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Christ's death conquers failure
 Regular Network Norwich and Norfolk columnist James Knight looks at our society's fascination with failure and how Christ's death causes victory and success.
Have you noticed how ‘failure’ seems to be such a fascinating matter in this country? Our televisions are full of it; we take into our hearts failures like David Brent, Basil Fawlty, Hancock, the Steptoes, Alan Partridge, and much worse the real lives of people who subject themselves to shows like Big Brother, The X Factor, The Weakest Link, Britain’s Got Talent, and the many other reality shows of this kind - the majority of which entertain us by the participants’ failings, humiliations and their delusions about their own talent.
The bridge between aspiration and success is for most a pretty rocky bridge – we all have our ups and downs, and some do not find their way onto the bridge at all. Yet one ought to observe that success is hardly the panacea that failure so often covets; take football as a good example. They say ‘no one remembers the losers in football’ and this is mostly true - a game that is now so predominated by money has left a huge gulf between the successful and unsuccessful – those that can compete financially and those that can’t. Success is everything except what it really should be; and if a supremely talented player emerges from one of the so-called ‘lower clubs’ in most cases it won’t be very long before his obligatory transfer to one of the biggest and most successful clubs occurs.
If both failure and success consist of pitfalls, one must wonder how Christianity is viewed a lot of the time, as a success or a failure? And does that initial perception condition how seriously one would consider looking into it? Perhaps Christianity is perceived as a failure by many who do not know much about it - after all, a man who claimed to be God was beaten and killed on a cross by the authorities, thus one can understand how to those who do not know the full extent of Christ’s actions, this could be deemed a failure. Even in Christ’s time on earth people were expecting Him to come as a conquering hero in the likeness of King David to defeat the Romans who were occupying Israel and make Israel strong again. These are not the sounds of people expecting Jesus to die:
"Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!" "Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!",
"Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?"
Yet it is precisely His death which causes the victory and the success. He was about to bring peace and glory, but not the kind that the people of the day were expecting – it was victory on the cross that culminated in Christ defeating death so that we could have salvation and eternal life. Even in the present day we have seen how death affects people in the most peculiar ways, particularly when it is the death of someone we know but do not love. There is nothing strange about grieving the death of those close to us; family, friends and loved ones, but I must say I find the whole business of grieving for those we do not know in person a little bewildering. If I could manage at least a little understanding of the sudden and shocking death of a national figurehead like Princess Diana, and perhaps more so the loss of a great talent like Michael Jackson, I was, if I’m honest, left rather baffled by the mass grieving for Jade Goody. Was it all very sincere or did it serve a deeper purpose in people’s lives?
 The world gives us so much to grieve for on our own doorsteps, when we see the death of a celebrity whose character most of us would not wish to be like at all, I really do wonder what people are grieving for. I wonder because in all honesty I have never had the sensation of grief for such things – at least not beyond the ordinary feelings of detached regret and sadness that most human beings could instinctively feel. For me it is more a case of ‘sad to hear the news’, but whereas in my close proximity I can react to such news with ‘what can I do to help?’ or ‘what do I have to prepare for?’ I do not have any of this with detached celebrity sadness. I feel sorry for Jade Goody and of course I wish she had made a recovery but that is about as far as I am able to grieve. I wish Michael Jackson had not died when he did, so too Princess Diana, but that is about as much as I can say.
Given that Christians are in the minority in this country and are far outweighed by unbelievers, perhaps the failure that many perceive is our lack of success in propagating Christ’s victory - after all, it was Jesus who said that the news should be spread as far and as wide as possible. I think this is where we can play our part in making the perceived failure a success, by helping make Christ’s success a reality for those who see it as unimportant.
If we have an in-built propensity to take on other people’s death, why not Christ’s also – is it because it happened so long ago? I think the answer must be yes. We see in everyday life, the more one knows someone the more one grieves for their death, yet if people can find it in themselves to grieve for Jade Goody and Michael Jackson, then surely a little knowledge of Christ on the cross will evoke is us some understanding of His glory. If death makes us aware of our own mortality and causes us to contemplate the bigger picture of the afterlife, I wonder whether the grieving of the death of detached celebrities is really a grieving of the self’s own position. St Paul says in his first letter to the Corinthians that we carry Christ’s death around in us, so it may well be true that every death we see is a microcosm of the big picture of the death of our Heavenly dreams while we are rejecting Christ – the dream that St Paul also said we carry in us – the resurrection of Christ.
If this were true it would suggest that unbelievers would be more likely to grieve for people they do not know than Christians. Being a Christian that might explain why my grief is more a question of ‘I wish Jade Goody had got better’ rather than the evocation of personal sadness and grief. I cannot be sure, but perhaps the luminescence of Christ’s glowing love and His victory over death that I carry in my heart means that unless the death is one of close proximity (family, friends or loved ones) I am far enough from death to be detached from it; I am living the Heavenly dream that Christ set out for me, and the concept of mortality may no longer be a reality in me.
