{"id":1003,"date":"2010-02-19T14:55:53","date_gmt":"2010-02-19T14:55:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/crazy-heart--bad-blake-tiger-woods-and-others.html"},"modified":"2010-02-19T14:55:53","modified_gmt":"2010-02-19T14:55:53","slug":"crazy-heart-bad-blake-tiger-woods-and-others","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/crazy-heart-bad-blake-tiger-woods-and-others.html","title":{"rendered":"‘Crazy Heart’— Bad Blake, Tiger Woods, and Others"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"crazy-heart-trailer.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

            <\/span>I watched
\nthe mea culpa of Tiger Woods this morning, all 14 or so minutes of it.  <\/span>It was definitely the material of a country
\nsong.  I am glad Tiger has begun to own his problems and misbehavior, though frankly I am not
\nsure immoral behavior qualifies as a disease— ‘sex addiction’, in the same
\nway alcoholism is a disease.  <\/span>More likely
\nits obsessive compulsive narcissistic behavior. 
\n<\/span>But it is a good thing Tiger has begun to come clean, and he is right to
\ntry and protect his family from the vultures in the press, who frankly do not
\nhave a right to his full confession, nor should they be hounding his
\nfamily.  <\/span>But then if enough of us would
\nprofoundly protest to the media that we don’t want to see or hear about such
\ngarbage, maybe the feeding frenzy when it comes to dirty laundry would slow
\ndown.  <\/span>It is after all ratings and money
\nthat drives such soap opera materials on the TV, and so ultimately some of us
\nare a huge part of the problem.  <\/span>I wrote
\na little ditty on the blog earlier this week called Grave Diggers about the
\npaparazzi. I suspect about now Tiger would pronounce the Amen to that poem.  <\/span>But the Tiger Woods real life saga in various
\nstrange ways parallels the Bad Blake saga recounted in the recent movie Crazy
\nHeart, about which this post will now reflect.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

            <\/span>If you saw
\nthe movie ‘the Wrestler’ the plot of ‘Crazy Heart’ is by now familiar.  <\/span>Broken down old entertainer tries for
\ncomeback, reconciliation with family member, etc. with an ending that suits a
\ncountry song. Only Crazy Heart has far more star power– Jeff Bridges, Colin Farrell
\n(as a country singer???  <\/span>Who would have
\nbelieved it?)  <\/span>Robert Duvall (a producer
\nof the film), and a winsome Maggie Gyllenhaal. And shoot, the country tunes
\naren’t half bad, and occasionally Jeff Bridges shows he can sing them.  <\/span>But his dissolute life of drinking and
\nsmoking and playing dirty bars and bowling alleys is not appealing at all.   <\/span>I must admit that I had not envisioned the ‘So
\nCal’ Dude being able to pull off a Waylon Jennings thing, but then, he is a
\ngood actor, and frankly he deserves his Oscar nomination for best actor in this
\nfilm.  <\/span>It is that believable and well
\ndone.  <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The movie has already been well
\nreviewed but here there is some room for reflection about what love can do to
\nyou— it can even make you want to clean up your act and clean up your life as
\nwell.  <\/span>And in this case…. it does finally
\nmotivate Bad Blake to do so.  <\/span>But even a
\nlove that sets you free may not produce a happy ending after so much
\nmisbehavior over so long a period of time. 
\n<\/span>The attempt at reconciliation with a long lost son fails….. and what
\nBlake mainly gets out of his rehab  <\/span>besides a new lease on life is more fodder for
\nhis country songs.  <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Bad also gets in some apt digs at
\nthe current MOR half rock, half pop, half country products that come out of
\nNashville and its star maker machinery.  <\/span>Take
\nfor example Taylor Swift.  <\/span>That girl can’t
\nsing worth a dime… and they have turned her into star instead of a pretty good
\nsong writer.  <\/span>She embarrassed herself
\nsinging with Stevie Nicks on the Grammies a few weeks ago, being way out of
\ntune, and she embarrassed herself before that on a show in January.  <\/span>She needs some seasoning, and a reality check
\njust like Bad Blake.  <\/span>As they say down in
\nthe country— she ain’t no Carrie Underwood, if we are talking about her
\nsingin’ ability.  <\/span>And I’m not talking
\nabout having an operatic voice, I’m just saying that even within the parameters
\nof what counts as good country singing, live and in color, she can’t deliver.  <\/span>She needs some voice lessons….etc. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Like a  <\/span>country song, this post has wandered a bit,
\nbut after a surprising chorus its time to return to the main tune.  <\/span>Country songs deal with real life, including
\nits worst and most immoral aspects.  <\/span>No
\none asks for them not to do so. That would be like asking a Bluesman like B.B. King
\nto stop playing in minor keys.  <\/span>Lost love
\nand lonesomeness and squandered opportunities are the stock and trade of such
\nmusic.  <\/span>But just because its real, doesn’t
\nmake the actions described worth emulating or admiring.   <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Tiger Woods is now living a soap opera
\ninstead of living his dream. Let’s hope and pray that he keeps going forward in
\nthe right direction.  <\/span>He said something
\nprofound at his press conference that Bad Blake could have stood to hear—-
\nwhen money and fame come your way, you begin to mistakenly believe you are
\nspecial, and that the regular rules of life and love and morality don’t apply
\nto you.  <\/span>You begin to believe what your
\nsychophants tell you is true, and so you believe you can get away with
\nanything, with no accountability.  But frankly, sin always has consequences,
\nnegative consequences, and what a person does when he thinks no one is watching
\nand when he thinks he is bullet proof, most reveals that person’s character—-
\nwhether you’re Bad Blake,  <\/span>or Tiger
\nWoods.  <\/span>The good news is— grace
\nhappens, if you know where to find it.  <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>  <\/span>         <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

            I watched the mea culpa of Tiger Woods this morning, all 14 or so minutes of it.  It was definitely the material of a country song.  I am glad Tiger has begun to own his problems and misbehavior, though frankly I am not sure immoral behavior qualifies as a disease— ‘sex addiction’, in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n'Crazy Heart'- Bad Blake, Tiger Woods, and Others - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/crazy-heart-bad-blake-tiger-woods-and-others.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"'Crazy Heart'- Bad Blake, Tiger Woods, and Others - 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A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1003\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}