Our Relationship with Sport

Transcript

Tonight, we're going to be considering what you see on the screen there, our relationship with sports. I always want to sport sports. I know the UK would probably say sport. We usually say sports.

It would have been good to do a little poll beforehand to find out who played sports as a young person or continues to play sports recreationally, who played on high school teams or in community teams. I know that giving this talk in the United States, sort of going into the belly of the beast, the sporting nation of the United States of America, perhaps a dangerous topic to be discussing. But I was asked to write an article for the tidings, which should be coming out maybe next month, about this topic. So this is really based on my thoughts that are going into this article that I wrote. And I think I was asked to write it because I'm not anti-sport. I played a bit of sports growing up. Our kids played sports. Rachel played a lot of sports growing up. We're an active family, but we tried to navigate our relationship with sports. Now, I also want to say at the beginning, we're looking at sports, but you could really take that word sport out and put anything in there. You could put in there our relationship with money or our relationship with movies or work or politics. The real topic, I think, and sports is just one aspect of it, is do we have idols in our heart? And how do I know?

And what can I do about it? How can I examine myself to make sure that I'm not

falling into idolatry?

So keep that in mind that this is just one aspect. And so some people might be like, oh, I don't play sports. I don't watch sports. It's not important to me. But you might have something else in your life that you do struggle with or that is a challenge. So keep that in mind as we go through this. And I'll try to stop once in a while to see if there's comments or thoughts that you want to share. And if I'm just going and you can't break in because it's all just coming out, just say, John, stop. Can I ask you something? I'm OK with that. I get interrupted on a daily basis on hourly. I teach grade 5-6, so what happens? So let's go on with this. And I want to start with this quote by Nelson Mandela. He was asked to give a speech at a sporting organization. And here's what he said. And it was called The Power of Sport. And he said, sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair. And we might say, well, that's overstated. But just think about it for a second. The power to change the world. Well, when the Greeks introduced the Olympics back in 776, and then it was reintroduced, the modern Olympics in 1896. Think about how much sports has truly changed the world. It might be a trillion-dollar industry. For sure, hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars are spent on sport. There's careers in sports. Stadiums have been built. Spectacles around the world. You could really say that sports has changed the world from what it was before there was organized sports to now that there is. The power to inspire. Now, I could give you Canadian examples of sports events that have inspired Canadians. But I remember during my history degree in university, I wrote about the miracle on ice. It was, what year is that? 80, no, 70, 80 something. Where the Americans, a bunch of college kids, beat the mighty Russian team in hockey in Lake Placid. And my thesis for that article was probably exaggerated. But how that turn was a turning point in America, which was kind of going through a bit of a depression at the time and struggling with some different things. And it inspired the nation. And we always hear about athletes that visit schools or visit hospitals to inspire people. And we can be inspired by them. So I think he's right there as well. The power to unite people. Hundreds of thousands of people crowded into stadiums, singing the same songs. It does unite people, wearing the same clothing,

cheering at the same things, crying at the same things. I remember listening to a podcast. It was called the title of the specific episode was Ping Pong Diplomacy.

And it was about how the United States and the People's Republic of China in the early 70s, their relationship was very strained. And they shared a bunch of tournaments between their ping pong players. And it was considered a way to improve relations and eventually normalize the diplomatic ties between the two nations. So sports brought them together. And now we know that America and China are best of friends. Just kidding. Sport can create hope where there once was despair. I think he's right there as well. There's been lots of examples of people who were growing up in desperate situations, but through scholarships, because of their athletic ability, gotten education, and were able to step out of poverty. Or they were in a nation that was struggling and they were able to elevate themselves and others out of that struggle. And so I think Nelson Mandela is in many ways correct about sports, but I think unwittingly he's also identified something that is an idol in our world. And we're gonna come back to this quote at the end of this talk, because what he's suggesting sports can do

really only in an eternal way can be done by our heavenly father and his word and his son. And we'll look at that at the end. But he's putting sport in many ways in the place of God. So we'll come back to that. But if he has identified a very powerful idol, then we have to be attentive to that, because there's a potential that it might be an idol in our lives. And so what we want to do is we want to ask

a generational question that's gone back for many, many, well, thousands of years, I would say, how do I interact with our culture? How do I engage with the culture that I'm living in? As a disciple of Christ, what is allowable? What are the lines between what is destructive and is destroying my walk? What's lawful, what can I do?