And of course, for the body that has the Spirit of Christ living in it death is no longer failure of life – it is, in fact, the beginning of a new life - the first step to eternal success, thanks to Christ’s victory over death. Failure may be fascinating, death may be overwhelming, but those who wish to supplant failure for the right kind of success, and death for a new kind of living will find the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead will come to live inside the body, and then the truth of success and immortality will be upon that person. And this might well be the reality that people are trying to tap into when they anticipate failure and death. In the risen Christ there is, ultimately, neither - only success and everlasting love.
The views carried here are those of the author, not of Network Norwich and Norfolk, and are intended to stimulate constructive debate between website users. We welcome your thoughts and comments, posted below, upon the ideas expressed here. You can also contact the author direct at james.knight@norfolk.gov.uk
James is a Norwich local government officer, author and Proclaimers church member in Norwich. You can access his current collections of columns here
Meanwhile, if you want to find out more about Christianity, visit: www.rejesus.co.uk |
., 15/12/2009 |
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| | Ria Landon (Guest) | 17/12/2009 23:46 | | Wahoo, here comes the fledgling with her ramblings!!!Interesting article. I remember reading once an article regarding the outpouring of grief over Princess Dianas death (long before I was a Christian). It explained how her death shattered the dreams of the fairy tale princess and how we all hoped she would find her happy ending. We cried for her because we saw ourselves in her.Not just us girls, the lads all wanted to be a night in shining armour for her and their beloveds at home!We all wanted the fairytale! Bearing in mind the press coverage she had and the personna of this woman we were led to have a relationship with, we might understand a little of the devastation that was experienced. Cinderella doesnt die does she? Doesnt she live happily ever after? But hang on a second this is real life isnt it? Regarding Jade Goody, another woman whose personality was governed by the media. When will people notice that it is not the person they are knowing and growing with, but what will sell papers, magazines etc? but thats another article!However, every day we are sold different agendas, one minute hate them , the next love them. But without a doubt, these two women had something in common, they were mothers to two innocent sons and mothers accross the globe will relate to each story in a similsr way, they will grieve for the those boys and what they will miss from the love their mothers could have given them . The grief must be the same whether you live in a castle or a council estate! Each mother is as valuable and precious as the next. I digress, back to article! Unfortunately as James suggests, their misery entertains us! Seriously, there really has to be something not quite right with that? My suggestion is that no matter who these people are, we empathise with them. The article I read about Princess Diana also said that the tragedy that befell her was something everybody could relate to. My dear brother died in the July just before Princess Diana died in the August of that year and if I hadnt cried for him enough when he died I certainly did then! The two have become intertwined, I think of him, I think of her, one an atheist one a believer and I wonder whom God forgives? But who am I to ask Gods reasoning?
We have all grieved at some point in our lives, some of us more than others but grieve we do for ourselves but also for others. I remember reading an article about a lady who was on a bus journey and whilst the bus stopped at a crossroads she looked out of her window and saw a little boy running for the bus but stopped suddenly as he realsied he had dropped his lunch box along the way. The devastation on his face, his panic at his loss was awful to witness, does he run for his bus or try to reclaim his lost possessions, his precious lunch his mummy lovingly prepared for him? His innocent heartache is obvious to anyone who witnesses this incident and there is a compassionate and loving heart in all of us who wants to help this child. That loving and compassionate heart comes from Jesus because he placed that loving and compassionate heart in us. I cry for others all the time, my heart breaks for them, not because of pity or sympathy but because somewhere deep down I lost something too, I know how they feel and if I dont, I want God to tell me or show me so I can at least just be there for them. Grief is grief, no matter the object, the reason or the desire, when you lose something you love it hurts. I have a Christian friend who cannot bear to look at any image of Christ upon the Cross because it hurts her too much, that he suffered so much for us ungrateful souls on earth who don't deserve it. (she doesnt think she deserves it!) I try to explain that he did that for her so that she doesnt have to keep hurting but her empathy for her saviour far outweighs any words of wisdom I may have to offer as the baby Christian that I am! But God is working! I do know however that the feeling she has for the pain and suffering that Jesus bore on the cross comes from devastating personal experience.
God will not and cannot eradicate these situations, sometimes I wonder why he makes some people suffer more than others. But who am I to question God? All I know is that he has a plan for all of us and we've just have to let it go and say: OK, you love me unconditionally so I will you too! And I know that he sent his precious son Jesus to suffer on the Cross for me so I and my friend do not need to anymore. I know this, but many peole do not. I guess what I am asking is do I think that in the real world you have to have experienced grief to know grief and therefore be able to empathise with others? Do we really have to have suffered with Christ on the cross to know what suffering is? Gosh, I truly hope not, we have enough suffering in this world as it is.Wow, i think I just answered my own argument, if ever I had one! Blessings xx
| | | James Knight | 20/12/2009 23:50 | | Thanks very much, Ria, for a very interesting response. I was particularly interested in your comment that the death of Princess Diana (and others like her – Marilyn Monroe? Janis Joplin?) may well have ‘shattered the dreams of the fairy tale princess and how we all hoped she would find her happy ending’. If my theory is correct, that when we observe death we are actually taking on elements of our own needs, hopes, dreams and aspirations and living a sense of vicariousness through others, I think it has theoretical mileage for how much of our other life experiences are really aspects of the salvation story being played out via unexpected conduits.
