{"id":2846,"date":"2023-07-31T07:47:47","date_gmt":"2023-07-31T11:47:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=2846"},"modified":"2023-07-31T07:47:47","modified_gmt":"2023-07-31T11:47:47","slug":"stay-thirsty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2023\/07\/31\/stay-thirsty\/","title":{"rendered":"Stay Thirsty"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

To listen to this reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>.
\u00a0
Does this guy look familiar?\u00a0
\u00a0
He\u2019s The Most Interesting Man in the World<\/em>.
\u00a0
In truth, he\u2019s an actor named Jonathan Goldsmith who starred in a series of TV commercials for a brand of Mexican beer between 2006 and 2016.\u00a0
\u00a0
Against a backdrop of gentle Spanish guitar riffs, a narrator would calmly recount the latest of his outrageous global adventures.\u00a0 Then Goldsmith would declare, \u201cI don\u2019t always drink beer, but when I do, I drink Dos Equis\u201d \u2013 before finally signing off with, \u201cStay thirsty, my friends.\u201d
\u00a0
Dos Equis retired him as the Most Interesting Man by means of a commercial in which he boards a one-way rocket ride to Mars, during which the narrator intones, \u201cHis only regret is not knowing what regret feels like.\u201d
\u00a0
As it turns out, Goldsmith\u2019s real life has actually been, well, rather interesting.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\u00a0
The 84-year-old was born in the Bronx into a Jewish family of Russian descent.\u00a0 His acting career has featured over 350 television appearances on 45 different series, including 17 episodes of Dallas<\/em>.\u00a0 He played five different cowboy \u201cbad guys\u201d who were shot dead at one time or another by Sheriff Matt Dillon of Gunsmoke<\/em>.
\u00a0
Goldsmith admits he\u2019s not particularly fond of beer.\u00a0 But his years with Dos Equis turned him into one of the coolest bar flies in the world, and boosted that brand\u2019s sales by more than 15%.\u00a0 These days he\u2019s starring in ads for a brand of tequila.\u00a0
\u00a0
He and his wife, who used to live on a sailboat off Marina del Rey, currently have a home in Vermont.\u00a0 They\u2019re active in a variety of charitable causes, including landmine victim support, intervention for trafficked children, and rescuing Siberian tigers.\u00a0 In 2017 he published a memoir called Stay Interesting: I Don\u2019t Always Tell Stories About My Life, But When I Do They\u2019re True and Amazing<\/em>.\u00a0
\u00a0
Does this actor \/ adventurer \/ philanthropist \/ man-of-the-world have any serious competition in the \u201cmost interesting\u201d department?\u00a0
\u00a0
Jesus of Nazareth can give him a run for his money.
\u00a0
No one knows what Jesus looked like. \u00a0Not a single physical description was reported by his peers.\u00a0 Yet no one doubts that Jesus and his earliest band of followers have been the subjects of more works of art than any other figures in history.\u00a0 Typically, whenever we see a picture of Jesus, we simply know him when we see him.\u00a0\u00a0
\u00a0
Jesus never wrote a book.\u00a0 Yet Cambridge, Oxford, Yale, and Harvard were all founded as centers of learning devoted to his teachings.
\u00a0
In his book Who is This Man? <\/em>John Ortberg points out: \u201cIt is in Jesus\u2019 name that desperate people pray, grateful people worship, and angry people swear.\u00a0 From christenings to weddings to sickrooms to funerals, it is in Jesus\u2019 name that people are hatched, matched, patched, and dispatched.\u201d
\u00a0
Humility, compassion, and forgiveness \u2013 three qualities scorned by the ancient world \u2013 became prominent Western virtues almost solely because of Jesus.
\u00a0
Ortberg reports that there\u2019s no end to the groups who claim to be \u201cfor\u201d Jesus:\u00a0 Jews for Jesus, Muslims for Jesus, Ex-Masons for Jesus, Road Riders for Jesus, Wrestlers for Jesus, Clowns for Jesus, Puppets for Jesus, and even Atheists for Jesus.
\u00a0
During the first century, names like Caesar and Nero dominated the headlines.\u00a0 \u201cBut today the names of Caesar and Nero are used, if at all, for pizza parlors, dogs, and casinos.\u201d
\u00a0
Jesus\u2019 name, meanwhile, is everywhere.\u00a0 It\u2019s hard to dispute that for centuries he has been the real-life Most Interesting Man in the World.
\u00a0
But that\u2019s only a small part of Jesus\u2019 attraction.\u00a0
\u00a0
If Jesus were merely \u201cinteresting,\u201d we could walk away from him and get on with the rest of our lives, the way visitors to a museum might take in a particularly intriguing exhibit, then shift their gaze to the next one.
\u00a0
Jesus might better be described as the Most Compelling<\/em> Man in the World.\u00a0 He challenges our biases, unsettles our plans, and ruffles our feathers.\u00a0 As the old saying goes, he may well comfort the afflicted, but he also most definitely afflicts the comfortable.
\u00a0
In short, he doesn\u2019t leave well enough alone.\u00a0
\u00a0
He insists that we come face-to-face with the truth \u2013 including raw and sometimes painful truths about God, about the world, and about ourselves.\u00a0 And just when we think we can\u2019t possibly endure such unfiltered realities for another minute, he reveals himself to be the one man in the world who can save us \u2013 who can forgive us, redeem us, and set us on a new path.
\u00a0
One thing we can be fairly certain he won\u2019t be doing is appearing in a series of commercials.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0
\u00a0
But if he did, it\u2019s just possible he might sign off by saying, \u201cStay spiritually thirsty, my friends<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to this reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here.\u00a0Does this guy look familiar?\u00a0\u00a0He\u2019s The Most Interesting Man in the World.\u00a0In truth, he\u2019s an actor named Jonathan Goldsmith who starred in a series of TV commercials for a brand of Mexican beer between 2006 and 2016.\u00a0\u00a0Against a backdrop of gentle Spanish guitar riffs, a narrator would calmly recount the latest of… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2847,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[617],"class_list":["post-2846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-jesus-identity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2846"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2848,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2846\/revisions\/2848"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}