Robert W. Smyth, 1922 - 2008

Robert W. Smyth died May 7, in Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, IL.

You don’t know who Robert Smyth was, do you? He was the man who came up with the idea for the Quaker Oats Great Klondike Big Inch Land Caper advertising campaign in 1955. From the Chicago Tribune:

Just 32 years old at the time of the Yukon campaign and only a copywriter at the firm, Mr. Smyth helped adapt the idea from an article he read in Life magazine about two men selling pieces of Texas.

So for a few weeks in 1955, each box of Puffed Wheat Cereal contained a deed to a square inch of land in the Yukon. These were the years when every kid with a television watched Sergeant Preston of the Yukon, and every kid who watched wanted their own plot of land right where Sergeant Preston and his trusty dog King had their weekly adventures.

Millions of those deeds still exist. The Lands Branch in the Yukon has a file 18 inches thick containing inquiries into the status of the properties attached to these deeds.

The answer, unfortunately, is not good news. Quaker Oats never registered the deeds because it would have been much too expensive, so the pieces of paper that came in the cereal boxes were worthless right from the start. And then, in 1965, the Canadian government took back the land Quaker Oats bought for the promotion. The reason? Nonpayment of $37.20 in taxes.

But here is good news:
You can still have a worthless piece of paper like this for only $29.95!

Some of the “landowners” got just a little upset about their raw deal.  

Charles Matznick, of Detroit, wrote several letters in the mid-60s and at one point threatened legal action if he wasn’t given title to the land.

On Jan. 4, 1965 the commissioner of the Yukon and the Prime Minister of Canada received letters from Iowa resident (sic) Steven T. Spoorl and John A. Zook.

“This is to inform you that certain areas located between Dawson and Whitehorse…hereafter to be referred to as Xanadu, hereby declare themselves free and independant (sic, again) from the Yukon Territory, the Dominion of Canada and the British Commonwealth of Nations.” (Source)

It was a bit of a scam right from the start, wasn’t it? But Robert Smyth’s idea worked on one level. Twenty-one million boxes of cereal were sold in just a few weeks. It was one of the most successful sales promotions in the history of advertising in North America. And when you’re in advertising, that’s what’s most important, isn’t it?

What is required in the third commandment?

The third commandment requires, That the name of God, his titles, attributes,[1] ordinances,[2] the word,[3] sacraments,[4] prayer,[5] oaths,[6] vows,[7] lots,[8] his works,[9] and whatsoever else there is whereby he makes himself known, be holily and reverently used in thought,[10] meditation,[11] word,[12] and writing;[13] by an holy profession,[14] and answerable conversation,[15] to the glory of God,[16] and the good of ourselves,[17] and others.[18]

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Romans 8:18-39: Steps 1-4

What I’m doing in this little demonstration is showing you (more or less) how I go about studying a passage of scripture if I really want to know what it means. I like to do in-depth study by writing an interpretive paraphrase. To see the general procedures I’m using to do the interpretive paraphase of this passage, go here.

Step 1 is to place the passage in the context of the book of Romans. Here’s a really rough summary of the book of Romans up through chapter 8:

• Everyone is sinful and as a consequence everyone is under the wrath of God (1:18-3:20).
• But there is a solution to the predicament we are all in: Christ saves people from the wrath of God by justifying them through faith (3:21-5:21),
• And saves them from the power of sin by the power of the Holy Spirit. (6-8)

The previous portion of chapter 8 is about life in the Spirit. Directly before this passage, Paul is writing about sonship in the Spirit. If we are sons, we’re told, we are joint-heirs with Christ, that is, if “we suffer with him so that we may be also glorified with him.”

Step 2 is to paragraph the passage. I looked at many translations and several of them paragraph it in the same way.  I’ll just copy them.

• 8:18-24
  
• 8:26-30
• 8:31-39

Steps 3 and 4 are to copy one verse in the chosen translations and underline the key words and phrases. Here are these steps done for verse 18.

• ESV: For I consider that the sufferings of this present time^(A) are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
• NASB: For I consider that the sufferings of this present time ^(A)are not worthy to be compared with the ^(B)glory that is to be revealed to us.
• NET: For I consider that our present sufferings cannot even be compared²³ to the glory that will be revealed to us.
• NLT: Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later.

You can probably see why I’ve identified these particular words and phrases as key ones, except perhaps in the case of  “to us.” I underlined that because while I was copying and pasting the verse from various translations I noticed that the NIV and NKJV both say “in us” instead of “to us,” so I thought I’d like to look into that difference a little more.

Next up I’ll move on to step 5, examining the key words in verse 18 one by one.

Any questions or comments on what I’ve done so far?