Daily Archives: December 16, 2014

Current Events Categories 2014-8

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Current Events Category         2014-8

When I think of this category I think, “So many subjects and events to write about.” Plus, once I was to write about the event or happening, it could be very soon afterwards, that it is no longer a current event.

At times, many times, the Media rules the event, by showing it on TV or writing about it in the newspaper or a magazine. (There still are newspapers and magazines out there).

It almost seems like an event or occurrence is no longer happening, because the Media have gone onto another subject and the old one is forgotten.  I should say, forgotten by those not intimately involved. Tell the Ebola victims or loved ones of those stricken and have died in Africa from the disease or the people in Dufar, Oman if they are still living with the consequences of atrocities they have suffered!

So maybe this category should read something else, such as “current event as of this date posted” or something like that.

Regardless, I will write about and possibly post something that is in front of us, and give my opinion about it.  The problem with writing about any subject, once you put it on paper and publish it, it is no longer a private thought, but a public one.  It is hard to change what you write one written and then have to give an apology to everyone because new facts come out that change everything.

This should or could be an interesting blog site and category to watch. The main thing is to keep it honest and truthful in the writing.  I had to let someone I know that things that were being sent to me were incorrect and was told “I don’t check them, just forward them.”  He decided NOT to put me on his mass mailing list and took me off; I agreed, and we are comfortable with the arrangement.

The world is made up of all types of people that believe SO, SO, SO many ways of thinking and believing in something. I think it is neat and wonderful to know. I will believe something about a subject, until someone can show me that my thoughts are incorrect or need adjusting. I will adjust and I will change my way of thought about a subject.

I hope you are open to change and if not change, open to a different way of thinking about some things. If not, then, so be it. My goal is not to change anyone, but to give light on a subject that opens the opportunity to see an altered perspective about it.

Centrist Party     http://uscentrist.org

I said somewhere else, sometimes I believe not in the black or white way of thinking, but instead the grey area of thought.  It is not always the correct way, but is a different way.  I sometimes call myself a “Centrist” and as such Do Not have a political party affiliation. Taking a note from the Centrist Party (I thought I said Do Not).   Anyway, I copied a paragraph from them and list it below:

Religion Category 2014-6

Posted in Religious by

Religion Category -2014-6

This post category might be the most posted to, by me on this blog.   As I feel that I am on a Spiritual Journey, that I will expound on in the future, I have many articles that I have written and will be writing in the future.

Whatever your religion is, or at what stage of life you are in that religion, please take the opportunity to read what I have written.  Comment if you like, but hopefully you will get something out of what I state in this blog, regardless if you comment or not.

I do NOT claim to know what I am talking about in the blog, but instead look at what I write as “my opinions”.  Because of this, they are not absolutely correct, but only what I think. I am not a “know it all” but could say I think ,”I am a  know a lot”, based on my age and experiences.

I welcome you to read now and in the future what I write. I look forward to your comments, if you make any.

The Sub-categories for this category are not in any order. I did not title them in a certain way, but listed them as I felt like it. Many of the titles are, somewhat, self-explanatory in nature, so you will get the gist of the individual blog by its title.

Religion is such a large topic and much has, and is, been written about it. I have not tried to offend anybody’s religion, and if I made a statement that does so (in your mind) forgive me and let me know how you feel and what I said. I am not a fan of being “politically correct”, but do believe that decency should always rule. I have a habit of not calling something black or white, but instead see it as grey, which is not being completely honest at times.

As the President of the congregation at the church I belong, I should watch what I say at times when writing about religion. Well, that is what I should do, but sometimes I do not and I feel comfortable with being me, as I am.  I think one of my future (written) blogs addresses this subject, not sure right now.

Enjoy and let me know if you like or dislike anything written.

DDB

Proof of God 2014-7

Posted in Religious by

Proof of God                                                      2012-7

I had someone; I will call Uncle Pete, ask me to prove that there was a God, or at least convince him that there was one. I was at the beginning of my Spiritual Formation a couple of year ago and tried to give this person objective thoughts that would help him see the light.  What light? The light of knowing, for the sake of any other light. I might have brought this up before, but it bears repeating perhaps.

