Yesterday my mom got a call from one of her friends from high school -- she called to say that her daughter was going to be on last night's American Idol. So, for the first time ever, we tuned into Fox to witness the Idol phenomenon.
It was one of the saddest things I have ever seen.
There was this one guy who said he never felt accepted by his mom until he broke to the next round of the show. Eventually came the round where he didn't break, and when he called to tell her, she hung up on him.
And then there was a girl who did break, and who exulted sincerely into the camera, "God likes good people," pointing to herself.
It was a celebration of unabashed selfishness.
It was a showcase for people who have no basis for their own self-worth.
It was a throbbing tribute to the pain and futility of living for what you can earn and hold and enjoy.
I kept wanting to jump through the screen and say "It doesn't matter!!! Give up this worthless thing and find something real to laugh and cry and scream and whoop over!"
But that is where most of our world lives.
Once again I was reminded of the importance of the "song" that we sing in our lives. Who are we singing for? What are we singing about?
All of the songs I saw sung on Idol last night were about love. But over and over again the singers displayed that they knew nothing about love. Some showed that they were unloved. Many many others showed that they were unloving.
Praise be to God that He gives us the assurance that we are loved and that HE is Love. That is a song worth singing.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
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7 comments:
Yes when you feel rejected by people you can fall into the arms of a loving Heavenly Father who will unconditionally love you. It doesn't matter how you look, act, think, feel, etc. God loves you no matter what. God will never reject us. It doesn't matter what people think. God's love is unconditional. And that is the love that I rely on when the world around me is falling apart. Praise be to God, Emily. And thanks for this article. May other people find the love that only God can give.....unconditional love.
I just thought of that song....."Of His love I shall ever sing, Till above I behold the King; Thro' eternity my glad song shall be Of the Savior's redeeming love." (There's a Glad New Song, pg. 431, Baptist Hymnal)
The verses are great too.
That was a very interesting and insightful cultural critique. Often we can become so immersed in the culture that we can no longer see clearly to critique it. So I very much appreciate the reflection.
Being the reflective person that I am, I have an interesting question to raise from one particular sentence.
"It was a showcase for people who have no basis for their own self-worth."
Please don't take this in the wrong way, but has this sentence imbibed something from our culture itself? I raise this question because I think it is one that Christians need to be thinking about long and hard.
Is the problem with our culture (and the show) that they have no basis for their own self-worth or is the problem that they are focused on self-worth to begin with?
This whole line of thought was opened up to me by John Piper, C. S. Lewis, and others (from other authors see When People are Big and God is Small for example). They argued that the real contrast is not between pride and low self esteem but rather between being self-focued or God-focused. What pride and low self esteem both have in common is the focus on self. One focuses on the self and evaluates the self as good and the other focuses on the self and evaluates the self as bad, but both are the same in the focus on the self.
The above thinkers have argued that the gospel message isn't about changing our evaluation of our self (except maybe that in the cross we see the depth of our sin) as much as pulling our attention away from ourselves and onto God. To treat the gospel message as giving a basis for self worth would be to miss the point. Piper likens this to going to the Grand Canyon to boost self esteem. That would be absurd. You go to the Grand Canyon to be in awe and to forget yourself in wonder of something else.
So how should we talk about our pleasure in the love of God for us if the point is not a basis for our self worth?
1. I don't think that we should take pleasure in the love of God because it makes us feel special like we are something special. God did not choose us because we are special. He chose us who were rebellious sinners. He chose us to magnify that he is special for showing such grace. And any old sinner would do the job for that so there is nothing special about us. So if the love of God is being used to make somebody feel special it isn't having the right result. We should be feeling how special he is for choosing somebody so unspecial to show such love to. That does not magnify our worth as much as God's worth.
2. However, this does not mean that we should not care about what God thinks of us or whether we are pleasing to him. I think there is a genuine biblical sense in which we want to be pleasing to God, but this does not have to be of the kind of pleasing to God so that God thinks we are something special. A son who wants to be the best basketball player in the world so that the father will be proud and think the son is the best player in the world is different from a child who obeys the parent because they love the parent and just know that it is pleasing to the father to obey.
