Good Friday morning! A merry and wonderful Christmas has just passed, and we eagerly anticipate the next one. Today, as I explore my purpose in life, I am wondering just what that purpose is. Yes, I am created to glorify God, but just how to accomplish that? As you may have guessed already, I have begun The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren (day 7 and counting!). Perhaps at the prompting of this book, or more likely at the prompting of the Holy Spirit, I see that we have a problem here and now. In the old days of the Cold War, we often criticized the communist news agencies as tools of their respective states. However, the major problem with current news agencies under capitalism is that they are tools of that dreaded bottom line. We wonder why news seems to become ever more sensational, and the answer is to improve the bottom line. Think about it. To get more viewers, which improves the Nielsen rating, and thus allows the channel or show to charge more for advertising, the news must compete against other news sources. Now we may think that getting to the news first is one way to accomplish that, but there are other ways too. More attractive news anchors, better pictures, and better commentary are also ways. However, as those managing the finances take over the company direction - don't laugh, it happened at my old workplace and probably yours too - employees are pressured to find ever more creative or underhanded ways to gain more viewers.
We chuckle at the channel billing itself as "fair and balanced" at the expense of the other news sources, which must by definition then be "unfair and unbalanced." This morning, I thought that perhaps a not-for-profit, unfair and unbalanced news source might be just the thing for these dark times. Instead of reporting that 6% of the working population does not have a job this morning, this news source would joyfully report that 94% of the working population is in fact gainfully employed on this fine morning. Which would you rather hear? :-) Our new news could report on the joyous arrival of new babies around the world. Take polls asking how many people actually do like their boss even while knowing that no boss is perfect. Each day the news could report how many people came to Christ on that day. I saw a news report this morning showing the Iraqi Christians celebrated Christmas openly for the first time in years... that's the kind of news we like to see! This news would also share the Good News of Jesus' imminent return (the world would call that the unfair and unbalanced part).
Do you think there would be resistance and criticism of this new news service? Yeah, oh boy would there ever be! I would sign up for it though; bring on the good news and the Good News!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Bucky
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