major universities and who was let go twice by pro
teams. He got his chance when Knicks' coach Mike
D'Antoni put him in when key players were side-
lined with injuries and the team had nothing to lose.
His rise to fame from nowhere is the classic Amer-
ican tale of the triumph of the
underdog, that anyone with de-
termination and perseverance
can make something of them-
selves. He is the first person of
Taiwanese descent to enter the
ranks of the NBA, and the first
Asian American in the league
since 1947. He is an Ivy League
graduate among players who
came up through college power-
houses with much larger pro-
grams. He endured rejection and
was overlooked numerous times.
center of attention, he would tell
you it's because of who is first in
his life. For Jeremy Lin, what
matters most is that he plays for
God's glory.
teem. He sees them as created in
God's image, equal in His sight,
and deserving of respect and un-
derstanding. He speaks openly
about how Jesus died to forgive
our sins and lead us to salvation
and eternal life. Jeremy sees his
ups and downs, his upbringing
and his current celebrity status
as signs that God "works all things together for
those who love Him and are called according to His
purpose" (Rom. 8:28). Jeremy is fond of the Scrip-
ture passage in Romans that says "we also glory in
our sufferings, because we know that suffering pro-
duces perseverance; perseverance, character; and
character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame,
because God's love has been poured out into our
hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given
to us" (Rom. 5:3�5).
own need to be true to the God who calls people to
repent, believe, persevere, and hope. Jeremy's
open talk is a welcome contrast to the rancorous
debates about the place of religion in American
public life In such a climate, Christians might
grow reticent about giving voice to their faith. But
Jeremy Lin has no other agenda but to ascribe to
and revel in God's gracious and
merciful love, a love made
stronger when it is shared.
ability of a righteous God bend-
ing low to embrace mankind in
His grasp by taking our pain and
through His mercy overcoming
it. That might be why Jeremy's
notoriety has an archetypal ap-
peal. It speaks to the ultimate
possibility that the common indi-
vidual can ascertain God's love
for him or her. Jeremy's ability to
bring teams, fans, even a whole
city together speaks to the native
possibility in each of us that life's
potential is not just found in the
individual, but is achieved to-
gether, each part helping the
other to become all that God in-
tends. As Paul puts it, God "calls
into being things that were not"
(Rom. 4:17).
year�old in Palo Alto, California
he declared to his youth pastor,
Steven Chen, that he wanted to
grow taller than six feet, play bas-
devotee who would take Jeremy and his two brothers
to a gym three nights a week, had kindled the dream.
Devout Christians, Jeremy's parents emigrated from
Taiwan. They attend Redeemer Bible Fellowship,
the English ministry of Chinese Christian Church in
Christ in Mountain View, California. Jeremy's
great�grandfather became a Christian thanks to the
influence of American missionaries. His maternal
grandmother fled from Taiwan to China in the 1940s
God's image and God's