The Xbox “Virtual Museum”: Life, Legacy, and Elisha’s Bones (2 Kings 13)

Microsoft is celebrating of the 20th anniversary of their maiden voyage into the video game space in a very unique way… by launching a virtual museum that commemorates not only the significant events in the history of the Microsoft Xbox family of hardware, but also chronicles the history of each and every one of the players. Yes, you read that correctly… if you signed into an Xbox at some point over the last twenty years, YOU have a personalized wing in this museum as well. If you haven’t checked this out yet, you are certainly missing out on an opportunity to not only take a walk back through memory lane to review some of the most iconic moments in the history of the Xbox, but of your own personal gaming history with these consoles, too. Come walk with me… we have some exploring to do. 

I have to give credit where credit is due. Microsoft could have simply made a museum celebrating all of their wins and accomplishments while scrubbing out some of their less successful moments, but it really is ALL here… from the polarizing debut of the Kinect (which I personally really enjoyed) to the “red ring of death” debacle (which I experienced first-hand and definitely did NOT enjoy). Exploring each of the platforms by walking through this virtual space is actually kind of fun, sparking more than a few exclamations of “Has it really been that long?” and “oh yeah, I DO remember that!” as you pass through each interactive area. But as cool as it is to take a virtual tour through gaming history, it is the incredible detail that went into each gamer’s personal museum that truly impressed me. And there may be a few surprises in store for you here as well…

Everything from the number of titles that we have played, the achievements we have unlocked, and our most played games are recorded in here. From our first achievement to our rarest accomplishments, from the first date we logged on to which games we played the most, you may be surprised at what you find here. If you want to have some fun, write down what you THINK the five games you played the most over the years were… then compare the results. I knew I played a lot of Destiny 2… I didn’t think it was THAT much. And I am even more surprised at what DIDN’T make the cut… for example I really thought my hundreds of hours exploring the world of Elder Scrolls would have easily exceeded my time spent in Halo 5 Guardians. Clearly, I have played more Halo than I thought. 

The funny thing is that I had forgotten about a LOT of this… I don’t remember hardly any of these achievements, and if asked about my top five most played games before reviewing the results I would have gotten a lot of them wrong. But for better or for worse, this is MY museum. These are MY achievements, and this is the history of MY gaming profile… the good, the bad, and the ugly are all present here. I am not proud of everything in it, but here it stands, nonetheless. And if I never pick up another Xbox controller again, this is where my gaming museum will remain in perpetuity… this will be my gaming legacy on the Xbox platform. 

The idea of a “legacy” is a complicated one. It is something that we are typically unaware that we are creating throughout a large portion of our lives, and once we begin to comprehend the concept of a “legacy” many of us suddenly shift into trying to mold it and remake it into something we will actually be proud of leaving behind. And if I am being honest, when I try to conceptualize my own personal legacy, it doesn’t feel very good. Sometimes, it feels like everything I have ever done didn’t really matter… not in a way that will have resonance after I am gone. If anything, the only things that I may be remembered for are for some of my worst moments, my most selfish choices, and my most obvious mistakes. Will anything I have done really matter once I am gone? What is it that I am actually leaving behind? These are tough questions to ask… and they are questions that need to be answered.

No less than the wisest man who ever lived wrestled with this problem… King Solomon himself. Talk about a guy who was having problems reconciling his feelings about the legacy he was leaving behind… he seems to be less than thrilled with the prospect, to put it mildly. As the wise old king began to truly comprehend his mortality and the point of life itself, he seemed to be just a wee bit salty about this whole concept and what his lasting legacy would truly be.

Ecclesiastes 1:9-11 That which has been is what will be, that which is done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which it may be said, “See, this is new”? It has already been in ancient times before us. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of things that are to come by those who will come after.

Ecclesiastes 2:16-18 For there is no more remembrance of the wise than of the fool forever, since all that now is will be forgotten in the days to come. And how does a wise man die? As the fool! Therefore, I hated life because the work that was done under the sun was distressing to me, for all is vanity and grasping for the wind. Then I hated all my labor in which I had toiled under the sun, because I must leave it to the man who will come after me. 

