To Tebow or Not to Tebow?

Don't read my blog about Tim Tebow, or at least, before you do, read Chuck Klostermann's essay on Tebow first, which is the best thing written about him yet. Why? Because CK is an Übermensch. He's like the Tim Tebow of non-fiction essays. Or something.

Ok, now that that is out of the way (and having lost half my readers who are now off reading the Klostermann essay and getting lost on Grantland), let's answer the age old question:

To Tebow or not to Tebow?


To me the answer is Obvious. Tebow. Tebow all the time. Tebow without ceasing.

Why? Unfortunately it seems that most folks who are commenting on Tebow miss an essential point, that Tebow is not praying in order to win, in some kind of directly causal way, as if his prayers cause the wins, but rather, Tebow simply gives thanks for his wins by praying. That's a huge difference.

To say it another way, Tebow is more theologically subtle than people are giving him credit for, and although some people, including his own pastor apparently, are interpreting Tebow as proclaiming some kind of prosperity gospel, it is not at all clear that is how Tim Tebow understands his own prayers.

Tim Tebow is prosperous, yes. But does that mean he isn't allowed to pray, and pray wherever he is?

Seriously, if you get a new job, don't you say thank you to God? If you find out you don't have cancer when the biopsy results come in negative, don't you say thank you? So Tim Tebow kneels and says thank you.

But Tebow does more than that. He also wears that ridiculous eye makeup, which makes him look like an athletic and happy member of the band Green Day.

I started toying around with the idea of featuring the lectionary texts on eye-makeup for Sunday worship, but then decided to skip it until it becomes more fashionable. For now, I think I'll just get a tattoo or something.

But here again, we're to remember that professional football is a show, even a religion. Tebow isn't the only one who wears the eye paint. He just was clever enough to actually put a message in the eye-makeup. He found a billboard where no one had noticed.

So, let's all get over ourselves, and let Tebow pray. He may be ostentatious, he may have a slightly different piety than yours, but the dude can play a good game of football, he seems like a genuine and nice guy, and it's completely within his right to pray without ceasing.

Now let's turn things around. Could you please explain to me why more people aren't Tebowing? I watched a mocking post go around Facebook lately implying that Tebow shouldn't pray in thanksgiving for a touchdown because in the meantime 30,000 children die of preventable diseases. However, that should simply be a reminder that more of us should be praying, not that Tebow should stop. Unless you think there shouldn't be professional football (which actually is a viable argument, but for another time and place, not here).

We should all be Tebowing in order to bring a stop to preventable diseases. And like Tebow, we should do what it takes to WIN GAMES against hunger and disease. What did you do today? What did I do?

The first thing I'm going to do is go Tebow, and start with confession. "God, I'm sorry I have not worked harder to end preventable diseases among children in our world." Then I'm going to say, "Thank you God for my health."

I might also go shop for some cheap mascara.