion (and the Unification Church) influences the assassination of Shinzo Abe.

Science: (or something) The Conversation discusses love (by which the discussion mostly means physical attraction.)

Gizmodo reports that the Webb telescope has been damaged by a micrometeorite. It should still function, almost as well as before the damage.

Gizmodo also reports that NASAs martian explorer devices have photographed what looks like a tangle of string. The article has a link to a previous finding -- something that looks like a door.

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

Thanks for reading.

 

How many kinds of dragonflies are there?

 

Graphic: Antique dragonfly, from openclipart 

My wife and I were out walking, when I saw a dragonfly. She remarked that this one was black and white, and innocently asked me what kind it was. (I hadn't a clue.) I innocently remarked that dragonflies are of many colors, and that there are hundreds of kinds of them, although most of these kinds don't live around where we do. Then she asked me, innocently, if God made each kind of dragonfly, or if they descended and diverged from other kinds. She also asked, innocently, if there wouldn't be a web page, or something, which told us which of these types of events happened.

Well, yes and no. There are some web pages, and/or books, which claim that each kind of organism was made by a separate miracle. For example, see this page, which doesn't specifically say that each creature was created by a distinct miracle, but says that the six days of Genesis 1 were literal 24-hour days, so it would have been impossible for some kind of evolutionary process to produce all the species of dragonflies. (Genesis 1 does not specifically mention flying insects, let alone dragonflies.)

There are also many books and web pages which claim that animals developed into many species, over long periods of time, by completely natural processes -- there is no God, and never was. Here is the Wikipedia web page on an introduction to evolution.

Though you probably don't hear much from them, there are other sources that believe in a Creator. Some of these believe that the days of Genesis 1 were very long periods of time, thus allowing for evolution of dragonflies from a common ancestor. Others who believe in a creator believe that Genesis 1 was never meant to teach science, and that it is a mistake to do so. Genesis 1-2, they say, were meant to teach important truths, such as that there is only one God, not many, like the peoples living around the Israelites believed. And God is sovereign. Further, humans are more like God than any other animal, and have some responsibility to care for God's creation. Genesis 1 and 2 were not, in their view, to be taken literally. This last group holds that God's marvelous original creation included built-in laws, processes and properties of atoms and molecules, and rocks and clouds, that led, over a very long time, to the world we have today.   

To answer my wife's question, there are about 3000 species of dragonflies living on earth today. There were fossil dragonflies, too. Some dragonfly-like insects had wingspans as long as your arm, or even longer. Just don't ask me to identify them.

Appendix See these posts: "Should Genesis 1-2 be taken literally?"

"Young-earth creationism and the kinds of animals"

"Is Genesis 1-11 history, or myth? Comparing the sequence of events in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2"

With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray, excerpt 135

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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 demand in connection with prevailing prayer—that it should be to the glory of God—is no more than right and natural. There is none glorious but the Lord: there is no glory but His, and what He layeth on His creatures. Creation exists to show forth His glory; all that is not for His glory is sin, and darkness, and death: it is only in the glorifying of God that the creatures can find glory. What the Son of Man did, to give Himself wholly, His whole life, to glorify the Father, is nothing but the simple duty of every redeemed one. And Christ’s reward will be his too. Because He gave Himself so entirely to the glory of the Father, the Father crowned Him with glory and honour, giving the kingdom into His hands, with the power to ask what He will, and, as Intercessor, to answer our prayers. And just as we become one with Christ in this, and as our prayer is part of a life utterly surrendered to God’s glory, will the Saviour be able to glorify the Father to us by the fulfilment of the promise: ‘Whatsoever ye shall ask, I will do it.’
 

To such a life, with God’s glory our only aim, we cannot attain by any effort of our own. It is only in the man Christ Jesus that such a life is to be seen: in Him it is to be found for us. Yes blessed be God! His life is our life; He gave Himself for us; He Himself is now our life. The discovery, and the confession, and the denial, of self, as usurping the place of God, of self-seeking and self-trusting, is essential, and yet is what we cannot accomplish in our own strength. It is the incoming and indwelling, the Presence and the Rule in the heart, of our Lord Jesus who glorified the Father on earth, and is now glorified with Him, that thence He might glorify Him in us;—it is Jesus Himself coming in, who can cast out all self-glorifying, and give us instead His own God-glorifying life and Spirit. It is Jesus, who longs to glorify the Father in hearing our prayers, who will teach us to live and to pray to the glory of God.

Sunspots 892

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

Food: (and finances) Listverse tells us some things we didn't know about Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC).

Health: (and politics) A writer for The Conversation argues that, prior to the 1800s, abortion, prior to quickening, which is perceived at about the fourth month, was accepted as a medical procedure, and was not stigmatized or outlawed.

History: (or something) Gizmodo on the Georgia Guidestones, which recently suffered severe damage from a so-far at large bomber.

Politics: (and computing) Gizmodo notes that former President Trump, his son, and others, resigned from the board of Trump's Truth Social social network, shortly before a Securities and Exchange Commission examination of the company.

Science: The Scientist reports on how an infestation of mange on vicuñas had important effects on an entire ecosystem.

*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 134

 

This post continues a series of excerpts from With Christ in the School of Prayer, by Andrew Murray. 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.

Or are not, in large measure, self-interest and self-will the strongest motives urging us to]pray? Or, if we cannot see that this is the case, have we not to acknowledge that the distinct, conscious longing for the glory of the Father is not what animates our prayers? And yet it must be so.
Not as if the believer does not at times desire it. But he has to mourn that he has so little attained. And he knows the reason of his failure too. It was, because the separation between the spirit of daily life and the spirit of the hour of prayer was too wide. We begin to see that the desire for the glory of the Father is not something that we can awake and present to our Lord when we prepare ourselves to pray. No! it is only when the whole life, in all its parts, is given up to God’s glory, that we can really pray to His glory too. ‘Do all to the glory of God,’ and, ‘Ask all to the glory of God,’—these twin commands are inseparable: obedience to the former is the secret of grace for the latter. A life to the glory of God is  the condition of the prayers that Jesus can answer, ‘that the Father may be glorified.’

Sunspots 891

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

Education: Grammarphobia discusses grandparents, grandparent's and grandparents.

Environment: A Conversation writer says that one way to alleviate the water shortage crisis in the US southwest would be to have cities pay farmers to use more efficient ways of getting water to their crops, eliminating much of the evaporation that uses the water supply inefficiently.

Health: I am not making this up. Gizmodo reports that some scientists are recommending that a sample of fecal material be stored when a person is young (can be frozen), so that restoration of the base-line intestinal inhabitants can be accomplished. Some fecal organisms contribute significantly to our health.

Science: Gizmodo reports that orcas (killer whales) have become predators of great white sharks, off of the coast of Africa.

A stored water lily seed has been determined to be a separate species, with leaf diameter up to 3.2 meters, according to a report by Gizmodo.

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

Thanks for reading.