Legacy

We all have a time and a place, this much is for certain. Maybe, this is the only certainty, only the now, our now, is for certain. For all of us, time and place are like the weather, ever changing from the norm of shared expectations. We desperately clutch these shared norms as a sailor clutches the mast of a sinking ship. These shared norms give us a fleeting feeling of longevity. Shared norms such as friends, family, religion, money, property, social status, politics or any other devised legacy. The idea of God can be another dead end legacy or God can be an adventure.

When our clock ticks down to practically nothing, some of us wonder about our place among the many.  What does it all mean?  We humans have been asking that question for millions of years. Our lives have to mean something, if so what?  Do you have any clues? 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Maybe

Religion is making so much out of so little.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Caged

Some of us are generalists, experts at nothing. We dabble on, delving into the whatever, forming opinions which are always subject to the greater wisdom. Some may call generalists accursed because our culture rewards the experts. However, the typical one category expert is not likely to catch the attention of we regular folk. Experts that have walked the general broad road are the blessed thinkers and have earned our respect.  

Some of us pray not for fortune or fame but the gifting of just one thinker who can share expertly, competently and independently, the truths of God, religion, history, philosophy, anthropology, cosmology, psychology and science. These folk are rare birds, indeed. These birds are less apt to be trapped in a cage of someone else’s making. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

Immunity

Department of Justice Memo: Ex-President Obama is here to for under indictment for leading a treasonous conspiracy to dethrone the duly elected president, Donald J. Trump, during his entire term (20016-20). The opinion of this DOJ is that such a conspiracy is not a part of the presidential powers that bring to any past president the shield of immunity.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.    

WOW

WOW. The possibility of an amoral eternity woke some folks up. Just because few of us would make such a claim does not mean that such a claim makes no sense. Ours is an amoral world, an amoral existence. Morality is a social issue not a God issue. Jesus was not a moralist, in fact, the moralists persecuted him, slandered him, put him on trial for claiming a spiritual status apart from the moralists, dragged him through the streets, put him on a cross for a slow death and ultimate humiliation. Was that moral? Jesus appeared among us not to make us or enable us to live right, whatever that may mean. Jesus appeared among us to show us a door to walk through.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Universalism

There is no way a God believer can be anything other than a Universalist unless that believer is selling a book, serving a bureaucracy or living a lie. God is about accountability but not eternal damnation. How God will work that out post death, we can only guess? Christian theologians of every sort have been guessing throughout the ages. This writer believes that there is no consistent God thinking for hell despite the endorsement of the likes of Billy Graham, Jimmy Swaggart and N.T. Wright.

Almost all books are written to please an audience, a market, the very few significant writings are written "come what may". A.T. Robinson's "Honest to God", was such a book. However, few writings of this sort arrive from the religious establishment. However, should another, "come what may" book be written, it may read something like this: God is not a religious extremist who condemns 90% of we earthlings to a Dante Inferno. The hell scenario is in lock step not with God but with our devilish human nature that delights in the misfortune of others.

St. Anselm (1033 - 1109 A,D.) gave God equality with the devil with his satisfaction teaching. God must somehow satisfy his holiness by the mass eternal torture of all nonbelieving souls in the resurrected Christ. Does this sound like a God win? Is God that concerned with looking righteous?  

Universalism like hell is not a new spiritual fad or gimmick. Both understandings have been around since the get go. History has always chosen the winners and losers but do we believe in history or do we believe in our God awareness?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

  

 

Opiate

Our world is not a conflict or contest between good and evil. We have been sold a bill of goods. The Cartesian dualism of good verse evil is rooted in a bedtime story told to the kiddies by the dualist in Chief, Plato. His intent was to give the very young a handle to navigate the blessings and risks of life. Question, could there be another answer to explain our fragile lives?  Many of us have been thinking on that one for a long, long time. 

Recent Old Testament scholarship (Copenhagen International Seminar) has dated the Genesis story of the Tree of Good an Evil at 325 B.C., at Alexandria Egypt, by a large group of Hebrew and Hellenist scholars. Moses had been dead for some 1500 years, leaving no material of this sort that can be dated to his time. As a result and as Karl Marx rightly told us, these (bedtime) stories have become the opiate of the people. How so?

The bedtime stories place the ultimate victory of Good verses Evil beyond this life and our demise. Therefore, the one who believes is shielded against the ravages of today and tomorrow because they are not of ultimate consequence. The reality of this believed victory, may or may not be true, but certainly it will never be verified in this life.  Some say, when bad things happen to good people just believe, have faith in the ultimate victory of God over Satan. This is the “whatever comes my way” opiate.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

      

 

 

FED

The United States Federal Reserve is supposed to be independent of politics but never has been and is now an unabashed Democrat influencer. Let's rename this body politic "the Jerome the Ripper Fed", in honor of another of us who preyed upon the people so many years ago. Those voices calling for more of the same, have a vested interest in the treachery and thievery of the Federal Reserve. 

Chase’s Jamie Diamond, the big bank guru, please take a long walk off a very short pier. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Killers

There exists among us a shadow government pulling the death strings that determine our future.  This shadow government that some of us call, “the deep state”, rains turmoil upon the people in order to hide their treason. The deep state hides within the bureaucracy of Washington. Being popular with the people, gaining political influence apart from the deep state, is a death sentence. The deep state will not tolerate winners. “Make America Great Again” could eventually expose and eliminate the power of the deep state.

