The Clip Show Edition

March 16, 2009

Today's Reading: Numbers 33-34 and Acts 26

There is nothing I hate more than a clip show. In case you are not an avid TV watcher like me, and don’t know what a clip show is, think about every time you were set to watch a new episode of your favorite television show, and it was some show that was a clip of past episodes.

I always hated those. I remember there was this episode of Family Ties where they sat around and told “Alex Stories”. I think there was an episode of the Cosby Show just like it. They told stories about their own family. Usually clip shows have some sort of weak story frame to them, and you’re probably only getting maybe ten minutes of new footage.

It’s like the studio said: “man, I’m just not in the mood to make a full episode. Let’s just film a little bit, and take some half days, and then we’ll edit it together and promise our viewers a new episodes”.

Why am I bringing this up? Because today’s reading in both Old and New Testament are clip shows. Yeah, Joshua talks about what stops he made along the way. And then in the book of Acts, Paul talks about what happened to him, telling him a story that we, the audience, already know. It’s a clip show, really.

So why do these clip shows happen? Probably because we need to see the big picture every once in a while. In fact, shows these days usually have this story-arc thing, and it is good to get a review once in a while. I know Lost has at least two shows a year devoted to just telling people what the heck is going on.

In Paul’s case, he had to tell Festus what was going on with his life. And Festus was saying: “oh, man, not another clip show”. No, I’m kidding. Still, Festus got to hear Paul’s extensive testimony.

And in the end, he got to see the big picture. It’s kind of funny, because Paul gets to say: I wish you were like me, except without the chains. All right, a clip show with an all new joke! What a payoff!

You know what you should do? Figure out what it would be like to have your own clip show. Personally, I have my own set of highlights. I’m not certain what sort of frame this would have. I guess if someone was going to ask me about my life, I would tell them this:

(Insert clips from past Irreverent Reverent Entries here.)