3. So I think there is a definite sense in which we can take boundless pleasure and joy in the love of God that is not for the sake of building up our self worth and we can still desire to live lives pleasing to God.
I am sure many readers of this will disagree and some may even have a harsh reaction, but I offer it up for further reflection and (hopefully) edification because I believe this is a crucial issue. This effects our own spiritual lives, how we share the gospel, and how we counsel. Whether one disagrees or not all have to agree that if indeed we have imbibed this focus on self worth from the culture it is a significant issue.
Let me give one example of the importance of the point. What will you say to the person who is seeking self-worth in all the wrong places? Will you say, "I know somebody who will give you great self-worth" or will you say, "I know somebody who will awe you so much that you will forget about your pursuit of self-worth to begin with. You will not care about doing dazzling things because you will be so dazzled by the thing he does"?
I end with an interesting question: How many verses can you find in the Bible that focus on self-worth?
I'm sorry for having raised the ugly spectre of "self-worth," as I agree that the heart of our relationship to God is our utter un-worth and His all-sufficiency. I hope that I have expressed that in other posts. I guess what I meant by that term is that "self-worth" in our culture isn't measured by what we are in God's eyes (created in His image, for one), but by what we are in the eyes of other people. By worldly standards, a girl who says "I am moving up in American Idol because God likes good people" could be considered someone with a healthy sense of self-worth. I would put her in the "no basis for own self-worth" category as well.
Oh no, please don't be sorry. It wasn't my intention to make you feel sorry. And really it was only a single sentence in what you wrote. Much of my comment was because I find this focus on self-worth to be so all pervasive among many Christians today.
My point is not that the world looks for "self-worth" in the wrong places but that the search is wrong to begin with. I don't think that to think Christianly on this issue is to switch where we look for "self-worth" but rather to get rid of the search to begin with.
What I am saying is that Christians have unknowingly inherited a question/pursuit which is not biblica to begin with. So rather than answering this question, they should be challenging the very question itself.
The idea of "self-worth" to me carries a lot of cultural baggage. It is something that ends on oneself. We want to be something special. Even when the Psalmist marvels that he is fearfully and wonderfully made, I think the point is ultimatey to marvel at the creator and not the creation itself. The point of the focus on "self-worth" in our culture is to feel special pure and simple with nothing about ultimately marveling in the one whose workmanship we are. It is really a pursuit of glory with the one lacking "self-worth" failing in such pursuit and the proud one thinking they have achieved and are worthy of such glory.
My concern is for those who want to Christianize the pursuit of "self-worth" by talking about how the Christian worldview/message can give them the "self-worth" they long for instead of attacking this desire for "self-worth" to begin with. But, as I mentioned above, these might be jarring statements to many people.
Great post Emily!
American Idol and almost every other TV show and movie are clear reflections of the truth recorded in Philippians 2:15b "....in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation;"
But God calls us to minister in that 'midst'. "That you may become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life..."
I feel sorry for those 'idol' worshipers. They need Jesus. How can I be a 'light' that shines forth the good news of the Gospel of Christ, the true Word of Life, and reach those who God has called me to reach, those who are lost in the midst of this crooked and perverse generation?
May God give us all a burden for the lost. May He use us to reach them with His love and forgiveness, as we share with them the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Paul asks the Ephesians to pray for him to: "...and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak." Ephesians 6: 19-20.
Please pray for me in the same way.
Hey Emily,
Great post! I totally sympathize with you when the desire to jump through the T.V. and shake some sense into those people is aroused. People seem to have lost all true emotions and attempt to over emotioinalize everything! It's curious to see how people experience more emotional pain when Simon tells them they cannot sing, as opposed to there being a death in the family. Perhaps America has gone to far in elevating the importance of individuality?
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