Coffee Klatch

Quite a while ago I got hooked on notpron for a short time. It’s a website that hosts a riddle-based game. It’s not a point-and-click kind of thing. Instead, you usually use what you can find out on the screen to come up with the next website, change the name before the .html and you get to the next page, and thus the next level. These things can get really hard and complicated (notpron calls itself “the hardest riddle available on the Internet”), so most of them have a Forum for people to ask questions, share hints, etc.

Yesterday a friend introduced me to weffriddles. Same kind of thing, but with a different flavor because it was designed by a different person. I first visited the website late yesterday afternoon and as of now I’m up to level 21. It can be addicting because you feel you’ve just about got the answer, so you’ll figure it out and then do “just one more level.”
For most of these, it helps to keep another tab or window open to Google or Wikipedia or something, so you can look up information when you need it. Sometimes it’s a play on words or something built right into the page you’re looking at. Other times it requires specific information, so a search engine helps.

If you want to give any of these a try, BE PATIENT! The first few levels are semi-easy, so you can figure out how the game works and what it takes to succeed. Some people literally spend months trying to solve the entire puzzle. (Unless they don’t have a life, it’s usually a few minutes here, half an hour there; that kind of thing.) Remember, if you need help, visit the Forum. You may even want to keep THAT open in another tab or window also.

If nothing else, these riddle games will improve your critical thinking and problem solving skills. Plus, they’re FUN!

Enjoy!

Ever wonder why there aren’t more accidents on our roads and highways? I’m driving down the highway, looking at all the traffic, and I think that all it would take is a lapse of concentration for just ONE SECOND and I could be in an accident. Multiply that by the number of drivers on the road. Factor in the relatively low intelligence and general awareness of so many of the drivers. Result: the conclusion that every time I drive to work or travel somewhere and don’t get in an accident is a miracle!

Here’s a search engine that I just found out about. It’s called Ixquick and it’s a metasearch engine, like Mamma or DogPile. When you search Ixquick, it looks through AltaVista/AllTheWeb, Ask Jeeves/Teoma, EntireWeb, Gigablast, Go, MSN, Netscape, Open Directory, Overture, Wikipedia, WiseNut, and Yahoo!, bringing you the combined results all on one page.

While it certainly has some nice features, like giving you the option to have your search term(s) highlighted on the resulting page or like providing you a narrower focus (theoretically more accurate) in your search results (a recent search of mine got “63 unique top-ten pages selected from at least 7,089,054 matching results”), the most popular feature right now is something they DON’T do.

They don’t collect any personal data on you or your searching. When your session is done, they delete your information. They are the “first search engine to stop recording privacy details” and yet they still let you search many of the big-name search engines. Read their press release: Ixquick.com eliminates ‘Big Brother.’

Are Christians saved by faith alone? Are works a part of it? Does what you do matter or affect your salvation? Do your works produce salvation?

While there is quite a deal of controversy about this topic within the various branches of Christianity, I think it’s mostly a matter of semantics. If Christians from different denominations would open their ears and their minds a little, most would find that they’re saying the same thing. Just emphasizing different aspects of it.

First, here are some verses from Scripture that talk about the relationship between works and salvation:

Romans 4:2-5 - If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. What does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.

Galatians 2:16 - Know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.

Romans 9:30-32 - What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the “stumbling stone.”

Ephesians 2:8-10 - It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works.

Matthew 16:27 - For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.

Romans 3:27-28 - Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.

John 8:39 - Jesus said unto them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would do the works of Abraham.”

1 John 2:3-4 - We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The man who says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

Titus 3:5-6 - He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior.

James 2:14-26 - What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder. You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone. In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.

Matthew 7:17-20 - Every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

Some people emphasize the need for faith apart from works, while other emphasize the need for works to prove out that faith. Most Christian denominations don’t advocate “getting saved” and then sitting on your butt until it’s time to go to Heaven. Instead, they say in various ways that the Christians needs to be active in the world, being “zealous for good works,” as the Bible says. The purposes include glorifying God, helping those around them, being God’s hand in ministering to others, and causing other Christians to glorify God. St. Paul called this “working out your salvation.”

Even the Catholic Church does not teach that works “save” in the way that Protestants view salvation, contrary to the hearsay that many Protestants believe. The Second Council of Orange stated that “If anyone says that … the beginning of faith … by which we arrive at the regeneration of holy baptism is not through the gift of grace, that is, … the Holy Spirit reforming our will … he is proved to be antagonistic to the doctrine of the Apostles.” Also, “If anyone affirms that without the illumination and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit … he can think anything good which pertains to the salvation of eternal life … or consent to salvation … he is deceived by the heretical spirit” (quoted from LumenGentleman Apologetics). They do teach that works can be meritorious (earning something), but that only by acknowledging that even the desire to do good works is a gift from God to the Christian. Works are seen as having value because they are acts of obedience. They are not the cause of initial justification, but are a result of it. You can read further explanation here.

