Elvis, Solomon and the Search for Significance

August 1997

Dear Friends,

A few weeks ago, my wife, Shirley, and I were in Memphis, Tenn., to attend a summer meeting of Focus on the Family's board of directors. Before flying home two days later, we stopped by to visit Graceland, the mansion in which Elvis Presley lived until the morning of August 16, 1977, when he suffered a fatal heart attack. Exactly twenty years have passed since that untimely death, which gives me occasion this month to share some observations and thoughts about the man the world knew as “The King of Rock and Roll.”

People visiting Graceland today have many different reactions to what has become a kind of shrine. Some still weep over their fallen hero, even two decades after his departure. Others come to remember the boyish singer who became a legend in his own time. Parents bring their children to learn about the man they idolized and imitated when they were young. Five hundred thousand tourists make this pilgrimage to Graceland each year, filing quietly through the rooms and corridors where Elvis had lived, laughed, loved—and then suddenly died at only 42 years of age.

Few entertainers have ever been so honored and adored as Elvis Aaron Presley. He sold a billion records in his short lifetime, more than any singer in history.1 Several rooms at Graceland are devoted to his trophies, with framed copies of 45s and LPs (remember those?) bearing such names as “All Shook Up,” “You Ain't Nothin' But a Hound Dog” and “Blue Hawaii.” Elvis had 18 No.1 hits in his career, and there were a million orders for “Love Me Tender” before the record was released.2 After a comeback tour in 1969, his fame hit the stratosphere as rabid fans scrambled to catch a glimpse of “the King” in person. He made a vast fortune from his recordings, films and concerts, and spent a sizable chunk of it on a variety of toys that are scattered around the mansion today.

For example, several of Elvis' personal automobiles are on display in a nearby pavilion, including a garish purple Cadillac, a pink Cadillac and two Stutz Blackhawks. Tourists can view them for a fee of $5. Sitting across the mansion are two old airplanes, a Boeing 727 named Lisa Marie (after Elvis' daughter) and a smaller jet called the Hound Dog II. You can walk through them for an extra $4.50. These aircraft were used to ferry Elvis to and fro, sometimes for the silliest of reasons. It is said that he had the larger plane flown to Denver late one night to get him a peanut butter sandwich. The singer denied himself nothing that money could buy during the glory years.

Despite the glitter and glamour that Graceland represents today, I found it all somewhat depressing and sad. In fact, Shirley and I cut short our visit and walked out the front gate as security guards warned, “Hey, you can't do that.” My reaction to the tour was puzzling at first. It had little to do with Elvis' death, although I liked his music when I was younger. I just knew that something in that glitzy manor had bothered me. We hailed a cab to the airport and then rode along in silence, which is unusual for Shirley and me.

Upon reflection, I have a better understanding of my emotional response on that day in Memphis. I was reacting to the darker side of Presley's story and the way fame and fortune eventually destroyed him. The entertainment industry had offered Elvis every material and worldly prize, but it couldn't provide meaning and significance—for which every human heart aches. Someone said that Elvis was like a little boy seeking love and affection, and that the adoration of his fans was like a “fix” to a junkie. Whenever it was denied to him, he suffered from bouts of depression, self-doubt and longings to be loved.

This young man, who had grown up in an Assembly of God church in Tupelo, Mississippi, groped desperately for something in which to believe during his last ten years. After the stressful breakup of his marriage to Priscilla, Elvis sought meaning in star gazing, numerology, astrology, healing and other occult subjects. He joined a worldwide Yoga organization called the “Self Realization Fellowship.”3 Author and road manager Joe Esposito wrote, “he believed fervently in reincarnation. Someone gave him a photograph of a statue in Rome and then placed it next to Elvis' photograph to highlight their identical profiles. Elvis thought about those two photographs long and hard. `Maybe I was here before,' he concluded.”4

Use of illegal substances became Presley's eventual undoing. He experimented with prescription drugs, marijuana and LSD, with which he hoped to open the “doors of perception.”5 He was searching for a “spiritual awakening” that never came. Elvis thought he could stop using pills whenever he wished, but by then, he was hooked. As Joe Esposito wrote, “He took them to sleep, to wake up, to perform, insisting all the while that he didn't have a problem. He was particularly fond of pain medication, which deadens both emotional and physical pain, but eventually deadens the entire system. He also took lots of amphetamine and B12 injections ...6 His drug abuse was a slow, gradual process that pulled [his friends] in as well. Before you knew it, even the craziness at the end seemed natural.”7

And so, Elvis Aaron Presley slipped pathetically into eternity, August 16, 1977. He spent his last night in bed with a casual girlfriend and died early in the morning, his body bloated from years of abuse, overindulgence and medical mismanagement. This likable young man, who was always courteous and kind to everyone, had been destroyed by the same forces that killed Marilyn Monroe, Judy Garland, Kurt Cobain, River Phoenix and many other celebrities. Two thousand years before their time, the Apostle Paul warned against the illusory values on which they had based their lives. He called them, “The lust of the flesh and the pride of life.”