And what actually edifies? And I think sport can kind of blur the lines sometimes where we're not exactly sure, how do I do this? How do I, is it okay to go to a hockey game? Is it okay to play in a league? Is it okay to join a fantasy league? Lots of questions. With this topic. So three pitfalls that I want to talk about before we get into it. And this happens in sports for sure. We can be blinded by emotion. So we might have a story in our lives about sport and how it really helped us or someone we know. And so sports are good. And anyone who says sports are bad, they're foolish, and I won't even listen to what they have to say. And so, for example, our son played basketball in high school, and he was, I would say, timid, shy, not a lot of confidence. And he got under a really good coach who called him the asset. And he kept saying, you are an asset to this team. And during games, Silas would just want to quit as it got more and more intense. He'd want to step off and the coach would be like, no, we need you out here. And he really bolstered his confidence, not just in sport, but elsewhere as well. You could see it. And so I would say that that was a good story. Now, some people might be blinded to emotion the other way and say, well, I've seen what sports has done to people and it's taken them away from the truth. They don't even come out anymore because they got so involved in sport. And so sports are bad. And so we can get too emotionally attached. So just keep that in mind as we go through this. Another thing we might, a pitfall, is we sort of swim in this tendency towards legalism and we have to avoid a legalistic response where we say, no one can play these sports or no one can do this on these days or no one and have all these rules. Okay, you can play this, but you can't play it. You can watch this, but you can't watch that. No team sports, no violent sports, no sports on weekends or just no sports. We can fall into a legalistic response and we wanna avoid that. A third thing is we can also fall into this self-righteousness where we become the standard of what is right. And so let's say I'm a runner and I run 15Ks.

Well, anyone who runs less than a 15K, they're not really an athlete. And anyone who runs more than a 15K, like marathons or half marathons, they're addicted and they have a problem. 15K is, we can fall into that trap of self-righteousness. I figured it out, what's allowed and what's not allowed. And we have to avoid that as well. So here's what I want to do that I hope will avoid these three pitfalls. I want us to use this opportunity, this class as an opportunity for self-criticism. There is this, now I think this is the person who said it. I was listening to a podcast and they said, this person said this quote, but I cannot find anywhere, even Google searching it, where this person said it. So keep that in mind. But it says, he said, if we have lost the capacity for self-criticism, we will become idolatrous. So if we're unwilling to look at our own lives and open up our heart and our intentions, if we're not going to do that, we most likely will go down that road to idolatry because we've basically become a fool to not listen and not self-examine. So keep that in mind, this class is about self-examination and I'm just going to be posing some questions that hopefully will help us in our self-examination. So hopefully we have that willingness to self-critique ourselves in relation to sports. So let's begin with why are we so captivated by sports? And I'm going to start with this picture. I'm going to have a picture of each. This is my daughter, Grace, when she was about four, maybe five years old. And before meeting one Sunday, they went out early and were playing hockey. And of course the boys put the goalie equipment on the four-year-old girls so they could shoot tennis balls at her. But I just love her stance there and how she's tight to the post. She's got her pads down. She's looking around. It's just one of my favorite pictures. But getting away from the photo, God has given us a sense of play. From a very early age, we enjoy running, jumping. We enjoy play wrestling, kicking a ball, throwing a ball. It's just, you watch little babies as they start to become toddlers and they want to play. It's this God-given sense. It's part of us. It's part of our makeup. And then as we get a little bit older, we start playing different games we might, that have a little bit more set rules and a set purpose like hide and seek or tag or capture the flag. And so we continue to play. And just to get the sense of how important this is, there's an organization, I can't remember what NIF stands for, but it's a foundation that's built on promoting play. And maybe it came out of the time when, in some places they were reducing recesses, getting rid of recesses so kids could study more and they could get the state scores on test up, maybe. Anyway, they go through and show how when a child has a play-filled life, it develops things like trust and flexibility and optimism and problem solving. And you can see the list there of different things. And when a child has played deprived life, some of the problems that result. And so play is important. And I would suggest, as I put in that slide, this is a God-given gift, this desire to play and have fun and interact with one another in this way. As you get older, and that is the person serving there, is my second son, that's Owen. He loved playing volleyball and basketball for school teams. So we go from this innate sense of play, and we might start to engage in community sports or school sports. And that's where you're going to have to start to navigate as a family, what are we allowing and what are we not allowing? And so we set some early rules about things that we would do and things we would not be engaged in. And we tried not to ever break those rules. Now that we didn't set those up as a legalistic standard for everyone, we did what we felt worked for our family and still encouraged active play with our kids. And we know that when they start getting in more organized sports, like volleyball and basketball and baseball or whatever it might be, wrestling, we know that this can provide many physical benefits, mental benefits, social benefits. There can also be some pitfalls as well, not to just glorify this, but this is why we're captivated by sports. And under the right circumstances, we can learn to work with others towards a common goal. We appreciate the need for rules. We can be taught the importance of winning and losing with grace and respect. So there's lots of things that we can learn through playing sports. And as you get older,

