President Trump is correct again, America is dead! Just as the Buffalo Bills football player dropped dead on national TV from a drug overdose, America needs a shot or two of Narcan. There is no breathing or pulse, all signs of life are no more, where are the paramedics? The football player got lucky, what about America?
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca
How can an all-knowing and all-powerful God be content to bring only the few to salvation safety? This is the tragedy of Christian theology.
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca
An Exposition
13. Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. (TNIV)
Jesus drops a bomb at the end of the Sermon on the Mount. Is Jesus playing some kind of video game? Some of us are more familiar with the gates of the old-fashioned pinball machines. In the prior verses, 7 through 12, he has promised us that if we seek God, we will find him, if we knock on God’s door, the door will be opened and if we ask of God, we will be given an answer. Does not Jesus say to us with these words, my Father God is readily available to those who seek him? Believing this, what are we seekers to make of the two bomb verses?
In these verses
that there are two gates or openings to experience the eternal truth of God in our
lives on earth. One gate is wide and one
is narrow. The unspoken assumption is
that all seekers choose one or the other, narrow or wide. We can also assume that most of us wrongly choose
the wide gate because it appears to be the most popular and user friendly. This is the religion entrance that Jesus
identifies as “the Law and the Prophets” in verse 12. Jesus was born into the 1500-year-old
religion of Israel, the long-corrupted faith of Israel and its spiritual
leadership. Every religion fails in the end
because the religion promises easy spirituality while it clutters up the
playing field with a lot of other stuff, like dividing people into groups of
sinners and saints, budgets, buildings and bluster.
Jesus goes
on to say that “wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to
destruction” (13). Nothing like being
blunt, the wide gate and broad road of religion will only lead us to be the loser. The Bible concordance gives us “loss” as the
first meaning of the Greek word everywhere translated as “destruction”. The translators probably chose destruction
because the word carries a heightened sense of finality, which may or may not
be the meaning Jesus intended to convey.
In modern language we might say that the wide gate and that road will
lead to a dead end.
The narrow
gate is the gate that will lead to authentic spirituality, reserved for those
seekers who badly want a taste of the certainty of eternity in this life. This is the gate of the “Golden Rule”, simply
treating others the way that you would like to be treated. The tragedy is that few will choose to pass
through the narrow gate. Who are these
few seekers? Potentially, they are the
people listening to Jesus on the hillside that day and the people in the synagogue
as long as they are willing to choose the narrow gate and not follow the crowd
within religion. The few are sincere individual seekers of authentic spirituality;
they want it bad. Theirs is the willingness
to set aside seemingly normal human priorities to follow the priorities of the
entire Sermon on the Mount. No longer is
their priority to be better than most; better personal security, food and
housing, better status and relative success.
The few do not run after a bigger and bigger bank roll, looking good no matter
the cost to others and surrendering to the distractions of our world.
Once through
the narrow gate, the road that leads to spiritual life in this lifetime remains
narrow and it will be difficult to navigate. The narrow road is like a coin,
one side says that God has provided a way and the other side says that way will
ever be difficult. Why will this road be
a difficult narrow road? Reason one, in
verse 16 he warns us, “Watch out for the false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but
inwardly they are ferocious wolves.” Who,
pray tell, are the false prophets? There can be only one answer that fits, the proponents
of the corrupted faith of Israel who parade in fine robs and collect the
religion taxes. You got it, the
religious leaders of the day. Jesus says, they are the bad trees of religion
that can only bear bad fruit.
The second
hazard on the narrow road is the company we keep while traveling on this road. Not everyone on the narrow road has the best
of intentions. Some have not been
willing to give up designing their own world.
They or we tend to make a show of spirituality, self-identifying as
prophets of God with great power over the demonic and doers of the spectacular.
A showy religion carries no weight with
Jesus for the only spirituality that counts is one experienced in a relationship
with our Father God (v.21). In fact, those who count on showy religion Jesus
calls evildoers.
Jesus uses
the Greek word “kurios” for his ministry in the affairs of God on earth. This word is translated as Lord, Lord, in verse
21. What did Jesus mean to say in this
verse with this self-designation? The
Apostle Paul uses this word among his new Gentile Christian brothers to mean
that Jesus was co-equal with God, a concept easily accepted in their confused
God-Man culture. The word had a similar meaning among Jewish converts to
Christianity but this would seem to conflict with the strict monotheism of Judaism.
To this day there is disagreement among
scholars as to what Jesus was saying with the word “kurios”, God or spiritual leader.
There is an
interesting article entitled “LORD” by J. Y. Campbell in “A Theological Word
Book of the Bible”, edited by Alan Richardson.
On page 131. J.Y. Campbell sums up the disagreement among scholars as contrasting
theories regarding the history of the word.
