First Ed McMahaon, then Farah Fawcett, and now Michael Jackson.
All dead at ages 86, 62, and 50 respectively. Icons of the 70s and 80s. McMahon was know and beloved as Johnny Carson’s sidekick for over 30 years on The Tonight Show. He developed the role of “the second banana” into an art form—and no one did it better, nor has his success been duplicated. Most late night performers these days prefer to go it alone.
Fawcett, known for her iconic poster that in the 70sn could be found in just about every bedroom of teenage boys and for her role as one of “Charlies’ Angels, died of cancer.
And Michael, died just yesterday of cardiac arrest in Los Angeles.
And then my grandpa (seen here).
He died 52 years ago at the age of 79—of cardiac arrest. I mention him because I just self-published this week a biography of his life, which I added to an edition of his 1952 Daily Diary. He wrote diaries for the last ten years of his life, and I am working now on the other years, and am close to publishing, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, and 1957.
He lived far away from the spotlight of Hollywood in a little village in northeastern Iowa. A railroad man, he was a widower the last 15 years of his life, didn’t own a car, and spent his last years walking about town visiting the shut-ins, participating in various committees and boards in his community church, and riding along with his pastor on hospital calls and the like.
In my book, he was a great man. But the world never knew him. But God did.
The psalmist says that there is value in “numbering our days.” It’s good for us when the news confronts us with notable deaths to stop and ask ourselves just what exactly is the content and context of our own lives. All flesh withers as the grass in the field, or disappears like a wisp of smoke in the wind. Our time is limited.
Most of us will pass from this world to the next without newspaper headlines to announce the event. But our lives matter. They matter to those among whom we live. How then should we live?
God spoke to the prophet Micah revealing the answer: “Do justice, love mercy, and to walk humbly with God.”
A life like that—a life my grandpa lived—is not a life lived in vain.
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