The Squelched Swan Song of Tim Tebow

There appears to be a consensus forming that Tim Tebow's career as a football player is over. This, in itself, is a strange phenomenon, since he has a winning record as a starting quarterback in the NFL, a relatively rare achievement for a young player who came into the league with questionable talent and playing for a mediocre (at best) team. Heck, it's rare for any young quarterback to come out of the gate with a winning record. In any  event, people have begun to speculate about what Tim Tebow might do next, now that he has no future in sports proper.

As has been well-reported in this (and every single other) space, Tim Tebow is a no-foolin' Christian, and one of the career options that is open to him is Mainstay on the Inspirational/Motivational Public Speaker Circuit. Tebow could likely earn his weight in gold dubloons each year, speaking to one packed stadium of Christians after another. But it might not be that easy.

Recently, Tebow accepted an invitation to speak at First Baptist Church in Dallas, the church led by Robert Jeffress, who has had some not-so-nice things to say about some segments of the population.  Outcry was quickly and loudly heard. How could Tebow endorse Jeffess' message by agreeing to speak at his church? After some thought, Tebow cancelled the engagement, saying that he "needed to avoid controversy at this time." Outcry was quickly and loudly heard. How could Tebow bend his faith to the will of the politically correct establishment?

As ESPN.com's LZ Granderson says in his piece on this recent Tebow miasma, "Tim Tebow simply can't win." He's criticized for agreeing to speak and then criticized for what he doesn't say. We've touched on this before in relation to LeBron James and his "unwinnable" All-Star game last year. This Tebow story makes it clear: it is life itself that is the un-winnable game.

Jesus' Sermon on the Mount (as a window into his larger worldview) makes life un-winnable. We think we can defeat adultery, but must admit defeat to lust. We think we can defeat murder, but must admit defeat to anger. We think we can defeat the inability to love our neighbor, but must admit defeat to the requirement to love our enemies. God's first word (law, requirement, standard) is a defeating word. It shows us that no matter which way we go, left or right, toward First Baptist Church or away from it, we can never truly do what Jesus would do. WWJD is too tall an order. We must rely on God's final word (grace, love, forgiveness), which is an enlivening word. It's even better to say that God's word of law is a killing word. It destroys us, no matter what we do. God's word of grace, though, is a resurrecting word, bringing life out of death and glory out of defeat.

In Good Company on the Last Rung of the Ladder

Are you doing well as a Christian?  It seems that, often, Christians are less concerned with the fact that they're a Christian than their proficiency at being one. Because of this, we envision our Christian lives as being like a ladder we have to climb. Sure, we think, Christ's great sacrifice for us was enough to get us on the ladder, but now it's up to us to move higher. We imagine Billy Graham and Mother Teresa as being very high on the ladder and those people who never read their Bibles or pray as being very low. This schema makes sense to us, and it allows us to do one of our favorite things in the world: compare ourselves and our progress to that of others.

So what, then, are we to make of the Great Christian Tumble? You know what I mean: when a great Christian (usually an evangelical leader, pastor of a giant church, or politically active preacher) is revealed to have been engaging in reprehensible behavior. We are immediately thrown into confusion; we don't know how to classify the event. Is this evidence that this person wasn't as high on the ladder as we had imagined? Perhaps they'd never really gotten on the ladder at all (i.e. they weren't really a Christian after all). The truth, though, is more profound, and right out of The Matrix: there is no ladder.

Check out this scene from the under-appreciated 2004 film In Good Company. Topher Grace has just gotten a big promotion at work, and he's in the mood to celebrate:

Isn't this just the way life works? Just when we feel we've gotten everything together, when everything seems to be going our way, it all falls apart. The same might be said of those Great Christian Tumblers. It's right when they're on top of the world that everything goes to hell.

I've said before that I'm ready to accept the ladder image of Christian growth as long as we can agree that the ladder is of infinite height (since we can never be perfect) and that, as we climb, each rung disappears beneath us (so that we're always on the last rung, hanging by our fingertips). This is the only way the Christian Ladder can be reconciled to human experience! But, like I said above, the truth is that there is no ladder.

