I’ve been reading J B Torrance’s Worship, Community and the Triune God of Grace with a few friends from College and I thought I’d share this little gem on prayer.
The first real step on the road to prayer is to recognize that none of us knows how to pray as we ought to. But as we bring our desires to God, we find that we have someone who is praying for us, with us, and in us. Thereby he teaches us to pray, and to pray in peace to the Lord. Jesus takes our prayers - our feeble, selfish, inarticulate prayers - he cleanses them, makes them his prayers, and in a “wonderful exchange” [...] he makes his prayers our prayers and presents us to the Father as his dear children, crying: “Abba Father.” (p46).
Sports stars aren’t known for their capacity to provoke thought, but I’m happy to report one such case! Have a read of these words from Michael Johnson, the four-time Olympic gold medalist for middle distance running:
“I believe sport is the most powerful vehicle for positive social change all over the world. It’s why I’m delighted to be supporting Beyond Sport, which identifies and rewards the most important sport development initiatives across the globe.”
Wow. I mean I love sport. I love watching and I love playing it. If I spoke to you in this last week, did I mention already that Spurs beat Liverpool last week? But “the most powerful vehicle for positive social change across the world”?
Of course, this statement is ridiculous. The outrage that has recently been poured out in the media over the acts of sports personality Matthew Johns, you would have to say that its powerful, but not necessarily positive. The positive vibes need to weighed against the negative aspects of sport throughout the world: the violence manifested in English Premier Football, the racism manifested in Spanish football, the riots that have flared up between Croatian and Yugoslavian supporters over the years have all demonstrated the failure of sport as a positive vehicle of social change. Consider even the way that people like Ben Cousins (this hurts so much to say this as a long-lasting Eagles supporter) dangerous serve as a role-model for young blokes. Consider the ridiculous amounts of money that English footballers are paid. Consider its byproducts, the gambling and drinking habits that are closely associated with sports. It anything, sport is a huge liability.
But is there any truth to his words? Well, my mind doesn’t have to stretch too far back to recall the strong sense of international community surrounding the Sydney Olympics - I wasn’t even living in Sydney and I could feel its gravity. Consider also the way that almost every person I know stayed up to watch the Socceroos in the last World Cup, or even the way that rival politicians and business leaders, fierce competitors in the wild will put their differences aside and play a charity match as a symbolic gesture of a greater unity in their humanity. Memorial matches form powerful symbolic gestures within society stirring memories of important people or occasions.
Here’s the point that Michael Johnson provoked me to think. Given these experiences, could it be possible that sport succeeds where our churches have been failing? Should we prioritise sports programs as key in our church community projects?
Stanley Fish here makes two great observations about sport. First, that sport does seem to weave a harmony between players despite their abilities and backgrounds - “the ethical fabric weaved by sport” - and my own experience testifies to the amazing capacity that organised sport provides for social networking, and particularly among the blokes. Passing someone a football can deeply representing approval, acceptance, and friendship. I’m not kidding!
Fish’s second points is that there is a strange aesthetic connected to sport. Not only watching a classy playing score from long range, nor the beautiful tapestry woven in the teamwork of a Barcelona or Tottenham Hotspur, but also the beauty of participating - playing and watching. Fish draws on Kant and Morales: It’s what Kant calls “pure disinterested satisfaction” and Olympic swimmer Pablo Morales described the pleasure he feels in competition as “that special feeling of getting lost in focused intensity.”
What I think is occuring here is another case of a collapsing of the True and the Good into the Beautiful. Sport is beheld as truly beautiful for many people and so forms a commonality between many people. Many people gather around it and it such community is thrilling and I wholehearted believe that it is positive. But is the Beautiful able to bring social change without also being Good and True?
In my opinion Christians need to embrace the evidently Beautiful in this world like sport, and also music and poetry and its other forms. But precisely the reverse of what Michael Johnson said is true. In fact, when you mention these other artforms you realise just what a vehicle influential Christians have been in historically promoting these artforms! I don’t know the history of English football but I wouldn’t be surprised if it grew out of the work of a Christian organisation like the YMCA back in the day. I reckon Michael Johnson would do better to find a vehicle of social change in the person of Jesus. Not his cheap caricatures but the historical one described in the Scriptures: Beauty, Good and Truth personified.
I was looking at the website of what you might call the official celebrations of Jean Calvin’s 500th birthday over here. The celebrations seem to have consisted of a some serious publications and a pretty flashy looking touring conference. It made me think: although a 500th is up there when it comes to birthday celebrations, if I had heard of this a couple of years ago I probably would have wondered what all the fuss was about.
When I first started reading Calvin’s Institutes, it didn’t exactly blow me away. All he seemed to say was what I already knew. But over time it has dawned on me how remarkable it is that his theology has lasted so long. There are plenty of books that age the moment they enter the bookshop, but Calvin’s theology and exegesis has been read and referenced for the best part of 450 years. What’s also remarkable is the way that his theology seems to constantly speak into the very latest of theological ideas and trends.
Anyway, I gleaned from this website what I thought was a cool little summary of a sermon preached at one of the conferences (posted there by Ray Pennings):
On Ephesians 1:3-14 enttiled “Election” by Rev. Geoffrey Thomas. He expounded the text with five points:
1. Election is a simple doctrine to understand. A useful illustrative narrative between a pastor and parishoner who was confused about election was used to make his point.
Pastor – How are you saved? Parishoner – By God’s grace.
Pastor – Did God save you or did you save yourself? Parishoner – God did.
Pastor – Did He do so on purpose or by accident?
2. We should not have small or shrinking thoughts of God’s election. He has saved a great multitudes of His people.
3. God chose multitudes because He loved them. “We cannot speak of God without speaking of Him as being in love with His people.”
4. The teaching of election effects us by (a) humbling us; (b)encouraging us; (c)providing support for evangelism; (d) making us courageous.
5. How can we know we are elect? We know our election by having Christ. “A faith as thin as a spiders thread, in Christ, will carry us across the fire.”