True Royals Fan

I am not a die-hard Royals fan. (Please keep reading.) In fact, I’m not a die-hard fan of any sports team nor is there any sports team that I passionately hate. It isn’t because I detest sports. I actually enjoy sports. It is probably because I have a hard time choosing favorites. Unless the opponents are clear jerks, I always feel bad for the losers and wish everyone could win. So sports are hard for me because I have “all the feels.” Seriously, it is annoying.
But when a major sporting event is happening, I enjoy being a part of it. I love that something is happening that unites us rather than divides us. We need more of that. So whether it is the World Series, the World Cup, the Olympics, or the Super Bowl, there is this sense that we are together in this – in one big living room with foam fingers and heaping piles of processed foods. I love that.
Throughout the series, there have been a few jabs in person, statuses or tweets about “true Royal fans” versus bandwagon folks. True fans are those who have gone the distance; fans who remained faithful through the highs and the lows and the lowest of the lows. I totally get that. You deserve every bit of joy and every second of celebration. You are the heart of what it means to be Royal. You teach us what it means to be a true fan.
But surely there is room on the couch for those who maybe are just now understanding what you have always known. Surely we can warmly and genuinely invite newbies to stand next to us on the parade route so they might catch the Royal fever too.
Sometimes Christians have the same attitude about people who haven’t been through the religious trenches or who weren’t early adopters of Jesus. When individuals begin to seek, we want to regulate them to another, lesser group – a group undeserving of front rows seats, box tickets or the right or the left hand of Jesus. We box them out from the parade route because we were here first and deserve to see and be seen. Plus, we get first dibs on thrown candy. We are entitled to that as the chosen frozen ones.
Nothing is more contrary to Jesus than this attitude.
The bandwagon doesn’t have to be such a terrible thing. Who knows …. someone might just catch the fever and decide to stick around because of the hospitality and heart of true fans and the team they are devoted to.
Maybe I’m wrong but that sounds like the Royal thing to do.