and there's no more high school opportunities. I don't know if any of us played college sports, I was not good enough, fast enough, tall enough, strong enough, could jump high enough. There's no way I was gonna play college sports, but you might continue in recreational sports. And I had to get all three of my kids in there. So that's my son Silas in that he's taking the shots now. And they play on a Sunday afternoon, they never miss meeting, but they play in a ball hockey league down in San Diego. And some of you might as well, it might be an individual sport. I know we have cyclists online, we have hockey players. Some of you might play other sports as well. So playing sports is one thing. We can understand why we're captivated by it. It seems to be a part of us. We want to, and it might not be something organized like this, we might enjoy really going for hikes, or we might be somebody who runs,

somebody who goes out on canoe trips. But why do we continue, why does this ingrained love of play continue when we simply observe others playing a sport? Which is interesting. And just so you know, that picture was taken actually in the Boston Arena, just recently when Canada played against the United States. I did have a video clip, but I didn't want to play it for a couple of reasons. Anyway, let's go through why we're so captivated by watching others play.

I think number one, we have an awe of the athletes themselves. We are astonished at the speed that a human being can run or skate, how fast they can throw something, how they can hit something with a baseball bat that's coming at them at a hundred miles an hour. We are amazed that their endurance, their strength,

the control that they have, their mastery of skills is beyond comprehension in many cases, and we're in awe of them. Now, what we shouldn't be, we shouldn't be in awe of the individual. We should really try to focus it in awe of a God that created people who can do these things.

It could be just a slight adjustment that can change things there. But there's no doubt we stand in awe of what they can do, especially when we go out and try to do the same thing and we realize how hard it is. I think sports, we like watching sports as well because the thrill of the unknown, every play, what's going to happen? You know, the game, who's going to win the game? But even down to every play or every period or quarter, what's going to happen? Every season, it builds our anticipation as we await the outcome. There's storylines that are woven throughout each game and each sport and each player and their lives. It can be the quest of the underdog. It can be battling through an injury, a mid-season blockbuster trade or the veteran seeking his first championship. There's all these intriguing storylines that we can become engaged in. And then there can be city or national pride. So I put up the Canada hockey team beating the, I can't remember who they were playing, but let me just do this to appease everyone. You can have city or national pride and that can be captivating as well. I mean, look at all those championships in baseball and basketball and football in Boston. That's unbelievable. And so you can rally around as a city and have national pride and that can once again, captivate you. Now there's a bit of a darker side. I don't really know much about fantasy leagues, but it really does take it to another level when you are recruiting players and you have your own team and you're really now watching each of the games to see how your team is doing against other people. And you can, but then there's also gambling, which can be extremely dangerous. People can lose themselves in the world of gambling on sports, which takes the level of interest to a totally different level. And sometimes we can become emotionally invested and that can come out as a lust for violence or a desire for retribution when you have a perceived injustice. So we can become financially and emotionally engaged in these things. And it can really quickly turn into a very dangerous level and addiction even.

