People who have been on reality shows have said that they are actually heavily influenced by the producers and heavily edited by the staff.
Right now, I’m sitting at a table in Colorado Springs and looking at Pikes Peak on a sunny morning. Its beautiful. I have been traveling and taking advantage of the hospitality of the people I am staying with, which, at this stop, includes a canyon a block away that I have been walking through every day. It’s hard NOT to notice the incredible beauty of God’s creation and handiwork. It’s hard NOT to focus on the things of God.
I usually start the day with a coffee and checking my emails. Below, I check a number of sources that I use for my business that include news updates. I really must be out of the loop. I just finished reading that one of the Kardashians spent an exorbitant amount of money on a wedding for a marriage that lasted about 72 days. I’m trying to figure out who these people are and why I should care. It’s even more fascinating to me that the people I walk with have made them famous; my fellow citizens
Celebrities stay in the news because we keep them there; buying the magazines, reading the articles, visiting the websites, and watching the TV shows or movies they appear in. We have collectively put them on a pedestal. If these celebrities weren’t making money through ratings and popularity, they wouldn’t be on TV, in magazines, in the news, or in the movies. We make them.
Proof: Bad TV shows with low viewership get pulled off the air.
In the case of the Kardashians and the money spent on a wedding – Really? People are suffering, starving, living in poverty, unemployed, and victims of all kinds of atrocities, not just in this country but around the world. Apparently, these same people who have been elevated to the top through a reality TV show have no real understanding of reality. I wish them the best and will pray for them. Reading about these people made me think about eternity and what is really important.
It makes me wonder about Michael Jackson, Steve Jobs, and other celebrities who are no longer with us and who had a high-profile position in the public eye. They had a stage. They were given a bully pulpit. People listened to what they said and took note. They added richly to our lives. What do you think they are doing right now? I asked my brother this question earlier this week. His response: “I guess they have it all figured out now.” It is true, and for some, brutally.
It also reminds me of a good friend who many years ago sought my advice. He was having an affair and struggling to make decisions about what to do next. I encouraged him to end the affair and, if he decided against it, to come clean with his wife. Several times, in various meetings that we had, I told him directly that he needed God in his life and Jesus as his Savior. He openly rejected these suggestions with unexpected anger and eventually turned his back on our relationship altogether. We had been tight. It hurts, but this was his decision.
Several years later, I received a call from a mutual friend informing me that this man had lung cancer. A few years later, my friend called me again to inform me that he had died. Now, I don’t judge this man’s soul – God does. But I can judge what he presented to me while he was here on earth, and that haunts me to this day.
Mona Simpson was the sister of Steve Jobs. Part of his eulogy: “Steve’s last words, hours before, were monosyllables, repeated three times. Before embarking, he looked at his sister Patty, then at his children for a long time, then at his life partner, Laurene, and then over their shoulders walking past them. Steve’s last words were, “OH WOW. OH WOW. OH WOW.”
What do you think he was looking over his shoulders?
I have been surrounded by a lot of violence and death. Many people have a moment of clarity before they die, and as we approach the gateway between this earth and eternity, there may be many things going on in our spirits and souls that we know very little about. I hope that in those final days and moments, there were opportunities for Jobs to receive Christ.
Several things are clear. I don’t remember Michael Jackson or Steve Jobs publicly expressing Christ or giving glory to God. Would God have expected them to do this if they were Christians? They were certainly given opportunities to do so. The answer to that question is based on your personal relationships with God. It is not the call of every Christian to evangelize boldly. However, most people I’ve met who love God and have come to Him through Jesus have a tendency to find ways to express that, in some way. It’s almost like they can’t help but do it. And, when you think about it, this is what a love relationship does. It makes you want to express it; somehow.
None of us really know when he will take his last breath or take his last step. Everyday is a gift. Are you walking through it with the eyes of God? Do you express God, in any way, in your areas of influence? Are your priorities aligned with God’s heart? Do you represent Jesus well?
2 Peter 3:10 – “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything made on it will be laid bare.”
2 Thessalonians 1:5-10 – “All this is proof that God’s judgment is just, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering. God is just: He will pay the tribulations to the that trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and also to us. This will happen when the Lord Jesus manifests himself from heaven in flames of fire with his mighty angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus, they will be punished with eternal perdition and excluded from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power on the day that he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be admired among all who have believed ” .
John 3:16 – “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.”
John 14:6 – “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'”
Your life here on earth is “a blink of an eye” compared to eternity. And how you go through it will have a huge impact on how you experience eternity.
Accept this: once the notion of eternity drops from your head to your heart, everything changes.
I wonder if famous atheist Christopher Hitchens wishes he had learned that, this side of eternity.