Deleted Scenes: The dilemma of a frustrated fan. Romans 3:1-8

On Sunday here at The Bridge, we talked about faithfulness. We talked about how we as humans are often fickle, finding it difficult to stick with commitments we’ve made when times are tough. The breaking of those commitments can causes immense pain and anger.

One of the first times I experienced this will sound trivial, unless you understand how passionate I was about sports as a kid (even more than I am now!). Soon after the Toronto Raptors came into existence, they became my favourite team. A few years later, they drafted a player named Vince Carter. Vince was one of the most exciting and athletic players in the NBA the moment he stepped on to the court, quickly gaining a reputation as one of the greatest dunkers in the history of the sport. Every Raptors fan put this guy on a pedestal. I had a poster of him above my bed. I collected every basketball card of his I could find. He was a superstar who made basketball cool in Canada. And then, everything went sour. Vince didn’t like the direction the organization was going in, so he quit on the team. You could see it. He gave little effort, floating around passively on the court. He demanded to be traded from the Raptors. There was even a rumour that near the end of his time with the team, Vince tipped off the opposing team about a play the Raptors were going to run. And when they finally did trade him (for pennies on the dollar), he instantly became a superstar again with his new team. That was the most infuriating thing. It became so clear that it wasn’t a lack of ability that caused the decline in his play, but instead a decision to quit on the team and its fans. I don’t know if he violated his actual contract with the Raptors, but for sports fans, there’s a kind of unwritten agreement we have with pro athletes. We watch the games, we buy the jerseys, we invest our time and money, and players do their best to help the team win. The reason so many of us Raptors fans felt so angry with Vince was because this unspoken commitment had been so blatantly discarded. Here’s my confession: that poster I had above my wall was shredded to pieces and when I watched basketball on TV, I joined with the Raptors fans in actual attendance who booed Vince mercilessly every time he visited Toronto with an opposing team.

The reason this is on my mind is because a couple of weeks ago, I was watching a Raptors game with my kids. At half-time, the Raptors did something they had never done before: they retired a jersey. Teams do this with retired players who left a significant legacy, as a way of honouring that player. Nobody on the team will ever wear that number again. And the player the Raptors did that for was Vince Carter and his #15 jersey. Vince never apologized for how he left Toronto. There was never meaningful reconciliation. But over the years (it’s been 20 years since he left), Raptors fans have become willing to let go of the bitterness and recognize the good that came out of Vince Carter’s time with the Raptors. There’s a whole generation of Canadians in the NBA right now who were first inspired to play basketball because they grew up watching Vince.

Me? I’m not sure where I stand. I'm conflicted. On the one hand, like I just mentioned, I can recognize the good that came out of it all (from a basketball perspective). On the other hand, the lack of repentance for that commitment-breaking still leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. I have a difficult time rejoicing in honouring a player who left that way and never owned up to it.

What does any of that have to do with Romans 3:1-8? Paul’s big question in that text is if Israel’s unfaithfulness to its commitment nullifies or cancels out God’s faithfulness. Paul says no, it doesn’t. In some ways, it only brings out the faithfulness of God even more. However, he says that this doesn’t mean that Israel isn’t accountable to its faithlessness, or that it should celebrate that faithlessness and lean into it even more. You can acknowledge how God can turn human brokenness into something good (eg. Genesis 50:20) without affirming or celebrating that brokenness. See, the thing about sports is that in this situation (human faithlessness, but with some good in spite of it), if you want to honour the resultant good, you end up needing to honour the faithless player. That ends up feeling somewhat disingenuous. But when it comes to Christian faith, we can honour God who is completely faithful and is the one who is able to work for the good even when we have failed. There’s no wishful forgetfulness here, no sweeping things under the carpet, no contradiction to ignore, no dilemma to resolve. We can be honest about the faithlessness of humans like me and you and yet celebrate the faithfulness of our great Savior God in the midst of it all.