Unlimited

My husband likes sports—all sports, even crazy stuff like curling, although Red Wings hockey is his favorite. So I learned long ago how to talk the talk, but I’ve never made any attempt to walk the walk. I am a fair-weather fan of just about any sport you can name.  When “our” teams are winning, I follow along, cheering. When they aren’t doing so hot, I have no interest whatsoever.

When I worked for a denominational magazine, I can’t tell you the number of times men would say something like, “You should do an article on the relationship between Christianity and sports. Teamwork, using gifts, building character, blah blah blah.” So about once a year we would run pieces on Christianity and sports, and some of them made valid points, but I never really bought it. There’s nothing wrong with sports; they are not unchristian or antichristian. But to try to put a holy spin on the sports industry never sat well with me.

I now work for a different Christian organization, and the men there talk sports, because that is what men talk about in our society. From my cubical, I hear them reviewing the previous day’s events. They seem particularly partial to Tigers baseball, and who can blame them? Until the actual World Series, it’s been a great season for the Tigers.

On the day of the final game of the American League playoffs, two of my coworkers were predicting the night’s events. “I guess it would be okay if the Yankees won tonight, to stretch out the series and give the Tigers less time off so they don’t lose their momentum,” said one fan.

“No!” said the other, indignantly. “Never, never give them a reason to hope.”

And there it was. The clear and definitive difference between Christianity and sports. Christianity is about hope, and sports is about crushing it.

That evening, at choir practice, our director mentioned a book about the feminization of worship, particularly music, and “the boyfriend song,” in which God (or Jesus) the almighty is portrayed as a tender, almost romantic soul mate who meets one’s every need. Men, it seems, prefer stronger music, with more masculine images of God and Christianity. Songs where Christians are called to battle against our foes and where God crushes the enemy.

Like all art, music is a reflection of culture, so it is no surprise that we are shaping God into characters we know from popular culture. We want God to be the romantic lead in our life stories, or the hero who slaughters the bad guys or scores the winning homerun. We want God to be Indiana Jones or Jason Bourne, someone who is tender with us but ruthless with our enemies. He always has a plan, and he always wins, all within a two-hour timeframe.

Like the authors of Scripture, we want to make God one of us, or comparable to something we understand. In the Bible, God is wind and God is shepherd; God is a mother and God is a father; God is light and God is a rock. If we were still adding to the Canon today we might equate God to a quarterback or a rock star or any number of contemporary images.

God is all of these things, and none of these things. God is more than we can imagine or put into words, which doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to put it in words, or in music. But our images of God should help us to explore all of who God is. It’s dangerous to cling to an idea that is comfortable for us and never move beyond that. We need to push the boundaries of our own understanding in order to begin to appreciate the scope of all that God is. We are limited, in our power and our imagination and in our understanding, but God is limitless.

Cafeteria

Although I quit my part-time custodian job several months ago, the school district has kept me on as a sub. Since my “real job” is only a couple of days a week and we have three kids in college, I take extra shifts when I can.

And so it came to pass that, one warm September Friday, I am asked to do a lunchtime set up and tear down at an elementary school. It’s a new gig for me; I had never been to this school, and I've never set up lunch. I am always up for a little adventure.

When I arrive, the secretary at the front desk points me toward the custodian’s office, where I find a set of keys, a map of the school, and instructions written in what I can only surmise is a kind of code. I use the map to find the lunch room, where I introduce myself to the lunch ladies, all of them grandma-types who work very hard for their pay. They are pleasant and helpful, and are happy to answer my questions when they can. Willie tells me that during lunch there are several parents who volunteer, and that part of my duties will include opening granola bars and policing the kids.

I need a few things from the supply room, so I consult the map. The principal, who happens to be coming by, sees me trying to get my bearings and stops to introduce himself. He quickly and efficiently arranges things on the cleaning cart while giving me a few more pointers on lunch procedures before heading off to do administrative stuff.

Cafeteria food has its own particular smell, and when the smell has filled the room, the kids begin coming in: second graders, kindergartners, first graders, and then the tiniest of breaks before the third and fourth graders. It’s like a crescendo of kids: the congestion and noise start low, increase with each grade level, then drop off slightly until the next groups come in. I seem to blend in with the parent volunteers, and kids are more than willing to ask me to open juice boxes or find them a band aid.

The principal, who spends the entire lunch hour in the room, beckons to me from across the room. A pudding cup has oozed all over inside a kindergartner’s lunch box; he asks me to help her get some pizza while he takes care of cleaning out the lunch box. Pretty classy on his part: I’m the custodian, but he takes the messy job while I get the far better task of helping a child. I even earn a shy smile of gratitude as I help her find her table.