The deep state has killed and will kill to preserve their power. Butler Pa. was not a multiple failure, Butler was intentional! The Florida assassination (killing) attempt on the life of presidential candidate Donald Trump was intestinal. The Viet Nam War was intentional. The assassination (killing) attempt and wounding of President Ronald Reagan was intentional. The assassination (killing) of President John F. Kennedy was intentional. The killing of presidential candidate Robert Kennedy was intentional. Martin Luther King was killed and a victim of deep state terrorism. The deep state killed its own in the jailhouse death of Jeffery Epstein. The deep state ordered national security to ignore the threats levels prior to 9/11 and these orders resulted in a death toll equal to that of Pearl Harbor. Igniting a war in the mid east was more important.

All were not failures, all were intentional. The deep state cares not about the holiness of human life. What’s next? President Trump, do not relax anywhere, hire your own personal security and carry a gun. The Secret Service is a paper tiger. The deep state is still scheming. We sense that you are working now under treat. The deep state includes those who take orders, those who know but stay silent, those who choose to remain ignorant and the few who refuse to bow down.

Please Mr. President, set everything else aside, hunker down, and go to war with the deep state. Death to the deep state is our only possible democratic future as a free nation.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Beginning

Probably the most recognized Bible verses, even in the secular world, are Genesis, Chapter 1, verses 1 and 2. The King James Version says it this way, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”

The more modern translations replace “void” with “empty”, the more immediate translation of the Hebrew. Both words describe our reality at its start as a blank space, a void, an emptiness or a nothing space. The traditional understanding among theologians is creation “ex nihilo”, creation out of nothing. Could it be possible that how you start is more important than how you finish? Is matter eternal or is God eternal?

Some say, there has always been God, then came matter. Some say, our world order cries out for God.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Think

We might ask and Texas is certainly is asking, why is life in our world so very fragile? How can a good God or any God be so seemingly sadistic? There are no safe spaces. The Guadalupe River swells 29 feet above normal levels in just 45 minutes, on a holiday and at midnight of July 4. If God had control of any of these circumstances, why did he or she allow the waters to rage? Can a seemingly apparent remote uncaring God be called good? Is not this God’s very existence called into question?  Maybe, as some have supposed, there is no God?

The television networks are interviewing religious leaders of every flavor and asking this question. The consensus from every quarter is that there is no answer, all we can do is nurse the fallout. Every time religion comes up short it becomes a so called “mystery”. There is a lot of mystery going around. If we remain as children stuck in the God is all powerful tree, there will be no sensible answers. God did not put this world into motion to display his powers or his authority.

Maybe God wants his people to think up to there potential. If we remain as children, accepting the “whatever” of others, we will remain as children. Thinking is not about education, it is about coming to understand the obvious and then making adjustments. Common sense thinking is available to all of us.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.          

 

Destiny

I am now doing what I was always meant to do. It only took me a lifetime to get there, hard headed as I am. Established religion was no help. I finally died to all earthly expectations and just listened. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Good

A false dichotomy is used by one philosopher to justify his assent to Christian doctrine. Who am I to call him out but here I am? This philosopher with mighty credentials and literary accomplishments, makes an elemental mistake. In defense of doctrine, he posits a false choice for the reader, a choice between the 300 year old Enlightenment understanding of human nature or a choice for the 1700 year old traditional Church doctrine. Enlightenment says that we humans are essentially good and Christian doctrine says that we are essentially evil (original sin).

After quite thoroughly tearing down the “man is good” extremism, this thinker seems to assume that we should choose Church doctrine for want of a better alternative. Could it be that the “man is evil” understanding is also an extremist view of human nature (forgive me dear St. Augustine)? Extremes are rarely consistent. Could there be a middle ground?

Who are we? We are the obvious, we are all obviously and hopelessly self-centered, no more, no less. Like the rest of creation, we are all momentary survivors. We can do “good” by mitigating our self-involvement or do “evil” by nurturing our selfishness. All of us do both, there are no good guys but we are freely choosing one or the other, that is good.  

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

  

 

 

authentic

We are all in the same boat. We seek an experience with the beyond and then turn to seeking validation in the experience of others. That is how religion gets started. As hard as we may look for a commonality, it is for naught.

Religion as a substitute avoids the simple fact of this our reality, there is no common experience on which to construct a perceived normal spirituality. We all are abnormal, abnormally solo seekers. My experience is not yours and yours is not mine. 

Why are spiritual chops ever so obscure?  Maybe, the authentic is not to be spoken of. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.   

 

 

Tragedy

History was so boring in my early years. Now that I am historical, I have become a bit of a history buff. Learning about the ancient Greek thinkers is a real trip. They seemed to be about finding how we and our world function. Their explanations came close to being a scientific mindset. Aristotle was for all intents and purposes a biologist. The pre Socratic thinkers were talking about atoms. Each was in an investigative mood.

Question: what would our world be like if it had not taken a deep dive into the top down empire of religion?  Circa: the Council of Nicaea, St. Augustine of Hippo and the politically and spiritually repressive Roman Catholic Church. Could the 1000 year period of “the dark ages” have been avoided?  Let’s hope so.

All of us should be thinkers because it matters. Just a little common sense prevents a lot of tragedy. Please, get the kids thinking.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

Juice

God is a moving target. To Aristotle, if it moves, it is God, it is Soul. This made the reading of “On the Soul” by Aristotle a bit disappointing. Some of us were or are anxious to hear again all the spiritual mumbo jumbo, even from the ancients. Instead, what we get is a detailed description of all our moving parts. The word that comes to mind is sterol, “On the Soul” is a sterol description of our reality. Where is the juice of life? Why are we here? Why have we all been here for thousands and millions of years? To be moved?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.   

