Note: This devotional was first published almost exactly three years ago (March 13, 2005), when the ACC still only had eleven teams.  It seemed appropriate to revisit this theme given Clemson's strong season and pending NCAA berth.  Of course, it also seemed appropriate given that this Sunday marks Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week which ends with the eventual celebration of another early Easter.  May your Holy Week be a holy one this year. CLG

Here in ACC country, this weekend marks the beginning of March Madness with the ACC Men’s Basketball Tournament. Eleven schools fighting and scrapping not only for the Conference title, but for a coveted spot in the big dance – the NCAA Championship tournament.

For basketball fans, March is indeed a month full of Madness.  A team can be on top of the world one day, only to see its season end the next. March is a month full of emotion, as the hopes and dreams of alumni, students and fans throughout the country rise and fall depending on the performance of those 18 and 19 year-olds who sport their colors.

We who are ACC Basketball fans all have our favorite March Madness memories.  Chris Webber’s ill-timed timeout. Christian Laettner’s last second shot versus Kentucky.  Derek Wittenburg’s three-point attempt falling short and Lorenzo Charles’ put back.  Even Clemson’s magical run to the Elite Eight, only to be knocked off by Kiki Vandewegh and the UCLA Bruins.

In our culture, the month of March and basketball go hand-in-hand.  It is a month full of excitement, Cinderella stories, and heart-crushing defeats.  No matter how dismal or disappointing your year has been, March is a time for new life. It is a time for turnarounds.  It is a time for hoop dreams to be resurrected.

In the Church, the month of March is also a time for new life, turnarounds and resurrection. In most years, Christians spend all or the bulk of March in the season of Lent, a time of fasting and meditating on our sinfulness and our need to repent, or turn back, to God.  This year, Easter falls a few days before the end of the month. So for the Church this year, the month of March is also a rollercoaster of emotions and feelings.  We begin the month with the echoes of Ash Wednesday still fresh in our minds (“…you are dust…and to dust you shall return…”).  As the month moves on, we experience great excitement and promise on Palm (or Passion) Sunday, as the crowds yell “Hosanna” and greet Jesus as the Messiah. But our joy ride takes an abrupt turn on Good Friday, as we experience the crushing defeat of the Crucifixion.  Our heads are hung low.  Like fans of a #1 seed that loses in the first round, we turn to one another in disbelief, “It wasn’t supposed to end this way.”

Then, in the midst of our despair and hopelessness, we experience another unexpected turnaround a few days later.  We find the tomb empty. Good Friday is not the end. God, not Sin and Death, has the last word. Jesus has been raised from the dead!

For both the Church and college basketball fans, the month of March promises to be a time of great mood swings, emotional highs and lows, tough losses, and in the end, one great final victory.  While it is indeed a maddening time for many…it also a time of great opportunity.

The Psalms, more than any of the other books of the Bible, capture the emotional swings of the faith.  Psalm 130 is a great example. The Psalmist begins with a cry of despair, “Help, God – the bottom has fallen out of my life! Master, hear my cry for help…Listen to my cries for mercy.”  But by the end though, the Psalmist is filled with hope for restoration, cleansing and redemption: God is coming, and with “God’s arrival comes love” and “generous redemption.”  Hey! I know it may look bleak today…but Resurrection is right around the corner!

As someone who has been trying to live out my faith for a long time, I know first hand how maddening it can be at times.  I focus on Resurrection, I believe in the promise of new life…and then suddenly, often when I least expect it, Sin and Death rear their ugly heads.  A forty-two year old husband and father dies instantly of a heart attack.  A mother of four dies within hours of being struck head-on by a careless driver on a rural, country road.  Four innocent people die in Atlanta when a man on trial for rape “goes crazy.”

Just as the road to the Final Four is filled with many highs and lows, the road of faith is filled with times of doubt and despair…along with times of celebration and life.  Like the Psalmist, we must learn to focus our eyes on God.  We must continue to believe in the impossible. We must pray daily for redemption and resurrection.

As you experience a maddening March this year in more ways than one, I hope that you’ll remember the greatest “Cinderella story” of them all.  It’s about this Jewish boy, born into poverty, raised in Nazareth…

Pulling for the underdogs,

lane

Rev. C. Lane Glaze

Campus Minister, Clemson UMC

Director, Clemson Wesley Foundation

PO Box 1703 Clemson, SC 29633

864-654-5547 (w) or 864-207-9135 (c)