Lies circulate about Michael Jackson converting to evangelical Christianity
flockwoodIt’s pitiful and dispicable and all too predictable. Some in the evangelical Christian community have begun spreading false stories about Michael Jackson “giving his heart to Jesus” right before his death.
This isn’t the first time that this type of rumor has followed a celebrity death and it won’t be the last. (Click here for more details).
Similar false stories circulated after the Crocodile Hunter’s death in 2006 and after the death of Charles Darwin in 1882. And there are other examples, if you Google it.
Quite simply, the people who make up these stories are liars and the people who spread them look awfully gullible and they discredit the faith they seek to advance.
The real story about Michael Jackson’s brush with evangelical Christianity, by the way, is compelling enough and needs no embellishment. He was friends with the great Andrae Crouch and Sandra Crouch and met with them a couple of times in recent months to talk about music and spirituality. At the last meeting, Andrae Crouch reportedly sang “It Won’t Be Long” — a beautiful song about going home to Jesus (via either death or the Rapture.) Crouch spotted Christmas ornaments still hanging in the house — ornaments that Jackson, as a Jehovah’s Witness child, had been denied.
July 3rd, 2009 at 4:17 pm
Even though no one will ever know, I agree. We hear of too many death bed conversions, many of which are Probably not true leading people to think, “I can wait until the end then believe” If they wont believe now what makes them think it will happen then?
July 4th, 2009 at 9:26 am
If they can’t openly use sex to “sell” their message, then they have to come up with something else. Why not trade on the name and celebrity of popular figures? Who will know whether it is true or not? The primary consideration is whether it may possibly work.
Apparently (and this story is only the tip of the iceberg), in the evangelical world there is little concern for truth, honesty, and/or integrity. All that ultimately matters is getting people converted to whatever it is they think is important — hating LGBT persons, killing abortion/abortionists, electing Republicans, making war on everyone that disagrees with them, and crucifying the gospel.
July 4th, 2009 at 11:38 am
Amen, Asinus, Amen.
July 4th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
It’s amazing how many famous people convert to evangelical Christianity and then die soon after. Is there a conncetion here? It’s also amazing how many of them don’t tell anyone about it until it comes out after they are dead. But since lying is a sin, I am sure the conversion stories can’t be false.
July 6th, 2009 at 10:39 am
We are not the judges of this poor man’s spiritual life. All we can do is ask God’s mercy upon him and upon ourselves.
July 6th, 2009 at 10:53 am
So true, Alice. This whole thing reminds me of what Walter Mondale said in the Vice Presidential debate. He said that his father had been a minister for many years, and said that the problem with deathbed conversions is that sometimes they get well.
July 6th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
I think being a wealthy megastar teaches people, more than anything else, the emptiness of that lifestyle. Also, many of things ordinary people yearn for and dream they already have, so there’s little to motivate them. Which is why most big celebrities turn to religion of one sort or another, usually a frightening variety. Madonna with “Kabbalah”; Tom Cruise with Scientology; Mel Gibson with his crazy brand of Catholicism, etc. Brad Pitt seems the only megastar immune to this, but then he has Angelina Jolie to contend with, and I’m sure she will suffer no other gods before her.