Saturday, December 4, 2010

Life (4): World Cup Tears

Sport has the habit of bringing out our best and our worst. The raw emotion and sheer dedication by any serious fan can be, quick frankly, rather intense! The greatest sporting moment in my mind was in the cricket, Steve Waugh’s hundred against England at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Against all the odds, Steve smashed the Poms all around the ground and he had everyone going crazy in process. Add to that the FIFA Soccer World Cup. The skill, determination and passion of the players who contest the cup. The fans come by the million – soccer is the world’s most popular sport!

Sport has this way of driving people mad! A great example of this is Australia’s campaign to host the 2022 Soccer World Cup. The Australian Government dedicated over 20 million dollars to the campaign, which sadly will be coming out of our (Aussie tax payers) pockets. Thousands of people hit the streets awaiting the announcement of the result. Australia was competing against Qatar who mounted a good campaign but in the eyes of the Aussies, it was no match for them. FIFA guaranteed Aussie votes and as a result, most Aussies thought we had this in the bag. Until, the result came and Qatar had done the impossible by winning the bid.

The Aussie fans were destroyed, as if the world was coming to an end. Let’s face it, when it all boils down, sport is basically a bunch of men or women running around on a patch of grass chasing a piece of leather around. How can sport demand so much power and influence then? In a lot of ways, sport is a kind of modern day god or religion. It weaves itself through the fabric of our lives, demanding our money, time and devotion. Sports stars are modern day prophets calling us to give more time and money. We send our kids to sporting clinics to hone their skills and we watch copious amounts of sport on television. We have pictures of our gods (sports stars) around our house and we even want to mimic our gods.

Please don’t get me wrong, I love sport, play sport and watch sport. Sport is a great way to meet people and have a great time in the process. What I want you to do while you read this is examine your devotion to sport. I want you to understand that sport is not life. They are two separate entities that seem to have meshed. Then I want you to think, is sport my god? Does it rule my life? Can I live without sport? Is it worth it in the end?

Did you know that Jesus created sport for your enjoyment and pleasure? He even wants you to enjoy and engage in sport. What he wants through this is your love and admiration. He created sport for enjoyment and not for you to worship. Jesus wants us to worship him as God.

They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! (Romans 1:25)
Let me now return to the opening remarks of this article by saying that my favourite sporting moment , which out does any cricket or soccer moment, happened two thousand years ago in Jerusalem. It was a well fought battle between two foes, Jesus vs Satan. Satan nailed Jesus to the cross, believing that this would defeat him, but Jesus divine knowledge out witted Satan and the cross simply took away the sins of those who trust Jesus. Satan was easily defeated, Jesus painfully victories. Jesus then rose from the grave three days later and he now reigns as king of the world! I love sport and I encourage you to get involved, but I also encourage you to worship the creator of sport, Jesus Christ, the king of the universe!

I leave you with this verse form the creator of the universe:
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21)
If you enjoyed reading this post, check out:
Life (1): This is my show
Life (2): Where in the world can I find joy?
Life (3): You are worth more than a trillion dollars!

Check out this years Christmas special:What the (2): Santa, Dutch Sailors and Coca Cola

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