Source Card

Quote scripture and one of two things happens. You’re heralded by the like-minded or dubbed the purveyor of an archaic and foolish worldview. That’s hard to say because it sounds like I’m polarizing people. But the truth about my journey of self-awareness is that it’s probably much grimmer and shorter without the Bible. Imagine getting your hopes up every year for some major event you thought would occur and then,  “just kidding brotha, welcome to Ground Hog’s Day starring…you”.

I felt that way as a B-baller and literally with God as my witness, I would have been undone were it not for the hope of larger than life words that speak to larger than life principles which speak ultimately to a larger than life creator. It was the rubber and road reconciliation when I started yellin’ at God because he let me down. My lamentation was loud and sacrilegious by the standards of church etiquette. But it’s hard in the struggle and if the scripture taps out when you need it most, it’s fraudulent.

But the Scriptura held on. I was 13 one day and seemingly 21 the next having sat the bench in ridicule on many of my basketball teams. But in the interim I wrote scriptures down on little index cards and read them before games. The subjects included everything from Anger to Humility to Patience and beyond. I was coping and I didn’t know why or how it was happening. I was emoting fury at the God whose word said, “Cease from anger, and forsake wrath; Do not fret—it only causes harm” (Psalm 37:8). I was a living contradiction of my faith in word but mostly in spirit because I thought the God of the universe had underachieved. Worse yet, I was mad because He didn’t save me from my crisis of identity. What do you do when you don’t know who to be because who you wanted to be evaded you?

I don’t know the answer to that question but Psalm 37:37 says, “Mark the blameless man, and observe the upright;
For the future of that man is peace.” It was the stuff inside the trite, hackneyed book that made it okay to observe the deeds of righteous men. That corny book that everybody thinks they have all figured out wasn’t scoff worthy anymore. Ain’t nothin’ to laugh at. I already tried that in my low points, cursing everyone and blaming the rest for my failures. The scripture became and becomes strangely appropriate, I’m finding, because it’s not afraid of my rudeness and superficiality. It’s that mirror I both love and hate. It’s like the school picture you can’t wait to see but don’t want to share. It’s the realest, most troublesome thing I ever read and no scripture, no 6ixth Man. Straight up.