In any event, Jesus’s self-designation as “kurios” may not have meant
what the Christian doctrinal theologians insist upon, that Jesus was also God. I am not a biblical scholar but the God-Man
theory sounds like an assumption without clear biblical standing. However, the life and message of Jesus was a God
given pivot point as God reaches from the heavens to you and I, of this, we all
can agree.
Mr. Langone, the company you co-founded, Home Depot, has made a lot of money and enjoyed a successful retail ride across America. As one of the little people that loves to roam the isles of your store, I am disappointed at your lack of political moxie. You jump on Fox News to announce the demise of President Donald Trump, why have you switched from past support? Could it be because 80% of Home Depot sales are now Chinese products? You would know the exact % better than I but my point is obvious, you must believe that a quiet surrender is better for business.
Mr. Langone,
you are correct about one thing, America has lost the will to be America. There is no will in Washington, no people
centered freedoms remain there, no freedoms that identify us as Americans. The political leadership of both parties have
sold off our country to China and those of our own corporate interests, as you are doing. You are a smart guy and should know that no
half-hearted political compromise will change Washington or America and return the people to power as the
Constitution demands.
Mr. Langone,
you and Fox news are thinking like cowards.
Nothing can possibly change without Donald Trump as our next president,
he alone has the guts to stand up to China, both as the 75th
president and again as the 77th president of the people, by the
people and for the people.
G.Goslaw
Landers, CA
Did you ever buy a book only because you were intrigued by the title? Without knowing the author or his motivations for writing, I purchased, “The Trouble with Being Born”, by E. M. Cioran, published in 1973. Yes, a philosophy book written in my life time!
Turns out
that Mr. Cioran was a life long nihilist philosopher meaning that he believed
that there is no meaning to existence in this world. This guy is a nihilist on
steroids. For him,
being born is the ultimate injustice, “the victim” has no say as to who, what, when
and where. This is what has bothered me, being born appears to be total random uncertainty. How does anyone, including God, make sense of the millions of uncertainties within a single birth?
I shall
leave you with a quote from page15. “I do not forgive myself for being
born. It is as if, creeping into this
world, I had profaned a mystery, betraying some momentous pledge, committed a
fault of nameless gravity. Yet in a less
assured mood, birth seems a calamity I would be miserable not having known.”
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca
As best I understand, an existentialist is one of us who traverses our world as this world actually exists. Most of us, travel through our world assuming our world is what we want it to be, ignoring the uncomfortable data. Most of us get angry when someone is arrogant enough to call us on our insanity.
G. Goslaw
Landers, CA
If you are looking for applause, don’t be a philosopher. However, in one way or another, we all are philosophers. We all have to create our own context with this confusing world by choosing our priorities. We have a choice, be a thinking philosopher person or be dead.
A thinking philosopher person asks questions, no questions, you are being led around like a fat dirty pig with a ring in your nose. This is why America is dead, a majority of voting citizens refuse to ask questions. Our dead are stinking and the increasing aroma is taking away our freedoms. Is the stink so strong that we will never again be the land of the free and the home of the brave? Take a deep breath.
G. Goslaw
Landers, CA
Isaiah 25: 6-8
On this mountain
the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet
of aged wine- the best of meats and fine wines.
On this
mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that
covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever.
The
sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces; he will remove the
people’s disgrace from all the earth.
The Lord has spoken.
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca.
This President Trump voter and supporter will never vote for any other Republican to be president, period! These are extraordinary times in the history of our now failing country, no half-hearted political alternative will win the day and preserve our country as a democracy. The old-style American politics is no longer viable because the radical left is not using the good old-boy playbook, they will not moderate their intentions, they have their eye on the ball, absolute control over all the people. It is their way or blood in the water.
The radical
left, all of the national democrat leadership and the stupid democrat voters
who have not woken up, have left the people no choice but to fight fire with
fire. America owes Donald Trump an apology. Republican unity with President
Trump at the front of the red wave, is our only hope to extend the greatness of our democracy. Disunity and disloyalty in the ranks at this critical hour
will not be forgiven and amount to nothing less than national treason!
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca
TWELVE REASONS OUR WORLD IS A HELL ON EARTH.
( the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations, the certainty of death. Isaiah 25: 7 )
One. Everyone born into this life has an automatic death sentence.
Two. Everyone
born into this life is born a life-long screaming narcissist.
Three. Our
world is ruled by blind chance.
Four. Our
world has one morality… might makes right.
Five. In our
world, only the strong survive another day.
Six. Our
world has no regard for fairness, justice.
Seven. Our
parents will ever be the measure of our lives.
Eight.
Everyone is his or her own worst enemy.
Nine.
Everyone is both a victim and a victimizer.
Ten. The
good in life is defined by the extent of gained power or influence over others.
Eleven. Our universal constant is suffering, be it physical, emotional or mental.
Twelve. Our human community has always been and forever will be fractured by our own evil consciousness.
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca