Jesus the Guru: Oprah Web Events

So Christine and the kids are away today . . . they’re down in the city visiting friends and going to show for Haley’s birthday.  I’ve been working around the house today – kinda nice doing stuff around here with just me and dogs.  We have some friends coming over tomorrow so I was given instructions to clean the house from top to bottom so I’ve been vacuuming, and moping around our place. 

I decided to download the Oprah Web Event podcast that she has been doing for the last couple weeks. I thought it would be good preparation for the upcoming series we’re doing at Connexus called Jesus the Guru. Always "fun" to hear what Oprah is up to when it comes to spiritual matters!  Have you heard about these classes that Oprah is doing online everyweek?  Oprah and author Eckhart Tolle are hosting a 10 week virtual "class" using Tolle’s book "A New Earth" as the foundation.  As a tech geek I find it somewhat fascinating.  The pure web content is streamed out of Harpo Studios in Chicago to people all over the globe.  It’s available the following day for free in a series of formats.  Users can connect directly with Oprah and Eckhart via Skype to ask questions.  The response to the "class" has been overwhelming . . . two million people logged on to participate in last week’s class.  Many cultural commentators are drawing the conclusion what we we are seeing born is some new form of "church" with Oprah as the pastor.  The normal "dooms day" voices of Christian-blog-world are calling this latest development with Oprah the sign of the end.  So what were Oprah and Tolle talking about on the episode I listened to today?  . . . .

Jesus.  That’s right.  In the midst of the spiritual self help talk was a pile of talk about Jesus.  It was again a vivid example from our culture of people being incredibly curious with Jesus.  They discussed what Jesus meant by "poor in spirit".  A caller wanted to discuss what was meant by the illustration used by Jesus that if someone steals your shirt you should give them your coat too.  Near the end of the event they talked about the "peace that passes all understanding" and how people might be able to attain that.  I had to smile at these multiple references to the teaching of Jesus on this hugely popular web event.  There is no doubt a bunch of other stuff mixed in with the approach to life presented in "A New Earth" but why is it that people like Eckhart Tolle are still so fascinated with Jesus?   Why are people who are interested in eastern spirituality but are unable to shake the appeal Jesus has for understanding life?  I look forward when we’re going to tackle these issues head on in just a few short days when we launch "Jesus the Guru".  Who can you invite to this series? 

Rich Birch
[email protected]
Executive Director of Operations
Connexus Community Church

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