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OUR PLAIN VIEW FARMROAD MAP:
INTRODUCTION AND MISSION STATEMENT:
Dear PLAIN VIEW FARM Guests,
HERITAGE
WHAT IS A "HERITAGE"? Is it where we lived or how we lived? Is it how we dressed, or the sports we played, TV shows or movies we watched, music we listened to or sang? Is it the people that were popular during our life time? Is it riches, fame, or fortune?
To us heritage means something from the past that enriched our lives. Things in our parents' [and grandparents' and even great-parents'] lives that were passed on to us. The dictionary says that a heritage is: her-i-tage n 1: property that is or can be inherited: inheritance. 2: something other than property passed down from preceeding generations: legacy: tradition. 3: the status or lot acquired by a person through birth; birthright: a heritage of affluence and position.
We can say, then, that our heritage is an abundance of wealth handed down to us from God through our parents' lives...The greatest heritage you [our parents and forebears] gave us was humbling yourselves before God and letting us see God in you through your lives. The Bible says to give honor to those to whom honor is due. So we honor you, because of Jesus in you. God, who is in you and in us, gets all the glory because other nations, tribes, and tongues will lift their voices to praise His wonderful name [because of your Christlike example, and giving of your lives, efforts, prayers, and personal witness for the sake of spreading the Gospel and Christ's kingdom]. Oh God, help us to live YOUR heritage in our lives before our children and others. Help us to continue to pass on the only true heritage which is Jesus Christ.
This is our Plain View Farm and Stadems Saga websites mission statement, respectfully republished from a New Tribes Mission February 1999 issue of the publication, "The Southern Cross"--Editors. Permission to reprint this portion, page 11 and 12, concerning Heritage being sought from New Tribes Mission, Sanford. Florida 32771-1487
THE ROAD MAP
Welcome to this road map page! I will try to explain how and why things work this way. What we are doing here is possibly unlike any other website since this is actually a two in one, or duplex. My publisher and I have combined our two websites to where a usual home page could not act as the index it was meant to be. So with this being a tool to get along the pathway or narrative flow from the past to the ever changing present, my publisher and brother Ron came up with the idea of roadmaps. God's Little Acres is the opening storyline to which Pearl's stories will inter-connect all pages thereafter like a river that flows through it. Ron's writings, with the use of several of his directories, will come along into the narrative flow to add more color, humor, and understanding to the overall story. It is thereby truly unlike other websites that use the home page as a index to lead you into the interior parts or levels of the website. I might add that with this being actually a combining of two websites that interwine thoughout Plain View Farm, after 1958 with Papa's Final Word the Stadem Family Saga Continues website will take over. So we have two big trees like Norwegian pines, in effect, whose roots are so intertwined and whose branches are so wrapped up into each other, it could be taken for one tree instead of the actual two. This was our objective: creating a narrative flow which this road map was constructed to facilitate. I hope my remarks here make it easier to understand that what is towards the top is the Historical Past being worked through and down, incident after incident, story after story, toward the most current events and onto the present pages. We recommend unless you have already done so that you visit the pages from top to bottom and not skip about too much, lest you miss discovering the explosive secret of the website. If you should miss it, you will gain really no idea why the websites were created and what they set out to show you. Instead of scattered impressions and random facts and occasional views of farm life on the Dakota heartland flats, you are meant to gain a whole new insight into the marvelous, tapestry-like weaving of Providence in the lives of the Stadem family. Would you choose to miss that? I seriously doubt it!
