Right! Way to go mates!
Back in the late 1970s (ouch!) when I attended UCLA, we had a silly ritual before the basketball games. Remember, this was Pauley Pavillion, the "house that Wooden built". This was the Mecca of College basketball. Before each game, a grad student named "Frisbee" would rise in front of the hushed student body of thousands, microphone in hand. Holding the game ball high above his head he would ask the assembled masses:
Frisbee: Is this a basketball?
Masses: Yes, that's a basketball! (deafening roar)
Frisbee: Is that a court?
Masses: Yes, thats a court!
Frisbee: Is that the loooosing team (pointing, of course, to our opponents)
Masses: Yes, that's the looooosing team! (student body, pointing as one)
Frisbee: And is that the WINNING team? (pointing now to the Bruins!)
Masses: Yes! Thats the WINNING (even more deafening) team!!!
And the chant would continue to its crescendo, as a review of the material (sort of like a quick review for the dense):
BASKETBALL? BASKETBALL!! COURT? COURT! LOOOOSING TEAM? WINNING TEAM!! Gooooooo Bruins. I get goose bumps thinking of it.
It was great. Always good for a huge laugh, and stares of shock from our opponents, although I think Digger Phelps from Notre Dame got sick of it after a while.
We love being on the winning team. Its awesome. The roar of the crowds, the accolades, the press, its just wonderful. And really now, who keeps photographs or memorabilia of the loosing team in their house? "Hi there Bob, come into my study, where I have the team photo of the runner's up of the last 10 World Series; quite a collection, eh?"
For the last several weeks Micheal Spencer's words have been rolling around inside my not so well hair-covered head. I think these ideas might make an excellent preaching series here, about what is perhaps going on in all of our collective Christian heads.
In the end, does it really matter that we are on the winning team? Does coming in first really matter? I wonder.
