Avoiding Our Gethsemane #13
This is a satirical, negative song I wrote in an Hour. I felt it was Dictated to Me. These articles transpose negatives into positives.
To hear me sing the song click here!
The Garden of Gethsemane in History
The Garden of Gethsemane is the place where Jesus was taken prisoner before he was crucified. It was a time of agony and soul-searching. He had a decision to make about what he would do, and his conclusion was, “Father, not my will, but your will be done.”
Jesus was making a decision we all have to make, albeit not on the level that he had to make. We all must face up to a decision about God. Many don’t want to and fear what he might require of them, so put off the process until they are faced with something horrific like their own death, the death of someone they love, or some other tragedy or problem.
We Like to Be in Control of Things
You see, we like to be the head. We like to be in control. We want to run the show. We want to be the captain of our ship. Life just has a way of backing us into a corner until we finally see we can’t even figure life out.
But sadly, many people have to be confronted with something too big to handle before they are willing to seek God’s guidance and help. Then of course, in our state of mind of wanting to be in control, we want to tell him exactly what he should do.
We Have A Self-Help Mentality Today
We want to figure out the puzzle of life, and then keep it together in exactly the way we want it to be.
We don’t want outside problems or problem people, but the truth is Jesus promised us both problems and problem people in our life. I like the cartoon I saw of the guy rushing into a bookstore with a horrified look on his face. He said to the clerk, “Quick! Where are your ‘self-help books’?”
We must come to the point of realizing we have limitations. An illustration I saw said: “Within many limitations, there is absolutely nothing I cannot do.”
People often seek help in church, and mostly what they get there is ‘self-help’ in one way or another. The preacher usually says, “Go try A-B-C this week and see if it works for you. If it doesn’t then come back next week and I’ll give you X-Y-Z to try.” Of course, the common preaching is, “DO read your Bible, go to church, pray, and give lots and lots of money,” or “DON’T lie, cheat, steal, cuss, commit adultery, yell at your spouse, kick the cat, or be a brat.”
Everything in life seems focused on a type of ‘self-help’ mentality.
There Are Many Philosophies and Religions
And there are so many philosophies and religions in the world that people have a hard time making a decision on which one to embrace. Even in Christianity, there are so many denominations that Wikipedia even has a disclaimer that it can’t even list them all.
There is a church on every street corner or strip mall. Genesis tells of the Tower of Babel, but I call all of this, “The SECOND Tower of Babel.”
According to philosopher Buckminster Fuller, what he calls ‘spaceship earth’ should have a much better set of instructions. I guess he never read his Bible. The Bible tells us the most about life, death, and how to get the most out of our life here on earth.
A Chat with The Gospel Life Coach
People who spend time getting to know God have a much better chance of handling life than those who don’t spend this needed time.
As a lawyer, I became interested in the Bible after reading a Readers’ Digest article about it. This article was about 1970, and it made the point that since the end of WWII, or about 25 years, there had been research institutes set up to prove anything in the Bible to be wrong — things about truth for daily living, the history it presents, or future prophecy.
As of about 1970, for 25 years these institutes had been silent.
As a lawyer who lived in a world where nothing is black-and-white, but a shade of grey, this was of real interest to me. So I began my study of the Bible.
Many make a decision about God strictly from their emotions. They either like the thought of God or they don’t like the thought of God. Their motto is, “Whatever I believe is OK for me.” They have no foundation or input. The truth is you can’t know what Jesus claimed about himself and remain neutral to him.
C. S. Lewis said it best, “He’s either a liar, a lunatic, or he’s Lord.” There is really no middle-ground when you truly know what Jesus said. He’s not just a smart teacher, a good prophet, or a moral man. He didn’t leave that choice open to us. He didn’t intend to.
Jesus was before Pilate after the Garden of Gethsemane, when Pilate asked, “What is truth?” It was a scoffing comment like the truth didn’t really exist. Pilate thought he was the judge of what was the truth. The fact is Pilate wasn’t the judge, but he was being judged by Truth. Jesus very boldly says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me.”