The Dark Side of the Reality TV Freakout

For those of us who watch too much TV, there is a certain phenomenon that we’ve noticed that coincides with the rise in popularity of Reality TV, the “freak-out.” This is when some person featured on a reality TV show has such a dramatic temper tantrum that it must be not only seen, but recorded and played back several times to be believed.
One of these events occurred on the TV show “Trading Spouses,” a show in which two radically different families trade matriarchs in order to experience a different world view. On one episode, a woman named Marguerite Perrin, who identifies herself as a devout Christian, has a complete and total meltdown after spending a few weeks with a family that practices a form a pagan religion. Upon returning home, she lashes out at her family, tears up the money they are to receive for participating in the social experiment, and orders all the “dark sided” people (i.e. the camera crew) out of her home. In order to better appreciate this, you can see her freak-out on youtube at the attached link(or at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHh9ywmo5AE). Although we may look at this and say she’s obviously a misguided lady who has missed the point of being a Christian and I do not personally agree with her reaction, I feel the need to point out that Jesus himself had his own freak-out and (although not televised) it did rub some people the wrong the way.
We are all probably familiar with the story of Jesus casting out the money changers. Upon visiting the temple in Jerusalem, he sees people changing Greek and Roman money into Jewish and Tyrian coinage since they were the only ones that could be used in Jewish rituals. He turns over the tables of the money changers, fashioned a whip from some cords, and chased the money changers out of the temple saying “My house shall be called the house of prayer but ye have made it into a den of thieves.” Although some people interpret it as the money changers exploiting the poor, I would be curious to see how Jesus would react to large churches putting ATMs in the foyers in case people left their cash at home for the tithe.
This event, although not televised, has been the subject of artistic representations and has been analyzed by Biblical Scholars right and left. However, I think it can be boiled down to something very simple, Jesus was mad and he wasn’t going to take it anymore. Although the effects of his actions were profound, I believe this was not something planned out by Jesus or foreordained, but a reaction to a circumstance that he found unacceptable. Although Jesus was divine, he was also human and humans don’t always act with calm collected action. I do not say this to minimize this event in Biblical history, but to express my opinion that it was not a carefully scripted play enacted by characters like puppets but a story of passion and zeal fed by individuals’ love for God and abhorrence of those who used and exploited others. Of course, we cannot minimize actions that are acts of impulse. After all, the “Tank Man” in Beijing who stood in front of a line of tanks being rolled in to quell the protests at Tiananmen Square probably didn’t think through his actions yet his defiance became a symbol of freedom and rebellion for the world.
In summary, God gave us brains, but he also gave us instincts and we should listen to them just as much as we listen to logic and reason. Although impulsive actions can sometimes cause problems (in this case, they certainly did Jesus) they can also be the catalyst of profound actions.