Date: 1.25.24
No, he was not an Avenger, and no, he didn’t fly around in an iron suit. Morton Downey Jr. (who often gets confused with Robert Downey Jr.) was a television host on a short-lived talk show that served as a precursor to Jerry Springer. Each day, viewers were treated to spectacles of absurdity as Downey Jr. led an endless parade of polarizing and often crazy people on his show. Fights were very common. Unlike Jerry Springer, who prided himself as being the “voice of reason” on his set, Downey Jr. was louder and more bombastic than his guests. He would often challenge, shout down, and fight with his guests, being one of the first in the audience to throw a chair when the moment arose.
Downey Jr. and his successor, Jerry Springer, gave rise to “shock and awe” entertainment as Ricky Lake, Maury Povich, Howard Stern, and the like tried to cash in on this new-found strategy to capture an audience…”What’s he going to do next?”
While I can’t condone the subject matter highlighted by the showrunners listed above…there’s something to be said about the strategy of building excitement through unexpected results. Think about it. This is why we love sports. You can put a top-seated team against a bottom-seated team in the championship game, and anything can happen! Yes, we can predict based on the strengths of the teams, but ultimately, it’s a game where anything can happen. A team on a “hot streak” can outplay a superior team on any given day. There’s a sense of drama and a sense of mystery. Let’s face it: if every team that was better “on paper” beat every team that was inferior “on paper” every time…there would be no need to play the game. It would be boring. We all would know the outcome long before the game was played. But we tune in, week after week, because we don’t know what will happen next. Every week, as the season carries on, the stakes get higher, and the anticipation is greater. Games in week 17 of the NFL season carry more weight than games in week 1, even though they have the same value - one win equals one win. The reason is because a week 17 could secure a playoff spot or home field advantage, or a bye week. At the beginning of the season, there are still 16 more games to determine all of that stuff. The longer we go, the more excitement and anticipation should build.
If you think about it, Jesus used this strategy during His earthly ministry. Everywhere He went there was this sense of anticipation…I can imagine the crowds who followed Him asking the question, constantly, “What’s He going to do today?” Maybe Jesus was going to heal someone that day. Maybe someone was going to get dropped through the ceiling while He taught. Maybe Jesus was going to call the religious leaders out. Maybe Jesus was going to raise someone from the dead…who knew? Everywhere Jesus went, there was a building anticipation of what He would do next. The people who were with Him the most were the most excited. Why? because they saw the miracles! They witnessed the amazing things He did. They knew Jesus could heal someone today because they saw Him heal someone yesterday. In fact, their belief went from believing it was POSSIBLE that Jesus healed someone to believing it was PROBABLE that Jesus healed someone. Think of how important that mental shift is - from what’s possible to probable. Imagine the expectation as Jesus made His way to Jerusalem. Imagine the excitement as He continued to perform miracle after miracle, each one greater than the last. This was true excitement.
This excitement continued during the Book of Acts. The church grew exponentially because instead of one man performing miracles, now several people were performing miracles. Now, it could be anyone who healed the sick! The people weren’t the generators of the miracle but only the conduits of the Holy Spirit’s power. Everywhere the gospel went, people saw miracles! Can you imagine what that must have been like?
My question is this, “Why do we have to imagine?”