Lent: Underdog God

Outside of the Peanuts comic/cartoon, no creative work has influenced me as much as the Underdog cartoon. Oh, maybe Jimi Hendrix. I watched Underdog when it was on television before syndication. During the 1960's as a child, Underdog had a profound influence on my psyche. The underdog archetype is powerful. In storytelling and myth, the underdog theme resonates deeply in the human soul. Films like "The Blind Side" come out a playbook well-established in cultures universally, but particularly salient in America "rags to riches" Horatio Alger themes.

I just received the complete DVD series of Underdog. I ordered it back in October while in production.  I wanted to make sure I had a chance to get this in my library. The best way to preserve such works is to lay down the dollars...money votes. I find it interesting that General Mills was behind the series. I have no preference for its breakfast cereals. In fact, I don't eat cereal at all because it is a giant waste of money. When I do eat grains for breakfast, it is either bread or oatmeal. So much for consumptive conditioning by commercials.

For Lent, I will be serving up themes on Christ's sufferings as part of the redemptive story of Scripture. Suffering is sanctified by Christ's work. Ponder the significant paradox of God in Christ being the underdog. When He used his powers of Deity, it was to defend others. He laid down the prerogatives of power in terms of his own person. Indeed, the Creator became subject to the Creation, and Creation was cruel. In a Darwinian existence, the "Survival of the Fittest," how can God die? Why would He choose to place Himself in that position willingly? For crimes He did not commit? Love.

Love transcends self-preservation. I have heard ardent Evolutionists argue incessantly about the "selfish gene" theory of altruism. It does not wash, cannot wash. Any one who lays down His life has gone beyond mere biology, no matter the theories shrouded in technical jargon. The theory has no clothes..bare and butt-naked. For such posturing is truly asinine and seriously downplays the moral courage its takes to suffer and die on behalf of others as an innocent.

Christ, our suffering servant, our God with wounds.