 

Wisdom

Aristotle taught that, first we must know ourselves and our place in this world and then we can start all that God talk. Not popular religion, we believers first go God shopping. Is it a Teddy Bear God to nurse our emotions? Is it the Judge enforcer God to keep us and the other guy on the straight and narrow? Is it the Patriot God to wave the flag? Is it the Daddy God to give us a bit of supposed security? Is it the God of ancient Greek culture that made our human frailties acceptable? Where ever there is a man, there is a God, some say.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Personal

I have been trying to get into philosophy. Why? God only knows. I have gotten to know some philosophers by the highlights posited by those thinkers who are discussing a variety of life issues. Reading beyond the highlights in the thinkers own words, however, expecting to be convinced, is a tough road. Take Aristotle’s “On the Soul”; my brain matter is definitely inferior but I have one criticism. If you can’t just say what you mean and mean what you say, very few of we intellectually challenged persons, will sit through all the arguments.

Philosophy seems to be a game. Who can make the best argument? It is arguing with no answers. Arguing for the sake of arguing. Many books have a conclusion, I try to go there first. Tell me what you believe or all your thinking is for naught. All philosophy books seem to be written to impress the thinking community not those of us who want answers.

Shall I give up? Hell no!

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.    

 

Real

Socrates was a confirmed conversationalist. He could engage in a conversation with almost anyone because Socrates was an expert listener. Listening is more than language and simpler than 2 plus 2. Listening was a rare talent 2400 years ago but is even more so today in our world. Listening is more than sound waves bouncing against the ear drum, listening is focus, awareness and a hunger to know and understand one another. Socrates was a good listener.

Socrates did not go around preaching and advising as if he was an authority person or expert. He asked questions. Socrates listened and then asked questions about what was being said. He challenged the popular accepted understandings that may or may not be correct by asking questions. This method got him into a lot of trouble with the people who became offended. We prize our delusions.

How many of us spend our days just talking? How many of us spend our days reclining behind the walls of our own little world? How many of us spend our days seeking entertainment or the next adventure or the next high? 

Maybe, we should listen to Socrates and become a real person, a good listener and conversationalist.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.   

 

 

Simple

There is an intellect and then there is an intellect. The total human intellect is more than brain function bound to the body. Our companion human spiritual intellect is a message center that will live forever, “he who has ears, let him hear”, as the Bible often says.

Socrates was the real deal, he named his spiritual intellect “daimonion” or inner voice with whom he listened. His students, Plato and Aristotle preferred to listen to the brain function intellect. Likewise, as most philosophers followed their lead, our understanding of who we are got more and more complicated through the centuries.

We can know who we are if we would just listen.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.    

 

Pain

Forty eight hours have passed since “Ma Ma” left us. Barron spent yesterday running around barking at the fence, barking at nothing, barking a different bark. He was crying out for his “Ma Ma“, where are you? The bark was an expression of painful separation. For the last five years, Ma Ma and Barron have been constant companions and playmates in the front yard at 1990 Gibralter.

For now, the fun is gone. Please don’t tell me that dogs don’t have separation woes or depression. Dogs have feelings too. Will he adjust as we humans adjust? Probably, we shall see but death is so final and our post separation world will never be quite the same.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Apologies

The Iranian Ayatollah has been killing Americans for the last 45 years. Suddenly, when they are about to get their come up in’s, they are not our enemy? Just because we have had eight different presidents over these 45 years singing the same song, means that the Ayatollah has not changed his strips. He is who he is, a murderous religious fanatic who needs to go down with his ship.

As for the people of Iran, you got what you asked for and there are no apologies for the end being messy.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Peace?

Give it up! Expecting or hoping that the Iranian Ayatollah is anything other than an irrational religious fanatic hell bend on killing off western civilization is delusional. It is them or us. It is them or Israel to the death. Peace is a pipe dream.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Vision

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics should be mandatory reading at the High School level as their life long decisions are being made. There are no mulligans in life, no do overs. No matter where one starts, the striving for excellence in whatever we do, will bring to us the better way called happiness or fulfilment.

Most books in this book are rather short, easy to read but a bit wordy. Every page has fantastic discussion points. Get the kids talking about real life and the happiness possible with decisions for excellence.  

Where there is no vision, the people perish (authored by another wise man, Proverbs 29: 18).

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

  

 

Birthdays

Happy 250^th Birthday of Our United States of America Army Corp!

Our Flag is flying at `1990 Gibralter Rd. Landers, Ca.

(Democracy is messy but freedom is worth the fight.)

Happy Birthday President TRUMP our fighter in chief!

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Broken Dreams

Certain supposedly conservative news outlets defend Obama by pointing out his deportation record. This was never who Obama was or is to this day. As president he had to keep the lid on the radical left because he was much too busy getting rich. The mortgages had to be paid on all those mansions. Oppositional heat would spoil the stew.

When the presidential torch was passed to Biden, the controls were no more because he no longer had to take the heat. Obama could run his socialist, communist ferry land by proxy with his supposed reputation intact.  Biden tried to enrich himself like his boss but he wasn’t as cool about it.

Meanwhile the radical left, Obama’s radical left, was running the country visa the auto pen. The radical left governed with a Marxist game plan which is in short, “burn to the ground what has been in order to build back the socialist ideal”.

The supposed ideal is only government control of everything and everybody, control by the few. Democrat leadership is and has been clamoring to be among the privileged few. The socialist ideal is ignorance resulting in broken dreams for the rest of us. We live to dream.

May Obama’s daddy worship never again work its evil among us? As President Reagan warned, as a country, we are never more than one generation away from socialism. Democrats want the people dumb and unaware.   

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

 

Home

Book II, Chapter I, is where Aristotle and this newbie thinker part company. Who are we as humans? What is significant or unique about you and me, as humans? Aristotle is virtue signaling but some of us blew that out of the water a lifetime ago.

“The Virtues then come to be in us neither by nature, nor in spite of nature, but we are furnished by nature with a capacity for receiving them and are perfected in them through custom.” 

