The Sucker Hat

In yesterday’s MacBreak Weekly, Leo Laporte talked about the concept of a sucker hat. Here’s how it works.

Leo and his wife went to a beach in Mexico. Vendors try to sell you their wares. Leo’s wife bought a nice cheap hat from one of the vendors. Leo told her, “You just bought the sucker hat!” That hat was a cue to all the other vendors that she was a sucker and would probably buy their junk too.

I’m pretty sure that sucker hats exist in the ministry.

• If you’re a pastor and dress up like a Transformer, you’re wearing a sucker hat.
• If you move from fad to fad, driven by the latest trends in ministry, you’re wearing a sucker hat.
• If your frame of reference is what’s happened in the last ten years, and you have little knowledge of two thousand years of church history and theology, you’re probably wearing a sucker hat.
• If the Word and prayer are being squeezed out in your life and ministry, you’re wearing a sucker hat.

I’ve worn a sucker hat more than once in my life. Sucker hats always look like a good, cheap buy at first glance, but they also make you a target for other hucksters selling stuff you can’t afford to buy.