That is what I was thinking and feeling as I toured the Graceland mansion. I was also struck by the utter insignificance of the stuff Elvis left behind. It led me to ask, so what? So what if there are hundreds of tarnished gold and platinum records hanging side by side in the mansion? So what if RCA gave Elvis a trophy 9 feet high and designated him as the greatest entertainer of all time? So what if he received gushy letters from the world's celebrities and had his photograph taken with President Nixon and Queen Elizabeth? So what? It's all wood, hay and stubble now (I Corinthians 3:12, KJV).

It is equally true in my own life. So what if I leave a similar legacy to those who come after me? Who cares, in the end? What difference does it make if trophies hang on the walls of my last home or if powerful and influential people knew me? It is of no consequence even worth mentioning.

To put these thoughts into broader perspective, let me conclude by sharing something that I wrote for young people in my book Life on the Edge. I was speaking of King Solomon and what he said about life in his final years on earth. This is his story:

... the young prince (Solomon) went on to become perhaps the richest, most famous and most glamorous king in the history of the world. He received 25 tons of gold every year (at today's value that is $308 million) and every form of wealth to go with it. The Scripture says, “King Solomon was greater in riches and wisdom than all the other kings of the earth. All the kings of the earth sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put in his heart. Year after year, everyone who came brought a gift—articles of silver and gold, and robes, weapons and spices, and horses and mules. Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots, and twelve thousand horses, which he kept in the chariot cities and also with him in Jerusalem. He ruled over all the kings from the River to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt. The king made silver as common in Jerusalem as stones, and cedar as plentiful as sycamore-fig trees in the foothills. Solomon's horses were imported from Egypt and from other countries” (2 Chronicles 9:22-31).

Indeed, Solomon may have been the most powerful and respected man of all times. No good thing was withheld from him. For the purposes of our discussion, wouldn't it be helpful to know how he felt about the abundance he enjoyed? Well, fortunately, that information is available to us. Solomon wrote his innermost thoughts and recorded them in a book we know today as Ecclesiastes. The following excerpts are extremely important to understanding the point I have tried to make. Please read them carefully!

I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired men and women singers, and a harem as well—the delights of the heart of man. I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me. I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labor. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind, nothing was gained under the sun . . . So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me. And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the work into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun. This too is meaningless (Ecclesiastes 2:4-11, 17-19, NIV).

What an incredible passage of Scripture this is, coming straight from the heart of an old man who had become disillusioned with life! It does not tell the entire story, however. Solomon failed to mention that he had strayed from the advice of his father, King David, and fell into grievous sin. God had specifically warned the children of Israel not to marry women from nations that worshipped idols and false gods. But Solomon willfully disobeyed this commandment and took hundreds of foreigners to be his wives and concubines. The Scripture then tells where that defiance led:

As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech, the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done (I Kings 11:4-6).

Now we know why Solomon was so depressed in the latter years of his life. He had a dark stain on his heart that was like a cancer gnawing at his insides. He had betrayed the God of his father, David. Can't you see the king bowing facedown before the false gods of Ashtoreth and Molech? These idols were used by pagan nations for the most unthinkable wickedness, including orgies and the sacrifice of innocent children. Yet Solomon, who had conversed with God and received every good gift from His hand, persisted in worshipping these evil symbols. Then he enticed the people of Israel to do likewise. Consequently, Solomon had lost all meaning in life, which explains his boredom with riches, fame, women, slaves, accomplishments, gold and even laughter. God's hand was no longer on him.

The lesson is clear for the rest of us. If we ignore the Lord and violate His commandments, there will be no meaning for us, either. The temporal things of this world, even vast riches and power, will not deliver the satisfaction they advertise! There must be something more substantial on which to base one's values, purposes and goals. And of course there is.

Jesus summarized that eternal value system while speaking to a large crowd that gathered around Him on the Mount of Olives. He was addressing a far less materialistic culture than the one in which we live, and yet he spoke sharply that day about the folly of living for money and things. These were His words as recorded in Matthew 6:10-21:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in to steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

That admonition reaches across 20 centuries of time and exposes the hollowness of our materialistic society. It contradicts everything we have been taught and trivializes all our selfish ambitions. That leaves us to ask, if not in money and status, can significance and meaning be found in this human experience? Again, the words of the Master hold the key. He said, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33, KJV). How desperately that message is needed in this culture where Elvis is thought to be alive and God is dead.

That's my thought for this month. Thanks for letting me share it with you. May the peace of Jesus Christ be with you all as the summer draws to a close. I'll write you again in September.

Sincerely,

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.
President