Cheers

Cheers theme song

"Making your way in the world today
Takes everything you got
Taking a break from all your worries
It sure would help a lot
Wouldn't you like to get away?
Sometimes you want to go
Where everybody knows your name
And they're always glad you came
You want to be where you can see
The troubles are all the same
You want to be where everybody knows your name
You want to go where people know
The people are all the same
You want to go where everybody knows your name"

If you've never seen Cheers, you might not get much of what I'm about to say. You'll get the general idea, but not the comparison. But seriously? Who hasn't seen Cheers?!
If you read the lyrics from the theme song, you'll get it. It really says it all.

The theme song could really point, in all aspects, to Jesus and His church.

The whole world longs for...

Making your way in the world today
Do not love the world or the things in the world. 1 John 2

Takes everything you got
Righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard). 2 pet 2

Taking a break from all your worries
It sure would help a lot
Wouldn't you like to get away?
Do not be anxious about anything. Phil 4

Sometimes you want to go
Where everybody knows your name
And they're always glad you came
And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. Heb 10

You want to be where you can see
The troubles are all the same
...The same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. 1 Pet 5

You want to be where everybody knows your name
You want to go where people know
The people are all the same
You want to go where everybody knows your name
That they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us. John 17

Kum Ba Yah

The strange thing about Cheers is the fact that they were seeking community, yet there were no kids or family involved. The entire show revolved around detached adults seeking community--at a bar.
I lived the Cheers life for much of my adult life. No kids. Various girlfriends. Gathering in bars.

I never found community.
It's a farce.
Finding community in this world is impossible. At least, finding community as portrayed by Hollywood.
The communities found in Hollywood are a farce. They are utopic.
We can gather in bars all over the world and sing "Kum Ba Yah" or "We are the World" and nothing is going to change.
Nothing!

Death

"Through death he[Jesus] might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

The Cheers life brought me nothing but depression, loneliness, and drunkenness.

"Give strong drink to the one who is perishing, and wine to those in bitter distress; let them drink and forget their poverty and remember their misery no more". Proverbs 31

We live--we die. That's it.

We need community, but we can't get it without Jesus.
Even with Jesus we struggle.

Death looms over our heads like a black cloud. We use entertainment or a-musement to try and forget that it is there, but it doesn't help for long.
Usually those who give up end up like the proverb. Using alcohol and drugs to suppress the bitter distress.

Do you know that the prefix "a" means "not", and "muse" means to think. Our amusement is a time to not think and forget the pain.

I've noticed here in the south that they have strong family ties. In Massachusetts and Montana family ties are a thing of the past. Families are for war. Families are left behind.
From my observations, the family ties in the south are soon to be lost. As secular humanism takes over, families die. Secular humanism is all about the individual. Death of the family.

Finding meaning in an artificial world

Has anything really changed? Jesus didn't have Facebook, television or even a newspaper. Was it different then? Were the world's problems different?
No!
Because they lacked the automobile, they had communities, but it was more forced rather than the false Hollywoodized community.
The reason we departed from communities when automobiles came upon us is because---we hate each other.

We fight. It's what we do best. Of course, we are civilized now so we use lawyers, but it's the same concept.

How do we find meaning in such an artificial world?
The same way they have for thousands of years.
God.
You may seek demons, idols, spirits, gods, Deepak Chopra, Oprah or what ever other religion you want to invent, but if there is to be meaning in a chaotic world, meaning will only come from the Creator--God.

When we rest in Jesus, we can really and completely say, "CHEERS"!
He knows my name!


Song:
Sweet Jesus