Kirk Franklin
In the story of life, I’m forever amazed that no one person can predict how each chapter will be written. Life is such an amazing mystery, and God sometimes doesn’t show his hand.
There’s one storyline that keeps me on the edge of my seat: the story of the underdog. How nobodies — people who were never at any table of influence or media coverage — just come out of the shadows and take our breath away. We love underdog stories because that’s how we see ourselves.
Silver spoons are not rationed out generously, so most work our butts off just to have some small amount of “significance.”
Every March, we get a new chance at the “Cinderella” story, but instead of a glass slipper, a ball, and a wedding ring, we’re looking at a metal hoop, a ball, and a trophy. We all want to see if there’s another “shocker,” when an unknown comes from the shadows and finds themselves standing on the national platform.
(I love movies like Cinderella… if you tell anybody I’ll ask God to give you gas for three days straight!)
I love it when the person or the team that everybody ignored shocks the world. And I also love when you hear the back story on that team and find out all of the mountains, hard work put into competing against people that may have had more, may have been stronger, or just looked more like “winners.”
Also see: My Letter to Kevin Durant
All of those obstacles made the Cinderella team dig deeper and fight for their chance. They knew it would never be handed over to them easily.
But pay attention, family: being unknown was never freedom to sulk. It was not a justifiable place to complain about the size of the school, how cheap the weights were, or how nobody pays any attention to a small college.
Many people I’ve met are some of the most negative people in the world: everything is a conspiracy theory or a reason to not even try.
Don’t those kind of people just suck the dreams out of you? Their excuses will have you believing it for you! And it is very hard to show them that challenges are really weights to make you stronger when you’re called into the game. Some people let go of their dreams if they aren’t exactly the way they see it in their mind. But it’s time to see that the excuses are actually robbing you of the time needed for your chance in the finals.
I love how the scriptures connect work and faith. Living for God and a great work ethic go hand in hand. They should actually fuel each other. You should see your life as a gift from God on borrowed time. You want to maximize that gift as a method to show your appreciation to God for giving it to you in the first place.
Some of these kids that play ball in college are playing like their life depended on it. For most of them, it does.
If you were blessed to have that silver spoon, maybe you need to get some friends that have plastic ones. You could learn a few things.
We cheer for the little guy who gets a big break and are thrilled that the whole world is telling the story of the team that made it all the way to the final four.
But be careful not to just cheer.
Let it inspire you to work, practice, bleed, sweat, and play.
Don’t let your lack of education, criminal background, teenage pregnancy (or whatever makes you a Cinderella), stop you from believing that it can happen to you too.
The Bible is full of Cinderellas. David’s daddy overlooked him. Rahab’s job didn’t really qualify her to be in the “hall of faith.” And my homie — good old stuttering Moses – well, he would’ve had his own reality show now if he was still here!
There are nobodies, rejects, the looked-overs… and we love them. We feel them. We dream through them.
But why not take their story and make it your own? You’ve got eleven months to do it. see you next March, Cinderella!
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