I was at a board gathering in Texas recently; in the mix was a good friend from Minnesota – he’s also a graduate of The Master’s Program – who explained his perspective about groups these days. He said that he scans the crowd and unconsciously slots people into two categories: “youngish” and “oldish.” The boundary between them is somewhat virtual, but they fall – generationally – into those cohort camps. Though intuitive and insightful, I told him that I was part of a third category: the “deadish.” If that’s how the lines form these days, which feels most fitting for you?

            Generational clusters aside, it’s been said that there are two types of people in our culture: people who lump people into two categories, and those who do not. Case closed.

            There’s another quirky definitional strata that floats in our contemporary consciousness: who’s responsible for the person you are? How do you explain the person you are?

            Being deadish, I still subscribe to a few print-version periodicals. A couple of weeks ago, Forbes landed in my mailbox with a haunting cover story: The Greatest Self-Made Americans: from rags to richest, the 250 most inspiring entrepreneurs, entertainers and executives from the land of endless opportunity. Talk about walking away with the gold medal…

            The article embedded on page 70 laid out the premise: “Grit. Hustle. Resilience. The American Dream is built on the audacious belief that anyone can make it to the top…” The all-star list includes lots of well-known names: Oprah Winfrey (#1); Bill Clinton (#8); George Soros (#12). The roster continued all the way to Martha Stewart (#250). A real who’s-who of the privileged elite. Self-made?

            Missing was a man whose name is widely known. Ted Turner is no recent AI mogul. He took over his father’s billboard business in 1963 after his father’s suicide, then founded Cable News Network (CNN) in 1980 and built Turner Broadcasting into an international platform. He was a sportsman and conservationist; he acquired over 4 million acres of ranch land across multiple states. Starting with three bison in the late ‘70s, his herd(s) now numbers over 51,000 animals spread across multiple ranches.

            Two weeks ago, Ted Turner died at 87. Though not on Forbes’ list of self-made Americans, he was most-certainly “self-made.” How valuable was that distinction on May 6^th, the day he passed over into eternity?

            Though raised in a Christian household and educated in a Presbyterian school, over the years, he described himself in varying ways: sometimes as an agnostic, sometimes as a skeptic of organized religion. He criticized what he viewed as intolerance and dogmatism in some religious traditions and once sparked backlash by joking that Christianity was “a religion for losers.” He never cited any personal encounter with the Gospel; he claimed no relationship with the Lord Jesus.

            Likely written by David who started tending sheep to ultimately assume the throne of Israel and became the progenitor of the royal line that would culminate in the King of Kings, Psalm 100 answers the “who made this guy the way he is?” question succinctly: “Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture” (Psalm 100:3).

            Paul keeps that consideration at the forefront of our foundational understanding of life: “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10).

            We all need to answer the question for ourselves: Who made me, and why? If you’re listening to Forbes, you get one answer. If you’re listening to God, the conclusion is very different.

            What are you hearing?

 — Bob Shank