It’s summer and that always reminds me of the story of me and Michael Jordan. No, it’s not that time I dunked on him. I had to sign a whole lot of confidentiality agreements about that. This story is different.

I met Jordan one summer while he was golfing at a country club in Pinehurst, North Carolina. My uncle and his family lived on the golf course, and I was spending a few weeks there before I started the eighth grade.

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I recently received an email that knocked me over.

I decided to post it for two reasons:

1. Somebody has a story like this and needs to know they’re not alone.

2. A lot of us have gifts we’re supposed to use that we can’t ever imagine God doing something with and this is a testament to what happens when we try. When we do something as silly and insignificant feeling as starting a blog.

After she emailed this to me, I asked Beth if I could share her story and she graciously agreed. I changed some of the details to protect her privacy for reasons that will become crystal clear as you read it. It’s time for me to just get out of the way and introduce you to the amazingly awesome Beth.

Hello!

My name is Beth and I’m from Texas. I am painfully shy. I didn’t always used to be. I used to be the crazy, silly gal that everyone laughed with. But now, I am shy. I used to be NUTS! I distinctly remember going to a pool hall and crawling around under the tables pretending like I was an alligator to cheer up a friend who had just broken up with her boyfriend. I was the only one who was SOBER.

My mother was a practicing (sorta) Catholic & my father was a Buddist. Since they could not see eye-to-eye on religion, I was not baptized. My younger sister, on-the-other-hand, was born 4 months premature & in 1977, there was no surviving that. She was baptized right away. She did survive though and in our Catholic upbringing, what that meant was that all my family went through the Christian education and rituals while I constantly sat in a pew. Because I was never baptized, I wasn’t able to go through church school or learn about the bible. My mom did the best she could to teach me, but she was hurt by being disowned by her family when she became divorced. It was difficult for her to teach me about Christ’s love when she was having a hard time experiencing it herself.

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A few weeks ago, my family and I went out to dinner together on a Friday night. The goal was to have a family meal, hang out, and possibly even enter into the Q realm. Quality Time.

Apparently every person in the greater Nashville are also had the same idea.

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I used to think I could quickly grow a mustache.

My beard is always patchy and hole laden and bad. (Not bad meaning good like Run DMC intoned but bad meaning bad.)

But mustaches? The Acuff family mustache is too fast and too furious. I always thought that was the one bit of facial hair I could hang my hat on or at least a mustache comb. Until I met my friend Daniel.

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It only takes about three followers on twitter to become a punk. I know this, because I did.

When Stuff Christians Like took off three years ago I went off the deep end a bit with my ego. I got cocky. I got arrogant. I got extra handsome.

See? That just slipped out. Even in describing my narcissism I proved my narcissism. It’s a problem. I’m working on it.

But when you get a few followers on Twitter or start a blog or open a facebook account, something weird happens – you get a platform.

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I like to judge the Israelites.

I like to read Genesis and Exodus and feel pretty smug about myself when I hear them complain.

“In Egypt we had meat! We’re sick of manna! Remember the good old days when we were slaves?”

They say and do some pretty incredible thing. It’s like watching a desert reality show. I keep waiting for the host of Survivor, Jeff Probst to step out and say, “Today’s reward challenge is that God heard your constant grumbling and has decided to make it rain poisonous snakes. We’re calling it ‘Pitted against pit vipers.’ On your mark, get set, go!”

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My dad uses his feet like hands, much like a gorilla opening a banana, when he loses frisbees in the pond at the disc golf course.

He’s not above stripping down to his shorts and diving in to recover discs. The pond is dark brown and is populated with turtles, snakes and frogs. If his disc lands in it, he walks around with his bare feet feeling in calf deep mud for it. Just typing that last sentence made me squirm a little.

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A few weeks ago, I bumped into a problem that’s plagued me for years, if not decades.

Was it deodorant related? No, but thank you for asking. I am well aware of that issue. I’m Old Spice Red Zone all the way but fear I might have beaten it. Is that possible? Is it possible that my body has bested that deodorant and I need to move on to something else? I can’t wear Axe body spray in large part due to the countless semi-clothed ladies who uncontrollably throw themselves at you the minute you drench your skin in something named “Swagger.” I’m running out of deodorant options, and I’m not kidding. I was probably one of the only people who packed deodorant in the backpack they wore around the Catalyst Conference. Bible? Sure everybody had that. Notebook? Without a doubt. Deodorant? I had it. But that wasn’t the issue that came up …

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I love a comeback story.

I love when someone who has fallen or stumbled picks themselves up and keeps going. I love when the underdog outreaches the distance we assumed they could reach. I love when the small nobody rises above a thousand obstacles and turns out to be a big somebody.

And I don’t think I am alone in that. This is why we all get excited about the “Cinderella Stories” during college basketball season, those teams from schools in the middle of nowhere that some how beat the giant school. It’s not nearly as exciting to see the team that should win, win. It’s not nearly as dramatic or interesting to see the seasoned professional hit the winning shot. That’s just what seasoned professionals do. The kid with the gruesome background who taught himself how to play basketball on a peach basket in his backyard? That’s a shot heard round the world.

This isn’t a new phenomenon, our desire to see comebacks. David and Goliath is the classic example of something being made out of nothing. But Youtube has opened up a whole new way to experience stories like this and I have a new favorite.

The back story is simple and chances are, you’ve already seen this wildly popular clip. Danyl, an unassuming teacher from the UK takes the stage to audition for a television show called the X-Factor. Dressed in simple clothes and with a nervousness that is palpable, he starts to sing in front of Simon Cowell, the American Idol judge. Watch this video …

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