Each of us are, as Martin Luther said, at the same time justified and sinner, or, in other words, we are both Christian and human. We live our lives in the glory of the Holy Spirit (Grace getting promoted) even while we are getting in accidents, getting called names, and getting abandoned by our loved ones. Our desperate need never goes away. The Book of Common Prayer, during the Ash Wednesday service, says that this nature of our lives puts us "in mind of the message of pardon and absolution set forth in the Gospel of our Savior, and of the need which all Christians continually have to renew their repentance and faith."

Truer words were never written. In ourselves, we are left in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the Christian ladder. In Christ, we are carried directly to the top, no work necessary on our part. Christ comes specifically for the accident prone, for the derided, and for the abandoned. That's a good thing, because that's where we live.

"Oh, Cutting Your Eyeball with a Laser-Knife is Totally Fine:" Casuistry and PEDs

Casuistry is a fancy theological word that means something like "the search for special cases." It exists by necessity; the law abounds, and so we humans (born lawyers, according to a friend) are compelled to search for ways to get around it. In fact, one might argue that casuistry makes up the bulk of a lawyer's job description: a client is accused of some manner of law-breaking, and the lawyer attempts to find a reason that, in at least this one instance, the law-breaking was justified. Lawyers spend dozens of billable hours a week at this job, but we humans are at it during every waking moment.

There are a million examples of casuistry in the world: lying is wrong...unless it will hurt someone's feelings. Stealing is wrong...unless it is from a big, faceless corporation. And now, a relatively new one: enhancing your performance on the athletic field is wrong...unless you do it in socially acceptable ways.

Syringes of Testosterone Cypionate, bad. Platelet-enriched ankles, good. The "cream" and the "clear," bad. Lasik surgery, good. Certainly it is true that some substances and procedures are banned by athletic federations and some are not, but the entire enterprise of picking and choosing which methods of performance-enhancement are "okay" and which are not is fraught with intellectual danger, if not outright buffoonery.

We engage in the casuistic exercise because we are desperate to justify ourselves. If we find an instance in which we are out of line (and therefore not "justified"), we scramble for a reason. "I told her that she looked great in that dress because the conventions of society told me to." "I didn't claim that income on my tax return because it would have required a lot of paperwork and it was only like $5 over the minimum limit anyway." Casuistry comes from the desire to never have to throw oneself on the mercy of the court and beg for a savior. Casuistry is a problem, then, for the same reason that anything that keeps us self-reliant is a problem: it clouds our ability to see ourselves as profoundly in need.

The more (seemingly) successful we are in our casuistic enterprise, the longer we will hold on to our (apparent) ability to save ourselves. But this is a ruse, a fake. We are in the Star Wars trash compactor, and the walls are closing in. Making up reasons that our situation is tenable is not a long-term solution. Best to shout out for help now.

Royce White on the Human Condition

Royce White is a great basketball player. He led his Iowa State team in every major statistical category as a sophomore and was a lottery pick in last year's NBA Draft, all while suffering from a serious anxiety disorder. He's currently in the throes of trying to work out a mental health protocol with the Houston Rockets (the team that drafted him) so that he can feel comfortable playing. White was recently interviewed by Chuck Klosterman for Grantland.com, and had some very revealing things to say.

CK: Well, then what's the lowest level of mental illness? What is the least problematic behavior that still suggests a mental illness?

RW: The reality is that you can't black-and-white it, no matter how much you want to. You have to be OK with it being gray. There is no end or beginning. It's more individualistic. If someone tears a ligament, there is a grade for its severity. But there's no grade with mental illness. It all has to do with the person and their environment and how they are affected by that environment.

CK: OK, I get that. But you classify a gambling addiction as a mental illness. Gambling is incredibly common among hypercompetitive people. The NBA is filled with hypercompetitive people. So wouldn't this mean that —

RW: Here's an even tougher thing that we're just starting to uncover: How many people don't have a mental illness? But that's what we don't want to talk about.

CK: Why wouldn't we want to talk about that?

RW: Because that would mean the majority is mentally ill, and that we should base all our policies around the idea of supporting the mentally ill. Because they're the majority of people. But if we keep thinking of them as a minority, we can say, "You stay over there and deal with your problems over there."

