Thanks to brilliant scientists and the development of Covid-19 vaccines, my wife and I were able to go out to lunch with our 21-year-old grandson for the first time in over a year! While ours is certainly not a unique experience in these re-emerging-from-pandemic-restriction-days, it most certainly is a wonderfully personal affirmation of gratitude for being able to be together again.
We met on the patio of a mutually appreciated restaurant, “Winking Lizard.” I have never seen a lizard wink, but the great quality of the name-sake restaurant’s chicken wings makes the experience of being able to verify any winking lizard sightings irrelevant.
I noticed that several Winking Lizard employees were wearing very bright, vibrant, T-Shirts. The eye-arresting color attracted me to the silk screen printing on the back of the shirts. Calling to mind the most difficult days of pandemic restriction, the shutdown of restaurants, and the great hardship on restaurant employees, the T-Shirts read, “EMPLOYEE APPRECIATION WEEKEND: TOUGH TIMES DON’T LAST. TOUGH TEAMS DO!”
What a great affirmation of spiritual truth; a truth revealed in countless ways, through countless people, in countless challenging and heart-breaking times, across centuries and centuries of human experience! What a terrific spirit-lifting encouragement for the present living of our days! What a spirit-lifting historical reminder that the human condition is replete with examples of thousands and thousands of people who could join in a mighty chorus claiming, “Been There. Done That. Got the T-Shirt.”
No reader of this blog will be surprised that I point out that tough teams lasting through tough times and coming out as a stronger team is also the biblical story. Indeed, the four thousand plus years of ancient time spanned by the human events occurring from the days to Adam (Genesis) to the days of John of Patmos (Revelation) also shout out this truth. TOUGH TIMES DON’T LAST. TOUGH TEAMS DO.
This is yet another reason why the teachers and preachers of biblical fundamentalism are so disturbing to me. They interpret 39 books of Old Testament and 27 books described as New Testament as a one-message-bible that only the “right-believing team or team members last through tough times.” And, if that were not enough the wrongly expanded interpretation of that biblical misunderstanding is that God sends tough times on purpose to test the toughness of the team. Too many religious leaders have used such theological nonsense to maintain authority and to stay in power.
But enough on nonsense. While we are surrounded and inundated with so much of it in these conspiracy-laden days of alternate facts and perpetuated lies presented as truth, the truth is that tough times do not last. Tough people of all faiths and no faiths teaming together for caring outcomes endure, last, and emerge in triumphal ways. It is the great truth of the God-created and implanted human spirit. Then and now, BEEN THERE. DONE THAT. GOT THE T-SHIRT! This truth is exciting and hopeful enough to make even a lizard wink.