The Apprentice

I happened to watch the first episode of the new series of ‘The Apprentice’, this is a programme in which a number of men and women, by completing a series of team based tasks, compete for the honour (if that’s the right word) of being employed by Sir Alan Sugar at a six-figure salary.  From my observations of Mr Sugar it would take more than a six-figure salary to persuade me that this was an ambition worth following, but there were many applicants for the programme, so obviously not everybody shares my cynicism about this exercise.    

My attention was drawn to one particular individual who drew the short straw of being the team leader (a sure route to certain exit should your team fail to win) on this initial programme.  I felt really sorry for him not I hasten to add because of his hasty and undignified exit when his team duly failed to win, but because he had chosen to take part in the first place.  As he explained at the beginning of the programme he had suffered a life threatening illness just a few years before and yet against all reasonable expectation he had survived and was cured. It seemed to me so sad that someone who had been brought face to face with his own mortality should, when given a new chance at life, choose to spend his time chasing illusory gold, and putting himself though a level of pressure he looked ill equipped to deal with.   He didn’t seem to enjoy the experience of taking part and was obviously not temperamentally capable of coping with the sharks in human form that were swimming around him each anxious to be the one victor at the end of the series. 

This man had been granted the most wonderful gift, life itself, a new chance, a fresh start, and as far as I could see he’d blown it.   The experience of his own mortality seemed to have taught him nothing.    I think that the term born again can be overused by some Christians.  They put great weight on the idea that when you become a Christian you are literally a new person, there’s a danger that people can come to feel that now they are wonderful and constantly emphasise how awful they used to be.   I find life is more like a pilgrimage that we are on a journey, but that there are moments of insight in our lives that can help us to make sense of ll that we experience.   I jus felt so sorry that this person had been given the gift of a new life born again but that they had missed just what that gift was worth.  Every day is a wonderful gift from God we should use it well.

Alan Harper - April 06