My Favorite Color

One of our family’s favorite and totally silly movies is “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”.  I must admit that it is a rather irreverent movie, but in its own bizarre way, it does have a peculiar sense of humor.  And one of our favorite scenes is when King Arthur and his knights come to the famous bridge where the keeper of the bridge asks them to answer truthfully three questions before they can pass.

All of them are worried.  One knight goes forward and is asked, “What is your name?  What is your quest?  What is your favorite color?”  He answers them all easily and correctly and is allowed to pass.  So then brave Sir Robin goes forward with confidence and gets the same three questions.  He answers the first two easily and correctly also.  But on the third question, he says,  “Blue….no red….AHHH!!!”  And for not answering the third question correctly, he is cast down into the endless chasm.  Bizarre humor, eh?

Now, does this silly story have anything to do with real life for you and me?  Haha, not likely.  And yet, at the same time, I have seen something in this story that touches a little too close to home for me.  The choice of what is my favorite color is a little more complex than you might think.  And as I ponder this question, I see a little bit of the “dark side” lurking within me.  Let me explain.

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In my family growing up, I was the last of four children.  As is often the case, being the last child I often felt like the others got the best of everything, and then I just got what was leftover.  And one of the things I thought about often was the dishes that we used at meals.  At some while we were young, my parents picked up a complete 4-person ceramic set of dishes with each set being a different color.

In many ways this was a good idea.  Everyone knew which set was his or hers.  My oldest brother Murray got the green set, then Blake got the blue set, and my sister Lorna got the indigo red set.  That left one set for me, and guess what color it was….yellow!!  Ugh!!  (Forgive me for anyone who does like the color yellow, but when I see a yellow car I think of it as a fat banana on wheels.)

So what was I to do?  When our whole family sat down to dinner, I would inevitably get my food served on to my yellow dishes.  But…. when not everyone was at the table, or if I was eating alone, I would slip my hand deeper into the cupboard and get either the green or the blue set of dishes.  This was my subtle rebellious way of getting back at both my siblings and my parents for sticking me with the yellow dishes.  : )

Now how silly is that?  And yet for some people, colors carry along meaning with them.  Red is considered a very lucky color in the Orient.  Purple is the color in many cultures for royalty.  Black is associated with darkness and evil.  White is also a lucky color and is thought of as the color of purity.  And for me, green and blue have somehow always been associated in my mind as colors of power and strength.  Whereas yellow I had thought of as the color of wimps.  And I definitely did not want to think of myself as a wimp.

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So now I’m 50 years old.  Now I am much more sophisticated, refined and mature, right?  Haha…. well, I would like to think that I am.  But every now and then, this old “dark side” of me wants to come out and demonstrate to all that I am mighty and invincible.  I have even given myself a powerful nickname.  I say, “I am the mighty hunter Namron!”  (It sounds like the mighty hunter Nimrod from Genesis 10:8-9, but all I did was turn my name around.)  : ) But being the last born as well as being the shortest of all the brothers, I think this created part of my need to “have to win”.  I must admit that I have had a competitive spirit for most of my life.

And this competitive spirit shows up when our family plays games.  Whether it is a simple game of Uno or a strategic game like Settlers, as much as I would like to gather around the table and relax with the family to have a good time, I have this unfortunate inner desire to “beat the pants” off everyone else.  (Haha… now wouldn’t that be quite the scene.)

So when we play a game that has game tokens, I tend to reach first for the green or blue token.  But I know how much Jill loves the color blue, so I try to always let her take that one.  But then I look at the green token and I still have the thought that this is a “power” color, so if I can choose this one, then I may have a good chance on winning the game.

Oh my, how foolish this all sounds, eh?  But then that is how tricky our hearts can be, which is what we read in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.  Who can understand it?”  And the answer to that is: Jesus knows my heart, and He is able to cure my deceitful heart when I come to Him and ask Him to forgive me of my selfish human desires.  So what should I do when our family gathers next time to play a game?  I think I’ll reach for the orange token.  : )