Fun fact about me is I love all things sports. When it comes to the month of March, I especially love sports. There is simply nothing better than watching college basketball when it’s tournament time. When I tell you, my entire schedule shifts around this tournament, I mean it. As a die-hard UNC fan, this is my favorite time of year. When the bracket comes out, I don’t care what seed we are, I have every bit of hope and faith that this is our year. Is it realistic? Sometimes. Does it usually work out that way? No. Yet I put the same amount of trust in the Heels year after year to take home the championship. This is what I love about college basketball. It doesn’t really matter what seed you’re ranked because anyone can win the tournament. Two years ago, St. Peters, a small school from New Jersey ranked as a 15 seed, made a shocking run to get to the elite eight. THIS IS WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT. And as much as I really don’t want to talk about it (or even like it), the Wolfpack are on a crazy run right now. It hurts me to think this wouldn’t even be possible if UNC had beaten them in the ACC Championship. This is the other thing about March Madness. You can have all this built-up excitement and hope for your team and in an instant, it can all crumble. Was I worried UNC was gonna have a tough loss to Alabama? No, not even a little. Yet, here we are waiting for next March so the Heels can bounce back even better and more prepared.
Why am I talking about this so much?
For one, it gets me so pumped, and honestly, I’ll take any chance to talk sports/UNC basketball.
But in all seriousness, March Madness is a beautiful example of the hope we place in the things that cannot and will not sustain us. I know that’s a silly (and slightly cheesy) example but it’s true! Year after year, I put hope in this thing that ALWAYS leaves me feeling dissatisfied. Even when your team wins a championship (as awesome as it is and will continue to be), it’s back to square one the next year.
In this month leading up to Easter, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about the areas or things in my life in which I place a lot of hope. I recognize the ways I continue to fall short and place hope in the things of this world, things that aren’t meant to satisfy but rather point to the One who does satisfy. By God’s grace, we get to experience His good gifts (one being college basketball of course) but even better, a relationship with our Heavenly Father… the One who doesn’t turn away when we fail but extends mercy and love so that we may know Him and have real LIFE and JOY!
THAT is someone worth putting hope in!
I’ll leave you with a quote that does a better job of summing up what I’ve been trying to articulate:
“Our souls long to be filled, long to be loved, and long to be known. Therefore our lives are one continuous movement in the direction of our deepest longings. The problem is that we tend to stop too soon, too near the surface. When we taste something that tastes good to our souls, we assume that it is what our souls were made to be filled with. And so we go charging off in the direction of that person, or that thing, or that experience, trying to extract something from them (or it) that they were never intended-or able- to fully give us. C.S. Lewis said it so well when he said that these things or people or experiences “are only a scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never visited.” In other words, the deepest most wonderful things of this life were never intended to fully satisfy us, but to point us toward God.” -Jim Branch
May He bless and keep you,
Meg