And then we also have to know that the multimedia complex knows that they can suck money out of our wallets by making spectacle after spectacle. That there doesn't seem to ever to be a break. Like this weekend, I know the Masters, the golf tournament's coming up. And the basketball just ended, the March Madness. And then there's gonna be the NBA finals and the NHL finals and then the baseball finals and then football's gonna start right away. And then Rachel's gonna be watching the curling world championships, bond spiel. And I'm sure there's bowling and corn throwing. It just keeps going. I don't think it's corn throwing, anyway. So as you can see, the point of this is to say we can easily become entwined in this. And we really have to say, when does this become an idol? And when is it just a small distraction once in a while? And I think the answer is let a man examine himself. So I think we have to start with, oh, and this is just a point. CBC, the Canadian broadcast company, wrote an article about how much gambling advertising is in games now. And they came up with this 20% that you spend 20% of every game watching some sort of gambling advertising, whether it's a commercial or all those circles are different companies and things that are about gambling. 20%, so you can see how they're trying to normalize gambling and how dangerous gambling is to families and individuals. So to examine ourself, I think we all start with the foundation that we love our heavenly fire, our heavenly father. We have a desire to have him on the throne. We want him to be the author of our lives. And we want to be sure that there is nothing that sits in his place. There is nothing that takes the place of Jesus Christ. And so that has to be our goal, our common starting place when we have discussions about what is an idol or what isn't an idol or what should I be doing or what shouldn't I be doing? And of course, every person must ask this question of themselves. But what I'd like to do is provide four questions, four tests that we could ask ourselves to see if maybe I'm going too far down this road and maybe I need to pull things back.

Okay, so four questions we can ask ourselves. And so the first one, and they're pretty easy. The first one is, what do you talk about? So Jesus told us in Matthew 6 verse 21, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And we know in Matthew 15 verse 18, he says, but those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart. So there are things that we treasure and our heart is going to be right by the things we treasure. And a very good way to find out what you treasure and where your heart is, is what you talk about a lot. So I've given this example before, but when I first met Rachel and came home after meeting her at youth conference, I could not shut up about talking about this girl, Rachel. And my mom picked up on it. Okay, who's this Rachel? It's because that's where my heart was and my mouth proceeded to just blabber on about it. And by the way, that worked out well. But when we fall in love with something, we just can't help stop talking about it.

So do we only ever seem to be talking about sports, our favorite team, the players on the team, their statistics? We had a custodian who was very much like this in relation to sports. He'd come into my room most mornings and all he wanted to talk about were all the games

the previous night. It was his one and only topic. And you could tell where his heart was, the things he was engaged in on a daily basis. And as I mentioned at the beginning, maybe it's not sports, maybe it's movies, maybe it's entertainment, maybe it's politics. What are you always talking about? Because that's a pretty good clue of the things you love. And so we may ask ourselves, am I talking too much about the hockey game or the sport I just played or whatever it might be? And am I ever talking about God and my hope? Do I ever bring up discussions

that might get people at work to think about their lives? A couple of verses beyond this one that I'd like to share. One is on the screen there, Proverbs 4, verse 23. It says, above all else, guard your heart for everything you do flows from it. So guard your heart. What are you allowing yourselves to love and think about? Because everything flows from it, the way you talk, the way you behave. So be very careful. But I wanna read Malachi 3, verse 16 through 18. Malachi 3, and think about what we should be speaking about. It says, then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another and the Lord listened and heard them, so they're speaking to one another. Why? Because they love their heavenly Father. So a book of remembrance was written before him for those who feared the Lord and who meditate on his name. So people are thinking about God and they get together and talk about God. And this is their favorite topic of conversation. And I know, now this isn't, once again, this is not to say we need to avoid all, just do not ever talk about sports or sports-related exchanges. The suggestion is, do some accounting of your own conversations, the things you love to talk about, and just assess it, do some accounting. Maybe I'm talking too much about this. What do I have to do to pull that back and put something else in my heart that I'd like to talk about? Another one, another passage is in Deuteronomy chapter six, just giving this idea that, you know, God wants to be a part of our lives. He wants us to be on our minds and on our tongues. So in Deuteronomy six,

starting at verse six, it says, all these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit down in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. This is what God is looking for us to be talking about, especially in our families. I know if we did it in the workplace, we might get into a bit of trouble, but, you know, more and more of it is better. All right, that's the first test. Just think about what you talk about. It might be a guide to where your heart is. The second thing is, what do you pay attention to? There's a book that I was reading, and the author said, this is a quote, the world aches to be awed. That ache was made for God, but the world seeks it through entertainment, politics, sports, travel, et cetera. So we desire as people to be in awe. And I said that one of the first things that captivates us about watching sports is we want the awe of the athletes. So there's this desire in us to be in awe of something. And it was supposed to be for God, but we replace all these other distractions. A couple of quotes for you. This is from a Stoic philosopher. I can't seem to say his name ever, Epictetus, Epictetus. He said, you become what you give your attention to. If you yourself don't choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will. So you become what you give your attention to.

