Sebastian Horsley – a child of privilege turned artist, author, and all-around self-promoter – died of a drug overdose yesterday, merely forty-seven years old. His sad life was marred by dysfunctional family life, followed by illicit self-indulgence in sexual promiscuity and heroin addiction. As an adult he engaged in shameless exhibitionism, as revealed in a dangerous and blasphemous stunt which he pulled a decade ago. His obituary comments:
The pinnacle of his career in this regard came in 2000, when he travelled to the Philippines and was crucified (“Christ, after all, had profound style”), fainting when the nails were driven in and falling when his footrest fell away. It was a gruesome and ignominious end to what some had viewed as a stunt in extremely poor taste, but Horsley’s name was trumpeted around the world, and even, he seemed to suggest, to the heavens. ‘I’d been rejected by a god I didn’t believe in,’ he noted.i
His last comment was particularly tragic, given that it was entirely untrue. God exists, and was willing to receive Horsley, if he would repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. The obituary goes on to cite a recent interview where Horsley cynically assessed his life, saying: “I haven’t really had a life…I’ve just sat in a room and died. That’s what we all do.”ii How different it would have been if he had turned to Christ in his desperation. For those who come to Him for salvation, the Lord Jesus promises life that is eternal in quality as well as in duration. As He said: “…I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (Jn. 10:10.)
TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE, CLICK ON THE TITLE.