Fans of Jesus and College Football

  My vacation went well.  Painting the house turned out to be a bigger task than I ever imagined.  I am not sure how much of the trouble was normal and how much was “the human element,” so we’ll avoid addressing that until the task is complete.

  Since the last post a lot of good things have happened.  Of course, ranking high on the list: college football has returned!  My Sooners are one win into a fresh season.  I didn’t get to watch the opening game.  For some reason local stations do not understand the intensity of the OU fan base in the Mississippi delta region.  My wife was patient, however, as we watched ESPN.  I didn’t have much interest in the game they were showing… I was watching the score updates scroll at the bottom of the screen.

  My love for the Sooners came early.  In Oklahoma you can say “Mom” or “Dad” before you learn to say “Boomer Sooner”… but you don’t let anyone know about it.  Contrary to rumors, graduating from High School doesn’t require identifying  three Sooners quarterbacks, Greg Pruitt, Joe Washington, Billy Sims, and the Selmon brothers… just don’t expect to be valedictorian.  Congressmen don’t have to be ex Sooners… but it helps.   You can even grow up in Oklahoma without even once wondering where in the world other fans get the idea they have a shot in the upcoming Red River Shootout… but we will look at you funny.  We wonder…. [Take Note: You do not get to ask whether we (ie. the Sooners) have a shot at this year's national title.  Even asking the question reveals such ignorance as to warrant immediate eviction.]

  Of course I grew up in a golden era of Oklahoma football… the 70′s.  Oklahoma was the king of the hill.  They ran the “Wishbone T” right into the college record books:  472 rushing yards per game… Greg Pruitt’s averaged 9 yards per carry.  The Sooner magic so filled the air, some of us were fans of the NFL’s ”Detroit Lions.”   “No” I am not exxagerating, and, “No” they weren’t any good back then.  In fact they were generally as hapless then as they are now.  Then and  Lions’ victories are to be savored… a long time… both of them.  But, back then, they had Steve Owens: Oklahoma’s ’69 Hesiman Trophy winner.  What more could you want? That was all the glory any team needed. 

During those seasons the Sooners averaged 30-40 wins every season!  Five or six in Norman, four or five on the road… the rest in my front yard.  Yes the Sooners played in my front yard.  All the boys in my family would gather and run the triple-option against whoever the unfortunate opponent was that week.  (On a “bye” week we’d blow out Texas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma State once or twice just for good measure.) 

 OK…OK… the truth will set me free… I have no brothers, and my sisters didn’t play football.  No problem.  It took four Sooners to run the Wishbone triple option, but I could do it all by myself.

   I, the quarterback, would walk up behind me, the center, and make my first read.  Was the imaginary defensive guy right on the center or in the gap, and where was the imaginary middle linebacker?  If they were out of position I would hike the ball to me, and hand it off to me the fullback right up the middle.  I’d have five or six yards before the imaginary safety ever touched me.  But, that imaginary safety better not get too careless; I might fake it to me… then slide down the line.  Once again I might hand it off… or I might pull the ball back out in another fake.  Imaginary defenses would be left standing in their shoes… completely lost.  Now it was just   me and the defensive end out on the edge where the big plays happen… would he go for me the quarterback or cheat out to keep me from pitching it to the trailing halfback… me?  Either way he goes, he’s toast… poor imaginary sap.  He won’t want to watch this on game film next week.  I am either going to cut up inside of him for big yards, or, if he tries to tackle me, pitch it to me around the end for a huge gain… probably a touchdown.  I even added another wrinkle… a fifth option… I would stop on a dime, drop back, and rifle a pass to myself downfield… wide open.  I could just walk into the end zone!   Oh yeah…I could not be stopped!!!

  Yes, I really was that good at one on none football.  It seldom took me more than three or four plays to score.  [I kicked field goals too... and did the punting, although every punt was one of Joe Wylie's famous fakes.] 

With all my success in the front yard, however, this will probably amaze you:  Barry Switzer never called.  No matter how tight the game… no phone call.  I know he didn’t have a cell phone, but there was that heavy cable with a rotary dial phone booth on the end.  I was never paged for my insights into the upcoming game.  The truth is, in forty-plus years of being a Sooner I have never even been on the field at Gaylord Memorial Stadium;  never put on the crimson helmet or a team jersey.  I have never sweated through two a days, ate at the team table, or boarded the bus for a road game.  My letterman’s hat is a gift from a former player.  In fact, as dominant as I was in my yard, and as adamant as I have been in support, my impact on Saturdays for the Sooners has been pretty negligible.  Well, its been exactly negligible… “0″.  Bob Stoops doesn’t have my number, Barry Switzer doesn’t know my name… I have never made any difference in even one Oklahoma Sooner football game.  I know, I know it amazes you, and it is rather painful to say it, but it is true.