And also in this book it said, only the things you allow your mind to stay on will shape your mind. So we have a choice, what we're going to pay attention to and what we're not going to pay attention to. And when we pay attention to one thing, we are ruling out everything else. And so it's a good question, what do I pay attention to? Because I'm going to become like that thing. Jesus put it this way in Matthew 6 verses 22 to 23. The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. Now keep that in mind, your eye is bringing things into the body. And if your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. Now I know there's different levels to this teaching, but I think there is this practical lesson that the things we look at, if it's good for us, if it's good, if it's holy, if it's separate, our whole body is going to be full of that. But if your eye is bad, if you're looking at things maybe we shouldn't be looking at, your whole body will be full of darkness. So our eyes, what we pay attention to, is going to determine what we're bringing into our body and what we're becoming. If the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness? So I would say the lesson here is pay attention to what you're paying attention to. Too often we just sort of don't even think about what we're spending hours and hours looking at. So a test of idolatry is just like assessing what we're talking about, assessing what we're watching, what we're paying attention to.

Now one other part of this,

Jesus gives lots of parables about stewards and servants who were given responsibility over things. And one of the most famous one is the people with the parable of talents. Some were given five, some were given two, some were given one. So they were given resources. And they were expected to be faithful with what God had given them. Well I think one of the greatest resources we have is our ability to pay attention to certain things and to eliminate other things. We have the freedom to set our mind on one thing and we have that freedom to not pay attention to other things. And we know that in this story, the one who was given five talents used that resource and did good things with it. And it was fruitful. And so with the one with two talents. But the one with one talent just went and hid it. And it's like he was saying, I don't wanna be about your business. I don't wanna pay attention to those things. I'm putting it out of sight. I'm putting it out of mind. He buried it. And it's like he's taking his attention and putting it on something else. And he was called the wicked and slothful servant. And he's basically saying, I've got other things to do. I've got my own business. So we have to be careful with what we pay attention to. And I think one of the best places of guidance of what we need to pay attention to is in Philippians four verse eight, which we all know very well. Finally brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are a good report. If there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things. Here's where you can pay attention. So just another area to question ourselves. A third thing, what can you speak articulately about? So just two possibilities. What could you speak more articulately about? Why Boston has a good chance of winning the championship this year? Not hockey obviously, but baseball maybe, or basketball. Yes, basketball. Why Boston Celtics have a good chance of winning the championship this year? Could you speak articulately about that? Or can you, would you be even more articulate about why the content and the Sermon on the Mount is something we should be building our lives on? Or why baptism is important? Or why there is one God, not three? You know, pick your Bible topic. But if we can speak about our sport team and their statistics for the past five years and the quarterback and his quarterback rating and all these statistics that we can fill our mind with, but we struggle to share our hope, then that could be a sign that we are going down the road of idolatry. And if we struggle with Bible topics, but we're fluent with sport topics, that could also be a sign of where our heart is. So once again, this is a self-examination. Let a man examine himself, but something to think about. Because Paul gives us, or sorry, clear instruction here. He says, but sanctify the Lord in your hearts and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear. We should be, it should just be on the tip of our tongue, ready to share articulately. And if we have to practice it, I remember a few years ago, everyone was talking about your elevator speech. What's your elevator speech? You know, that's not a bad idea to be able to speak and have verses in mind and places we would go and things we would share. Cause you never know when somebody's gonna ask.

So that's the fourth, that's the third one. So the third one is, what can you speak articulately about? The last question we can ask ourselves is,

where is it easier to spend your money? So let's say you wake up and you have two texts on your phone or two emails. And one, oh, sorry, one is a financial appeal. This is an actual email that I received. I can't really, you can kind of see it says, our Bible mission entered 2024 prayerfully with an ambitious plans for new projects and special events. Now into the second half of the year, with thanks to our heavenly father, these projects are in full swing. And so it's a financial appeal. Now, what is easier to spend money on that? Or let's say you get another text that says, there are tickets to the Leafs Bruins game or the Celtics Lakers or whoever. Which is easier to drop 200 or $400 into

or to spend on a Jersey or whatever it might be. Do we sort of wince at the idea of putting money into the collection plate or a missionary? But man, that New Jersey, I can, the money's gone so quick for tickets. It's just a question to ask ourselves. It can be a good sign of where our hearts are. And so that's a pretty easy one. Because we do have instruction about what we should be doing with our resources. So 1 John 3 verse 17. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? And in James chapter two, James chapter two, verses 15 through 17. It says, if a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, depart in peace, be warmed and filled. But you do not give them the things which are needed for the body. What does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works is dead. So just a couple of verses to think about there.