We went back and forth via email and I found out something. You cannot have a decent dialogue via email. I would bring up 5 or 6 ideas or thoughts and Pete would select only one and comment on it, forgetting or ignoring the others.  It was very frustrating to say the least.

So, being somewhat of an amateur then on everything from Scripture to basic knowledge of religious things, it did not work out. I decided to let it remain in the hands of God and have Him somehow get to Pete. Although, I have the idea that if God or Jesus Christ knocked on his front door, he would tell Him to go away or he would call the cops or worse, get his shotgun and take care of things himself.

How do you PROVE there is a God?

Guess what? I still do not know how to prove to someone that there is a God! I could relate my experiences to someone, but that is not proof to them. It is proof enough for me to the point that I do not just believe in God, I KNOW there is a God. Believing and knowing are two different things.

Years ago, when I related an experience that I now call “The Happening”, the person who I will call Johnny, stated that I was somewhat delusional and sort of suggested that my “mind” made it up.  There was no way he was going to believe me and admit that what I was saying to him was accurate and truthful. Sometime later he also espoused on his beliefs that there is no way a being called God could do  or have done the things others think He does. He might have being the one that stated that God cannot hear, talk or do things for individuals, because there are so many humans on Earth. He meant that there are too many people and only one God. I addressed this when I wrote “God’s Time”.

Barna Group        https://www.barna.org

I have read statistics from the Barna Group, which is a survey company regarding many things, including religious ones. The numbers show that the rate of believers or at least churchless people in almost all areas is changing in a negative way. The problem (if you could call it that) is complex and I do not want to go into details in this discourse, but state that there are reasons for my Uncle Pete and friend Johnny to say what they said.

It would be great if God were to show His presence to people, like He did with me and make it easier for people to believe in Him. That would be too easy, perhaps. It would be too easy for each of us to have the thing that really stands out for God to see. That thing is the word “Faith”.  For most of us faith is what makes us believe. Faith is what makes us keep going and faith is what helps us understand that God is real and His presence is with us always. If you lack faith, a person has no belief, simple as that

President’s Message 2014-5

Posted in Messages by

Presidents Message Dec 2014                                                    2014-5

OK, I admit it!  I normally celebrate Thanksgiving; then I forget it. We actually celebrated last Friday, instead of Thursday like most people do. We have to accommodate two other in-law families of our two daughters and sometimes we win and sometimes we lose for that day of celebration.

Back to the forgetting bit!  It, Thanksgiving, is somewhat like Christmas.  We lead up to the celebration day with all kinds of thoughts of food, cleaning the house, getting other things ready, and waiting for everyone to arrive.

Once family get here, we sit around and talk, watch the grandchildren play, feed the fireplace and get comfortable in many ways. Of course, on Christmas we open gifts and ooh and ahh about what we exchange and perhaps play with some of the children’s toys. The day stretches out and starts to quiet down; the hoopla is over and then the next day.

BOOM! It is all over; until next year. So, Thanksgiving is somewhat the same. Once here it is celebrated and then we go on with our lives.

I don’t want to dwell on it, but do want to share with you thoughts I had this year.

Yes, we sat down at the table to eat the wonderful smelling turkey and all the trimmings.  My eldest daughter said she wanted to say grace. She started with the somewhat normal thanks for the food and at somewhat the end, thanked God for her Dad and his being alive. I was surprised at first and then realized that a year ago I was in Intensive Care at the hospital and my mind was in la-la land.

We tend to forget sometimes, but this simple act of grace made me look back and, to a degree, remember what happened (or told to me what happened).

The presence of the Holy Spirit was with me and those around me. I felt Him with me and in that feeling, my mind did not forget about Thanksgiving and what we are thankful for then. I thought of my loved ones and their concern. I thought of my church family and friends, and their prayers for me and I cried inside.

I freely admit I am on a Spiritual Journey and it means so much to me. My Pastor and Pastor Paul have helped me to experience a deep relationship with our God and I am so thankful for their guidance and help in this. I look at those I know and see God in their eyes and that makes me also so very gracious in the knowing.

