Legends of the Crossroads and Redefining Success

Early this mornin'
When you knocked upon my door
Early this mornin', ooh
When you knocked upon my door
And I said, "Hello Satan,
I believe it's time to go."—Robert Johnson.

Crossroads. Before Rock and Jazz.  Before Rap and Hip Hop.  Before Pop and Metal.  There was Blues.   There is a story—some say legend and some swear its true.  It’s the story of Robert Johnson at the crossroads. He was pretty good guitarist, but not good enough. Son House discounted him.  He couldn’t read music, write lyrics, and just wasn’t skilled enough to be as a professional musician.  He desperately longed for fame and fortune.  He was married to his young sweetheart. And seemed happy enough.  She died in childbirth (and the baby as well).  He hated God for it. And turned to his whiskey, voodoo and song. All he wanted was to be a great. He made a decision. At the stroke of midnight, he walked down to the windswept crossroads at the junction of Highways 61 and 49 in Clarksdale, MS. He called upon Satan. In exchange for Johnson's soul, the devil tuned his guitar, thereby giving him extraordinary abilities. From then on, the young blues-man played his instrument with an unearthly flair, his fingers dancing on blue strings. His voice moaned and wailed, echoing the deepest sorrows of a soulless man.

  
One year later when Son House, Charlie Patton, and Sonny Boy Williamson saw him playing, they knew he was different.  Overnight he went from a ‘nobody’ to fame: writing, singing, recording.  He sank deeper and deeper into this success, a three year downward spiral of fame and fortune, and then the devil came a calling.  Crossroads Johnson died, almost as suddenly as his rise to notoriety.  Oddly enough his death is surrounded in as much mystery as the legend that gave birth to the ‘crossroads.’ There are two tombstones that bear his name.  In 1986 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll hall of fame, as one of the creators and inventors of blues. Funny thing is, by this time his bones were dusted. He never really absorbed his success.

The story of the crossroads has been told over and over.  Different versions, different settings, different passions.  But the same story.  I’ve heard of athletes, opera performers, movie stars, lawyers, preachers (yeah, even preachers do it) and politicians who traded their soul for their name in neon lights.  Much of the legend can be traced back to the story of the German scholar Faustus and story of Jesus.  One bartered his soul away to Satan for more knowledge and the other defined himself by refusing the bargain. 

At Lighthouse this Sunday we will juxtapose Jesus with a personality who claimed to be the spokesperson for Satan--Anton LaVey.  He claimed Satanism was a path that “ embodies rational self-interest . . . and a perseverance towards success and human potential.”  For LaVey success was whatever you wanted it to be.  It was defined and measured by your own whims and wishes, a land where dreams really do come true. It was a magical world where you were god, and made your own laws, and defined your own success.  

Part of the air we breath in American Culture is this very notion.  How many times have i heard "if you believe it, you can achieve it" or "dreams really can come true" or "you can be whatever you want to be."  Pastors and preachers spin this human longing for god-dom into sermons.  And yet I really wonder if what we define success as, really isn't success.  Its a idolatrous mirage dancing on a desert floor, a lustful dream titillating us into a covetous frenzy.

For the Jesus student, success can only be, what Bonhoeffer called 'simple obedience' or what Peterson called 'a long obedience in the same direction' or what Jesus called 'follow me'.  Over the next few weeks i want to ponder and push the envelope of success.  I want to lament what is has become.  I want to be inspired by how a new generation is redefinging success.  Like my series below on questioning authority, i hope to walk through the dusty crossroads and expose the hollowness of excessivity, quantitative reasoning, and a shallow world that seeks name recognition.  My thought will be reflections from wildernesses and crossroads, daring speeches and provacative notions.  Keep checking in . . .

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[Tony]

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