Stephen Mason’s life has been formed by guitars, barber shears and the Bible.
After which there was the dad joke that landed him on ESPN.
Three years in the past, the previous Christian rocker turned barber was speaking to a buddy and fellow fan in regards to the opening of the Main League Soccer season when 4 magical phrases popped into his head.
“Let My Folks Purpose.”
Mason, a longtime member of Jars of Clay, a Grammy-winning Christian band, was reducing a fellow soccer fan’s hair in his Nashville, Tennessee, barbershop when he recalled how a musician buddy had been watching a soccer sport and shouted out these phrases when the group scored.
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He joked to his buddy within the chair — what if we put these phrases on a T-shirt for followers?
Then, in a second of both inspiration or horrible judgment, Mason pulled out his cellphone mid-haircut, opened up a browser on Amazon and purchased the costume that modified his life. One other buyer in line, who owned an indication firm, provided to make a banner.
A number of days later, Soccer Moses was born.
“It’s a dad joke gone horribly proper,” mentioned Mason in a current cellphone interview.
The joke may need died proper after that first sport. However images of Mason at a Nashville SC sport in full regalia — flowing white hair and beard, a biblical-style tunic, a purple and yellow banner with “Let My Folks Purpose” — and a glance of sheer pleasure on his face made their technique to social media, catching the attention of a producer at ESPN.
Mason first noticed that image on TV whereas getting Sunday brunch and chatting up some fellow soccer followers. A profile of the previous rocker published by Main League Soccer described that morning’s scene this manner: “Mason screamed. His spouse regarded round and noticed the display. She screamed. Mason was on ESPN.”
Lately, Soccer Moses is a celeb superfan for the Nashville soccer membership. His face flies on a flag exterior the group’s new stadium and he’s usually discovered within the group’s supporter part, the place its most devoted followers collect. A neighborhood brewery put out a particular “Let My Folks Gold” beer, which advantages a neighborhood soccer charity.
Just lately Mason and a few mates placed on a “Nuns N’ Moses” fundraiser for the native Humane Society — taking part in covers of Weapons N’ Roses in costumes — when the exhausting rock band was on the town for a present. That present was impressed by one other dialog on the Handsomizer, the store Mason opened after being skilled as a grasp barber in 2014 when Jars of Clay stopped touring after almost 20 years on the street.
Mason had been a part of forming the band — named for a verse in 2 Corinthians — when he was 18 with some mates from Greenville College, a small Christian college in downstate Illinois. They grew to become one of many greatest bands in Christian music within the Nineties, mentioned Leah Payne, affiliate professor of American spiritual historical past at Portland Seminary and creator of “God Gave Rock and Roll to You,” a brand new historical past of up to date Christian music.
Payne mentioned that within the Nineties, many Christian teams wished to get mainstream success. However few had been capable of. Jars of Clay was certainly one of them, with the band opening for Sting and hits like “Flood” being performed on rock radio stations across the nation.
“In some circumstances, individuals knew them first as a contemporary rock band — not as modern Christian music,” she mentioned.
Payne mentioned she’s loved seeing Mason’s evolution.
“It’s nice to see the artsy, enjoyable life he’s having,” she mentioned.
Mason didn’t develop up a soccer fan however found the game whereas recording the band’s second album, “A lot Afraid.” Their sound engineer obtained the band tickets to a sport at Highbury, the previous longtime house of the famed English soccer membership Arsenal. From the primary second, Mason was swept away.
“The gang was leaping and singing all the time,” he mentioned. “It felt prefer it was on the verge of catastrophe all the match. I’d by no means felt vitality like that earlier than.”
When the band returned house, Mason would rise up early to look at soccer from abroad and when soccer got here to Nashville, he was a daily within the crowd. Going to matches is lots like life, he mentioned, paraphrasing soccer journalist Roger Bennett of Males in Blazers, a media firm that covers soccer.
“It’s a profound expertise identical to dwelling,” Mason mentioned. “It’s many occasions unhappy, and it’s on uncommon events superb and magical.”
He mentioned that each his work as a barber and his soccer fandom are crammed with pleasure. That search after pleasure — and the flexibility to make the world a greater place — guides a lot of his life as of late.
George Dohrmann, an editor for the Athletic and creator of “Superfans,” mentioned that Mason’s journey to being Soccer Moses parallels the tales of different superfans.
“It usually isn’t deliberate,” mentioned Dohrmann. “You usually fall into it and then you definately notice how good it makes you’re feeling.”
Dohrmann has written in regards to the function organized teams of devoted followers — usually often called supporters — performed within the success of the Portland Timbers, one other Main League Soccer group in a smaller market like Nashville. Soccer followers, he mentioned, type a way of group that’s in contrast to different sports activities — with organized chants and songs and a pleasure that’s as a lot part of the expertise as the sport on the sector.
“There’s a way of unity amongst fan teams that doesn’t exist, in say, the NBA or NFL,” he mentioned.
There have been a number of superfans with spiritual themes — like Da Pope and the Bless You Boys Popes, followers of the New Orleans Saints; and the Rainbow Man, who wore rainbow wigs and held up “John 3:16” indicators at main sporting occasions for years earlier than being jailed for a weird kidnapping episode. However none have fairly the backstory that Mason has.
Mason mentioned that when he first placed on the Moses costume, his spouse warned him he is likely to be doing it for the remainder of life, one thing he appears to be at peace with. A buddy from St. Bartholemew’s Church in Nashville now makes his tunics by hand — he has a number of of them — and he usually hosts tailgates on the barbershop earlier than strolling over to Geodis Park, house of Nashville’s soccer membership, only a stone’s throw away.
Being a superfan, he mentioned, is simpler than life as a Christian musician, the place individuals wished to know his beliefs on hot-button points or scrutinized the band’s lyrics.
He loves the variety of the crowds at video games, seeing individuals from all walks of life being sure collectively by the enjoyment of the second.
There’s one draw back, which can persist with him when he lastly lays his tunic down.
“I’ll keep in mind being actually scorching,” he mentioned. “I don’t understand how they did it within the desert.”