Addicted to the News?

Sometimes I really wonder why we are so addicted to the news. I know some of you aren't, but a lot of us are. It's almost as if we think there's something we can do about everything that's going on in the world, or if our knowing about it makes us more powerful or something. I remember a time when news was news, not political propaganda. A time before nothing but nasty debates took place every night and every day, 24/7. I remember even around 12 years ago, I used to watch CNN in the teachers' lounge where I substitute taught in the district where I have now worked for ten years (there is no TV in that teachers' lounge). That is not really all that many years ago, 12 years, now, is it? Wow. How quickly times have changed. Jerry Springerism, that's what I call it. Exploiting the ignorance of people for profit, that's what it is. Sad. Well, I have been watching a little less of it lately, and I hope to watch a whole lot less of it as time goes on. I don't miss it at all. I know what's going on, they keep repeating it, and social media keeps harping on it. It's TMI (too much information), in my view, and I'm about as filled with it up to my eyeballs as I want to be. I think it literally makes us sick. I like the good news about Jesus Christ. That's the only news that is good. We celebrate his Resurrection this Sunday. His Resurrection. He rose from the dead, after being murdered by vicious, cruel people, for our sins. He is the Son of God. They asked for Barrabas, the criminal, to be released and for Jesus to be executed in the most horrendous way. But he rose again, as he said he would. He was prophesied in the Old Testament. He fulfilled every prophesy about the coming Messiah, and after he died, he rose again. If you don't want to believe it, that's your choice, but it's a very unwise one. I used to say, "I didn't ask him to die for me." Wow. What an arrogant attitude. But He is so merciful. Even after his assassins tortured him and left him looking unrecognizable as a human being, he said, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." He saved me, from my sins, from myself, from the curse and penalty of sin, and I have been born again, and I am a new creation. That is good news. And the good news that saves is the best news there is. The Bible tells me what I can do about bad news. I can pray. "Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle--I am speaking the truth in Christ and not lying--a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth" (1 Timothy 2:1-7). And that is good news.