Tag: Elvis Presley

A Joyful Heart

Friday’s Column: Brent’s Bent

Brent Pollard

Physician and sociologist Nickolas Christakis tracked 5,000 people over 20 years and discovered what most of us likely suspected, that surrounding ourselves with cheery people makes us happier. Happiness is contagious.1 And though this should cause us to carefully choose our associates (1 Corinthians 15.33), it should likewise motivate us to be that one spreading the joy. 

Solomon wrote, “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17.22 NASB1995). I have often received this medicine, including my most recent visit to interventional radiology to have a surgical drain placed in an abscess. One of the nurses in the radiology department is named Andre, and I have had the pleasure of receiving his care on multiple occasions. 

Last November, when hospitalized for the same purpose of draining abscesses, Andre was the one who came to fetch me and carry me to radiology. You could hear Andre singing before he arrived. He helped me into a wheelchair, and we took things routinely until we reached a long, empty corridor. Then, suddenly, Andre started making the noises of a race car, and we went flying through the halls. As we turned corners, Andre would screech as if he had to brake hard to keep us from crashing. 

Andre had to fetch my father from the waiting room during my latest visit. Upon arriving at the waiting room, he asked those seated if they’d rather hear him imitate Bing Crosby or Elvis Presley. Their choice must have been Elvis Presley because he played Elvis on his smartphone and danced as he brought dad to my bedside. Then, he pointed at my hot-blooded sideburns, which he mistook for pork chops, and said, “See, Elvis.” 

It is hard to feel anxious or afraid about your procedure when such a friendly fellow has you grinning from ear to ear. It is also hard not to like Andre. It reminds me of what interpersonal relationships, even with strangers, could be if we sought what edified others rather than divisiveness (Romans 14.19).  

Had we wanted, we could have focused on our differences. For example, Andre has more melanin in his skin while I have less. Perhaps that has led to Andre developing a different worldview. I acknowledge that this may have caused Andre to experience things I have not, wholly negative things. But Andre did not act as if that were a factor in our interactions. Things like politics or socioeconomic differences were not a consideration. Instead, Andre and I interacted as two people made in God’s image. He treated me in a manner consistent with how he desired me to treat him (Matthew 7.12).    

Paul tells us to look out for the interests of others (Philippians 2.4). We likely take this to mean that we should focus more on meeting physical needs like hunger or spiritual needs through evangelism. However, I suggest that sometimes the best way to look after another’s interest is to smile at them and share your joy (Galatians 5.22). I admit that we cannot all be extroverts to the degree of Andre, but we can still spread the joy we feel to others. 

Sources Cited 

1 Arley, Dan. “Beware: Happiness Is Contagious.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 11 June 2009, www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/predictably-irrational/200906/beware-happiness-is-contagious. 

A Lonely, Lonely Man

Neal Pollard

My sons and I often say that we don’t really want to know much about our favorite singers. It seems that there’s always immorality and stories of their ungodliness. That’s as true of many of the rock, country, and easy listening singers from decades ago as those making music today. Despite my having grown up in the south, today I was able to do something I’ve never gotten the opportunity to do. Kathy and I toured Graceland with our gracious hosts, Barry and Celicia Grider. We enjoyed ourselves. This tour tended to glamorize and sanitize his life and career. Elvis Presley enjoyed a meteoric rise to stardom, and he was a global icon. He made more money than he could spend, though his lavish collections of furniture, cars, instruments, clothes, and the like shows that he tried. Despite his love of gospel music and religious roots, there were the affairs, drugs, and fast living that likely contributed to his premature death at age 42. His daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, who remembers him reading often, “He had stacks next to his bed. He read all the time…Always of a spiritual nature. Always looking. Always searching for something” (from a placard in the mansion). Gospel preacher, C.W. Bradley, preached his funeral thanks to the connection of Elvis’ stepmother. But there is no evidence that his search led him to obey and live the truth, and there’s evidence to the contrary.  He once sang a song where he said, “It’s a lonely man who wanders all around, It’s a lonely man who roams from town to town.  Searching, always searching

for something he can’t find, hoping, always hoping that someday fate will be kind.”

Billions never achieve the fame or wealth of Elvis, but live their lives on a similar quest. They live, always searching for something they can’t find. Solomon spends so much time, with access to wisdom, wealth, wine, and women. He found, in his grand experiment, that these did not fill the void. Instead, the answer was to “fear God and keep His commandments” (Ecc. 12:13). This beautiful hope is shared by Jesus in the greatest sermon ever preached. He teaches, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Mat. 7:7-8).  These things are written to keep mankind from duplicating the future search for purpose and meaning. It has been revealed. Let’s look in the only place where loneliness is vanquished—in the presence of God!

23519311_10214099401337193_6063397463412721560_n