CK: OK, just so I get this right: You're arguing that most Americans have a mental illness.

RW: Exactly. That's definitely correct.

CK: But — if that's true — wouldn't that mean "mental illness" is just a normative condition? That it's just how people are?

RW: That doesn't make it normal. This is based on science. If there was a flu epidemic, and 60 percent of the country had the flu, it wouldn't make it normal.

White has hit on something here, something that Christians have always known. Despite Klosterman's seeming confusion, what White is talking about is an idea as old as Christian theology: original sin. Humans all have a problem, and even though it's spread evenly throughout the entire population, it's still a problem. In other words, it's normative and problematic.

We like to think that it's mostly those "other" people who have a problem. As White says, it comforts us to be able to shunt them over to a corner to deal with the problems that we claim we don't have. This is the tragic genius of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount: he takes all our problems back to first principles (it's not murder, it's anger; it's not adultery, it's lust; and so on) tearing down our ability to think ourselves "illness-free."

The church should look like Royce White's America: he would have us "base all our policies around the idea of supporting the mentally ill." Our churches should base all their policies around the idea of supporting sinners by proclaiming the arrival of a Savior.

A Ray Lewis Redemption

I find Ray Lewis' persona, both on and off the field, to be oppressively distasteful. He seems boastful, showy, and hugely self-absorbed. Exhibit A is his presence on the field for the final snap of the Ravens victory against the Broncos (his final home game) to facilitate his signature "look at me" dance. The final snap was a Ravens offensive kneel-down; Lewis is a defensive player. Despite all of this, I'm almost disappointed that he's retiring after this season, because the consensus is that he'll be a "great" television announcer, which means I'll just be subjected to more of him after his retirement than I was before it.

Also, there's the fact that he lied to police in an attempt to impede a murder investigation, and investigation in which Lewis himself was implicated.

For many years, I used this information to justify my hatred of Lewis. Sure, some of that hatred comes from the fact that I'm a Steelers fan, and Lewis is one of our nemeses. Some of it comes from his self-aggrandizement. But a lot of it comes from my belief that he's a criminal, who got away with a plea-bargain. These feelings came to the surface again several years ago during the national discussion about whether or not Michael Vick (convicted of running a dog fighting operation) should be allowed to play in the NFL again. It angered me that Lewis, present and potentially complicit in the death of a human being, was never so much as suspended, while there was sentiment that Vick shouldn't ever be allowed to play again.

The truth about Ray Lewis is this: he made a bad mistake. Very, very bad. He's not unlike me. But I need him to be unlike me.

My ability to feel good about myself requires people to exist in the world who are worse than I am. Ray Lewis fills that role. In Nick Hornby's book How to be Good, his heroine (a doctor) is a better person than her husband. One day, though, her husband experiences a spiritual conversion, and becomes (for the purposes of the book) "good." All of a sudden, the wife's world and identity are thrown upside down. She has defined herself as being "better" than her husband...now that she isn't that, who is she?

If I can't say that I'm better than Ray Lewis, who am I? What value do I have?

Ray Lewis, by all accounts, has completely reformed his life since the incident in 2000. He is a devout Christian, a pillar of his community, and a mentor to many young men. His is a story of redemption, and such stories are what we, the redeemed, should be cheering. I may not be better than Ray Lewis, but that's not a bad thing. We share an incapacitating compulsion to selfishness and sin, and we share in a regenerating love of a Savior infinitely better than both of us.

Oh, and one more thing: I hope Ray Lewis and his Ravens get crushed on Sunday.

Why I Like that RGIII is called "Black Jesus"

I could have called this post "I Literally Couldn't Think of One Original Thing to Say About Manti Te'o," but that seemed a little wordy...and, you know, uninformative. Seriously, though, I just flew in from Chicago and boy are my arms tired! One word, though, about Te'o before we move on. It seems to me that this whole story (a story about which, amazingly, we still don't have all the facts) shines a light on one universal human truth: we will do (or believe) absolutely anything if we feel that we are beloved. I mean, Te'o allegedly flew to Hawaii just to see his (non-existent) girlfriend, and even though she proceeded to only communicated with him via text on that whole trip, he still "wasn't sure" whether or not she existed until a week ago! "She" even, at one point, asked him for his checking account number! However, she also said that she loved him. Who among us wouldn't do anything for such a woman?

