March Madness

I enjoy watching sports.  I love watching the Oklahoma State Cowboys play football and basketball, and the Boston Red Sox play baseball.  My favorite sporting event is the NCAA basketball tournament.  The cowboys usually make it to the tournament, but even if they don’t I like watching it. It is an exciting sporting event with games that usually go down to the wire, but the reason I really enjoy it is because the underdog has a realistic chance of winning.  Each year there will be some team you have never heard of who will upset a bigger, better team from a well-known conference.

Although God probably does not care anything about the NCAA tournament, He does care about underdogs.  He cares about how we treat the poor and downtrodden.  He cares about whether or not we look after widows and orphans.  He is concerned about how we respond to people who are different than us, people whom society pushes to the margins.  When Israel is rebuked by the prophets it is often because they are living a prosperous life, but they are ignoring the weaker members of society (Isa. 1:23; Jer. 5:28).

Jesus was also concerned about how we treat the lesser members of society. In Luke 6:21 He says, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” and in Luke 9:47 He says, “the least among you are the greatest.”  We need to be concerned about the underdogs, because we will be judged by how we treat the least among us.

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