We only have one chance to live here on Earth and then, the opportunity to live forever with God and those that have gone before us. It is with deep satisfaction in sharing my life now with you and enjoying God’s presence with me always.  I am eternally grateful and thankful.

Peace,

Dennis Betts

Messages Category 2014-4

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Messages Category

The Messages listed as sub-categories are offered for review and comments. They are taken from monthly “Messages that I did for a church group where I am the President and have varied subjects, depending on the time they were written. I would sit down and write something based on what came up at the time, so many are time related for holidays (such as Christmas) and others, just what I was thinking of at the time. Since the group is a Church Council, they may be related to the Religious Category, but I decided to include them in the blog, as a separate category instead.  There is somewhat of a message in each one, so enjoy if you can do so and get something out of each, if possible.

Woe of a Dog 2014-3

Posted in Humor by

Woe of a Dog                                                                                                 2014-3

We had two dogs while living in Euclid, Oh, and both were, att one time or another, invested with those critters called fleas. The dogs would go outside in the yard and collect them and then bring them inside, of course.

It never became a BIG problem, but did involve “dusting” of the dogs!! It helped, but during the summer the fleas were a constant annoyance for both the dogs and us humans that took care of them.

To see a dog, cat or pet of any kind with fleas, sitting and scratching and knowing what is causing the discomfort, makes one feel for the animals.

Woe of a Dog

What is the answer for the life of a flea

Why does he have to pester me?

When will he finish and go away

So I can get up and go out to play?

With all this itching and scratching I do

My time for fun will soon be through.

Why did I snuggle with that infested collie?

I now regret that short lived folly.

OH, for the life of a flea I see,

His only thoughts are to chew on me.

DDB

Poems 2014-2

Posted in Poems by

Poem Categories      2014-2

The below categories are listed to give the blog reader an idea as to what is available to read. Some of the poems could be outdated, but most are relevant to any time period. I will add to each category as I have time and try to pick the better ones that I have in my collection of poems. I have written over 350 poems over a course of about two years and my daughter had about 50 of them published under the title of “Thoughts, Words, Indeed, Vol. 1”, which I gave away basically . I don’t think making money on poems is the way to make a living, unless you are VERY well known.

Contemplate

Head Injury

Humorous

Love

Miscellaneous

Nature

Political

Religious

Statement type

God’s Time – Our Time 2014-9

Posted in Religious by

God’s Time – Our Time

What is God’s time? How does it differ from my time or your time? What other ramifications occur when the two times are not the same?

I think these are good questions to consider.  I do not know! That being said, I do have an opinion of these questions and my thoughts are not mine exactly, but of another person who had the same thoughts and wrote about them.

First off, let me be up front about this. The person whose books I have read is C.S. Lewis. I admire his writing and he makes sense about the unsensible things in life or at least those that are not easy to understand. He wrote in his book “Mere Christianity” about God’s time and in doing so, made the idea of God looking at us daily in a different light. So, I will borrow from Mr. Lewis in a way, as I remember.

Time in the mind of most humans is a definite way of being. Some of us want it to hurry and others would like it to take forever, it all depends on what is happening in our lives. For me to be enjoying the sunset on a beach in the Caribbean, time can take its time. Being in a dentist office having a tooth extracted time can go as fast as can be, I want out of there. Such is life in the slow and fast lanes.

But, how do we look at life overall, at the past, right now in the present and the future to come? Does God look at those three time periods the same way? I hardly think so.  I had someone state something about these questions and make the declaration that it would be impossible for God to be able to hear everyone on Earth at the same time when they were praying to Him. There would be an overload of input to Him, because of millions, if not billions, of people talking/praying  at the same time.

One thing he did not think of (at the time) is the fact that time is different for God. He can take all the time it takes to listen to your prayers and mine. He is not restricted by the concept of time and as such can spend as many moments as it takes to hear us speak or pray. How so, it is asked? Let me explain and give you an idea of how this may work. Again, it is my opinion, or one perhaps copied from Mr. Lewis.

