———————————————————————————————————–

The other day, I ran into a colleague, who is an ABC (American Born Chinese), in the hallway of my working place. He was very excited to tell me how great the “Jeremy Lin” is in recent NBA games. Initially, I was not paying much attention to his excitement because I am neither a NBA fan nor I had much knowledge about him. Then, the 2^nd day, he stopped by my office again to urge me to watch Jeremy’s game that night because Jeremy had amazed most of the participated teams by consistently scoring high points. I hate to discourage him because I have no TV subscription at my home… 🙂

After I checked around, I learned a lot about Jeremy’s background. Most of you probably have already known more than I did and I am not going to repeat here. The interesting phenomenon is there are many creative phrases such as “Lin + something” are floating around the internet, media and news. One of them called “Linsanity” caught my eye. It is a very creative way to describe how people were crazy about Jeremy Lin.

Jeremy’s story is somewhat alike the mobile phone salesperson, Paul Potts, who became an overnight celebrity after attended the Britain’s TV show “Got Talent”.  The flooding spotlights and media coverage on both of them, to a degree, is somewhat insane. To Jeremy, it is the phenomenon of “insanity” from other people that created the word of “L + insanity (Large Insanity)”.  This also gives us a picture of what this world’s view is. The overwhelmed spotlights and media, however, did not tempt Jeremy’s faith away from our Lord, as I have learned. This attracts a lot of interest to people and the media. This is the sanity aspect of the “Lin + Sanity”.

I also learned that Jeremy is from a good Christian family. His parents led him to the Lord in his young age and continue to accompany with him throughout his growing years. This reminds me of young Timothy who was brought up by his mother and grandmother into a person of fearing God in his youth (2 Timothy 1:5). Later he became a dear brother, an assistant, a co-worker and a successor to the apostle Paul. It tells me how important the role of parents is.

Most of us have a name that was given by our parents. It represents parents’ anticipation or expectation. Jeremy, for example, is a short name for Jeremiah who was a major prophet in Old Testament time. In the Bible, the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations give us a picture how he undertook God’s assignment and how he had followed His expectations closely. My dear brothers and sisters, for us, we have a common name too. It is called “Christian”. In the same token, we were expected by our Heavenly Father to follow our Lord Jesus Christ closely too. How about God’s name? Bible told us that His name is above all names and there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12b).

My dear brothers and sisters, are you insane? If yes, it should be for our Lord. And, “Lord + insanity” should represent how crazy we are about our Lord. May His name always mentioned by us to others when we have opportunities.