I saw amazing displays of ego and self this weekend in the NFL coming from every team. All cheered by fans. Players celebrated personal gain through shameless and grotesque displays of human expression. Hardly team play, as far as I’m concerned. Yet all anyone seemed to be able to criticize and find fault with was a player kneeling to pray.
Unreal how the words of Jesus ring true so often, that we will suffer for following Him. Look what happened to His disciples.
Looking back at the history of bad behavior in all of professional sports – from double murderers, to drugs, to prostitutes, to alcohol abuse, to spousal abuse, to illegal guns in night clubs and on airplanes, to sexual assault, etc. etc. etc. – it is difficult to understand how the angst over Tim Tebow has reached such a fever pitch. To say hatred, would be an understatement. You have to really know someone to hate them.
This is something else and Jesus warned us about it. The seething anger towards Tim Tebow exposes a much larger enemy that dwells among us. We should recognize it as such.
The Lambeau Leap, The Ickey Shuffle, The Super Bowl Shuffle (sorry to critique my Bears, but they are guilty too), players stowing cell phones in the end zone to make dramatic celebratory displays of self after a score, placing bows on footballs to give to fans in front of the live network cameras, and simply acting like fools – all warrant more scorn than a player taking a knee in a personal moment with God on the sideline. But these displays are touted and celebrated, while this prayer is ridiculed in the media, on the streets, even in churches.
I’m not surprised. And neither should you be.
This past summer Texas Ranger Josh Hamilton tossed a ball into the stands and it cost a man his life. The fan reached over the upper deck railing and fell. Some call Josh’s practice a noble gesture and say he should keep doing it in spite of the fact that someone has died.
Is Tim Tebow kneeling an improper display of faith? Show-boating? It can be taken that way, although I doubt Tebow’s intent would justify the accusation. We’ll never know either, because he probably won’t speak about it much.
What about Josh Hamilton? Could he not save those baseballs and give them to fans in a more private (and safe… and proper) setting? Sure he could!
I love Tim Tebow for persevering through the relentless criticism and kneeling in the face of the adversary. I pray he keeps on “Tebowing” throughout his (surely to be) very long and successful career.
I am a fan for life.
Go Tebow!!!
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.” John 15:18-20
During the Broncos’ regular season loss to the Buffalo Bills, for instance, “progressive” troglodyte and pseudo-intellectual funnyman Bill Maher tweeted about the game, encapsulating [the] visceral hatred for Tim Tebow in 140 characters or less: “Wow, Jesus just [expletive deleted] #Tim Tebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere in hell Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler ‘Hey, Buffalo’s killing them.’”