As the first lunch fades, I notice an overly tanned mom waiting at an empty table with a multipack of chocolate cupcakes, a birthday treat for her son’s class. She wears hot pink head to toe—hoodie, tee shirt, short shorts, and sneakers—and her bleached blond ponytail is pulled through the back of her hot pink baseball cap. She’s not old, but she’s way too old for her outfit.  Hell, most of her son’s classmates are too old for her outfit. Clearly she does not want to blend in with the other parents.

The older kids don’t need help opening their food, but they are louder, and they do need a little encouragement to use walking feet and inside voices. The lunch ladies and the principal insist that the kids clean up their own tables, and with only a little prodding they do. And suddenly they are gone: the kids, the aides, the principal, the parents, Malibu Barbie mom. The lunch ladies retreat to the kitchen, and I begin cleanup.

There’s a lovely breeze blowing through the room, which makes sweeping up the Capri Sun straw wrappers a little tricky. I finally get everything corralled and into the trash, and I begin mopping. I use a nasty string mop, which is heavy and hard to manipulate, but it does seems to get the job done. I try to work methodically so I can tell what’s been washed and what hasn’t, but everything is so sticky the contrast between dirty and clean is pretty obvious.

One of the lunch ladies comes out and asks again my name. She says, “You’re a hard worker; I’m going to tell Jim [the regular custodian] that you did a good job.”

In blue collar world, this is the highest compliment that can be paid. No one cares if you’re smart or creative or well dressed. They don’t care what your grades were or what other jobs you’ve had. They want to see you work, which requires actual physical movement. In blue collar world, paper pushers are useless and overpaid, because they don’t DO anything.

I am tired, and glad to be finished. I make one more trek out to the dumpster, return the keys to the custodian’s desk, and walk out into the sunshine. Being a custodian is the hardest I’ve ever worked for the least amount of money.  And mostly I hate it, but it does have its rewards. As I walk to my car I remember the gratitude on the face of a cherubic kindergartner, and I smile.

Soccer Mom

When we first talked about adopting, a friend who had also adopted when her bio kids were a little older, was of course encouraging, but she also prompted me to consider carefully all the things that we would have to do again. “You've got to ask yourself, ‘Do I really want to go to all those soccer games again?’” she said.

Every Saturday morning when I’m at the soccer field, I remember that advice. When the weather is good and the kids are having a great time, it’s not too bad. But during the latter days of the season, when the weather is lousy and I’m tired of giving up my Saturday mornings, I remind myself that I chose this.

Both Lewi and Lily seem to enjoy soccer, which at their ages might be more important than having talent. Lewi is sporadic in his play, with moments that are inspired and others that are less than majestic, but Lily has settled into being a pretty good defensive player. She’s not fast and aggressive like the forwards, but she has a great kick, and she consistently moves smoothly into position between the ball and the net while keeping her eye on the play, trying to anticipate where the ball is going.

Over the years all of the kids have played in the rain (and even snow), but there is rain and there is rain. On this particular Saturday it had begun to rain, hard, before we woke, continuing cold and steady throughout the day. We were happy we had the early game, although when we arrived the field was completely soaked. Lily had dressed in layers, as did I, but I knew that was an exercise in futility. We were gonna get wet.

Some spectators set up chairs and huddled under blankets and enormous umbrellas right on the sidelines, but I’m more of a pacer, especially when it’s cold. The field is at the edge of the school’s playground, at the bottom of a little hill. Several of us have taken to setting up about midway up the incline, because it allows a better view of the whole field. Standing there, umbrella in one hand and rapidly cooling coffee in the other, I could see everything that was going on.

On rainy days, dads outnumber moms on the sidelines, and only die-hard grandparents show up (briefly, before remembering they have something really, really important to do).  I know some of the moms, but I didn’t see them that day, although with all of us bundled up like hikers on Everest, I’m not sure I could recognize anyone. It was too cold for chatting, anyway, so I focused on the game.

Lily played in goal for a quarter and as a midfielder in two. She didn’t have to move as much as some of the other girls, which was great, because it meant the team was playing well, but bad, because she was getting colder with every inactive minute. When she was bored she would look for me and wave. She had a couple of good saves and played her position well. By the third quarter it was obvious all the girls were sick of it but, soaked and cold and muddy, they played all four quarters to wind up exactly where they started: zero to zero.

Some days are like that. Sometimes even the things that should be fun and easy become hard work under adverse conditions, and in spite of your best efforts, you come away with nothing to show for it. And if you had seen it coming, you might have chosen a different path. But no game was ever won by second guessing. Better to slog on. Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass; it’s about learning to play in the rain.