You are quite right - "grief must be the same whether you live in a castle or a council estate" - and that goes to show that there is no class system or wealth stratification when it comes to the deepest human emotions.
I have never been very enamoured with the celebrity culture, and think it does much more harm than good, particularly when it takes the shine off other good achievements in the process. I actually think it can be healthy to help alert people to a more evenly distributed approbation for celebrity cults by showing that what everyone thinks they know about some bloatedly famous inflated reputation can be false or misjudged, or based on a misreading or misinformation. Here it can be much more interesting to avoid cliché surfing and identify those who we lionise too much at the expense of other deserving folk – an example of which is the canonisation of Martin Luther King Jr, which actually led to an unsophisticated rewriting of history that, because of America’s penchant for Christian heroes, fails to give enough acclaim and recognition to the great black and white secularists such as Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, and Walter Reuther—who did a great deal for the civil rights movement, but whose names remain unfamiliar to most people.
The point is, anyone can say Fred Phelps is a nasty piece of work, or Pat Robertson gravely disfigures the term ‘Reverend’, or Henry Kissinger is a war criminal, or Anjem Choudary and Omar Bakri Mohammed are dangerous fundamentalists, and no one’s going to bat en eyelid, but the moment one says anything controversial about Princess Diana or Mother Teresa or Hillary Clinton, you’re given daggers and told that the consensual view must be the right one – which of course is false security, and this kind of false security by its nature gives huge hostage to fortune.
Regarding my article, if mine was the Samuel Johnson approach, I had suspected that I might have needed a James Boswell to bring the readers’ attention to the brighter elements of celebrity cultures, at least in the sense that you implied with Diana’s ‘fairytale princess’ vicariousness. So as you rightly suggest, for every element of faux gaiety, and the endless tedium of reputation mongering, gutter press, spongers, snobs and poseurs, there is always the elements of these people’s dreams that we play out in our hearts, and if we are astute, recognise them as variations on the dreams we are trying to live through the glory of Christ (I hinted at something similar in my article a few weeks ago about the seven or so basic plotlines).
For every image of one of those gaudy celebrities in hock to social climbers and gossip columnists and showbiz values, we may have in the background hundreds or thousands of people living their lives through these vicarious measures, and through this, miss out on their own fairytale that Christ has got planned for them – the journey as well as the happy ending.
When I was a child, one of my neighbours claimed to have seen an alien spaceship. I did not, in fact, believe her; but the mere making of this claim - the approach of the alien spaceship to within even that receiving distance of actuality, revealed to me at once that if the claim had succeeded it would have numbed rather than satisfied the desire that alien spaceship claims have previously aroused. Once the alien spaceship had been called real, the agreeable desire would have vanished - it would have moved its goalposts, like the rainbow’s end, and there would be a further horizon to which one would aspire a quicker journey. Whatever one would feel at the discovery of something like this, it would have nothing to do with the agreeable desire, and would leave a sense of longing that couldn’t be met with anything tangible. That, I suppose, is what the fairytale story and the salvation story must be like while we are still discovering them, and might explain why so many people change it to gross simplifications and seek their thrills in the superficial world of celebrity showboating.
| | | Tom Booley (Guest) | 21/12/2009 17:07 | | Very interesting and this all goes to show how little our facts of life are really what the big picture is all about. We are all on our own fairytale journey and while it might be tough for many, there remains the hope of bigger things as we persevere in the Lord Jesus.
| | | Ria Landon (Guest) | 21/12/2009 17:51 | | Thank you James. And yes quite, Tom. I have these last few days been reflecting on my first year of becoming a CXhristian. Have I changed since knowing Christ? Yes, very much so and in many ways I wouldnt have expected! A silly example but in relation to the above: I used to be the worlds biggest Robbie Williams fan! Now I feel totally embarrassed by my old adoration of him and realise now that yes he is indeed just a fellow man, on his own unique journey through life! Indeed, no one impresses me much any more, yes some people, books, music, films etc appeal to me more than others but there is only one celebrity in my life now and that is Jesus! Even Christmas has taken on new meaning this year. Its been a very special journey and I look forward to the next year and many more thereafter, embracing and growing in relationship with my saviour. Happy Christmas everyone. God bless
| | | James Knight | 21/12/2009 20:40 | | Ria >> "Now I feel totally embarrassed by my old adoration of him and realise now that yes he is indeed just a fellow man, on his own unique journey through life! Indeed, no one impresses me much any more, yes some people, books, music, films etc appeal to me more than others but there is only one celebrity in my life now and that is Jesus!"
Yes amen to that!! I don't think pedestals are where men and women belong. Jesus is the only King worthy of a pedestal, and the more lionisation we can give to Him and the less to celebrities, church leaders, historical figures, etc, the better.
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