Now, on to Black Jesus. Robert Griffin III is not the first athlete to be dubbed "______ Jesus." Most receive the moniker for their on-field exploits (Larry Bird, the "Basketball Jesus"), although Charlie Whitehurst is called "Clipboard Jesus" more for the look (and for the fact that he never plays). My question is, do we have to wait for Andy Dalton to win a Super Bowl before he's dubbed "Ginger Jesus?" In any event, the appellation rubbed me the wrong way at first, as you might expect. But did you catch Fred Davis' explanation for the nickname (in the above linked article)? "I mean, like I said, he's Black Jesus right now. He saved us today."

Whatever hesitation I have about the name of the Christ being invoked so flippantly is mitigated by the fact that the people who are using it are at least thinking in terms of Jesus as a savior. This is rare enough to be remarkable (and important). Normally, for people both Christian and non-, Jesus is nothing more than exemplar of love, care, and charity. He is the classic "great moral teacher" to whom C.S. Lewis refers. Fred Davis, though, is thinking of salvation. Robert Griffin III saved the Redskins, and Jesus saves us. The defense rests: Black Jesus.

It's helpful to look at this from the other side. As I've said, most people see Jesus primarily as an example to be followed, in the same way that all of the New England Patriots have adopted coach Bill Belichick's "mum's the word" press conference style. No one, however, has ever been (nor will ever be) moved to refer to Belichick as "Podium Jesus."

So let's call Robert Griffin III "Black Jesus." Anything to keep All-of-Creation Jesus' saving work in the front of our minds.

Lance Armstrong Redeems...Lance Armstrong?

As I write this (Wednesday, January 16), Oprah Winfrey has confirmed that, in an exclusive interview taped on Monday to air on Thursday, Lance Armstrong has admitted to the use of performance enhancing drugs. At this point, this is a total snore. With the baseball writers' recent decision to not vote a single player into the Hall of Fame (some simply for the possession of bacne), PED accusations and confessions are like Beanie Babies: when everyone's got one, no one cares.

The Wall Street Journal (online) has a piece in the January 15 issue called "Behind Lance Armstrong's Decision to Talk" which attributes a quote to the athlete, and a response by a bureaucrat, that is decidedly not a snore. In a meeting with Travis Tygart, the head of the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), Armstrong pointed to himself and said,"You don't hold the keys to my redemption. There's one person who holds the keys to my redemption, and that's me." We've covered this human desire before (most specifically HERE), but the fascinating thing about this quote isn't the brazenness; it's the common nature of the refrain.

Everyone thinks that their redemption is up to them. Except, maybe, for Travis Tygart. Upon hearing Armstrong's claim, Tygart allegedly responded, "That's b-[expletive]." Now Tygart seems to have simply been calling bull-waste on Armstrong's allusion to redemption in any form, claiming that the cyclist would do and say anything to be allowed to race again. But his initial reaction is accurate. The idea that we hold the keys to our own redemption is total b-[expletive].

That Armstrong might believe that baring his soul (or, at least, the contents of his medicine cabinet) to Oprah would lead to his redemption is, at worst, cynical in the extreme and at best, evidence of a woefully weak definition of redemption.

When Christians talk about redemption, we don't refer to a return to a prior state of good standing.  Some do, actually, but such thinking, as Gerhard Forde points out in his seminal On Being a Theologian of the Cross, hinges on the un-Biblical notion of a "Fall."   We imagine that we were once at a certain place in our relationship with God, we messed that up, and Jesus gives us the ability to get back. That is, according to Forde, "a tightly woven theology of glory [a theology that "uses" Jesus and the cross to "get" us something, rather than one that sees Jesus and the cross as the end of us, and our resurrection]." The truth is so much better. In our redemption (in real redemption) we are saved to a state higher than we ever had before: we are regarded as one with Christ, as God's own son.

If that is the gift, then we cannot hold the keys.  And thank goodness, too, because when another (a saving Christ) holds them, our gift is immeasurably more valuable.