Again, the mighty "Ol' Man River" of the narrative flow will eventually lead you into the next website, and its own road map. We encourage you to visit down the line, and sign the guest book at one of the different opportunities we offer a link back to the dining room along with refreshments such as Mama's Apple Crunch, or Lemon Cake, or even her fabulous whipped-cream- smothered rhubarb torte! Even her pea salad could qualify as a dessert, she was such a superb cook! Food aside, this is a unique experience as a inter-related story something very much like a kaleidoscope will unfold to your gaze. Many bright pieces of the constantly shifting artistic pattern, dancing with light and magical color, are yet to be linked in, so surely you will want to come back to finish your tour of Plain View Farm in its final stages. In saying this, I simply wish to show you how large this virtual farm is compared to the actual size, which was a rather small property even when it was a working farm. Nowadays, farms in the Dakotas are giant agribusinesses, but Plain View Farm was the traditional farm that we have known and loved and can never forget. That is the farm, and it never changed, thank God, into something modern and fully automated, with machines doing everything, and humans the least part of the whole complex operation. Besides, there are many pages yet to be linked and the Stadem Saga Road map to be created as of this writing, November 10th, 1998. For those of our guests learning about the Stadem family and Plain View Farm, as things unfold and as you have time to return or choose, an ultimate 75 pages are a bit too long for one visit anyway, so we expect many visits from you. So, please let us know how we are doing either by the guestbook or email, or both.
It will be after a whole year or more from now till we are done with the pages we are working on now, as we plan to add more photos to the pages, two photo albums, hymns, animal sounds, and more graphics to the pages. Also, our main linking page that will be modified to present newsletters, rings linked with us, links to the search engines we are registered with, html/web mastering helps that were helpful in doing this joint project, more Christian Ministry and personal websites linkings, along with an Honorary Family Members page and, of course, yet more new pages, especially if more relatives sign on as active website participants. So what is at the top and on this road map below this letter and onward to the next road map should help you understand how this works. No one road map or index can give you the complete picture, but just like life, it is an adventure holding more surprises just around the next corner. Like an L.A. freeway interchange, a real labyrinth of overpasses, underpasses, and exits offering to take you in a dozen different directions for every mile you speed down the road, this combined webs-site is, to my view behind the scenes, that complex, but be assured I, as a kind of conductor and trailblazer, have thought out the route you should go and will do everything in my power to help you get to all the prime spots on the map, so that you miss nothing essential even while you may choose to pull over here and there to sample the local scenery or just to catch a quick sample of food, fruit, flowers, or whatever else is offered at some inviting roadside stand--something you wouldn't be allowed to do on the real highway system down in California.
Thank-you for your time and patience especially when you find a page linked, but yet completed. So please come back to enter later as there are plenty pages done and being worked on to return to for future visits well into the next century. Besides life as we know it isn't over until Jesus Christ returns for us singly or collectively for us all on that mighty Day of Judgment. May each of us be at the Lord's Table for those eternal refreshments that are sure to be shining there amidst golden plates and diamond cutlery and magnficent bouquets of heaven's flowers. What will the menu include? It is hard to say, but simply being present will be the greatest honor and joy to share with all others at that table. What a feast our eyes will be given, as we look round at friends and family and other fellow believers in Christ the Savior! That will be just the beginning course of the banquet. Certainly, there will come the climax of the meal when we all partake of the fellowship of our Heavenly Father Himself, thanks to Christ's great sacrifice upon the cross for you and me. We can only pray and hope that we, while still living on this old earth, played a role in giving a word, help or answer to someone's prayer that might aid him or her in the journey toward the Lord's banqueting table on that great day. Until then, we simply trust that we are somehow doing our little part in the work of these websites. Only God Himself knows how much the Lord by way of the Holy Spirit will be able to use the message found within these pages--a message that is earthy and also heavenly, amusing and also giving food for thought. Outside of an entry in our guestbook or an email, we will just have to wait until the grand unfolding of all God's purposes in Heaven to find out or see the complete effects of this venture. Until then, God bless you and keep you or restore you in good health physically, and spiritually. Lastly, thank-you for paying us a visit at Plain View Farm in order to share and enjoy the treasures of her golden heritage. Just as over the many years her corn, wheat, potatoes, livestock, milk and cream, and other bounties blessed the world and nourished many thousands of people, so may her spiritual bounties now pour forth to nourish even more people!
--In Christ's Love,Jerry L. GintherWeb Master
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