  Understand, even though I may talk about how “we are looking good, coming off that win,” my “role” in the “we” is ”fan.”  Nothing more.  I am sure I humor God with the prayers that go up when we are behind, but my role on the team for the past 40 years has been “nada.”  I am just a fan living vicariously off the hard work and hectic schedules of the team. 

      Now fans are not bad.  When things go well they cheer, high-five, the whole bit, but they are not “disciples.”  When the great things happen “fans” laud, cheer, glorify, and praise.  Disciples praise… then go out to do likewise.  They go out to be in the world the glory they have witnessed.

  Jesus has lots of fans.  Facebook is running over with His “fan pages” (including, “Yes I love Jesus but I am not forwarding this to 12 friends”).  Jesus has lots of fans, but few disciples.  A lot of folks want to cheer Jesus… very few want to follow Him into the world.

Jesus didn’t pump his hands at the crowd for everyone to stand and cheer.  He said, “Come follow Me.”

One More “Trans-Siberian” Post

  If you are not familiar with Trans-Siberian Orchestra, their Christmas albums are somewhat musical stories, sometimes with “substories” woven in the middle.  Here is another of my favorites.  It’s about a father, a daughter, a prayer, and what would it be like if Jesus came as a child into a bar and called upon the people to save someone outside?  Initially it bothered me that they would have Jesus going into a bar to call these men to his cause.  Then, I thought, “What kind of world do I think He came to?”  Perhaps “bar” is a good metaphor!  I’ll let them tell the story.  The recording is at the end.  Neon lights are a poor substitution for a star.  Here’s a prayer for everyone this Christmas, far away from their Father’s home, for whom a neon sign is the only star they have.

Come, Christmas, stay, Christmas  
Watch over her this day
Keep her, protect her
From harm now in every way

Shelter her gently,there in your arms she’ll be, until the day
When you bring her back home to me …

After he had heard the prayer
The angel gently set it free
And followed it to the father’s child
In a far away city

And there the girl in desperation
Was searching through the sky
For a star that she could wish upon
But stars were in short supply

And the only light that she could see there shining all alone
Was a neon sign on an old bar
And so on this, she wished she was home

In an old city bar that is never too far
From the places that gather the dreams that have been

In the safety of night with its old neon light
It beckons to strangers and they always come in

And the snow it was falling, the neon was calling
The music was low, and the night,  Christmas Eve

And here was the danger, that even with strangers
Inside of this night it’s easier to believe

Then the door opened wide, and a child came inside
That no one in the bar had seen there before

And he asked did we know that outside in the snow
That someone was lost, standing outside our door

Then the bartender gazed through the smoke and the haze

Through the window and ice, tTo a corner streetlight

Where standing alone by a broken pay phone
Was a girl the child said could no longer get home

And the snow it was falling, the neon was calling
The bartender turned and said , “Not that I care
But how would you know this?”
The child said, “I’ve noticed, If one could be home
They’d be all ready there.”

Then the bartender came out from behind the bar
And in all of his life he was never that far
And he did something else that he thought no one saw
When he took all the cash from the register draw

Then he followed the child to the girl cross the street
And we watched from the bar as they started to speak
Then he called for a cab and he said J.F.K.
Put the girl in the cab and the cab drove away
And we saw in his hand that the cash was all gone
From the light that she had wished upon

If you want to arrange it
This world you can change it
If we could somehow make this
Christmas thing last

By helping a neighbor or even a stranger

And to know who needs help you need only just ask

Then he looked for the child, but the child wasn’t there
Just the wind and the snow waltzing dreams through the air

So he walked back inside somehow different I think
For the rest of the night no one paid for a drink

And the cynics will say that some neighborhood kid
Wandered in on some bums in the world where they hid

But they weren’t there,so they couldn’t see
By an old neon star
On that night, Christmas Eve

When the snow it was falling, the neon was calling
And in case you should wonder
In case you should care

Why we’re on our own, never went home
On that night of all nights, we were already there

Then all at once inside that night, he saw it all so clear
The answer that he sought so long had always been so near

It’s every gift that someone gives, expecting nothing back
It’s every kindness that we do; each simple little act….

 

Christmas time
And the moments just beginning
From last night
When we’d wished upon a star

If our kindness
This day is just pretending
If we pretend long enough
Never giving up
It just might be who we are

And so it’s good that we remember
Just as soon as we’ve discovered
That the things we do in life
Will always end up touching others