Hello,
As many of you,
long time readers of the Bungee Cord, know, I am a rather avid University of
Illinois fan. I have more orange and
blue apparel than the test for mental sanity allows. I have a man cave where flags, shirts,
pictures, pennants, and even the floor are orange and blue. The cabinet that holds my orange and blue
drinking glasses sports a large “I” on its door. And the people of my congregations have all
come to understand that my favorite colors are…..yup….orange and blue. I have even floated the idea of beginning a
write in campaign to establish orange and blue as one of the liturgical colors
of the church year (an idea that hasn’t taken off very well in the opposing Big
Ten states in which I have lived.).
Some may think me
to be a bit foolish….foolish to try and cover every inch of space with orange
and blue….foolish to sing “Oskeewowow Illinois” in public settings…but maybe
most of all, to be so foolish to set my heart on a team that is so often really
bad! And yet, I am not alone. There are scores of people whose Illini
fan-hood runs deep in their veins, who join me week after week in bemoaning yet
another heartbreaking loss. There are
even some…yes Kate (that is my wife)…who are even more avid than I. They buy vans and paint them orange and
blue. They travel far and wide to attend
games, decked in orange and blue. They
even are bold enough to have purchased (and wear) orange suits. Greater fools than I!
I have thought
about this foolishness, this foolishness to root for a team that regularly gets
beaten and pummeled by so many others.
Surely, anyone with any brains would give up such foolish loyalty. How many times does one’s hopes and heart
have to be dashed in the last few minutes of a game (or from the very beginning
of the game) to get it into one’s head that such loyalty is self-inflicted
cruelty, and it makes one the laughing stock of many nearly every week? Yet we Illinois fans go undeterred. We still buy anything that is orange and
blue. We still have friends of the
opposing team over to watch a game with us with “Oskeewowow Illinois” playing
in the background when they walk into the house. We don’t seem to care what people think about
us….we cheer for the Illini (ugh!).
Why? Here’s my answer. It really doesn’t matter. Rooting for a sport’s team is not a life or
death conviction. In the scope of any
day, except to those on the field, it really is of little consequence to life
as to who wins or loses the game….whether the team does either with any
regularity. Rooting for the Illini with
the foolish fervor that I do, for me, is merely a fun distraction as I deal
with the blows that actually hit me hard in my life. When it comes to my fanatic Illinois
foolishness….it really doesn’t matter….and so I really don’t care if someone
thinks me to be a fool.
But when it comes
to things that do matter, I don’t want to be a fool. When it comes to doing my job, being a
husband and father, making life and death decisions…the last thing I want to be
is a fool. And maybe most of all, in the
largest of all things of matter, that which I most deeply believe in, being a
fool is the riskiest of titles to own.
Personally, it
doesn’t bother me that many people find it hard to dive in head first into
Christianity. It doesn’t bother me that people
ask hard questions of the Christian faith as they stick their toes in the
water. It doesn’t bother me if the
words, “I believe”, are slow to make their way across one’s lips. It doesn’t bother me that people are slow to
hang their hearts on the Christian proclamation of God’s undeserved love and
mercy. These things don’t bother me
because these things tell me that people understand that that of which we
Christians speak is really important, and it matters deeply.
To adorn one’s
self with faith, to publically assert a trust in Jesus, to arrange one’s life
in Christian devotion….all of that is very risky when it comes to potentially
bearing the name, “Fool”. But I find
myself chiming in with the Apostle Paul of the Bible who devoutly claims the
title “Fool for Christ”, because I, like he, have been woo-ed into the love of
God in Christ. It has not always been so
in my life to be bold in faith, as a matter of fact when I was in high school a
new kid in town showed up in my church, and I hid in the choir loft, fearful
that I might be seen, and the faith that secreted in me might be judged in the
court of public opinion. But day after
day, God, like a undeterred lover has courted me in grace….grace that has
shaped my life….grace that has opened my hands to others….grace that has
provided me hope…grace that has embedded in my heart…grace that has woo-ed me
to not care if others think me to be a fool.
Ok…I am a fool…a
fool to parade around in orange and blue….because it really doesn’t
matter. And a fool (at least to some)
to follow one whose grace has given me life…and that really does matter.
As Michael Card of Christian music sings, “Come be a fool
with me!”
Have a great week.
God’s grace and peace, (ggap)
Pastor Jerry Nuernberger
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