Getting Closer to God In Three Easy Steps

IT IS REMARKABLE, and perhaps a bit disconcerting, the sheer volume of material on Facebook amenable to the writing of essays. Without Faebook, this website would still exist, but would undeniably be more difficult, and maybe even less interesting. Its almost as if Facebook is a compressed microcosm of the internet,and the inernet, a not so compressed microcosm of our wide, wild world. The only differene is that one half ot the internet is pornography, we are told, whereas the percentage is less,if only slightly,on Facebook and in the world at large. Facebook,of the three, is governed the most strictly, or so it is claimed. Everybody who publishes posts on Facebook knows exactly what they are talking about,and much about what they aren't talking about. Certainty of conviction is never in short supply in the internet, at least among American users, where everyone is an expert on something. Of the wide world of planetary posting, I am not qualified to speak, as if that should stop me, or would stop your average Facebook user-poster. This one said, and I kid you not, something like: "Three ways to get closer to God". Not three humble suggestions; three ways, tried and true. I was so immediately contemptuous of the blatant presumptuousness of this post that I refused to click on it, an find out exactly how, in three easy steps, to get closer to God. Now, I'll never know, to my probable detriment. I tend to block and or remove religious fanatics from my list : this one I'm glad I did not, not yet as least, and, Lord willing, I'll have another shot at this presumed bit ofsurpassing wisdom. If I do, look for another essay. And now for some sheer speculation. Are the three was to get closer to God all Christian, their applicability confined to that particular faith? My best guess is yes, they are. I simply canot conceive of a Facebook post of such an allegedly authorative nature having anything to do with any religion other than the one true Amerian one: Christianity. Heaven forbid that the three great eternal verities of a facebook religious post be applicable universally, extended to any or all of the world's, what, several thousand religions, or even the big three Abrahamic ones! As to whether the limitation extends to Protestantism or Catholicism, or if to Protestantism, which of the several hundred (or is it several thousand?) denominations as the one true relevant and applicable one is anyone's guess, certainly not mine. Next question, the vital one: exactly what are the three principles or methods or suggestions or whatever for getting close to God? My first guess? 1) Read the Bible...2) go to church...3) pray daily, or hourly. Although that sounds a bit too prosaic, never forget,there is nothing too pedestrian and prosaic and unoriginal and hackneyed to be included in advice on how to be a good Christian, assuming that it involves accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, fearing God, praying,reading the innerant word of God, and so forth.Problem is,once one has listed these most basic means of getting closer to God, one has exceeded the number three. I count five, minimum. The numbers don't add up. Whose fault is that, one might ask? Obviously, none other than mine. If only I had been more openminded, and lesscynical and contemptuous, not only would I now know how to get closer to God, but I would not now be languishing in theologicl uncertainty. But,on the other hand, this essay would have been impossible.