Richard Simmons

One of the things that makes long flights a little easier is the TV screens on the back of the seats. You usually have a choice of movies or television shows...along with a graphic that shows your flight route complete with your plane, how close(or how far away for us pessimists!) you are to/from your destination, and even how fast you're going! On my  most recent trip to the UK, our flight from Houston, TX to Newark, NJ had Direct TV that you could purchase, for a nominal fee! As I sat down, got "comfortable" in the undersized seat that flying coach provides you and began waiting for all the stragglers to get on board the plane, I began scrolling through the channels. I was excited to see the Outdoor Channel as one of the stations! For those that don't know, the Outdoor Channel is the best thing that ever happened to rednecks. It's basically hunting & fishing shows 24/7, guys (and a few ladies and even kids) killing or catching stuff! I was ready to get my credit card out and swipe it until ...I turned over to the Outdoor Channel, expecting to see some good ole boys blasting a whitetail or calling in a turkey to a shotgun blast to the face only to see this guy, a Richard Simmons infomercial on the Outdoor Channel!!!!  

"Ted Nugent, can I go hunting with you?"

 

I actually said out loud (do ya'll realize you usually talk just a little louder when you have those little cheap airplane headphones on?), "Richard Simmons on the Outdoor Channel, I'm cancelling my subscription!" Now, I really don't want to get into what exactly I think of little Richard, or why I don't really like him, but it was ironic for several reasons. First, I am also a GROUP EXERCISE INSTRUCTOR (not an aerobics instructor!) like Richard, and let's just say my classes, clientel, and teaching styles greatly vary. Second, alot of "friends" have called me Richard Simmons in the past because I teach fitness classes, so I know some of them will enjoy this! But third, and most important, whether you like Richard Simmons or not, you don't expect to see him sitting in a deer blind with Ted Nugent or Michael Waddell, or sitting with his back to a tree while Will Primos puts a strutting tureky in his lap! My problem was that Richard misrepresented what the Outdoor Channel stood for, and I planned to let them know about it!

 

As I thought about how aggravated I was at the Outdoor Channel, I realized maybe I didn't need to be watching hunting & fishing shows anyway and decided to  read my Bible and look over some sermon material for what I felt led to preach on in the UK. It didn't register with me as I flew "across the pond," but as I returned home and decided to give the Outdoor Channel another chance (surely the Richard Simmons Infomercial was simply a mistake...or a joke!) I realized there was a great truth for my life, and maybe for someone else's, that I wanted to share. How often do my words, decisions, actions or inactions misrepresent who I say I am as a follower of Jesus? In James 1:26-27- The writer informs us that practicing Christianity without… controlling what we say/how, when or where we say it, ministering to the helpless/hopeless at the moment of their need, keeping ourselves “unstained” by the worldliness of our culture is worthless. Throughout 1 John, John says our salvation is revealed in…whether we are “walking in darkness” or not, whether we obey/disobey Jesus’ teachings, whether we love or hate our brother, whether we continue in sin, whether we share our abundance with those doing without, and being able to discern the Spirit of God.

 

It's interesting how God can use something as funny and seemingly insignificant to teach me an incredible truth about my responsibility to represent Him in all areas of my life. As we continue to see the Christian community become more and more vocal about some critical issues in our culture, we have to ask ourselves an important question, "Are we accurately representing Christ (in ways we are instructed to represent Him) to an increasingly non-Christian culture?" As a GROUP EXERCISE INSTRUCTOR, I love the purity of leading a hard class, feeling a sense of accomplishment along with class members when we survive it!,  and seeing people transform themselves as they remain consistent to working out. In the same way, I strongly believe we can see our culture transformed by the Gospel when we acccurately represent Jesus and how we've been instructed to live our lives in Scripture. I haven't seen Richard Simmon's infomercial on the Outdoor Channel since I've been back in the US. Maybe they realized it just didn't fit into who they are. Brothers and sisters in Christ, I pray we will adopt the things that accurately reflect we've been transformed by Christ and purge from our lives the things that do not.