“O” so Scary
Oprah is off the air – for now. I rarely watched her in her early years and I haven’t had TV for the past 12 years so I haven’t seen the more recent shows either. But, her influence shows up in a lot of our culture. I have been reading about her anticipated exit from her daily TV show, her last show, and the powerful force that she’s been on Americans in general.
There are books about how to get on her show. There are books about the financial success of those who do get on her show. There is a lot of talk about her diet and exercise programs. She even seems to have a following of spiritual groupies who want to know what she worships.
In this morning’s paper an article entitled “Oprah leaves Big Impact on How We Spend” made it obvious that her influence goes way beyond our wallets. This is an excerpt from the article:
The episodes that made the biggest headlines – think Tom Cruise jumping on a couch, or author James Frey squirming in the hot seat – aren’t what made Oprah fans so loyal.
Regular viewers tuned in for guidance on the major issues they struggle with day to day, said Suze Orman, the financial guru whose fame can be traced to the show. ‘”They are watching ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’ not to be entertained, but to be transformed,” she said.
And money and health are the topics that resonate most with viewers – which is why Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil, and Orman star in “Oprah’s All Stars” on OWN.
The paper’s emphasis was on the financial but her influence is far greater than that – and I think harmful. So, if the largest portion of her audience, women, are watching to be “transformed” instead of entertained, shouldn’t we be asking, “Into what?”
In the article I read on World Net Daily they preported that on the last day of her show Oprah was on Good Morning America. During that interview she said “I often say, ‘Nobody but Jesus could have made this happen for me. I had no stylist, I had no publicist, I [was not] marketing-savvy, I was the most naive in terms of how the business operated.”
But, the article continues, “Though brought up as a Baptist, Oprah has since embraced and promoted a New Age-style philosophy promoted by Eckhart Tolle of “The Power of Now” and “A New Earth.” She explained how she reconciled her Christian roots with Tolle’s let-go-and-breathe counseling on peace through silence and stillness: “What I believe is that Jesus came to show us Christ consciousness. That Jesus came to show us the way of the heart and that what Jesus was saying that to show us the higher consciousness that we’re all talking about here … .””
Well, the Bible begs to differ. Matthew 1:21was predicting the birth of Jesus to Joseph who was engaged to Mary. God gave the reason for His coming: “She (Mary) will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” He also said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.” John 5:24.
Interestingly, Jesus did come to show us the way of the heart according to the Bible. God had said in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” And Romans 3:23 tells us that “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” Because Jesus has the only pure heart He could show us how deceitful our hearts are.
The bottom line for all those who have watched Oprah Winfrey thinking they would be transformed is that they have been treating her as a god. Only the One True God changes hearts and He does it by offering the gift of faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ to pay the debt for our sin.
Romans, a letter written by the Apostle Paul to those who believed that Jesus had come and died to take away their sins instructed them about being transformed. Here is what he taught in a nutshell: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Renewing the mind starts and ends in the Word of God. When we are transformed by TV personalities we are being conformed to the world – not transformed by God.
Oprah has certainly heard the Truth about Jesus. Years of celebrity have confused her with a sense of her own power and position. I don’t know her heart – but I know she has led many astray and not pointed them to the one, True God. I pray that before she returns to a TV show that she will be transformed by the Word and the love of a gracious and forgiving God through Jesus Christ.