Virtues for the few is secondary but Aristotle puts them up on the front pew. No wonder the purveyors of Christian Church tradition and its easy doctrinal believism made the thinking of Aristotle their bread and butter. Spirituality and the pursuit of virtue is about being good little boys and girls, so they say. Aristotle called it “custom”.

O. K., if virtue is secondary, what is primary? Are you not asking that question? Instead of Virtue, what other desire could we plug into the above quote? What other desire is primary and universal among we humans? Maybe, the personal, one by one, search for God reality is primary. Some have called the search, the problem of God. A problem it is because the search desire “is in us neither by nature, nor in spite of nature, but we are furnished by nature with the capacity for receiving” messages from the spirit world.

The best and possibly only way of thinking about this is the natural reality of imprinting. Why does the salmon return to their natural spawning pools?  Does the Salmon have a “homing organ”? What about the homing pigeon? Can anyone, including the A.I. gurus, explain how the homing pigeon navigates? The homing capacity just is. We humans have a home in God land, who knows, wherever that may be. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, ca.  

Welcome Aboard

As individual people, when we choose the good our lives are better, happier, more productive and less complicated. This is a no brainer, we all know it because we are living with the consequences, positive and negative. Forming the habit of choosing the good is called moral character formation. This is an ongoing, life-long, simple lesson we began to learn in childhood but for some strange reason, we too often, young or old, insanely choose to be miserable.

This is my story and probably yours as well. This popular understanding seems to be what Aristotle in saying in the remainder of Book I but he makes it so damned complicated. “Happiness is a kind of working of the soul in a way of perfect Excellence”. Is perfect Excellence a goal or is it supposedly attainable?  We are then taken into a confusing description of the soul, rational and irrational, vegetative, etc. One thing is clear, Aristotle’s understanding of soul is not our 2400 years removed understanding. Before we pat ourselves on the back, 21^th century man is equally confused by soul talk, what it means to me is probably not what soul means to you.

Aristotle finishes well with a short paragraph on what he means by the Excellence of Man. Maybe, somewhere within this Aristotelian definition is an answer to the question, who are we? Some say, as does Aristotle, we are intellectual and moral beings who daily shape our own futures by our choices. Choices we make to think or not to think, choices for the Good or not. Welcome aboard! 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

La La Land

Question, if happiness is our Chief Good, our moral center, what then would our world look like?  Let’s call it “La La Land”! In such a world, who in their right mind would storm the beaches of Normandy? All of us would avoid any cause that would threaten our well-being. Aristotle must have a broader definition of happiness in mind or is death happiness?  To this point this happiness thing seems very elitist, for the very few who can avoid the daily vicissitudes of living and dying. We shall read on.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Happiness

Aristotle’s book, “The Nicomachean Ethics”, comes highly recommended. When I finish this project, I shall report back to this blog but at first glance, the book seems to be a how to advice column on how to navigate this world. Happiness is the goal. Valuable indeed. However, a focus on happiness in this world may be a bit short sighted. For now I shall let Aristotle speak.

What is for certain and the starting point to navigate this world is action, we humans are to be men and women of action, doers. Aristotle seems to agree. Question, what are we chasing, a rule book that leads to happiness or are we chasing the Good as in Plato’s world?  Or, are we first chasing after an illusive understanding of God which as we progress, may or may not bring happiness. Who can be happy in bad times?  The only definition of happiness that works for me is a sense of fulfillment and meaning in this world of ours. God is happiness and God is the Good.

This present understanding is open to revision as I dig. Later.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.        

 

 

monster

Does anyone else wonder who is calling the shots for the Democrat opposition to this Trump Republican administration? Could the shot maker be the dude who repeatedly calls every liberal judge to do law fair? Does anyone else wonder who was directing the Biden Democrats from the bleachers? Does anyone else wonder who was calling the shots in opposition to the first Trump presidency?  

What kind of American political leader would advocate giving away our national sovereignty and taking in the world’s trash? Who would use the Marxist playbook of destruction in order to build it back in the way of communism? Who would consent to making America a satellite nation that takes orders from China? Who but one who is angling to be the destroyer of our country. Who but the one who promised us fundamental change.  Now we know what fundamental change was all about.

You got it, the black African monster Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President of these United States and destroyer in chief.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

 

Embarrassed

Because the third century B. C. Jewish writers of their history mistakenly used the Platonic juvenile bedtime stories about a human beginning amongst the Gods, the Bible thumpers have been embarrassed. Some blindly cling to these beginning tales while others have come to consider all cosmology (our big picture) almost evil or to be avoided.

Neither of these reactions will survive. Neither will give today’s God believer the courage to walk uprightly into eternity. Where are the prophets of a new cosmology?  Where are the prophets with a cosmology that fits our human experience? Somebody out there can talk knowingly about science, psychology, philosophy and God without being embarrassed. Where are you?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Death

I will never know myself as myself again, however,

myself will merge and submerge into the greater circle of knowing.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Guessing

Paradise is nowhere but life is everywhere. Life is before the beginning and after the ending. Life is beyond definition. Time and existence are somehow circular. Life fits our best description of God and life is a God gift. As it ends, separation from God ends and life begins anew. 

G. Goslaw 

Landers, Ca.

Trust

Faith is otherworldly trust. There are no boxes to check, we are not voting, for life comes and goes without rhyme or reason. Trust is permanent. Trust is knowing that no matter what we encounter in this life, good, bad or indifferent, God has our back.

One day soon, the curtain will be raised and we shall all understand. A grand party awaits and nothing can separate us from that joyful future.

Until then, are we listening for the party sounds? For now, are we following the party sounds? For now, do we trust the party sounds?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Beware!

