Allegiance
I have to confess, pep rallies were never really my thing. In high school, I attended a small private school (sounds way fancier than it actually was) with very few sporting or music options. Then, in college, I was required to attend pep rallies as an athlete. As you might guess, forced compliance really won me over! (Sarcasm here.) It could be my personality, my experience, or very likely, a mix of both, but I do not feel a great sense of comradery with any school that I attended.
Now, that isn’t a dig on anyone who really enjoyed those things or feels a great sense of comradery in their alma mater. Living in Iowa for nine years and in Ames now for six of those has given me a new perspective on the dedication and passion of an association with a University or school. In the purest way, it is the outward representation that something different has changed within the structure of a person’s identity. Again, that is not a bad thing. In fact, in many ways, it is a beautiful representation of the power of community. Being associated with a University creates instant community, even if two people might have nothing else in common. It also helps to establish a certain set of values that someone holds to; it provides an ethic of sorts. More beautifully than any human-made institution can offer us, Jesus welcomes us into a whole new identity and resulting allegiance. Along with that allegiance comes a whole new way of living. The theologian Karl Barth once described it this way, he said that as Christians, we are “freed for right action.” Why? Because in salvation that is extended to us by the Father and through Jesus, we are fundamentally different. Here is the full Barth quote,
“In the self-giving of Jesus Christ fulfilled in His crucifixion, God Himself intervenes for man who cannot help himself, as God the Son obedient to the will of God the Father, as the Judge bearing the judgment for the judged. To this action of God there corresponds on man’s side the obedience of faith which accepts what is done. In the assumption of human nature by the incarnation of Jesus Christ God raises fallen man up again and exalts him to be a partner of His covenant and to new life in righteousness. To this action of God there corresponds on man’s side the obedience of love in which man, freed for right action, imitates in relation to God and neighbor that which God has done towards him and for him.”[1]
In other words, at one time, you were not a Cyclone, but now that you are a Cyclone, you are to live like a Cyclone. We get this! We live in a community that shows us the beauty and power of allegiance to something that unites all sorts of people. Jesus offers us a version of that experience that is lasting. What we experience in part through human institutions, Jesus offers us eternally and completely. At one time, you were not a Christian, but now that you are through the grace and mercy of God, you are to live as a Christian. You have a new allegiance to a different Kingdom.
[1] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, ed. Geoffrey William Bromiley, trans. Geoffrey William Bromiley, First American edition. (London; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1994), 173.