Whats there left to say about Tim Tebow? Hes brilliant and appalling, inspiring and annoying--a straightforward young man who somehow played and prayed his way into being the most enigmatic figure in American sports.
In the essay-length Kindle Single The Gospel According to Tim, Joseph Bottum argues that Tebow strikes a nerve because he has slipped beyond all the usual categories of our wink-and-nudge culture of irony. And hes done that mostly by being simply who he is: not a football-playing theologian but, in essence, a mystic:
Isnt that what everyone who has met Tebow does? Believe in him, I mean: believe that hes for real. The young man is drunk on charity, in the same way hes drunk on the endorphins that race through his body during his strenuous daily workouts. In the same way hes drunk on the excitement of winning and losing football games before roaring crowds. In the same way hes drunk on what the medieval mystics used to call the gift of tears, weeping easily and often. In the same way hes drunk on his constant conversation with the Lord, referring all his victories and all his losses up to heaven.
Tim Tebow isnt a Christian theologian. Hes a Christian mystic intoxicated, as all mystics are, with God. Hes King David, dancing in the joy of his youth before the Ark of the Covenant.
Joseph Bottum, a writer in the Black Hills, is the author of the bestselling Kindle Single Dakota Christmas. He is, the essayist Andrew Ferguson has written, one of Americas most gifted writers, with a perfect ear and a matchless style."