Are you aware?  Hasn't the post 2020 Democrat party fled from the cause of  compassion to violence? Maybe, violence became the acceptable political tool of the Biden Democrats? As a result of this shift, compassion has become the missing cause. Has the self-righteous concern for the alien wanderer and the homeless only been an act? Democrats can only answer that question.

Old school Democrats are now in danger as Republican leadership has been endangered. Are you scaredy cat Democrats being used by the purveyors of hate to spread their evil?  Borders are not evil; people are evil. All modern Democrats are either evangelical hatemongers or just willfully ignorant or just plain scared.

There is the possibility of evil everywhere and we are all hypocrites so look around, are you aware?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

copyright

Some books, if not a few, have something to say to us. When we find such a book, it makes all the book browsing somehow meaningful. However, no author has it all together, every author is either a reaction in opposition to or a builder upon what has gone before. There is always dribble to be separated out of every good book. 

Complete originality has never happened nor will it.  Yah, but that’s the book we all want most to read.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.     

Stuff

Our world was abuzz with God talk. There was no media news sourcing, no newspapers, only the latest rumors. Rumors spread across the known world about a missing body, the dead body of the man Jesus, taken down from his death cross and buried. This body is now reported missing. What shall we make of the rumored empty grave?  What is the man on the street to think?

There were spiritual centers but no organized religion. Many opinions flourished and then were challenged. One’s God understanding had become a life and death opinion. Chaos reigned. There were two major combatants, those who believed that the resurrection of the man Jesus was a God event and those who believed that the man Jesus was God, having the same stuff as God and co-eternal with God.

Going into the fourth century after the Jesus event, the 19 years old Emperor Constantine became the supreme God of the disintegrating Holy Roman Empire. There was chaos in his empire and chaos on the streets. There was a cry for unity from all quarters.

Emperor Constantine threw a party for all the spiritual leaders of the day, at his home turf at Nicaea, present day Turkey. Constantine wined and dined the spiritual leaders of the known world for months and then turned to payoffs, bullying and threats. It became clear that no one was leaving until there was an agreement.

This agreement became the First Church Council at Nicaea, 325 A.D. The agreement declared that Jesus was also God and possessing the same stuff as God. The Christian Doctrine of the Trinity of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, was born. Seventeen hundred years later, this is the unquestioned understanding among Christian believers. To claim to be Christian is to accept the conclusion of the First Church Council, (325 A.D.).

Three spiritual leaders would not agree with this doctrinal conclusion. Emperor Constantine banished Arius, the most popular spiritual leader and dissenter. The other two dissenting spiritual leaders were murdered by the emperor.

Make of this what you will. Is it enough to say that God can use evil to accomplish good? 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.       

All

God is not social, only universal. All means all. God embraces all of life, the good, the bad and the ugly. Make all the earthbound qualifiers that may please the folk in the short term, however, don't mess with eternity. The only damnable people are those self-righteous fools who place anyone, regardless of race, religion, kinship or supposed moral integrity, beyond inclusion in the forthcoming unity of the Godhead. If it works for thee, it works for me. Amen.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

 

Vision

Human life is always a faith trip, there is no other life for us, no human independence, no faith free zone, we all believe each day in something or someone. To those of us who have come to believe that as humans we are also spiritual beings, a part of living is extending a hand to the spirit world as if to say, “here I am”. The Moses mural on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome memorializes this inherent and universal human desire. The desire to be noticed by God.

This desire to be noticed by God is at times denied, scoffed at, substituted for or ignored but the desire never quite goes away. We have all been there. The God desire may appear to go away at times like the puddle of water after a rain storm but it has only changed places, returning later from elsewhere. The God desire is as human as imagination is human. We are human spiritual beings because we look to the stars, we look to the beyond. We look beyond ourselves.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Ultimate Question

Why is there something rather than nothing?  Is there anywhere an answer?  A God or gods?  No God, then what?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Trees in the Desert

15,000 sq ft: fenced yard, 1990 Gibralter Rd., Landers, Ca.

(1) Sycamore: front (origin)

(1) Fruited Mulberry: rear (planted)

(1) Fruitless Mulberry: front (origin)

(2) Joshua Trees: front (origin)

(1) Joshua Tree: rear (origin)

(1) Oak: rear (planted) 

(1) Italian Cypress: front (planted)

(2) Monterey Pine Trees: front (planted)

(2) Evergreen trees: front (planted)

(4) Evergreen trees: rear (planted) 

(1) Eucalyptus tree: rear (origin)

(2) Dollar Eucalyptus tree: front and rear (planted)

(1) California Pepper tree: rear (origin) 

(1) California Pepper tree: rear (planted) 

(3) California Pepper tree: front (planted) 

(1) Pickled Orchid tree: front (planted) 

(2) Juniper Evergreen shrub: rear (planted)

(1) Evergreen shrub: front (planted) 

(3) Oleander bushes: front (planted)        

         All planted trees (11 to 4 years old)

         All origin trees (50 to 70 years old)

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

maybe not?

One day something different happened among us. Two thousand years later, this world is still trying to figure it all out. An obscure Hebrew spiritual teacher without credentials, from the obscure and tragic land of Palestine, was hung on a Roman death cross because he disrupted the political/religious order of things. There is nothing different here, nothing new. Then, out of the blue, all that resurrection talk began. The whispers permeated the known world. Does dead not mean dead?

Maybe, maybe not. If you or I had a still heart and no brain activity, certainly we would be pronounced dead, given a number and a ride to the crematorium. End of story, well, maybe, maybe not. Does dead mean dead, is death an ending or a door?

This is the question of every time? It was the question that haunted our world two thousand years ago and haunts us to this very moment. After all the supposed human progress, the gargantuan libraries in the sky and all the scientific advancement that has revolutionized our world, still we ask, does dead mean dead?  The question has no answer in this world, only opinions.  

