An Audience of One

As a teenager I remember playing in the rugby match, the biggest match of my life so far. It was an England trial. I was so nervous, desperate to play well and to be picked for the England squad. There were several hundred people watching but I only saw one person – my mum who had come to watch me for the first time. The fact that she was there affected me in two ways. I so much wanted to please her and impress her. Yet at the same time I knew that even if I had a nightmare, the worst game I ever played, that she would still put her arm around me afterwards and say, ‘Alex, you are my son and I love you’. Alex Harris, Aylesbury Rugby Club

Then God said,

“Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground."

Genesis 1:26

The tension between Christian values and sports values is summed up in the cliché “You are only as good as your last game” Players get their identity from playing, being part of the team and performing in a way that the coach and the spectators will think well of them. Thus the player at the top of their game can easily become arrogant and base their self-worth on their good performances. The problem is that the player who kicks the rugby team to victory one week can miss the vital kicks the next week and lose the game. And what does that do to the player’s self-worth? If your self-worth is based on what people think of your performance, life will be a roller coaster.

Of course, the Christian player is inevitably caught up in this to some extent. We care how our performance pleases others. We suffer the same highs and lows as the rest of the team. But, the Bible teaches us that there is a better approach. To understand this we need to go back to Genesis 1:26 where we read how men and women are made to rule the creation under God’s authority.

Have you ever wondered why God in the Ten Commandments was so strict in forbidding his people from creating any images of God (Exodus 20:4)? It is simply because Genesis 1:26 has taught us that there is already an image of God in the world – you and me! The second commandment in Exodus 20 forbids creating any kind of object, for example a statue, picture or building and making it the place where we go to please God. Pleasing God our creator cannot be restricted to a time or place when we stand before a statue, or an hour when we enter a certain building. Made in God’s image, we are to rule on his behalf in all of his creation all of the time - 24/7. This means everywhere we go and covers every single second of time. This includes the training ground, changing room, playing field and the post match celebration or commiserations!

What really matters in sport is not the public assessment of our performance but that we are responsible for pleasing God first and everyone else last! It is to please the God who gave us our lives, made us in his image to rule on his behalf and under his authority and who knows our motivations when we play. We are to play for an audience of one.

As we as Christian players recognize that our ability to play sport is a gift from God, we will more and more want to use those talents to please him – simply because of who he is, the creator and Lord of the universe and the God who loves so much. We will want to offer our talents and abilities as an act of worship. That means that we will still be giving 100% to the end even if the game is already lost. We need never be ashamed of being competitive and wanting to do our best provided that our motivation is to please and honour him rather than for our own praise.

What does it look like to please God? Genesis chapter two pinpoints two very specific principles, which must be applied to our sport. The first is how we use our talents; the second is how we use our relationships.

Another way of expressing this dual aspect of being God’s representatives on earth in our talents and our relationships is Jesus’ summary of the Ten Commandments in the ‘Golden Rule’, where Jesus tells his followers the two great commandments. He said, ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself.’ (Matthew 22:37-39).

Stuart Weir