The Cool Factor

The other day I was listening to the Weightlifting Talk podcast titled "Greg Everett". The topic at hand was the "cool factor" and how it influences peoples decisions. They started off by talking about how a big factor in Oregon's football recruiting is how cool their jerseys are. To be honest, I would play for Oregon even if they were terrible just because of how sick some of their uni's are. As they linked it back to the sport of weightlifting, some connections and distinctions were made.

Part of what is now drawing people to weightlifting is the cool factor. There is something just inherently awesome about taking large amounts of weight and throwing them overhead. A great example is Hassle Free Barbell Club up in San Fransisco, which specializes in teaching weightlifting to high school kids. The cool thing is that what started as a club of 10 kids has now grown into over 300  members. They didn't have to do anything crazy or magical to attract kids- weightlifting is fun, and it attracted kids to itself. What led to Hassle Free's popularity was kids growing to love the sport, then sharing that love of the sport with their friends, who then grew to love the sport and share it with their friends, and so on and so forth. If they would have tried to reinvent the wheel by trying to make weightlifting something that it is not, they would have cheapened the experience for those who truly love weightlifting in its pure form. Not everyone will like it, and that's okay. But those who do grow to love it will do so for the right reasons and will be sustained in the sport with the right motivations.

I think sometimes it's tempting for us to try to make Jesus something He's not in trying to make Him seem cool to others. In doing so, we don't always portray Him as he really is. It's easy for us to talk about His love, but much harder to share the truth of His justice. It's easy for us to view Him as the Lamb, but not always as easy to remind others that He is also the Lion of Judah. We want to see Him as the man who loved on prostitutes and tax collectors, but it's harder to think of Him as the man who flipped over tables and called out Pharisees. When we portray Christ as only loving, or as only meek, or as only gentle, we cheapen the experience and the power of who He really is. Oftentimes we do this in hopes that others will be drawn to His more mellow characteristics, and repelled by His more fearsome qualities. What we must remember is that not everyone will love Him for who He is, but those who do will love Him for the right reasons and will be sustained by Him with the right motivations. Christ calls us to Himself in an irresistible way- we don't have to make Him cool or hip.

Just a thought. Blessings