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Welcome to my website. |
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It is based on Faith and personal responsibility....with some stories of growing up on the family farm in the '50's and '60's. Originally, I put a lot of this material together for my 2 daughters when they were in high school as a way to explain some things and hopefully help them. |
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| I will tell you up front that this site is an ongoing process and it will be changing as I go. I am not sure of everything that will be included here, but as I think of things and/or hear of things that others might want to see or hear, I will endeavor to include those things in this site. And, just so you know, my life is strongly rooted in farming and education. (you may notice that as you go along). | |
| There are two main issues that I want to achieve. First, I want to explain my views and faith in God because I believe that my life is a gift, each and every day, no matter what that day may bring. And second, I want to challenge others to really examine your life and actions so that you may arrive at your own true beliefs. | |
| And, there is one other thing. I enjoy life and I like lots of different things so I want to have a website that provides opportunities for others to see and hear good things because contrary to what most of us are exposed to, there is a lot more good than bad......and we, as responsible adults need to convey that to our children. | |
| WHAT TO EXPECT | |
| The main articles that I have published here were written for my two daughters when they were in high school...because I felt that I needed to do that at the time, based on things that had occurred in my life up until that time. Those things, and more are being published here because I have been feeling the need to do this for others for a couple of years now but I kept putting it off. Later on, I will explain the process I've gone through getting to this point. | |
| As time goes by, I have more articles that I have been working on and I plan to have a Good News Network area that will incorporate news articles about things that are happening everywhere that are "good" things. (there has to be a balance somewhere) And I will invite others to send items to share. There will be other areas in the site where we can share other things too, like quality family events people can attend, volunteer opportunities and maybe even favorite recipes. (I like to cook and eat too!) And I love roadsigns, you know, the ones with the sayings like: "Good Habits are as hard to break as Bad Habits", etc. And of course there will be web links. | |
| In other words, I want to have something we can share because this is a learning process for me as well as everyone else. I certainly don't have all the answers and a lot of times when I am talking about something to others, I get a kind of "slap" on the back of the head (ala the TV show NCIS) indicating an answer to something I've been trying to understand. | |
| Keep in mind that this is my website and my thoughts and beliefs. You may agree.......and you may not. I am not here to try to convince others that I'm right on everything. But, I do ask one thing. At least, take the time to listen and then think for yourself. | |
| MAIN BELIEFS | |
| Here are my core beliefs. I am a Christian. I believe in God. I believe in Jesus. I believe in an afterlife of Heaven and hell (yeah, it's not capitalized because I don't think it deserves it). And I have faith in the Word of God!! And.....I believe in personal responsibility ! | |
| And, while I would like to be able to say that I can prove there really is a God, etc., the truth is that I can't because it is physically and technically impossible.........for now!! And, just to be fair, the "non-believers" can't prove that there is no God, either. I will go into it later. | |
| So, we come to the basic premise of everything: If it can't be proven that there is a God (and an afterlife) and it can't be proven that there isn't a God (and afterlife), then we need to examine exactly what we all have to gain or lose by believing or not believing. This to me is the core of everything because nobody will know exactly if there is an afterlife..........until.......you die. But then, in my understanding, it will be too late to change things. | |
| This is why I have taken the time and effort to develop this website. Because I want everyone to understand that (according to my understanding) each of us will die sometime, but we don't know when. And when that time comes, what you have believed up to that point becomes very important and I want everyone to have the opportunity to examine those beliefs and the consequences of their decisions......before it's too late. | |
| My main idea and question is this: "What if I am right?" | |
| MORE TO FOLLOW | |
| Stay tuned.....and thank you for taking the time to look. May God bless you now and for ever more. | |
| "Now, faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for." Hebrews 11:1-2 New International Version | |
| Stars in the Sky at Noontime | |
| By Richard (Dick) Roth Copyright 1995- All rights reserved |
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In this current age of technological marvels, with one scientific breakthrough after another, it’s very easy to bypass the simple, easy-to-understand things in favor of the more complex issues. Maybe it’s because we feel we are accomplishing more by solving the complex rather than the simple. The title for this website/poem/book/manuscript came to me one time as I was trying to solve what I thought was a complex problem but was in reality much simpler to understand. I remember astronaut Brewster Shaw coming back to his hometown school and talking to the kids about his adventures in space. One of the questions encompassed the idea of: ….”if your rocket blasts off from earth during the middle of the day (noontime) when the sun is shining bright, and that rocket goes straight up into space, what would the astronaut see as he rides along?” |
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Shaw’s answer was: (and I am paraphrasing here) “First, you would see the blue sky, white clouds and sunshine. Then, as you climbed into space, the blue sky and clouds would be below you and the stars that you see at night would be above you.” |
| There was more, but this was the part I remembered. When I was contemplating a title, I thought of this example. The simple truth is that, on earth, even though you don't see stars in the sky at noontime, they are there just the same. It is just the brightness of the sun, the sky and the clouds that obscures our view of them. | |
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My experiences in life have been this way too. I spent too much time searching for complex answers to simple questions. But, the simple answer was always there, right in front of me.
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| Photo reproduced courtesy of NASA | click on the menu to read more........ |
| (Click here to read Poem) Stars in the sky at Noontime | |