Most of us avoid asking the question, let alone posing an answer. Some of us just file away someone else’s answer and walk on doing our own thing. Forget about what is on or in the next room, in our time, only one question bothers us, does dead mean dead? Forget the macho bravado stuff, all the denials, death as an ending, bothers us.

Shall we take Easter for what it is? Easter is one day in our limited world, a day to celebrate the, "maybe not"!  Party on!

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

 

 

Questions

What is consciousness?  How is it that we humanoids are not only aware of our now but also the past and possible futures? Why are we humanoids able to ask the questions, who am I, who are you? Is the male dog asking any such questions as he sniffs the behind of any female in his world? Why is there such a momentous distance or gulf between we conscious humans and all other forms of life? Does any concept of a mere natural progression provide an adequate answer to these questions?

If not, what is going on here?  If the answer is yes, we are taking the bridge to nowhere, are we not?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

Appendix

Every good book has a climax. Every good book promises to take us somewhere yet unexplored. Some books do and most do not. What is God about in this world of ours?  Is God about reshaping the peoples of our world? Not so much, despite all the claims to know God, we have yet to find a worthy and engaging reflection.  Every ethic, theology, every book is but a short-term fix to a long-term human problem. This problem cannot be fixed, we are who we are. Like it or not, we are who we are.

Maybe, the only live option is to surrender. Surrender to our own and others’ expectations. Surrender to the supposed divine expectations. All the plastic surgery available to us cannot turn we who are ugly into the beautiful. All the makeup is pointless. Give up and grow up!

Ours will ever be a competitive, dog eat dog world. Why are we all born as combatants? Why were we all born to trust in something? If there be a God, the only marker available to us in this world is to trust this God, past all the craziness and beyond the grave. Somehow we as individuals are significant, somehow we matter, our lives matter. 

Living and learning to trust in the surety of God is the only meaningful earthbound viable option. It is not easy but it is not complicated.  

What have we got to lose?

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

 

Diagnosis

"Whether we call ourselves liberals or conservatives, there remains a flaw in the human species, a sin that clings to us as tribal creatures afflicted with a seemingly incurable disease: we would rather be right than loving.  We would rather be correct than compassionate. We would rather be saved than seek justice. This is why it is so much easier to reach a verdict than to become a disciple. This is why the church is dying."

The Underground Church, Robin Meyers, 2012, p. 29.

 

 

Done

I have said my peace. What little I know of myself, I know for sure I am a good starter and a lousy finisher. This one thing I have finished well. I have shared what was given to me as I searched for the hidden God among us. No more, no less and am convinced that this God cares for us all and our country in total. This God cares for each of us despite all the evidence to the contrary. God cares as all the negative appearing earthly evidence rains down upon us as if in a thunderstorm. God cares because there is the eternal rainbow.

To all those who so choose, take it from here. For me, this is done. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

 

Mix

Eternity should properly be called the Mix. Defined as a grotesque melting pot that the God of eternity is forever stirring toward unity. We humans come into this world by a process of dispersion or scattering, our only choice is to explore or search out our earthly place. All of life in our world is a grand dispersion or scattering.

Eternity is the reverse of scattering. Eternity is a grand coming together in the Mix.  

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

More

Death is a turning of the page. Every sinew of my being says there is a God of the next page, there has to be such a joyful place for joy is such a rare earth mineral, here and there but never for very long. Life is about competition yet life has to be more than just scratching at the earth for a place in the sun. Life has to be more than heredity, gene pools and the like. There has to be more.

We arrive with nothing; we are deserving of nothing and when our page turns, all of us are nothing or we gain everything. The game does not end on the fifty-yard line, it is all or nothing. There can be no half way God. Thusly I believe or more correctly hope. A hope is far beyond wishful thinking, hope is more of an earned expectation after much searching. This is the universal constant in our earthly life equation.  

When and if the competitive fires have gone out and the dreams are no more, we alone await the turning of the page. Wait one minute, some of us scream, that may be the alive definition that some of us live out but the turning of the page more likely is a wrecking ball that intrudes into the world of this competitor. Death is an enemy, a robber that prowls the night, there are dreams yet to be lived. What say you?    

Life is not about justice or fairness, only the fight is guaranteed to us in our world, nothing more. Winning or losing is not the life barometer, the only barometer that makes us alive is our competitive life fight, win or lose.  One round or ten rounds, opportunities missed, roads not traveled, applause or condemnation, they all are of little consequence. 

The more has to be so much bigger.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

 

 

Sparks

Charles Darwin, among others, was born on February 12, in the year 1809. Two hundred and sixteen years later, our Christian God thinkers have failed to take into account our world as it actually exists. As a result, they have tried to keep God believers in the story time caves of ancient thought.

One hundred years after Darwin published his book, “On the Origin of Species” (1859), most of our world had agreed with Darwin. Even the God believers in the pew have awakened to the new science reality as the turmoil caused by this publication began to subsided. The caves have become increasingly irrelevant to the people, we have to live in our now world.

The Christian God thinkers, regrettably, are a cave dwelling Church protected class. Some God thinkers in the last fifty years have tried to sound hip to Darwin but I have yet to read a plausible, consistent and scientifically relevant God understanding that fits our world. Please, just give me a name of one such authority, ggoslaw@gmail.com. While I await the flood of responses, I shall continue.

The authorized Christian God thinking cave dwellers have a problem. They say, how can we speak to the people in a manner that is relevant to modern science, particularly Darwin, and at the same time remain glued to the historical doctrinal statements of the faith and the Christian Church? This Church has demanded for thousands of years conformity to the creedal statements as it labels all dissenters heretics and deserving of impoverishment if not burning at the stake.

