“Yet as I read the birth stories about Jesus I cannot help but conclude that though the world may be tilted toward the rich and powerful, God is tilted toward the underdog.”
GENESIS 36-37
JOURNAL
I love that Jesus is a rebel. Not rebellious for rebellion’s sake, but rebellious in the truest sense of creation. He refuses to let dead religion define what God is like. He refuses to let pride, control, and performance have the final word. And every time He confronts the Pharisees, He isn’t just breaking their rules. He’s exposing the emptiness of their system and creating a new way forward built on mercy, truth, and Spirit.
It hits me that rebellion, in many ways, is a form of creation. God has given us this sacred gift, the ability to imagine something that doesn’t yet exist, and then the strength to work, build, and bring that vision into reality. That’s why none of us are truly stuck. None of us are permanently trapped in yesterday. We are always becoming. Always changing. Always being invited into something new. And when we are filled with God’s Spirit and actually surrender to Him, that creative force in us doesn’t disappear. It becomes aligned. It becomes holy. It becomes life giving.
That’s why I’m starting to think the “underdog” isn’t simply who God prefers. Maybe it’s deeper than that. Maybe the underdog is often the one who has nothing left to prove and nothing left to cling to except God Himself. And in that surrender, they end up carrying the very thing the world can’t explain, the Spirit of God. Not ego. Not hype. Not image. But power, love, and self discipline, the fuel that turns rejection into resilience and suffering into purpose.
Joseph dreamed, and everyone mocked him. David was overlooked. Moses was disqualified in his own mind. Jesus was underestimated, judged, and opposed at every turn. But the ones who are truly alive are the ones who keep trusting God’s voice over the noise. They keep creating in faith. They keep walking forward even when the crowd says it’s over.
That’s why Rocky still hits me in the chest. I can still see it like it was yesterday, sitting there in the theater and watching people actually stand up and cheer. At the time it felt almost silly, like who gets that fired up over a movie. But looking back, I get it. We weren’t just watching a fight. We were watching the longing in the human heart come alive. We were watching someone refuse to accept that his past, his status, or the opinions of others were the final word. And something in all of us recognized that battle, because we want it to be true for us too.
We want to believe the shame of our past and present is not the end of us. We want to believe better days are ahead. We want to believe that somehow, some way, we can finally get it right and be redeemed.
And the miracle of the gospel is that this is not just a story we watch from a distance. It is the reality we are invited into. God is not merely rooting for underdogs. He is rescuing people from darkness and filling them with His Spirit. He is giving us a new identity, a new future, and the courage to create a new life as we surrender to Him.
I love that Jesus is a rebel. Not rebellious for rebellion’s sake, but rebellious in the truest sense of creation. He refuses to let dead religion define what God is like. He refuses to let pride, control, and performance have the final word. And every time He confronts the Pharisees, He isn’t just breaking their rules. He’s exposing the emptiness of their system and creating a new way forward built on mercy, truth, and Spirit.
It hits me that rebellion, in many ways, is a form of creation. God has given us this sacred gift, the ability to imagine something that doesn’t yet exist, and then the strength to work, build, and bring that vision into reality. That’s why none of us are truly stuck. None of us are permanently trapped in yesterday. We are always becoming. Always changing. Always being invited into something new. And when we are filled with God’s Spirit and actually surrender to Him, that creative force in us doesn’t disappear. It becomes aligned. It becomes holy. It becomes life giving.
That’s why I’m starting to think the “underdog” isn’t simply who God prefers. Maybe it’s deeper than that. Maybe the underdog is often the one who has nothing left to prove and nothing left to cling to except God Himself. And in that surrender, they end up carrying the very thing the world can’t explain, the Spirit of God. Not ego. Not hype. Not image. But power, love, and self discipline, the fuel that turns rejection into resilience and suffering into purpose.
Joseph dreamed, and everyone mocked him. David was overlooked. Moses was disqualified in his own mind. Jesus was underestimated, judged, and opposed at every turn. But the ones who are truly alive are the ones who keep trusting God’s voice over the noise. They keep creating in faith. They keep walking forward even when the crowd says it’s over.
That’s why Rocky still hits me in the chest. I can still see it like it was yesterday, sitting there in the theater and watching people actually stand up and cheer. At the time it felt almost silly, like who gets that fired up over a movie. But looking back, I get it. We weren’t just watching a fight. We were watching the longing in the human heart come alive. We were watching someone refuse to accept that his past, his status, or the opinions of others were the final word. And something in all of us recognized that battle, because we want it to be true for us too.
We want to believe the shame of our past and present is not the end of us. We want to believe better days are ahead. We want to believe that somehow, some way, we can finally get it right and be redeemed.
And the miracle of the gospel is that this is not just a story we watch from a distance. It is the reality we are invited into. God is not merely rooting for underdogs. He is rescuing people from darkness and filling them with His Spirit. He is giving us a new identity, a new future, and the courage to create a new life as we surrender to Him.
No comments:
Post a Comment