So are works necessary for salvation? Yes and no. But I think we can agree as Christians that if someone claims to be a Christian and does not live a life of good works, his Christianity is questionable. “You will know them by their fruits.”

Just when I thought things were going to stabilize in the Reference Dept. of the library because of the wiring project getting finished, another change is thrust upon us. We’d talked about rearranging all the shelving units in Reference to see if we could come up with more space (currently they’re at an angle, both sides angling toward the front and center) and I even drew up some plans for a couple different options, to see what space we would recover. In the end, it didn’t seem to be enough space to warrant all that work.

And moving bookshelves in a library IS a LOT of work!

But after seeing where the conduits and outlets were placed in that wiring project that’s allowing us to double the size of our computer lab, we took another look at it and decided to move things around. Instead of shelves angling toward the center, they’re going to be perpendicular to the back wall, coming straight out. That will allow us to see all the way down easily, in case someone’s looking lost or confused or maybe doing something they shouldn’t. It also gives us about four more feet of needed space at the front of the shelving while still allowing a wide aisle down the left side where all the windows are.

In the end, it will be really nice. In the meantime, I’ve got 10 large book carts filled, along with two tables and three 30-foot rows on the floor running along one wall. That to clear the space needed for getting started moving shelves and relocating the books.

Not only does this project require moving shelves around, but the books will also have to be in different places to keep them in order. We can’t just take books off, move a shelf, and put the books back on. So I spent my free time during my Reference Desk shift yesterday planning out the steps for the most logical process while trying to keep the work as low as possible and the most books on the shelves at a time as possible. Classes ARE in session now and people MAY need to actually USE some of these books. So “quick and organized” is my motto.

And, of course, this also means that any other projects get sidelined while trying to hurry all this through. But, then, I do get to dress down until I’m done, since I’m sweating and getting dirty.

Yesterday I got to mow the lawn at our new house for the first time. The yard is huge (313 feet from the street to the back fence) and it hadn’t been mowed this summer. Most of the grass was over 12 inches tall and there was a thick grassy undergrowth that was 4-5 inches high. It took hours of sweating, pushing, and restarting the mower to get that backyard done. (The front yard I did a couple evenings ago. A neighbor had mowed it a couple times during the summer, so it wasn’t so bad.)

Today we’re supposed to get the living room carpeting installed, so then we can move our living room in. It’s still at the apartment right now. I can’t wait to have a carpeted living room with comfortable furniture and an entertainment center again. Sigh….

The International Astronomical Union has been meeting at a conference in Prague for the last week that involved 2,500 astronomers from 75 countries. One of the hot topics was whether Pluto should be called a planet in light of the discovery of “Xena” or whether that one should also be called a planet.

As of today, they have officially defined what makes a planet and Pluto has gotten the boot. Because it has not cleared its orbit of neighboring bodies (its orbit intersects with Neptune’s), it fails to meet the criteria. The official definition is as follows:

“A celestial body that is in orbit around the sun, has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a … nearly round shape, and has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.”

It’s been debated ever since Pluto was discovered, but there has, oddly enough, never been an actual agreed-upon definition of what made a planet. Now there is.

And we have 8.

Here are some thoughts and commentaries on world news from a friend’s blog. He quotes Newt Gingrich from when he was interviewed on ABC News. Look at the connections around the world and ask yourself what more has to happen before it really IS World War III.

Last night I got to watch Alaric practice in his football pads for the first time. They just got their pads at the end of their practice on Friday, so this was the first time using them. It makes a difference doing all the running and things with that extra weight on and above your shoulders.

Alaric is going to be a lineman. Mostly offense, sometimes defense. Last night, after drilling some stances and basic moves, they were spending a little time learning about scirmmaging and running some plays. Still very new for everyone. Alaric got put on the defensive line for a while. At one point, from quite a ways away, I heard one of the kids say, “Come on, guys! Stop letting Alaric through!”

Made me smile.

Just wait until he’s experienced and in shape!

Current music: Winds Across the Pacific, by Medwyn Goodall

Today I came across a funny script that offers frustrated consumers a new option when bugged by a telemarketer. Visit http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html to see the script. It’s easy to follow, just like what the telemarketers use.

You can also access the PDF version of this counter-script here.

BONUS: The FCC has also provided tips for “Putting Cold Calls on Ice.”