i'm already having olympic withdrawals. the husband and i literally watched olympic coverage every single day it was on -- and most nights (missing only 2 i think) we watched all four hours of prime time coverage. i have no idea what we're going to do tonight without bob costas and his way-too-dark hair... and jen hatmaker's hilarious twitter commentary... and nbc's back stories that rip my heart out and make me cheer for people even if they aren't on team usa. i just LOVE the olympics.
how can you not love these people?!
the fab five (or fierce five? whatev.) won team gold -- being only the second american team to do so (and if you don't know that the magnificent seven of '96 won the first one, i'm not sure if we're friends) -- not to mention that they picked up medals in the all-around (get it, gabs) and individual events, too. i may or may not follow all five of them on twitter now.
missy franklin DOMINATED the pool. she seemed so genuinely humble and excited every time she won. i love that this girl would rather swim for her high school team than turn pro.
then for week 2, we turned to the track, and it was game over for china's medal count. i became such a fan of allyson felix. she never missed an opportunity to be super open about her faith and source of strength -- which would've been cool no matter what, but was even more cool since she set a world record and walked away with three gold medals.
i could easily go on, but i'll stop there since those were my stand out favorites. so i'll ask it again -- how can you not love these people?! here's the answer -- you can't. you can't not love them (sorry, grandmother, for the double negative). and that, my friends, is why i love the olympics.
i love the beautiful shows and the incredible displays of talent. i love when a tiny country like grenada wins their very first olympic medal. i love when records get broken and people cross the finish line with utter shock on their faces. i love, love, LOVE hearing the athletes' stories. but i think what i love most of all is the feeling that all of us are cheering for the same team.
think about it -- whether you went to chickfila on august 1st or not, you were cheering for gabby douglas in the all-around final. whether you think john calvin is a hero or a heretic, you were pulling for michael phelps to become the most decorated olympian of all time. whether you're a republican or a democrat, you were hoping for a miracle in the men's 4x100 relay. at the risk of sounding like a naive, airhead beauty pageant contestant wishing for world peace, i wish we could all cheer for the same team more often.
i realize congress will probably never agree on anything ever, but what about the church? i read this tertullian quote recently (thank you, @early_church): "what marks us in the eyes of our enemies is our loving kindness... they say, 'look how they love one another!'" i literally laughed when i read that on my twitter feed. i wonder what he would think of us now. i WISH people would describe us as a loving bunch. i WISH the random american would think of loving kindess when he thought of christians.
all of this to say, while watching the olympics this year, i realized how fun it is for all of us to be FOR the same thing. i'm so tired of the blog posts and tweets and status updates of people being against things. what if we all realized we're actually all on the same team? we're all hopefully on the same mission and working toward the same end, right? i think there's a lot of time and energy being wasted by christians being against other christians when we could all be for loving people that don't know the grace and mercy of jesus. i know, i know... i sound like the kid that says, "can't we all just get along?" ... but seriously, can't we?
how can you not love these people?!
the fab five (or fierce five? whatev.) won team gold -- being only the second american team to do so (and if you don't know that the magnificent seven of '96 won the first one, i'm not sure if we're friends) -- not to mention that they picked up medals in the all-around (get it, gabs) and individual events, too. i may or may not follow all five of them on twitter now.
missy franklin DOMINATED the pool. she seemed so genuinely humble and excited every time she won. i love that this girl would rather swim for her high school team than turn pro.
then for week 2, we turned to the track, and it was game over for china's medal count. i became such a fan of allyson felix. she never missed an opportunity to be super open about her faith and source of strength -- which would've been cool no matter what, but was even more cool since she set a world record and walked away with three gold medals.
i could easily go on, but i'll stop there since those were my stand out favorites. so i'll ask it again -- how can you not love these people?! here's the answer -- you can't. you can't not love them (sorry, grandmother, for the double negative). and that, my friends, is why i love the olympics.
i love the beautiful shows and the incredible displays of talent. i love when a tiny country like grenada wins their very first olympic medal. i love when records get broken and people cross the finish line with utter shock on their faces. i love, love, LOVE hearing the athletes' stories. but i think what i love most of all is the feeling that all of us are cheering for the same team.
think about it -- whether you went to chickfila on august 1st or not, you were cheering for gabby douglas in the all-around final. whether you think john calvin is a hero or a heretic, you were pulling for michael phelps to become the most decorated olympian of all time. whether you're a republican or a democrat, you were hoping for a miracle in the men's 4x100 relay. at the risk of sounding like a naive, airhead beauty pageant contestant wishing for world peace, i wish we could all cheer for the same team more often.
i realize congress will probably never agree on anything ever, but what about the church? i read this tertullian quote recently (thank you, @early_church): "what marks us in the eyes of our enemies is our loving kindness... they say, 'look how they love one another!'" i literally laughed when i read that on my twitter feed. i wonder what he would think of us now. i WISH people would describe us as a loving bunch. i WISH the random american would think of loving kindess when he thought of christians.
all of this to say, while watching the olympics this year, i realized how fun it is for all of us to be FOR the same thing. i'm so tired of the blog posts and tweets and status updates of people being against things. what if we all realized we're actually all on the same team? we're all hopefully on the same mission and working toward the same end, right? i think there's a lot of time and energy being wasted by christians being against other christians when we could all be for loving people that don't know the grace and mercy of jesus. i know, i know... i sound like the kid that says, "can't we all just get along?" ... but seriously, can't we?
No comments:
Post a Comment