The Real Thing Beats an Imitation
To be as big a football fan as I am, I don’t watch a whole lot of pro football. Anyone who knows me knows of my love for the college version of the game and my allegiance to the football team of my alma mater. I also love the high school version of the game, having played football at that level and also having spent some time as a coach at that level when I worked in the field of education.
I enjoy the pro game but I simply do not have the time available to follow it as diligently as I do the college and high school version of the game. I try to always catch the Falcons’ games on television as well as the games of the New York Giants, a team I’ve always liked even before they began winning Super Bowls. Yet, my passion for the game is not as strong at the pro level.
That said, I went to spend a few moments with you today discussing a situation that is currently taking place in pro football and show you how this situation is a metaphor for life.
The officials for the National Football League currently do not have a contract with the league. Therefore, the NFL has locked out its officials and not allowed them to work this year. As the negotiations with the officials continue, the management of the NFL has brought in replacement officials to call the games this year.
These are officials who are not used to officiating professional football. In fact, most of them have not even officiated college football as it is played at its most elite levels. The end result is that the officials this year in pro football are not very good. They are doing the best they can to be sure, but they simply are not as familiar with both the subtle and dramatic differences in professional football and the game at its lower levels.
Watching these fellows officiate pro football is not unlike watching a St. Bernard try to race a Greyhound. In fact, the officials have been so bad that this week the NFL ordered the coaches of its teams to not berate and abuse the officials.
The problem that the NFL has discovered is that when one tries to substitute what is not real for the real thing the result is never satisfactory. Such is the case in life. An imitation cannot replace the real thing.
In the seafood section of many grocery stores a product is sold called “imitation crab meat.” It looks like crab meat smells like crab meat and tastes somewhat like crab meat.
Also in the grocery story is real crab meat. It is much more expensive than the imitation. Even so, when one eats the real crab meat one can tell the difference. The imitation is no where close to being as good as the real thing. The imitation just isn’t as satisfying.
In the life of every human being there is a hole that has to be filled. There is an empty place in all of us that must be filled to make us complete. The only thing that can adequately fill that hole is God.
Sadly there are many in this life that try to fill that hole with other things only to discover that these things are mere imitations of the real thing. I need not list all of the things people use to fill the empty hole in their lives but material things, power, human relationships, and the pursuit of pleasure make for good examples.
Whenever we try to replace God with earthly things we are committing idolatry. We are worshiping things that are of no lasting value.
In Colossians 3:17, St. Paul writes of this saying that the earthly things are merely a “Shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” Shadows are of course imitations but in Christ we have something that is tangible and eternal.
The truth is that God cannot be replaced by an imitation for the imitation is only a shadow. The only thing that can take God’s place in our lives is God. By accepting the love that God has shown us through Jesus Christ we find the real thing not an imitation.