Thanks to a friend from church, Chris and I were able to attend a home OU game; the Missouri game, to be exact. Now, as a non-oklahoman, I was excited for a few reasons. One, I knew I would be one of the few Mizzou fans there. Secondly, to see what all the hype was for Oklahoma. I have never really understood OU fans, except that it has always seemed creepy to me that they almost worship the team.
My experience began the moment we entered Norman. We lived in Norman for about 7 months, so I have already had my taste of the town and was not impressed. Anyways, as we walked the 3 miles from parking to the stadium, I was overwhelmed with the amount of people getting smashed out of their minds and calling it "tailgating". The amount of beer, alcohol and crimson I saw was seriously overwhelming. Add to this the girls, dawning their OU gear, with their skirts short enough to see their OU panties, and their cowboy boots next to the steriod infused men that groped them as they all drank was truly nauseating. As we got closer to the stadium, the crowd mixed from these types to the "older folk". The distinguished alumni and the rich folk who cheer for the crimson and cream, with their judgemental glances and their noses in the air.
We got to our seats and were surrounded by 90,000+ people. As the clock entered the less than 20 minutes till game time, a roar went up from the crowd as pre-game festivities began. The band took the field, the Oklahoma flag was unfurled, and the state song was played. These things I enjoyed, as they paid tribute to the military with the playing of "Grand Ole Flag" and other national ceremonies. Then began the customs and traditions of OU, that really got me to thinking.(More on that in a minute)
A video on the huge screen, about the size of my home, began to play some spout about how the loyalty to the crimson and cream demanded pain and blood and sacrifice from the players. They ended the video with a phrase that rattled me to my core; "There is only one Oklahoma" and they held up their #1 finger raised to the sky. At this, the crowd erupted and then the school song came on singing about how wonderful their campus was and how awesome the school was and "Long live University". It was followed with the national anthem that the crowd sang, which would have been fine except they substituted words that referenced a unified nation with the word "sooner". This also bothered me, as the song was written to remind us as countrymen of what our nation stands for.
As the game proceeded, the #1 finger was raised at every possible moment. Fans were unifed in one voice, hands raised to the sky, lifting up in shouts of adoration, pointing their one finger, to.... OU???? Wait a minute! I thought to myself, "this is worship". Everything the Bible speaks of how we are to honor, pay reverence and treat God was happening in this stadium, but not to the God of all creation, but to a team of young men. A team of young men who catch a ball and slap each other on the buttocks... and we call it "being an OU fan". No way!
I was overwhelmed with a new sense of sadness and awe. I stood among a large group of people who had traded the God of creation and had substituted him with a game, a team, a school. Now, many would say, "No, we don't do that. It's just tradition." Really? Then when was the last time you raised your hands in the air for the sake of Christ? When was the last time you raised your hands in worship to your Creator God? Oh, never? Because someone might look at you funny in church and think you are a.....fanatic?? Isn't that what we are supposed to be? A fanatic of God?
I saw more worship in that OU stadium than I have seen in a year at my church. The feel at the game was that of worship, but in church, it is of comatose and boredom. My husband got a picture of me near the end of the game and laughed about how it was a picture of a Mizzou fan after a loss, but what was in my mind at the time had passed from the score and was on the state of the people in this world that surround me. It was that of a Christian, realizing how desensitized we are to the dying of souls around us. How many people who will be perishing in the pits of hell because they decided that God was too "old fashioned" and " old school". And the saddest part to realize was that I recognized the sin in it all and had no feeling anymore about it all.
As a Christian, the phrase "There is only one Oklahoma" bothered me because that phrase is biblical, except it is the first commandment of God and it says "There is only one God". Some would say its just a coincidence and that sentence could have come from anywhere. Really?
We live in a world that is run by the enemy who will do anything and everything to steal our souls from our first love, which is Christ, our savior. He is our groom and we are his bride. Our relationship with him is similar to a friend of mine. She is awaiting her wedding anxiously as her groom is away in the military. She longs for the day when he will return to her, marry her and carry her away from her current home and make a home together with her and "live happiliy ever after". Isn't that the promise of Christ's return? He fought the criminal who was going to take us away from him forever and died to pay the ransom for us. Because of this, he had to go away for a time, but he will return with the full glory like that of a magnificent wedding and marry us, carry us away to his palace and we WILL live forever, happily ever after. The evil one has done such a wonderful job of wooing us away, however. We, like the nation of Israel, have become prostitutes in this generation, giving our hearts and souls to another while our faithful love waits for us.
My prayer after this is that God will bring warmth back to my heart as I search for forgiveness from my first love and ask that He give me strength to wait faithfully for Him. That while I do so, I will show His love to others and lift Him up as He deserves. That I will not be afraid to be a fanatic of my loving God, who so willingly sacrifices so that I may have.
I want to live an OU fan life, but for God instead. Instead of lifting hands up in adoration of a team, I want to lift my life up to a God who gave His blood, and sacrifice for me. That I will raise my voice in adoration to a God who created everything to point me to Himself, so that someday I may rest my head in his heart and have Him draw me close. Rather than chant "Boomer Sooner", I want to be heard shouting "Jehovah Jirah", "Magnificant Redeemer", and "Lord God Almighty".
