The Danger of Hero Worship

We Christians easily engage in hero worship.  We enjoy a rock singer, a disc jockey or a preacher and we put them on a pedestal.  I suspect that’s one reason Brant Hansen gave up his gig.  I suspect he felt he was becoming the focus of worship and not the Christ he served.  That too is the reason God didn’t plop Moses into a cemetery grave---He did not want the Lawgiver worshipped.  That too is why Calvin chose an unmarked tomb.  If you want to read his works you can, but if you want to pay respects to his body you’re out of luck.  Fortunately I don’t have to worry about being anybody’s’ hero.

To quote Mercy Me, “I’m not saying follow me; I’m not the one who leads…”  I just share life hoping we can walk alongside each other and be encouraged.  Take today for example.  Management changed the schedule I wrote and shorted me a person.  It’s a more complex situation than that but today that was the case.  It frustrates the heck out of me to work in a customer service position and not be able to provide good service.  I spent a chunk of my day wrestling with anger and flip flopping from thought to thought.  I prayed for a good attitude, I prayed to walk in the Holy Spirit and I prayed for those who are persecuted for righteousness in other countries.  Then I’d flip into anger and quote Psalm 58:10 which speaks of God’s vengeance.  So hero I’m not.

The thing about hero worship is that it’s usually make believe.  We place perfect people in little alcoves for worship and there are no perfect people.  Our real worship needs to be God directed.  That means being real with who we are.  We wrestle to be better.  Certainly we can emulate, after all Paul said, “Follow me for I follow Christ.”  God has never been satisfied with the worship of clay idols in place of Himself.  “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves…”

Strong Currents Beneath

A young boy of about twelve years of age I stood on the bank of a river with my parents and commented about how easy it would be to swim to the other side. My parents adamantly informed me that although the river looked calm at the top there were strong currents moving below its surface. I was reminded of this as I took a walk through our local preserve today. Sunday Morongo valley had been hit by a flash flood. The wooden walkway through the preserve was covered with mud. Waterways alongside the walk were now deeply rutted and the ferns which grew straight and tall were gone or flattened. What power there is in moving water!


While hiking in the Grand Canyon in 2012 we were told by a volunteer that they had just fished out the bodies of two Boy Scouts that were playing near the river; a third death of an adult that tried to save them was also reported. I came across the tragic story of Kaitlin Kenney, a 21 year old Colorado woman that was an accomplished fiddler (Colorado Sate Teen Champion) and lover of the outdoors, “friends told investigators that they shared whiskey with a passing group who visited them at their campsite while kayaking. In the days leading up to her disappearance on the night of January 11, Kenney had eaten some of the hallucinogenic mushrooms that she brought with her, but their effects would have likely worn off by the time she walked away from the campfire that fateful night.” There is some doubt as to the mushrooms but an autopsy revealed a significantly high blood-alcohol level. Newspaper stories speculate that she may have got up in the night and fallen into the river.

On every internet news page I pulled up there was a picture of Miley Cyrus on the sidebar. Brant Hansen has a great blog post where he apologized to her on behalf of all adults.

Life looks safe but there can be savage undercurrents that are not initially visible. On occasion the raging waters just suck us out into their vortex. More often than not we fail to heed the warnings from parents, friends and counselors to be careful. “Guard your heart with all diligence,” says the Teacher, “for from it flow the waters of life.”