If you are anywhere near the age vicinity of this blogger, and you are afflicted with the sporting disease, Americano, then the name, Manute Bol, will probably resonate.  One look at the man, and you really do get the picture…

Yes, with the obvious of the man, for all to-see, it was no surprise that Basketball would be his capper, and while his height was his God-send, he did not have the co-ordination of a shuperstar (Thanks Richie)!  Although, with arms outstretched, the hoop and its protection was a faithful friend (He was a good shot-blocker).

Recently, this extreme version of a body that encapsulated the man, gave way, and Bol, a Sudanese immigrant, would leave this land of the living.

In what can be described as a potent account of the man’s legacy, Jon A. Shields, in the Wall Street Journal, describes the actual motivations of Manute, and what redemption really means, when life is more than a basketball court, a delirious crowd, and an adoring public.

Bol’s life and death throws into sharp relief the trivialized manner in which sports journalists employ the concept of redemption. In the world of sports media players are redeemed when they overcome some prior “humiliation” by playing well. Redemption then is deeply connected to personal gain and celebrity. It leads to fatter contracts, shoe endorsements, and adoring women.

Yet as Bol reminds us, the Christian understanding of redemption has always involved lowering and humbling oneself. It leads to suffering and even death.

It is of little surprise, then, that the sort of radical Christianity exemplified by Bol is rarely understood by sports journalists. For all its interest in the intimate details of players’ lives, the media has long been tone deaf to the way devout Christianity profoundly shapes some of them.

Obituary titles for Bol, for example, described him as a humanitarian rather than a Christian. The remarkable charity and personal character of other NBA players, including David Robinson, A. C. Green and Dwight Howard, are almost never explicitly connected to their own intense Christian faith. They are simply good guys.

Christian basketball players hope that their “little lights” shine in a league marked by rapacious consumption and marital infidelity. They could shine even brighter if sports journalists acknowledged that such players seek atonement and redemption in a far more profound way than mere athletic success.

While the reader may not be able to empathise with Bol’s Christian faith, the witness of his life should speak to all as an example of how to use one’s acquired status for something beyond the trivial and banal.  We live in the age of the celebrity, and while this is not the time to prognosticate, the life of Manute Bol screams to those thus afflicted that they can use their gift and calling for something more profound, impacting , and long-lasting than a sporting career, even out-lasting the years of one’s living.

It may even resound and resonate into the future!  I am inclined to believe so.  I have even staked my life on this!

Here I Stand!

However, there is also this… If we live our lives without thinking about our legacy, we are pushing delete on the future impact for the generations to come.  One of the consequences of facing one’s mortality, is that one is challenged to ask such questions that we are too prone to ignore, and relegate until its too late to change the picture.  As a Father, I ask myself what I am building now into my boys lives, even for the years yet to come?!  It pains me to think that my failure in the present will also resonate when my face is a picture in a frame, and it motivates me, under God, to run like this day may be my last.

In conclusion, I would point you in the direction of Manute.  You need a reigning paradigm that has the capacity to deal with your dilemma, a paradigm that has the potency to deliver, which can even do so on demand, and without delay.

I only know of One!

I encourage you to read the whole article, where you will get a full understanding of the extent of Bol’s legacy, which even breathes today!

You can find and read the article… HERE!

For the Fame of His Name

Man of Spin

H/T: Tom Golding