So once again, that self-examination in relation to sports, we can test ourselves. We can ask, what do I talk about all the time? What do I pay attention to? And I know with phones and things, you can actually track how many hours you're paying attention on different apps and things like that. So you can really examine these things. What can you speak articulately about? And where is it easier to spend your money? And so hopefully we can go through these things

and apply that self-criticism because that passage or the quote I started off at the beginning, if we have lost the capacity for self-criticism, we will become idolatrous. All right, I said we'd come back to this and then I have one little section after this as well. So Nelson Mandela said, sport has the power to change the world, the power to inspire, the power to unite people. And he said, sport can create hope where there once was only despair. And I wanna show you why I think this is taking the place of our heavenly father or trying to take the place, how it can become a distraction because the power to change the world. Well, we know in Daniel chapter two, verse 44, it says, in the days of these kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed and the kingdom shall not be left to other people. It shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms and it shall stand forever. So sports can change the world in a small way, but our heavenly father is the one who can truly and eternally change the world. We shouldn't be putting our hope or being distracted to idolatrous levels by sport or anything else. Yes, sport has the power to inspire, but think about verses like these and there's many more you could consider. Philippians 4.13, I can do all things through him who strengthens me. We think about the example of Christ. What is more inspiring than Jesus Christ and his teachings and his life and that he went to the cross and was raised again and the promises of our heavenly father. Isaiah 26, verse three says, you will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed in you because he trusts in you. So we've got to keep our minds stayed on our heavenly father. And there's so many inspirational verses like that. Sports can unite, but as we read in Psalm 22, verse 27, all the ends of the world shall remember and turn to the Lord. And all the families of the nations shall worship before you. This is the power to truly unite the whole world. The whole world will be filled with the glory of our heavenly father as the waters cover the sea. Yes, sports can create hope where there once was only despair, but an eternal hope. Jeremiah 29, verse 11 says, for I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil to give you a future and a hope. I mean, this is the true hope for all people, regardless of economic status,

color of skin, country you were born in, age that you were born in. You know, this is the one true hope.

And it's the only one that can elevate us out of mortality. So this is what I wanna end with

because it's interesting and maybe ironic that Paul so often uses sport to exhort us to stay on the right path and to not be distracted. And it's funny that we can actually have sport which can distract us from our hope. And so I just wanna go through examples where Paul uses sport. You know, he's examining, using it as a metaphor to strengthen us, to stay on the right path. So Philippians 3, verses 13 through 14. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God and Christ Jesus. And so straining, and just like those skiers, they're straining to the finish line

for the prize of the upward call. In Hebrews 12, verse one through three, I put this,

this was a picture from somebody who's doing the Pacific Coast Trail or the Appalachian Trail and putting out all the things they needed. And of course, they tried to take as little as possible. But in Hebrews 12, verses one through three, therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which cling so closely and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. So he uses sport to tell us, no, we're running a different type of race. We have to lay aside those weights and sins. Galatians five, verse seven, he says, you were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? So maybe this is a Christadelphian at the Boston Marathon giving out pamphlets.

But a runner would not wanna be distracted, even though that would be a good distraction. But runners try not to be distracted. And in our walk, we don't wanna be distracted. We don't wanna be hindered from obeying the truth. And we have to make sure that sport or movies or whatever it is, isn't hindering us. Two more verses in first Corinthians nine, verse 24 to 27. He says, do you not know that in a race, all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly. I do not box as one beating the air, but I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others, I myself should be disqualified. So self-control, discipline, keeping it under control. And lastly, and I think this is a beautiful one to end this talk on. He says, I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will award to me on that day. And not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing. And so if we focus our minds on his appearing, and if we love his appearing, and we do this self-assessment on these different things, hopefully we can stay on that path and also be with him and being able to say that I've finished the race and I've kept the faith.