I have a feeling we can all relate to a few aspects of what Solomon is laying down here. No matter what our path in this life is, deep down inside we want it to MATTER. Both Christians and non-believers alike struggle with ascribing a value to the museum we will all one day leave behind for others to explore, and we want it to MEAN something. And I have some good news for you… it DOES. Even if we don’t get to see the full impact of the lives we have led and the souls we have touched, what we leave behind is important. And one of my favorite examples of this is the story of Elisha’s bones. No, that is not the name of some new rock band (although it WOULD be a pretty cool name for a band) … no, this is a literal story about the literal bones of the literal prophet Elisha literally bringing someone back to life. Literally.

2 Kings 13:20-21 Then Elisha died, and they buried him. And the raiding bands from Moab invaded the land in the spring of the year. So it was, as they were burying a man, that suddenly they spied a band of raiders; and they put the man in the tomb of Elisha; and when the man was let down and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet.

So… of all the resurrection stories in the Bible, this one has to be the weirdest. Elisha had been a faithful prophet of the Lord all the way through to the end of his journey, and like most people, he was buried after he passed away with the assumption that his story was over. But after his passing these old bones had ONE more miracle left in them… one final life left to touch. A group of men who were interrupted while burying their friend were forced to place the body in an already occupied tomb to avoid becoming corpses themselves. But in the panic of avoiding the attacks of the invading Moabite raiders, they placed this body just a little too close to Elisha’s final resting place… and upon contact this previously lifeless body was given a new lease on life. Now, I don’t know how to explain this one to you. If this incredibly bizarre resurrection completely broke your theology on how prayer and healing are supposed to work… well, I’m sorry for the inconvenience, I guess. You will have to take that one up with God. But the real story here is that even after his passing, the life Elisha lived and the touch of God on his life still had a resonance that changed another person’s life… long after his voice had been silenced and his final breath had been taken.

Here is the tough truth we all must reconcile with… we do not get to choose our entrance into this world or our exit from it. But we DO choose the legacy we leave behind and the choices we make to leave each person and place better than when we found it. This isn’t about monuments or statues to recognize our “achievements”… if they had made a statue of Elisha and they dropped that dead man’s body off next to it, he would still be dead. It is in the bones of the life that we lived for Christ that continues to give life and healing long after we have departed. It is the life we choose to live for the Lord going forward, starting right now, regardless of what skeletons are in our old closets. It was the remaining presence of God on the life of Elisha that continued to impact lives through even the bones he left behind… a lasting legacy that Elisha didn’t get to see until after he was gone. 

What we do down here MATTERS. ALL of it. Not merely as some random snapshots of our accolades or merely chronicling our unique journey on this large rock spinning around a giant star, but because there are numerous souls we may never even meet who will have their lives changed by the decisions we are making right now… even if we never become aware of it during our sojourn on this planet. If we want to leave a lasting legacy that matters, or perhaps just feel like our life has a purpose and meaning beyond the constant lather, rinse, repeat formula of our daily existence… there is only one way to accomplish that. When the light we have chosen to shine is the light of Christ, it continues to burn long after our story is complete. Time to unlock one last achievement…

When I explored the Xbox virtual museum, I realized something… it was never really about the games. It wasn’t even about the console I played them on or the achievements I unlocked… this museum is the story of my journey as a human, a gamer, and a child of God. It is the story of the times I felt alone, and through these gaming experiences I was introduced to others who shared my journey, even if it was only for a short while. It is a reminder of the laughs, the tears, the ups, the downs, the games I regret playing, and the games I am still playing… and all of this makes up my legacy. Not my legacy as a gamer, but as a human who “games”. Is it flawed, and at times even embarrassing to look back on? Absolutely. I mean, I played (and enjoyed) all of the Burger King games for crying out loud. But our legacy is not the mistakes we have made… it is how we allow those to shape who we are becoming and determine what type of “bones” we are leaving behind. We are deciding, each and every day, if these “bones” that make up our legacy will help and heal those who find them and lead them to a deeper relationship with the Lord… perhaps many years after we are no longer here. The trees we are planting in faith today will generate fruit for generations to come, so we must choose the seeds we are sowing with this in mind. Elisha may not have chosen when he would graduate from this life, but he DID make the choice as to what his bones would represent to those who found them. Let’s make the decision today to plant thoughtfully, invest our time intentionally, and show Christ’s love unconditionally. The ripples of a life lived in service to the Lord can restore life to those we may never even meet on this plane of existence… you and your life MATTER, more than we may ever know. We were chosen to serve God in this exact time and place, in a way that will last beyond our final chapter. Plant with care. 

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