Actually, I’m surprised that I had made it this far. Usually the lifeguard is blowing the whistle and telling me to get out of the pool by the end of the first weekend, but this year I did pretty well until Michigan State made their run and took my tournament winner out and I went through the door with them.
I’m not really that much of a college basketball fan, a consequence of living too far from a local rooting interest in any serious contenders, but I usually fill out a bracket. Why not? It’s a simple diversion, a joyful connection with friends, a playful competition with a minimal stake or reward. I find it hard to apprehend the outrage over the President taking the time to fill out a bracket – and you only need to see his outcome to know that he didn’t put too much time or energy into it (after all, even I beat him!).
It is, of course, at the center of our nature to be competitive, evidenced by the overwhelming nation-wide interest in challenging each other to this contest of blindly foreseeing the outcome of a game played by 18-year-olds. People -especially guys! - I meet are deeply invested in perfecting their bracket, regardless of the fact that it involves something less than the cost of lunch at McDonald’s. There’s pride at stake, bragging rights, winning! And we’re all about that.
Which is the rub, of course. Don’t misunderstand – I’m for winning. I’m for striving, putting forth best efforts, honest competition and learning grace both in victory and defeat. It ought to be within our human nature to always seek success, and desire and drive for the best outcome in all we do. But we must recognize the line where that drive for victory becomes a drive for self, a compulsion for pride and the trappings of mastery which destroy grace, humility, and finally defeats faith.
The savior said, “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life?" (Matthew 16:24-25) The life that matters is not a tournament, the prize we seek is not a trophy, the final score is measured not by what we have gained, but by what we have given, the victor’s crown is not gold but a twist of thorns covered in blood.
There is an opportunity in this season (the other March Madness that we call Lent) I hope, to be reminded again, that the true value in the tournament of life is not the rewards our labors bring to us, but the value they bring out from us.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Of Easter and Double-Dog-Dares ...
I double dog dare you!
When I was 11, it was the ultimate threat. You could maybe slip away from a simple dare, you could sometimes even evade a double dare, but there was no getting away from the dreaded double-dog-dare. When that challenge was thrown in your face and you saw the expectant and fearful looks on the faces of your friends, the meaning of life snapped into instant focus. Somehow, despite the screaming voices in your head and the butterflies churning around in your stomach, you knew you had to step up.
And so you did.
Fear is a strange thing. It is one of those absolutely common characteristics that make us all human. Sometimes we are victimized by our fear, sometimes we rise above it, but it remains always there, always influencing our choices, defining our makeup, shaping our destiny. Many of our moments of many of our days contain opportunities for fear, usually small frights that are easily overcome. Sometimes, though, there are those great fears, those double-dog-dares, that challenge us at the very core of who we are. Those contests can make us great. Or they can destroy us.
What amazes me most about fear, though, is that it is not real. Fear is not how we react when bad things happen, it’s how we react BEFORE the bad things happens. Fear is the reaction to what we anticipate, what we expect to happen IF we do or do not do a thing. Fear exists, in most part, within ourselves, in past memories and shared experiences and deeply ingrained expectations. It does not take much, no, hardly anything, to bring it up. It comes, whether we bid it or not. The challenge is to not let it destroy us.
Which leads to the answer to the most important question: how do I conquer fear?
The world is full of scared people. You hear it in their voices as they talk about their retirement accounts, the markets, their jobs. You see it in their faces when they hear their neighbor’s bad news and wonder, “What if that happens to me?” The news headlines scream that we should be even more afraid, of terrorism and war, of unemployment and financial ruin, of even each other. It’s a wonder that we haven’t all crumpled into a fetal position in some corner by now.
But we can’t live like that. When the world throws you the old double-dog-dare, you have to answer. The alternative is shame and humiliation and rejection. You have to find, somewhere within yourself, the courage to face that fear and take that dare and grow, live, even triumph.
When the women who followed Jesus traveled to his tomb on that first Easter Sunday, they were afraid. Afraid of the aftermaths from the horrid events of the past Friday, afraid that they wouldn’t be able to roll the stone away from the tomb’s entrance. Then, finding the stone moved and the tomb emptied, they faced a whole new level of fright on seeing the angel and hearing his words. And in its original ending, Mark leaves us in this very human place …
So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Mark 16:8
But, of course, we know that they didn’t. We know that somehow, in the face of the most amazing and frightening moment in all of history, they faced up to the angel’s double-dog-dare and they did go out and they did tell, and wow, did they tell! We are the heirs of their courage. We are their victory over fear.
So will we do the same? Will we find the power to overcome the fear of what might be in the awesome witness of what was, what is and what will be? For this is the promise of Easter, He has left the tomb behind, has put fear and terror and death behind him and beckons us forward to a place where we can conquer our fear and change ourselves and change our lives and change our world.
