“I have never subscribed to the doctrine that we Christians should live in an intellectual vacuum, refusing to hear what the world has to say. A faith that must be "protected" is no faith at all.

If I can retain my faith in Christ only by closing my mind against every criticism, I give proof positive that I am not well convinced of the soundness of my position. The soul that has had a saving encounter with God is sure beyond the possibility of a doubt. His happy testimony will be, "To the LORD I cry aloud, and he answers me from his holy hill. I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the LORD sustains me.

I will not fear the tens of thousands drawn up against me on every side" (Psalm 3:4-6). Such a man will not need to shield himself from the classics nor from comparative religions or philosophy or psychology or science. The Spirit bears witness to Christ deep within his consciousness. His heart knows, though his reason my not yet have caught up with his heart.

When a very young minister, I asked the famous holiness preacher, Joseph H. Smith, whether he would recommend that I read widely in the secular field. He replied, "Young man, a bee can find nectar in the weed as well as in the flower." I took his advice (or, to be frank, I sought confirmation of my own instincts rather than advice) and I am not sorry that I did.

John Wesley told the young ministers of the Wesleyan Societies to read or get out of the ministry, and he himself read science and history with a book propped against his saddle pommel as he rode from one engagement to another.

Andy Dolbow, the American Indian preacher of considerable note, was a man of little education, but I once heard him exhort his hearers to improve their minds for the honor of God. "When you are chopping wood," he explained, "and you have a dull axe you must work all the harder to cut the log.

A sharp axe makes easy work. So sharpen your axe all you can."
A. W. Tozer Sermon: Sharpening the Axe

When I try to use a picture (like the wolf pic above) the transfer brings over the tag - how do I get the pic without the tag?

Just when one thought that Job was all about persevering through trial, the story continues. After Job has suffered the noted losses and endured the terrible counsels of his supposed friends, Job repents of his own stupidity. But God is not done. Here is what he says to the three friends - Job 42:7-9:
"7 The Lord said to Eliphaz:
What my servant Job has said about me is true, but I am angry at you and your two friends for not telling the truth. 8 So I want you to go over to Job and offer seven bulls and seven goats on an altar as a sacrifice to please me. After this, Job will pray, and I will agree not to punish you for your foolishness.
9 Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar obeyed the Lord, and he answered Job’s prayer." (CEV)
After suffering all he did, Job was required by God to pray for his friends who had "...not spoken of God what is right, as my servant Job has". (v. 8c) Otherwise God would "deal with [them] according to their folly." (v. 8b) (NIV)
Job was a true friend - and an obedient servant of God.
How do we show we are obedient? How do we show we are a true friend to others - and thereby attract them to God or encourage them in the faith?

So, how did we get here and what will happen next? In their insightful new book The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe, Discovery Institute Senior Fellows Jay Richards and Doug Axe and statistician William M. Briggs grapple with crucial questions:

What will be the total cost in dollars, lives, and livelihoods of this response from governments, taken on advice from scientists? 

What role have national and global health organizations such as WHO played in this? To whom are they accountable? 

What evidence do they rely on in sounding the alarm?  

How did science bureaucrats, relying on murky data and speculative computer models, gain the power to shut down the global economy? 

How did politicians, who know nothing of the science, decide whom to trust?

In this talk, Richards, Axe, and Briggs will outline what we now know and how to prevent this from ever happening again.

WHEN

Tuesday, December 8, 2020
Noon–10 PM PT

We don;t do canning. As a result, our inventory consists of 50 pounds of onions and 20 squash in the basement, and 10 quarts of raspberrys in the freezer. Winter is upon us in the northern zone!

Art can represent life. Dostoyevsky's idiot is a ball of fire; Camus' stranger is stone cold. Reading, we learn about the philosophy of Existentialism.
@shortart