Get a sheet of 8-1/2 x 11 paper and put it sideways. On it, make a large dot on the left side and one on the right. Now draw a straight line between them. Now, envision yourself as being God and looking down and think of this as your lifeline. You were born at the time the dot on the left was made and will die at the time of the dot on the right. At the moment you are somewhere on the line as being the present time. Hopefully the line is long and you are not near the right side very much.

He is looking at your life and all that has, is, and will happen. He can see your birth NOW. He can see you as you are today, again, somewhere on the line, and He can see the time when you die; all at the same time. He is not restricted by our timeframe of looking at past, present and future. We can remember our past, be it long ago, and our present as we experience it. Our future is uncertain, but God can see it, not as the future, but as now, to Him.

For God, our tomorrow is looked at the same way as we look at today. All our days are “now” for Him. He does not look (the way we look) at yesterday, He just looks at us doing them, because, to us, we have yesterday as history and He again just sees it as today in His eyes.

It does not get into predestination of the doctrine that all events of our lives have been willed by God or into the concept of God’s will, but instead He can see like it actually is and not as it will be. He is not changing anything in our lives as they occurred, or are, or what they will be, but instead as they actually are to us and to God they are now to Him. God is already in tomorrow and we cannot see what that time brings to us. We do not know what we will be doing then, but when we do it, to God it is “Now for Him.”

This concept is not in the Bible, or written in any creed as such.  It is something that Christians have been thinking about in the past (especially God’s will), but is not important as a Christian to believe this or not or even think about it at all. In Christianity, those who believe in predestination, such as the reformer, John Calvin (1509-1564) around the time of Martin Luther, postulated that God must have pre-appointed certain souls to salvation and precluded the others. That word is used in many ways today since Calvin’s time.

I highly recommend reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. I got a good bit out of the reading and he helped clarify some things for me.  I believe he read excerpts over the BBC airways during the hard times of the Second World War, from books that were compiled into one book.

Introduction Blog 2014-1

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First Blog Post        2014-1

Hello, welcome to the blog of Den Betts! I hope you enjoy this blog, and come back. It is somewhat new so don’t judge a blog by its cover sheet and get to know it better as time rolls along.

I am not going to make this blog a specialized one, where I am always on the same subject. I intend to vary it and have different categories that will interest you.

Blog Title!!!

This blog, called TheBettsDen  is ambiguous and doesn’t give any indication of what it means and that is done on purpose. They are thoughts coming from me while sitting in my den at home, which could be called my “man cave”. It sort of looks like an unruly,  junky, cave of a man whose wife allows him to live like he does, just so she doesn’t have  to clean it up. She also likes the door to remain closed so that others do not know just how he habitats in there. Love her for that!!!!

What to Blog?

Well, I have to admit there will be a trend of Religious thoughts for you to think about. I intend to write most of the blog myself, but may include articles from sources that will be enjoyable and of interest; perhaps.

I am also a poet, so will have a category of various poems that I have written in the past.  I have a bunch of them that vary in type, so will try to mix and match them. Some will be funny, some sad (?), and some dark (sort of) and maybe a little that are just plain weird.

There may be a category on what I will call, “Messages”. This is where I have written “Messages” or monthly writings to a group I belong to and am in charge of, somewhat, on subjects that I arrived at the day I wrote them. Well, maybe not, it depends on how I can redact them to make sense. I will see on how that fleshes out.

I like to comment on Current Events, so will include that type of blog. I will TRY to be objective, but relish the chance of being completely honest and upfront in my thinking. I will not promise to be “politically correct” but will be truthful in my thoughts on the blog.

Ok, Religion, Poems, Messages, and Current Events.  That is a start, and I will go from there. One thing though, I am not looking for others to agree with me.  You have a mind, so I welcome you to comment and tell me what you think about what I write. Hey, if you like a certain blog let me know that also.

Comments?

I look forward to blogging and hope you like what you read or you might have input about the words I write down. If you like this blog, tell others, and if not, try to tell me, OK!  I may or may not comment on your comment, but I will have at least read them and look forward to any you write.

Welcome again, and let us begin.  Den  Betts