And yet, it’s better to be focusing our competitive energy on a game than a costly war if we can also focus on maintaining peace through strength and not let sports distract us.
I’ve experienced the pain of five surgeries after I turned 60 and some of the best advice that I received was not to be a hero and judiciously take prescribed pain meds so that I could successfully complete the requisite physical therapy. Opiates were developed to dull pain with the caveat to use them sparingly and get off of them ASAP! We all know they can become addictive and have a negative if not deadly effect on our lives. Sadly, far too many people take opiates to dull the pain of life and achieve a temporary illusion of feeling good.
Avowed atheists like to quote Carl Marx out of context when
he wrote in 1843, “Religion is the opium of the people.” Left standing alone it implies that the
masses use religion as a crutch to navigate life. But Marx goes on to write that “religion is
the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul
of soulless conditions.” So, are they
right in saying that “God is an imaginary friend for adults” or is religion a
natural response to the felt existence of God and the recognition that we are all
broken? Christianity believes that God wrapped
in human flesh atoned for our brokenness, promised to be with us always and
prepared an everlasting spiritual home.
That’s a feel-good message which rivals any man-made opiate!
The book of Matthew quotes Jesus in chapter 6 saying, “Where
your treasure is, there will your heart be also…The eye is the lamp of the body”
and the doorway to our very souls. A
good test of what we treasure is to consider where we spend our time, such as
watching sports and television or staring at our digital devises. And we’ve all noticed the all-seeing eye of
God or the Eye of Providence on our one-dollar bills symbolizing God’s
benevolent oversight as he watches out for us.
Marx was writing in the nineteenth century before the advent
of wide-spread drugs, the internet with streaming series, social media apps, using
all sorts of electronic devices anywhere, anytime and of course a wide variety
of organized sports venues year-round.
Its no wonder that many folks are drifting away from organized religion
and spending more time on twenty first century opiates. Spectator politics, television, sports, etc.
are a ready distraction from the real problems we confront daily but they offer
no real solutions.
As we enter the third year of a world-wide pandemic with
millions of deaths confronting our mortality, many people will be exiting the
lockdowns with a thirst for real relational gatherings, a yearning for connecting
with the divine and meaningful action in their community.
It's OK to occasionally be sitting in a lounger at home in
front of a television on a given Sunday instead of a pew and cheering on our
favorite team. But we need to be mindful
of the reality that the time spent compared to communing with our Creator won’t
do a thing to lessen the anxiety of daily life once the final whistle sounds or
the bell tolls.
