The Anatomy of the Upset
Upsetting Upsets Upset what we’ve Set Up.
That’s a lot in one sentence, so let me break it down.
Upsets. Noun. The circumstance or situation that is truly unexpected and often unnerving or upsetting (the adjective and resulting emotion).
Upset. Verb. The action that throws a wrench into our plans and causes everything we have set up (the object of the sentence and the objective we have for our lives).
In the context of “March Madness” I want us to see why we enjoy and thrive off the chaos of the college basketball tournament. We absurdly assign ranking to teams we only half understand (because many teams don’t even understand themselves) and then attempt to predict which ones will do what their rankings says they should and which teams don’t. It's like building a giant Lego city only to destroy it like a three-year-old or Disney's Stitch.
The reason this exercise in futility is so interesting is that it so poetically mirrors our lives. At least laughing at our ineptitude in creating a half decent bracket makes laughing at our everyday ineptitude a little bit easier.
Here’s how we utilize similar insane tactics in our daily lives. We, as mere mortals lacking divine omniscience, attempt to calculate the best plan for our lives going forward. Often, the focus of our plans is comfort. We feel insecure in every sense of the term and we hope to make a plan to become more secure (i.e. more financially, relationally, emotionally, physically secure).
Jesus understood this deep seeded proclivity for security when He told the parable of the two houses. One is built on the rock and the other on sand. We learn that only building our lives based on Jesus and His Word will result in a solidly built house that will weather the storms of life because there will always be trials and storms. Jesus does not promise to send us to some dessert oasis where it never rains. No, Jesus says storms will come and how we handle them will show us what we trust as foundational.
In fact, the very verse we quote to talk about God’s good plans (Jeremiah 29:11) comes in a very dire and difficult circumstance: Israel’s exile in Babylon. Jesus reminds His disciples that in this life they will have “trouble.” James encourages us to consider it pure “joy” to experience “trials of many kinds.”
Here’s what I want us to remember: that upsets upset us. When our plans don’t happen the way we plan them we freak out. As childish as this description may sound, it is often true of me and I imagine it is sometimes true of you as well. It is times like these that I long for the Spirit to send me His fruits like patience and self-control. It is times like these that the simple yet true Serenity prayer becomes all the more important:
God, grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can and the Wisdom to know the difference.
My prayer for each of us is that we might find a little more serenity in our lives. Maybe “March Madness” can serve as a healthy reminder to avoid true madness in our everyday lives. Because, if a sixteen-seeded team name after golden retrievers can beat a tournament favorite, then perhaps anything can happen in our everyday lives. Perhaps we have less control over our lives than we think. Perhaps we can learn to accept this reality. Perhaps we can learn to be okay with upsets.
