Your knucklehead scribe was minding his own business and on the way to a neighborhood pub to meet a friend. It was a Saturday afternoon with beers and football on the menu when a chance encounter with the mailman occurred.
The conversation quickly turned to a recent NFL game. Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers heaved a ball about 70 yards into the end zone where it was miraculously caught by a teammate. It was the game’s final play, a desperate and successful attempt lifting the Packers to victory over Detroit. It’s being called the “Motor City Miracle.”
Our neighborhood mailman whips out his wallet to display a Packer decal. “I’m from Wisconsin and a Green Bay fan my whole life.” We shared laughs about the game as I offered memories of another miraculous football finish in Michigan. In 1994 as a television sports guy, I was standing at the goal line when CU’s Kordell Stewart heaved a ball about 70 yards into the Michigan Wolverine end zone and into the arms of a Buffaloes’ teammate. That crazy play will forever, for Buff faithful, be known as the “Miracle in Michigan.” Our unexpected conversation wrapped up with the postal worker offering, “It’s just goes to show what can happen when you least expect it.” Amen buddy.
His final comment took me back to the day before. In the usual Friday morning Platoon gathering of goofs challenging each other to grow stronger spiritually, the assembled, self included, were talking about the craziness of Paris, Colorado Springs and most recent, San Bernardino.
The conversation turned to a dude named Saul who would become Paul. A man who, in modern-day terms, would be characterized as a terrorist executing people for no other reason than their faith. Crazy. Sadly, we’re seeing it far too often these days all over the world.
Could it be though, that order might come from chaos? It’s encouraging to see a growing and more vocal Muslim community strongly condemn the acts of extremists waging jihad against innocent men and women.
Victory’s A Stronger Cord wellness movement stresses the importance of unity. That whether we’re “Black, white or brown; live in a mission, mansion or on Main Street, we gotta come together.” How do we make sense of the senseless? How do we seek order from this chaotic world in which we live? Some suggest, it’s hard to argue against, we need a miracle.
We see them frequently. A buddy is suddenly cancer free, quarterbacks successfully heave Hail Mary’s, a murderer is forever changed after seeing a blinding light on the road to Syria. Life a tad chaotic right now? Don’t lose hope it can change in an instant!
The friendly mailman delivered more than the mail on this day. The silver-haired gentleman’s sudden appearance brought a wonderful reminder that chaos is often the prelude to transformational and wondrous miracles - home, work and elsewhere.
And like the US Mail, rain, sleet or snow cannot stop them!
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