Stepping into the Light

Sunday night the Lakers won game 5 against the Orlando Magic to clinch the 2009 NBA championship. This was the Los Angeles team's amazing 15th win in 30 playoff finals appearances. Tomorrow--deservedly--they're getting a hometown parade that will cost two million dollars (the team will foot half the bill, the city of L.A. picks up the rest of the tab). Thousands of Lakers fans will be there, basking in the glow of their team's victory and showing their appreciation for the opportunity to bask.

Maybe you're not a major sports fan, but surely you can understand the desire to demonstrate the worth you place on a team that has given you a great season of excitement. Or maybe you can better understand the desire in others to give something back to a hero police officer who saved a hostage, or a fire fighter who breathed life back into an infant overcome by smoke.

More than a million people--nearly all strangers--stood outside to watch when Princess Diana's funeral procession passed by in September of 1997, because she was so beloved.

All of these displays of appreciation and emotion are quite understandable and even Christians expect  and sometimes engage in this behavior without thinking it strange.

Why, then, does it seem strange to so many Christians to display the same hero-worship and excitement for Jesus? Why do we often have to drag ourselves reluctantly to church, only because we can't come up with an excuse not to go that particular Sunday?

Our Lord breathed life into you the day you were born and continues to do so with every breath you take. Jesus died and rose again to give you a chance to be rescued from a fiery eternity. Every time Jesus faced Satan, He won. You can have infinite victory over evil because of the moves Jesus made.

Jesus deserves a two million dollar parade every day. Can you get excited enough about what He has done for you to join a few other saved sinners on Sunday morning and maybe on one night a week for Bible study, just to show how much He means to you?

Why wouldn't you go to church? Don't start with the tired old line about the presence of hypocrites there. Since when has that stopped anyone from going anywhere besides church? If you're looking for a place with perfect people in it, let me know if they let you in when you find it.

What other excuse is there? You haven't found the right church yet? I've seen people sit on their rusty well-known euphemisms for twenty years using that whiny line whenever the subject of church came up. Where are you looking--under your sofa pillows?

C'mon, what else have you got? Oh, I know--Sunday's your day to sleep in. Really? That's more important than God? Sleep in on a work day and see how that goes for you.

I'm not trying to make anyone feel guilty. I'm only trying to point out that Jesus deserves more than what we give Him. What if He'd decided to sleep in the day He was supposed to go to Gethsemane? What if He decided not to die on the cross at Calvary because there were too many hypocrites in the crowd? I'm just sayin'.

(AP Photo/John Bazemore)