Freedom

“What we have here is a failure to communicate”.  Cool Hand Luke

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

sparrow

There are a few words in the Bible that we might consider to be Jesus words. You know, those Jesus words that some scholars tout to be historically authentic. The words that could have been spoken before all the interpreters of religion stacked the deck with additions. Jesus had a thing for sparrows, to him, the sparrow is the national bird of God’s world.  

Why did Jesus use the sparrow to teach us about God? Sparrows are everywhere, they are short lived, they are of little earthly value and they have no power. Every day, every hour could be their last, they are at risk of everything. They are totally fragile but as Jesus said, God cares for them! Despite all the evidence to the contrary, God cares for them. 

Jesus may also ask us, is it therefore lunacy to believe that God could also care for all of us, for you? Well, it is lunacy and it is not lunacy. Shall we ask the sparrow? .

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

Freedom, Freedom

If there be a God, that God is to be experienced as freedom. Dictators are all about this world, even the dictators who use only the name God. They are ignorant of what it really means to live our days in the fresh air of freedom.

How do we know that God loves freedom? God loves freedom because all of us were dumped into this risky, dangerous world where the monsters are allowed to live among us. God wants us to learn of the other world by living in ours. Our world is a teaching tool, are you learning?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Scandal

The scandal of particularity is a God scandal that looks human. It is a scandal for any human to say to this world of multiplied billions of humans that somehow, God has noticed me. Some would say such a claim is craziness and that may very well be. However, is such a claim only Tom foolery? Does or can God scandalously influence the particular individual?

Some say that God does so influence the individual, one on one, and that religion most times is at war with these same individuals. Religion and God are not always comingling because religion is about control and God is about freedom. Those who have been impacted by God do not talk about it, they just go on about their God directed business. They are not broadcasters, they are doers. They are not virtue signalers, they give virtue away.    

The ultimate scandalous question needs to be asked. Could God likeness be advanced among men through the life of an individual as seemingly undeserving as that of a bastard individual? You know, those of us who did not ask to be born at a particular time and place but born they were, born to live their lives in the midst of a very real social stigma and the resulting turmoil. Such a notion would even be a bigger scandal. Some of us believe that God did just that when he scandalously chose to influence Jesus.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

December

What are you 31/ATLAS? Are you an interstellar object on a parabolic orbit through multiplied solar systems to return again in thousands or millions of years? Better yet, are you an interstellar life probe from a distant solar system looking for others of us? We are about to find out in three months. Will our world be a stopping point or will the interstellar object merely wave to us from its orbit, 168 million miles from earth? Hold on to your hats.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Fun

The Bible as in every word is either, truth from the lips of God, or none of the words of the Bible are truth from the lips of God. We believers cannot have it both ways, picking, choosing and ignoring the words that are discomforting. The Bible has been passed to us as a hand me down from God but it is not true blue God. That supposed Bible is an idol, along with the other everyday idols of God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Every writer of every book is a unique interpreter of God with unavoidable blind spots and expressed God clarity. All the words of the Bible have value but only as they are put into the context of their historical time, made relevant to our time and the 5000 year God narrative. All Scripture has value but not equal value, that is where you and I come in. The complicated can be fun.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

What if?

Good morning Mr. Westman, welcome aboard. You are dead before your time and so are the children, do you feel any better? Looking up, Robin responds, well, no. 

Could it be that believing a mother’s lie can have eternal consequences? What say you? Dejected, Robin looks down and is silent. The prosecutor says, “God don’t make mistakes!” The Judge says, "Please go to the back of the bus".

Court of no appeal.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.