The Most Famous Person to Ever Live?

If there were a world-wide poll held today, who do you believe would be voted the most famous person on the planet?  The Pope? Barack Obama? Vladimir Putin?  Once you answer that question, here is an even better one: who is the most famous person to ever live?  Socrates, Buddha, Leonardo Da Vinci, Einstein?

Today, fame and notoriety have become the “call of the wild” on a global scale.  Maybe it’s always been that way, but with Instagram, selfies, Twitter and 24 hour electronic connections, you can be known in a millisecond for good, for bad and for very ugly stuff.

However, historically you didn’t need 21^st century technology to become famous.  You just did something amazingly-spectacular which most often had world-wide affects or ramifications.  Believe it or not, in reports about the recent “God” and “Jesus” themed movies now being released, I have heard several well-known (famous) TV personalities, in reasoning out Hollywood’s new found fascination with Jesus say, “Why not? He’s the most famous person who ever lived.”  And, it’s true; Jesus tops every list as the most famous person who ever lived.

At this time of year it seems more okay or reasonable or acceptable to talk about Jesus.  We get the same treatment at Christmas.  It’s like the secular world gives us a “pass” during these season.  And this is true, but why?  At this time of year it seems to be centered on his passion and death.  That’s what most of the movies focus on.  And that seems right too.

Often, the most famous people become even more elevated in history because of the mysterious, extraordinary, or bizarre circumstances connected with their death.  Although profoundly famous for what they were doing during their life, they receive “elite status” and become even more famous for the way they died.

 Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy did wonderful and historic things, but we seem even more drawn to their story – at least what keeps their stories alive – by the sensational and very mysterious way they died.  Princess Diana's funeral on 6 September 1997 was broadcast and watched by an estimated 3.5 billion people worldwide.

Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy, Michael Jackson, Heath Ledger could all fall into this category.  But I wonder if we would see them the same - if history would look upon in with the same level of renown - if they had grown to a ripe old, wrinkles and grey haired age and then simply died quietly in their sleep?

Jesus is at the top of the list of  sensational, famous-making, deaths.  But that is not what made him the most famous person to ever live.  Maybe it was his teaching?  Maybe it was his radical social reforms?  Maybe it was all the miracles?  He turned water into wine, calmed hurricane-force winds, he fed thousands with a sandwich, and he raised people from the dead!  We haven’t seen that one on Instragram! 

So, it has to be his death, right?  You can’t get more sensational than the archetypal image of being crucified. Surely the cross is the most famous symbol the world has ever known.   But, that is not what garners Jesus' top position even by secular standards, as the most famous person to ever live.  If you’d like to know the answer, join us in our Sunday worship at MWPC.