For the first four years of this website a Q&A section of six pages was linked to the common menu. When the Quotes & Philosophies section was created, those six pages were deleted from the website, and the below selections archived here. These questions and answers were among those found in the original (various topics now mixed together) Q&A pages. Any additional questions will show the date they were asked and added to this page.
Q:
How do you picture God?
A:
I see God as beyond my ability to picture or understand, but yet
very personal and approachable, Someone with Whom we are always connected.
As a Christian, I look to Jesus as my Savior and relational example, and believe
there is a Holy Spirit within me helping me to open up to greater truths, and a
better way of living, all the time.
Q:
Now that you've been connected for a few months, what do you think
of the Internet?
A:
My first impression of the Internet is that it is incredibly cluttered.
Beyond that though, I do have to admit, I am impressed by the wealth of information
available at your fingertips. I also like connecting with people (through
email) more regularly, especially since there is no "per call" or "per minute" added
cost. And, there is no question, that the ability to share one's work beyond
local contacts, indeed -- worldwide, is simply mind boggling.
On the downside, it is just one more way for us to busy ourselves with what we are creating, and ignore the incredible outside world which God has already created and placed us into. Regardless of how awed I am at some of the artistic talent involved in many of the graphics on the Internet, I have yet to find one which can hold a stick to a real sunset. No matter how moved I might be by music and visual combinations, they cannot capture, in the truest sense, the peace and connectedness found by a wooded stream. I have never understood our rush to enter a "virtual reality," when we have not even begun to experience "real" reality. (Assuming, of course, that this world is not already something illusory, but that's a whole different discussion.) In whatever ways the Internet can help us to care for and connect with that which we were created a part of, and the One Who created it, I applaud. Whenever, it pulls us away from God, or experiencing all with which He has blessed us, or allows us to ignore our responsibilities to be good stewards of that with which He entrusted us, I see it as just another toy for a self-centered species, which cannot be bothered to walk in the realm of truth. Like anything else, it is just a tool. How we choose to use that tool tells all.
Q:
The Book of Daniel predicts that increased earthly devastation
will mark the "End Time" and return of Christ. Paradoxically, many fundamentalists
see dying coral reefs, melting ice caps and other environmental destruction not
as an urgent call to action, but as God's will. In the religious right worldview,
the wreck of the Earth can be seen as Good News. Tell me what you think.
A:
In Matthew 24:36-51 Jesus talks about the end times and his
second coming . . . "No one knows about that day or hour . . ." is how the
verses start, but the key issue here is how they conclude [I'll begin at verse 48]
"But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, 'My master is staying away
a long time,' and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink
with drunkards. The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect
him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him
a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
The parable uses other people to make the example, but the implications are clear.
Jesus does not expect us to mistreat what God has created while we await the end
times. That would include ALL of what God created. AND He certainly doesn't want
us to be abusing one another, nor any of his creation, in an effort to force that
time which "No one knows about that day or hour . . ." Indeed, He states very
plainly that those who do, will be considered "hypocrites." Scripture says
to avoid greed in all its form. Living in blatant disregard for other's needs, and
the rest of God's creation, by using the "end times" as an excuse, is just GREED
playing games. And it's not even all that subtle. Not to mention a host of other
sins Christ has asked us to leave behind as we follow Him.
Q:
Were you always interested in poetry and writing?
A:
No. I had very little interest in English class subjects in
school. I once had a college professor tell me, after giving us an assignment
to write a poem, that the one thing she could be absolutely certain of, was I would
never become a poet. I started writing later. At first, because I had
some dreams I wanted to remember. Then in 1985, in the middle of some significant
spiritual searching, and after a "stress collapse" (the psychologist's term), the
floodgates just burst open. I still do not see myself as a writer, but as
a photographer who writes.
Q:
Did you study photography or were you self-taught?
A:
I am self-taught. In my teenage and early adulthood years I took pretty decent
photos with a little Kodak 120 Instamatic. At age 35, when my wife of 17 years
divorced me, I decided to treat myself to a 35mm camera. After about 10 years
of taking photos with that camera I thought perhaps I should get some instruction,
so I enrolled in the correspondence school, New York Institute of Photography.
But, I've not been real crazy about formal schooling since graduating from college,
so even though I had paid for the whole course, I only actually completed one lesson.
I did learn some things by reading, viewing, and listening to the materials they
sent. But mostly it has been trial and error.
Q:
Why don't you have one of those counters showing how many people visited your site
before me? I like to see what visitor number I am.
A:
Much like when I opened the Teaching & Sharing Center at the beginning of 1995,
I had a decision to make. Was I doing this because it was the path I thought
God was asking me to take, regardless where it lead or how it played out, or was
I doing it with specific goals and expected results. If all the time and expense
I have put into this site was so that God could touch just one human soul, is it
not just as worth it as if He were to use it to touch thousands, or millions?
Yet I am human. To know that few people visit the site would offer a discouragement,
I would need to constantly work at overcoming. To know that multitudes are
visiting the site, would offer the American temptation to see what I do as valid,
because it is justified by the numbers, instead of constantly turning to God for
direction. I am better off not knowing the count. Unfortunately that
means you don't get to know your visitor number either.
Q:
Why do you mention money on the first page of this site, when your focus is not
on money?
Q:
You have made your website so complex that it operates
for about 3-4 minutes and then doesn't open. I suggest you simplify it so it will
open quickly before you lose all those that are trying to use your site. When in
doubt...simplify.
Q:
(added in October 2007)
[I] Can't believe that as pix intense as your site is that it loads up so quickly
. . . is there a trick to that?
If your photo program only has low, medium and high, at 500 pixels, the medium setting is usually sufficient to get the file size down. Once you get the hang of it, things move pretty quickly. Unless of course you work with the amount of pictures I do. Then sometimes it feels like it's going to take forever just to get the images ready to use.