"Winning isn't everything; it's the only thing."
Losing God
The headline in my newspaper ran, "I have never been happier says the man who won gold but lost God", the account of a sporting superstar who has lost his faith. I know the person who is the subject of the article and respect him immensely.
As Christians we love it when secular newspapers "do our job for us" and announce that the England rugby captain only accepted the position after praying or report Bernhard Langer's acknowledgement of God's presence in his life. Can we complain when an athlete's loss of faith makes the headlines?
For those of us who work as Christians in the world of sport there are big questions to consider. Two quotes from the article resonated with me. "It was as if during my 20-plus-year career in athletics, I had been suspended in time" and "when I retired, something happened that took me by complete surprise. I quickly realised that athletics was more important to my identity than I believed possible".
Suspended in time. What an unusual (unreal?) world professional sport is - as if outside the real world. Nothing matters but winning the next game/race. Those of us who have never experienced life in the crucible have little concept of what it is like. The high of success - being an Olympian, playing in a World Cup, being the best in your country at something - is something few of us ever achieve.
Then there is the question of identity. Of course a sportsperson's identity is partly in sport - a lawyer's is partly in the law. But unless an athlete (and a lawyer) realize that their identity is in who they are in relation to Jesus Christ, they will find no ultimately satisfying answers. The Bible says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. The same if we score the winning goal as if we get a red card or miss the last-minute penalty. [Ashley Null's book,"Real Joy" is the best I know on helping sportspeople to understand their identity].
I think we often fail to understand the identity issue. I was talking to someone this week who won an Olympic Gold Medal, then retired and went back to her original job. Most people who met her professionally probably never know she is an Olympic Champion. She seems to have made a seemless transition back into her career. When I asked her if winning the gold medal had changed her, her reply was honest, "I think that my beliefs and values and who I am as a person have not changed. But because of what happened that one day in Sydney, my life was turned upside down"
As we seek to help sportspeople become mature in Christ, we need to understand the pressures, the suspension of time and identity crises that come with the territory of competitive professional sport. We need to pray much for sportspeople. We need to walk with them through the experience.
July 2007