Unbelievable

It's that time year: March Madness. What a tournament it's been so far. I was pulling for Texas Tech last night but West Virginia proved to be the better team. But, what an unbelievable job that Bobby Knight has done. Or, what an unbelievable team that the 'eers have -- I would have never guessed they were that good. It's been an unbelievable tournament.

Gonzaga, the recent Cinderella of the tourney, was a 3 seed and was knocked off by another team attempting its own fairy tale year. Just last night, Louisville beat the 1 seed Washington in a game proving that Rick Pitino knows basketball. Who knows who will end up in the biggest dance (I think a coach named Rick might be there?)

For Christians, it's an unbelievable time of year. It's this time of year that we celebrate an event that is truly deserving of the term "unbelievable." The infinite, transcendent God became flesh in order to demonstrate his love for his creation and to find his lost sheep. At Easter, we remember that unbelievable of unbelievable events: the very people that God created and had been in relationship with for thousands of year did the unbelievable, they killed him.

Calling his people to be love just didn't fit the mold that the Jews had fashioned for their messiah: they want a lot more Maccabees and a lot less Jesus. They wanted to overthrow the Romans and be the power brokers of the ancient world. The Holy of Holies was not the only box for God to inhabit.

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Final Four basketball is not really that unbelievable. We all recite, "Any given team can be beaten on any given night." We know the realities and the frailties of humanity. The one who was all-powerful, the one who ruled supremely became frail; so frail that his own creation could crucify him. How unbelievable, that the creator of the Universe who offer himself up to his creation to do with as they pleased. And, we wonder how they did it.

If that same God became incarnate today, what would he do with us and what would we do with him? I think Jesus would question our way of life in such a way that he would become first, an annoyance, then a pest, and then, the focus of our wrath and anger. He would question our busyness, our lavishness, our irresponsibility, our lack of stewardship and inability to love each other. He would question our support of war and our laziness in praying for God to intercede (how many churches prayed for Iraq before the war? How many pray for our soldiers/sailors/marines?) He would question our accommodations to culture and making the church a monastery rather than a lighthouse.

He would look at the way we treat each other in church and in other places that carry the Christian name (I work at a Christian College and I would say that the non-administrative employees and faculty are treated the same way my paper shredder treats paper.) We don't really love each other, and at church we are merely checking our time cards and racing out as quickly as possible. We are against abortion but not actively adopting children (in the Roman empire, female babies were a blight and so they would be taken and placed in an area that made them vulnerable to animals, the elements and charlatans, Christians began to frequent those places and raise the children as their own.)

He would look at the money we spend on real estate which doesn't last while neglecting people who do last, and I think one word would pop into his head: unbelievable.

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"The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door, and deny Him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable." Brennan Manning


A friend reminded me that this is at the beginning of the dc talk song, "What if I Stumble." It dovetails with this idea of being unbelievable.

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"The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult, and left untried." G.K. Chesterton

Church tends to keep us so busy that we don't have time to be and do the one thing required: to first be disciples, then create disciples. It is hard work because it can't be done with 10% of ourselves. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." The problem is that we don't want to die to our own will: that will wants to control us. It is easier to go through the motions. It is easier to show up two hours a week than fight a will that refuses to yield to God. As God says, "...they worship me with their mouths but their hearts and minds are far from me."