Who can blame anyone with skin in the game for not bucking the religious system or systems? Not I but maybe this is why God has consistently picked on the nobodies of this world to breed correction. We nobodies have nothing to lose. The correction at issue is twofold, Jesus was the best nobody to have lived among us and he selflessly lived out his God given message. Second, our history as humans is of this world not the story telling improvised genealogy of the Genesis account. This is very simple and direct but the sparks will fly.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.    

      

 

Beauty

There is nothing more beautiful than a woman in labor or a woman who yields life leadership to a man while ignoring her own superior abilities.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca. 

 

Fog

Sin is an earthbound fog. The fog limits our vision and awareness of consequences. Sin is an atmospheric condition similar to that of any other. Sin can be seasonal or doggedly routine. Sin can be geographically located or burned off by the sun. Sin is arrogance.  What sin is not, as some make the biblical story time of the Garden of Eden to say, is an unavoidable God ordered natural human condition. Sin is an atmospheric condition.  Our world was created with the possibility of living and dealing with the arrogant fog or the choice of seeking clear skies. That was the choice given to every human as represented by the tree in the midst of the Garden of Eden. What the tree or the fog is not, is our natural human God ordered and intended destiny.

Life therefore becomes a test, a choice, that choice will reverberate into eternity. Jesus chose to walk into his God intended destiny, the humble way. When Mahatma Ghandi was invited into an unfamiliar home during his many travels, he would first go to the bathroom of that home and clean the toilet. In so doing, this saint was making practical the belief that the arrogant fog, for him, had long gone. Cleaning toilets was his way of staying out of the arrogant fog. Now that is a test.

G. Goslaw

Landers, ca.   

 

Partytime

Anyone who has read a few pages of our human history knows that three things define who we are as humans. We like our sex. We like to kill each other and we like to party. Jesus also was a party animal. Jesus screamed to his world of Palestine 2000 years ago, “hey, guy’s there is a party going on”. Drop the swords and the one upmanship and follow me to the party of all parties. The tables are set and the celebration is already happening in eternity.  The only question to be answered there, in eternity, is the seating arrangement, who shall be closest to the action at the head table?  

We shall be eternally thankful that God will decide that one but for Jesus, the seating arrangement will be about one choice we make in this life of ours. Are we satisfied to chase after the temporary big three or do we chase after the forever God. The God that cannot be defined in this world, the absentee God who beckons to every human ear.

Party on friend!

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Common Sense God

 1.   One God

 2.  One God for All of us.

 3.  One God who ever rewards the seeker of God joy.  

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca 

Never Alone

“It is a harder path to hear answers than to ask someone to give us an answer, but it is the path that many people have embarked upon.” CAR: DBB, 2012, p114.

In my own experience, it has been the only path left to me, on my front porch. No matter what we are going through in this beautiful, hazardous and frequently ugly world in which we find ourselves, we are never really left alone to face the whatever trauma of living, guaranteed. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Signing off (Maybe)

Signing off, some say signing off at last, after 939 blogs and fifteen years it is time to shift gears. It has been fun and I have discovered abilities that have been dormant for a life time. Many thanks are extended to those few readers who have been patient with my dribble. The radical left of Soros, Obama and Biden have been given a gut punch that will sideline their treachery for years to come. Our country is now in the capable hands of President Trump with a great future before us. I will be flying our house American flag tomorrow and watching all the festivities.  History will record tomorrow as a pivot point; the people shall reign.

As for the God stuff, I have arrived at a God understanding that is not traditional Christianity but it is at least for me viable going into the future in this modern world. All religion is a no go. Agree or disagree, time will tell. 

You have my best wishes and to all a good night.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

Secret Place

Psalms 31: 20 The songster David describes his God.

You (God) hide them in the secret place of your presence from the conspiracies of man; You (God) keep them secretly in a shelter from the strife of tongues. NASB

We humans are social animals. Does this offend you? It shouldn’t. The Rufus monkeys are social animals. Their language is not our language but among Rufus monkeys, they relate to one another as a group, socially. So it is with we humans, verbal language or body language, we are a specific group in the animal world who are necessarily socially related. I wonder if monkeys have secrets, maybe, maybe not?

We humans do have our secrets but more importantly we have a secret God place. This place will not show up on a map or an X ray, it can be denied, laughed at and ignored but this place always has the lights on. The secret place is possibly the only place for us in this world with total privacy. Do you secretly desire such a place with total privacy, to be totally alone? Such a place is free from all the social gamesmanship of this world. That avoided desire for such freedom is a seeking after the unavoidable God secret place we find in our aloneness. 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

 

 

 

 

Fair Play

A message for the soon to be new Secret Service, detail all the recent Woke hires to protect Joe Biden and friends! 

Need we ask the opinion of those who were burned alive and the thousands of recent homeless in the LA fires? Without competence in government, we all are doomed as a nation.  Where are the celebrities now?  

Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Many

The reality of God is not mental high jinks or accepted tradition. The reality of God is only experience, one person at a time being touched by the eternal.  If so, why so few? Are the many mere spoiled goods to be trashed or recycled? What our world has always and most needed is not a theology of the few but a God understanding of the many.  All of us, arrived with nothing and leave this world with everything.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

Betrayal

The nameless writer of the Old Testament Book of Ecclesiastes was a thinker that today we would consider to be an existentialist. Such a thinker believes that the individual person is responsible for creating purpose and meaning in their own lives. Gods, governments, parents, teachers and all secondary authorities are only advisory. Like Friedrich Nietzsche, the God is dead philosopher, most of these thinkers do not believe in a God or Gods.

