August 14, 2011.
We were just clearing out an old bookshelf at home and stumbled upon a sealed envelope. It contained a letter my baby sis wrote to Junior Agogo back when he was Ghana's Most Beautiful. See:
February 8, 2008.
Dear Junior,
I am a fifteen year old student... who admires you a lot. I’ve watched you play a lot of football matches and have decided that you are the best football player ever. I’ve always wanted the opportunity to see you in person but as fate would have it, I’ve only watched you once from a distance and that was at the Black Stars match against the Nigerian Eagles. I can’t be described as one who is easily taken aback by a person’s style of play but I must confess that the way you handled the ball was excellent. I also pray that in coming times, you become an even better player. Also, that maybe one day I will have the honour of owning your jersey. Please don’t get bored reading my letter since I never get tired of looking at your smile. I have a picture of you on a newspaper which I have proudly plastered on the wall in my room. Everybody in my house is getting tired of listening to me these days because all I say is, ‘Junior this, Agogo that’. All the girls in my class have adapted [sic] your surname (Agogo) and are now using it as their nicknames.
In a nutshell, everyone loves you and I urge you to keep up the good work. I wish I could see you in person, get an autograph or even a souvenir from you but if not, then the mere fact that you took time off your busy schedule to read this letter is honour enough.
Your No 1 Fan
I didn't even know my sis had such vocabs back then! When asked today what she thought of the letter, she said after a laugh: 'Mtchew. I should have used the time to study twi' (See, it was the only BECE subject she didn't get grade 1 in). Nnipa dasani!
What this made me realise is just how transient fame is. I mean, all those years ago: with the screaming fans, Fiesta Royale mobs and Blazing Gear stampede (yeah, I kinda caught the fever too ;-) who would have thought Junior Agogo would 'fall water inside'? I hope for his sake Agogo took a leaf out of Jesus' book:
'While Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover festival, many people believed in him because they saw the miracles that he performed. Jesus, however, was wary of these believers. He understood people and didn't need anyone to tell him about human nature. He knew what people were really like.' (John 2: 23-25, God's Word)
Wise Man. I've learned that hype is a very sticky thing. When we start to believe it about ourselves, it's easy to get stuck on it; to build our self esteem and self worth on it... And this applies not just to fame, but also our looks, accomplishments, wealth, talents and abilities... the pride of life. In time, we might just drop the last two words from 'pride of life' and become people God opposes. Scary.
A friend was telling me the other day that he had come to a realisation about the hype surrounding his name (See, he's a certain star writer of the initals B.A, with the ability to bring out the gold in words ;-) He said something I found profound: '... It helps when you realise that people don't necessarily love you- they just love what you do'. Keeping this in mind may just help us get it into our heads that we're not 'Homo Sapiens 2.0'- just blessed. For those of us who have discovered and make use of our gifts, let's not forget that we are only vessels. We are not the source of the gift; and we didn't get it because we're special. It's all by Grace. It's only by Grace.
So let's not forget to thank and serve the God who allows us to share in His amazing power to make people smile, laugh, cry, think... or better yet, let's thank him by serving Him. Like Solomon said, 'Have reverence for God, and obey his commands, because this is all that we were created for' (Ecclesiastes 12:13, CEV) Lecrae says something in his song 'Background' that I just loooove:
'... And I'm not that impressive- matter of fact, I'm who I are:
A trail of stardust leading to the Superstar'
May our humility grow with our gifts. As for hype, lots of it passes away in this lifetime; and the rest will likely evaporate with our last breath.
Comments
Post a Comment