Football and the Cross

I'm a southern girl through and through. Raised in Texas, football is a way of life.  I watched and learned about it as my brother played through his teen years.  Then I marched and twirled my way across a football field for all of my high school years.

I was accepted into The University of Texas at Austin but my parents would not allow me to go as they thought I was too wild.  Smart parents.  My brother attended and graduated as did his wife.  My husband is a Plan II graduate and 3 of my daughters were accepted although only one attended and graduated. That had to do with money offered by other schools.

We spend hours watching football during the fall and early winter. Some days, Saturdays are all consumed from noon to night with various games.  We honor its players.  We buy their jerseys.  We wear the colors.  We spend what to some is a yearly income on tickets, especially season tickets. We watch certain players rise to fame only to most of the time fall from the attention they are too young and immature to handle.

And if you are a pro football fan ( which I am not ), you then repeat this process all over on Sunday and then Monday through Friday talk about what did happen, what should have happened, and what you hope will happen the next weekend.

But what about the Cross?  Do we really give all this time to a sport during half of a calendar year ( and then some go on to basketball and baseball) and have difficulty giving an hour to our God on Sunday?  Are we really that naïve to think in this information highway of a world that there is not an end and a result?   You won't be able to meet St. Peter at the gates with a football and walk right in.

Do we spend as much time talking about our faith as we do about our sports?  Do we  even contribute to our churches and ministries with money and time in the same ways and amounts that we give to our teams?

We live in an incredibly unstable world.  For far too many years we have separated ourselves from the rest of the world thinking that we were untouchable until 9/11 and some still think that we will never fall. The recent results from our government should have all of us quaking in our shoes. If for no other reason ( and there are plenty) we should be on our knees praying for peace and wisdom.

I pray that our culture finds hope in the sanctuaries. I pray that we see where our allegiance should lie.  I pray that we teach our children and grandchildren the goal of life is not to be happy but to bring happiness.  And I pray that each one of us that spend time cheering on a team, will then spend time in prayer in the presence our God.