Our youngest son plays percussion with the Lakota East High School Marching Band. I was standing in the end zone at a recent football game, helping move marching band gear after the pregame set of the National Anthem and fight song, when the opposing team entered the field. Just moments prior, the stadium had been filled with cheers of celebration and good vibes for our football team on their home opener of the season, but when the opponents entered the field, there was a massive crescendo of “Boooooooo!” It was deafening. The disdain was overwhelming and made me sad. These kids, from another town with different colored uniforms, are still kids –the same as our high school athletes.
Humans are passionate creatures. We rally with enthusiasm for our teams, causes, beliefs, and the people we love, while also vehemently pushing back against opponents and enemies real or imagined. All too often, we expend more energy focusing on who or what we are against, than who or what we are for.
I’m weary of all the hating and animosity. I’m tired of how we are constantly trying to dominate others. So much around us says that winning is all that matters. We’re told that we have to be the best and crush the competition. Friday night lights are a mirror of our culture and communities – cheering with joy and affirmation for some and spewing hate for the other. We don’t have to play along.
The Apostle Paul challenges us with a different way of thinking when he writes, “do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind (Romans 12).” We don’t have to join the throngs of “Boooooooo!” for anyone who isn’t on “our team.” We don’t have to conform.
Imagine what would happen if we harnessed all this negative energy in a different and better way. How might it transform our families, communities, congregations, and world if we channeled our rage and spite and hatred into encouragement, joy, and hope? Think about what a difference our Christian witness could make – would make – if we weren’t obsessed with all the things that we’re against?
Songwriter Scott Stivers writes: There’s more to loving good than hating evil.
There’s more to doing right than avoiding what is wrong.
More to being steadfast than just standing still.
More to having faith than being strong.
It’s so easy to unite ourselves against a common foe.
We try to keep the peace by making war.
And we see with crystal clarity what we must fight against
We’ve lost sight of what we’re fighting for.
I want to be – and I want our church community to be – focused on the things that we’re for, rather than spending our lives on what we’re against. I want to live fueled by what God is “for” and how the Spirit of God is at work affirming and building up, creating and redeeming.
I want to leverage my passion to cheer for others and celebrate what they have to offer. I want to work for freedom and help set the captives free. I want to move through each day inviting, welcoming, and including.
I want to spend my life empowering and encouraging others. I pray that my heart and mind will continue to grow as I listen to and learn from those beyond my experiences, neighborhood, and “team.”
Galatians 5:22-23 summarizes it well, saying, “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” The same sentiment is nestled in the Lord of Life mission statement, too. Living, sharing, and celebrating are powerful words filled with positive, collaborative momentum. Let this mission drive our actions.
Cheering for you,
Pastor Lowell