DENVER—There is an electronic billboard here, on an otherwise nondescript street corner north of the downtown, that is becoming famous internationally. A Japanese news crew was the latest to make the pilgrimage this week.
In the wake of the Denver Broncos stunning NFL playoff victory over heavily favoured Pittsburgh in overtime on Sunday, it was flashing “Tebowmania lives on” and “Now do you believe?”
In a city where you can buy T-shirts that encourage “Tebowing for Greatness” and where some fans wear No. 15 football jerseys with Jesus stitched on the nameplate, there seems a constant search for deeper significance in all things football and a willingness to believe some greater power is unfolding.
And in almost anything associated with Tim Tebow — quarterback, devout Christian and, as we learned from an ESPN poll this week, the most popular athlete in America — meaning can be found in the mundane. That those flashing LEDs are owned and operated by three Muslim brothers, well, that was interpreted as further evidence of Tebow’s power to bring people together, to do God’s work.
Never mind that the Suleiman boys, who work at their father’s importing company beside the billboard, are simply football fans displaying their support for the Broncos. They started using their public forum back when the Broncos were sputtering along with a 1-4 record and put up a plea, urging the Denver coach to give Tebow a chance. They got their wish and the Broncos started to get their wins.
And now the Broncos will be facing the — again — heavily favoured New England Patriots on the road in a divisional playoff game Saturday night.
The Suleiman siblings will of course be watching as their billboard continues to shine a light for Tebow.
“We were just fans crying out for a QB change, then the media kind of flipped it over and made it into a religious thing,” says Mohammad Suleiman, at 26 the youngest of the brothers.
“But it’s good. It gives Muslims a better name because the media is not really on our side that much. It gives another side of us that a lot of people haven’t seen in a while.”
It’s now another passage in the Tebow story, which is growing into an epic tale of, dare we say, Biblical proportions.
Categories: United States
Many Evangelical Christians made a big deal out of Tebow throwing for 316 yards against the Steelers as a type of ‘sign’ for the verse John 3:16. They even ran a commercial during the game yesterday featuring children reciting the verse, which claims that God sacrificed his ‘only begotten son’ because he loved us so much.
The verse, of course, is an innovation of a later writer and was not spoken by Jesus himself.
Even more interestingly, though: Yesterday in being crushed by the New England Patriots, Tebow only threw for 136 yards. In answer to the John 3:16 hype, twitter is abuzz with the words of Mark 13:6, which reads,
“Many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and will deceive many.”
I wonder if this ‘sign’ will be taken as well by the Evangelicals?!
It is interesting to read Mark 13:6. Evangelicals will find a new interpretation of this verse in order to stay in business. Fundamentalists have interpreted verses differently at different times. For me it’s intriguing that God can side with one group or individual over the other yet we are all children of God. Also can God bend laws which he created to support one group?? ……Not long ago people in Pakistan brought out their prayer-mats in the open to pray for their cricket team, but the Indian team won. This was a collective prayer, yet it could not save the Pakistani from humiliating defeat.