The writer of Ecclesiastes was an everyday existentialist but a God believer in the long-term. To him, in the short term, all of life is meaningless and beyond our understanding.  All of life is “a chasing after the wind". (1:14; 1:17; 2:11; 2:17, 2:26; 4:4; 4:6;4:16, 6:9 TNIV) This was the short-term conclusion he arrived at after observing and experiencing all the goings on here on earth. 

“All this I tested by wisdom and I said, I am determined to be wise but this is beyond me. Whatever exists is far off and most profound-who can discover it? " (7:23,24 TNIV)

The writer tested with wisdom, today we would say we are testing the evidence. No evidence was readily available to prove the existence of God, then or now.  He looked around, concluding: 

" The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; BUT TIME AND CHANCE HAPPEN TO THEM ALL." (My Capitals: 9: 11, TNIV)

Where did the cosmic disciplinarian God go?  Surly God would be handing out benefits and bonuses to the good guys.   

"There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: the righteous who get what the wicked deserve, and the wicked how get what the righteous deserve." (8:14, TNIV) 

God did not and does not make sense in the short term. Our Gods can betray us, religion can betray us, governments can betray us, family can betray us, teachers can betray us, in whom can we trust? The only possible answer is the long-term God hiding in our midst. 

That God, the God that snuggled up to the nobody Jesus, snuggling up so close that Jesus called this God Father. That God who promised us in the words of Jesus another reality in our world and beyond death. Jesus named that reality the Kingdom of God. We arrived with nothing and leave with everything (gg). 

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

 

 

 

Fire!

The front porch is habitable again. My porch faces east and the house is a natural shelter from the breezes that come off the ocean.  The Santa Anna winds, however, are another story. Without the sun and the winds blowing fiercely, the only shelter is indoors. My morning smoke on the porch stops when these miserable winds blow as they have the last few days.

How miserable can they get?  Just ask the folk in the Los Angeles inferno who lost their homes the last few days. I hesitate to make the winds political but there it is, Los Angeles has reaped the reward of voting for the liberal environmentalists who would rather budget social wokism than available water and fire safety. Elections do have consequences, sometimes firry consequences.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.    

 

Unity

The One hidden God living among us is the God we humans have consistently turned into a variety of religions, each of which serves only to separate we humans. No religion works to our good and they are all dead ends. Thank God, the One hidden God living among us is bigger than our petty pipe dreams. Just wait, unity will be had by all, someday soon.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.

 

 

Welcome

Are there any adults among the 2025 political gathering in Washington? Just one politician is willing to say out loud what everyone knows to be the truth. Therefore, there is only one adult. Senator Rand Paul says, there can be no successful long-term money reform in Washington unless entitlements, welfare spending, Medicare and Social Security are a part of the discussion.  This is the ugly truth.

Maybe, President-elect Trump should welcome Senator Paul to the soon to happen, national cost cutting party.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.  

 

Hope

Are we as Americans in 2025 children or adults?  Are we participants in our democracy or are we merely feeding at the trough of government?    It would seem that in our time, the adults among us are few. No matter the income level, social status or education, all of us are intent on chomping down at the welfare office and the stock market. Our cries for more and more are baby talk and our politicians in Washington earn their mansions by dishing out the baby food. This is the now America.

Blame it on the politicians if you must but we every day Americans have to change or we die. We have to grow up. We must become givers who want the greater good, the elusive national good. The ancient Roman empire faced a decision point as monumental as ours and failed. Two hundred and fifty years of growth and then two hundred and fifty years of fractured dreams that ended in national suicide. Are we so special that we can somehow buck the trend of history?  2026 will be our 250^th year anniversary as a nation.

Let’s get practical. Most of America welcomes all the MAGA optimism about the future of we the people and deservedly so. Optimism has the power to influence history in the short term but optimism is not enough, optimism is not hope. Hope is long-term, hope is adult stuff. Hope says we are about paying the price now for a better future. Hope says we will feed the kids first and be content with the leftovers. We adults must join together and be better American participants.

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.     

 

  

 

 

Sparrows

St. Matthew 10: 29 -31.

29. “Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.  30. “But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.  31. “So do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.       (New American Standard Bible, 1995.)

29. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?  Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. 30. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.        (New International Version, 1978)

29. Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And one of them will not fall to the ground without your Father.  30. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.    (King James Version, 1611.)

My new (old) Bible came in the mail yesterday, New American Standard Bible 1995, Giant Print, indexed, red letter, brown that looks red, in genuine leather, $35. Love it for all these reasons but mostly my affection is based on sentiment. I discovered the Bible when I bought a NASB paperback edition in the seminary bookstore, 1977, or so. I was not a good student nor a good fit for the job but the NASB and I have been partners ever since those days. Little did I understand that the search for authenticity would take so long.

The description of God as expressed in these three verses are, in my humble opinion, the most authentic Jesus words in the Bible.  Jesus words are simple, primitive and earthy. We are like sparrows whom God cares for even in death yet we are more valuable than the sparrow to God.  Much of the remainder of Chapter 10 can best be described as what others said about what Jesus said, therefore, in my book, verses 29 to 31 stand alone.

G. Goslaw 

Landers, Ca.

 

 

Again

Woke FBI: The message in New Orleans, again, don’t believe your lying eyes! Not until President Trump is in charge of the FBI, will we be informed or given the truth about what motivated the new Orleans terrorist.  Was he an illegal alien, a mad liberal Democrat, an Iranian doing Jehad, an angry sex charge person who believed the lie that happiness is about sex or just a hate filled degenerate?  

The act itself was and will ever be intentional terrorism. Bravo Ms. Mayor. All this dying over the last four years is the Biden, Democrat legacy that they will carry for many years. Who says elections don't have consequences?    

G. Goslaw

Landers, Ca.