As you all know…I follow pop culture. It is my understanding that Paul instructs that in order to reach a group of people we must be intentional in our understanding of them. Paul said in his letter to the Corinthian church that in order to reach those under the law he would become like one under the law. To those without the law he would become like one without the law. He further explained that he becomes all things to all men so that by all possible means some might be saved.

Naturally it is not a stretch at all to understand that in order to become like a group of people you need to first have a solid understanding of how to be like them…to understand their world and their culture and start where they are and where they are thinking...without compromising the gospel of course.

So I follow our culture. I know who Kanye West is, I know that Paris Hilton just got her car impounded and I know that Anna Nicole Smith is dead…and I knew who Anna Nicole Smith was prior to her death also, as a matter of fact.

Many of you have contacted me the last several weeks and have asked me “Gary, what do you make of this Anna Nicole Smith story?” I’ve been completely hammered here on the church planting front and have just not had time to sit down and write. When ever you see me disappear on the blog here just know that I’m getting beat up in the office…because preaching and writing have the duel foci of my love and passion in the ministry.

So here goes…I think the Anna Nicole Smith story is incredibly tragic. Anna Nicole of course was her stage name…her given name was Vickie. Vickie, to say the least... had a hard life. Stop all your current thoughts about Anna Nicole…Vickie had a very hard, inconsistent and unstable life. Her dad left when she was around 2 or 3. Her mom, Virgie, married her fifth husband in 2000. Vickie got bounced around a lot growing up…she lived with her mom and aunt Elaine for a while and then her mom re-married and she lived with her mom and her new husband, Donald Hart. During that time Vickie’s name was changed from Vickie Hogan to Vickie Hart. When Vickie was in the 9th grade she was sent to live with her other aunt, her moms younger sister, Kay. Not surprisingly…Vickie failed 9th grade…she dropped out of school during her sophomore year of high school.

She started to work and obviously wanted some stability. She took a job at Jim's Krispy Fried Chicken in Mexia Texas. It was while working there that she met a boy, and I do mean boy, named Billy Wayne Smith…Billy was a cook. So at the age of 17, Vickie married 16 year old Billy in 1985. She married him…I think it is clear that this girl just wanted stability in her life. She likely, like us all…wanted a family that loved her…a place to call home…something she could hold onto. The next year those dreams started to manifest…because her and Billy began a family…their son Daniel was born. Sadly, however…those dreams unraveled quickly…a year later she and Billy split up and Vickie took one year old Daniel to Houston.

She worked at Wal-Mart for awhile and then for awhile she was a waitress at Red Lobster. The reality of being a high school drop out and single mother began to sink in…she felt that she was going nowhere real fast. So Vickie, not seeing any other way and not having been treated with much dignity her whole life…became an exotic dancer. From that day until this day, Vickie has been terribly used by the world. Of course she could have, at any point really, gotten off the ride…and she chose not to. She bought into the façade of the world…to a certain degree at least…it is no exaggeration to say that her son Daniel was likely the only person in her life…literally…that she knew she could trust. Think about that…is it any wonder how devastating his death was to her?

So the men at that exotic bar used her…the exotic bar owner used her…Hugh Hefner used her…Guess Jeans used her…J. Howard Marshall used her exactly like the bar rats did when she first became an exotic dancer…on and on…everybody wanting a piece of Anna Nicole…nobody but Daniel caring or giving a rip about Vickie. It’s disgusting actually. Again…you all know me…I don’t let anybody off the hook…that was the life Vickie lived and she did not put a stop to it…Vickie let herself be used…but that does not absolve the users does it?

Billions of dollars have been made, directly and indirectly, by those who have used Vickie. Billions more will be made in the years to come...and all the while not one person really caring about Vickie. However, they all loved Anna Nicole Smith…she had big boobs, a gorgeous face, was willing to take her clothes off... let them take pictures of her... and then publish those pictures all over the world. Take any one of those three things away…and there would never have been an Anna Nicole Smith for the world to “love”. She was willing, for whatever reason, to be treated like an object…to be gawked at like she was some kind of glorified and glamorous animal…a spectacle…and the world, with a devilish grin and glee…was as usual….willing to oblige. And now, even after her death…the world, like vultures…are circling around Anna Nicole Smith. There is a reason why the news networks have round the clock coverage of this mess…because they are making millions of dollars from it…they are as sick as all these men claiming to be her baby’s father…they don’t care about that baby…they all care about the millions and millions of dollars this drama is generating…

This whole story amplifies for us, again, loud and clear, the way the world is. The world is fake, artificial, a sham, phony, shallow, superficial, petty and selfish. As long as you are useful the world cares…when you’re no longer useful…well…out you go. Is that not the way of the business world? Sports? Entertainment? Is that not the way the world treats marriage?

The world does not now, nor has it ever, seen intrinsic value in an individual…the intrinsic value of the soul. The world asks now, and has always asked, “what have you done for me lately?” Only those in Christ are loved for no reason at all. Think about that…only those in Christ truly experience unconditional love…you can’t earn it, you can’t keep it…you just have it…for no reason at all…God just lavished it.

Followers of Christ are called, repeatedly, not to love the world. The Apostle John explicitly directs us “Do not love the world or anything in the world.”

The lesson is simple…the world does not love you…why do you love the world?

“The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.” 1 John 2:17 niv