This Jesus, this living Jesus, is the one who is daring us now, double-dog-daring us to live with him, to come out from our own tombs and face the fears inside us and overcome them with the Spirit he has given us in our baptism. What will you dare to do in this brave new Easter world?
When I was 11, it was the ultimate threat. You could maybe slip away from a simple dare, you could sometimes even evade a double dare, but there was no getting away from the dreaded double-dog-dare. When that challenge was thrown in your face and you saw the expectant and fearful looks on the faces of your friends, the meaning of life snapped into instant focus. Somehow, despite the screaming voices in your head and the butterflies churning around in your stomach, you knew you had to step up.
And so you did.
Fear is a strange thing. It is one of those absolutely common characteristics that make us all human. Sometimes we are victimized by our fear, sometimes we rise above it, but it remains always there, always influencing our choices, defining our makeup, shaping our destiny. Many of our moments of many of our days contain opportunities for fear, usually small frights that are easily overcome. Sometimes, though, there are those great fears, those double-dog-dares, that challenge us at the very core of who we are. Those contests can make us great. Or they can destroy us.
What amazes me most about fear, though, is that it is not real. Fear is not how we react when bad things happen, it’s how we react BEFORE the bad things happens. Fear is the reaction to what we anticipate, what we expect to happen IF we do or do not do a thing. Fear exists, in most part, within ourselves, in past memories and shared experiences and deeply ingrained expectations. It does not take much, no, hardly anything, to bring it up. It comes, whether we bid it or not. The challenge is to not let it destroy us.
Which leads to the answer to the most important question: how do I conquer fear?
The world is full of scared people. You hear it in their voices as they talk about their retirement accounts, the markets, their jobs. You see it in their faces when they hear their neighbor’s bad news and wonder, “What if that happens to me?” The news headlines scream that we should be even more afraid, of terrorism and war, of unemployment and financial ruin, of even each other. It’s a wonder that we haven’t all crumpled into a fetal position in some corner by now.
But we can’t live like that. When the world throws you the old double-dog-dare, you have to answer. The alternative is shame and humiliation and rejection. You have to find, somewhere within yourself, the courage to face that fear and take that dare and grow, live, even triumph.
When the women who followed Jesus traveled to his tomb on that first Easter Sunday, they were afraid. Afraid of the aftermaths from the horrid events of the past Friday, afraid that they wouldn’t be able to roll the stone away from the tomb’s entrance. Then, finding the stone moved and the tomb emptied, they faced a whole new level of fright on seeing the angel and hearing his words. And in its original ending, Mark leaves us in this very human place …
So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Mark 16:8
But, of course, we know that they didn’t. We know that somehow, in the face of the most amazing and frightening moment in all of history, they faced up to the angel’s double-dog-dare and they did go out and they did tell, and wow, did they tell! We are the heirs of their courage. We are their victory over fear.
So will we do the same? Will we find the power to overcome the fear of what might be in the awesome witness of what was, what is and what will be? For this is the promise of Easter, He has left the tomb behind, has put fear and terror and death behind him and beckons us forward to a place where we can conquer our fear and change ourselves and change our lives and change our world.
This Jesus, this living Jesus, is the one who is daring us now, double-dog-daring us to live with him, to come out from our own tombs and face the fears inside us and overcome them with the Spirit he has given us in our baptism. What will you dare to do in this brave new Easter world?
As someone who avidly reads several wonderful blogs, it seems a good idea to take up my own best efforts to add to the conversation, and, by some grace, improve the nature of the world we share.
Dr. Luther admonished us to make "plain utterances" of our faith. I find that a great challenge as a preacher, to speak those things which truly reflect the gifts of faith, but do so in a plain way, so that many can hear and know and feel and understand. It is our daily task to use the gift of language well, with beauty that is simple and available to all.
This place that I call home is named by many as the "Plains" because those who first encountered it found it lacking in grandeur, and consequently, interest. But those of us who have been raised here know that its plainness is its very beauty, and though we enjoy a visit to mountain and forest and city as much as anyone, we find ourselves longing for the vast openness and truth of the prairie.
I think many, many people long for that. I believe it often eludes us.
I should only hope that I could bring that same quality to the words that follow here.
Dr. Luther admonished us to make "plain utterances" of our faith. I find that a great challenge as a preacher, to speak those things which truly reflect the gifts of faith, but do so in a plain way, so that many can hear and know and feel and understand. It is our daily task to use the gift of language well, with beauty that is simple and available to all.
This place that I call home is named by many as the "Plains" because those who first encountered it found it lacking in grandeur, and consequently, interest. But those of us who have been raised here know that its plainness is its very beauty, and though we enjoy a visit to mountain and forest and city as much as anyone, we find ourselves longing for the vast openness and truth of the prairie.
I think many, many people long for that. I believe it often eludes us.
I should only hope that I could bring that same quality to the words that follow here.
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