What We are Up Against

December 18th I went in for what I thought was going to be a routine knee scope to repair a few minor meniscus tears. Once in the knee they discovered two areas where the cartilage had been severely damaged. Fortunately, they were able to repair these spots with cartilage grafts. The recovery process for the grafts is much more tedious than a meniscus fix. So I’ve spent the majority of my Christmas holiday on the couch with my foot up, periodically icing my knee. In addition, I have before me a somewhat long and painstaking recovery process. When you go through something like this you can’t help but be reminded of just how fragile we are. Christians understand that human fragility in all its forms, physical and mental, is a consequence of the “Fall”. Sin’s effect was cataclysmic and cosmic in its scope; leaving no area in God’s good creation untarnished. As a result of the Fall our God given human capabilities become even more limited and problematic. All athletes (and every human being) are faced with “sin’s” consequences, and there are times we must learn to deal with them by putting our trust and hope in God, and then there are other times that we must seek to overcome them with God’s help.

I’m certain we would have a fun discussion trying to imagine what it might be like to be an athlete in an un-fallen world. One of the aspects that we would need to keep in mind with our imaginative construal is that there would still be limitations by the mere fact that we are created humans and not God – contingent beings. For instance, we would continue to be bound by the laws of the created universe (e.g. gravity). How exactly an un-fallen creature experiences these laws or natural inclinations would be at the heart of our discussion. Presumably according to Scripture, Adam and Eve hungered and ate before the Fall. Again the question centers around how they experienced hunger and how they experienced being satiated in the pre-fallen state. From my perspective, the difficulty we face in this imaginative construal is that all we have ever known and experienced is a “fallen” world. Also, I think it is hard for us to understand, to see, or to know the extent of sin’s effect on the cosmic order. In other words, our imagination itself has taken a hit. Nevertheless, I believe there are some things that we have come to realize about sin’s effect. The Fathers of the church spoke about three interrelated areas of the fallen condition, ones that are important for a Christian athlete to keep in mind.

In the fallen state there are certain physical/bodily shortcomings. As a result of the Fall we are subject to tiredness, exhaustion, injury and physical pain. In addition, we are liable to disease (cancer, MS, etc…) and certain genetic dispositions. We age; it’s the process of decay and one that is impossible to escape. And finally we are given to bodily death. All of these things were not God’s original intention for us but are the consequence of the Fall. Athletes spend a great deal of careers battling against these bodily shortcomings; in many ways these are one of the day-to-day enemies that we seek to overcome.

A second area, and one that I think that is often overlooked by athletes, are the shortcomings that have arisen in our moral nature due to the Fall. Morality encompasses our dispositions and states of mind. Sin’s effect renders us “subject to boredom, depression, listlessness (apathy), and lack of concentration.” Also we are given over to “lapses in memory” (the great Saints of the Church contend that man’s greatest sin is forgetfulness – forgetting God). Furthermore we constantly deal with “inner dividedness, weakness of will and moral paralysis.” St Paul himself tells us in Romans (7:18-24) that he often found himself doing exactly what he did not want to do. I can’t help but think about how many times as an athlete it was these moral aspects that actually hindered more than my physical limitations from achieving my athletic goals… lost focus, commitment, fortitude, and resolve. Being moral they are also spiritual in nature and in need of redemption and transformation.

The third area the Fathers spoke about when considering the effects of the Fall is our inherited sinful nature. Of course this is one that we Christians are acutely aware of; we are sinners. We are born into a world in which it is easy for us to do evil and hard for us to good; we are inclined towards what is sinful. Christ came into the world to save sinners – to restore our relationship with God. You and I live into this salvation by placing our faith in Jesus Christ. Through baptism we are cleansed of this original guilt, forgiven our sins, and empowered to live in love and obedience to God. After baptism, we are able to sin and not to sin with the positive goal of growing more and more into His likeness each day (1 John 2:1). All to often we Christians take this grace for granted by say things like, “I’m only human”, or “that’s how I was made”, or “God knows I’m a sinner”. We make excuses for our sins, and when we do that we underestimate (take for granted) God’s transformative grace. We forget that in Baptism we are made a new creature – renewed in the image of the Risen Christ – and set free from sin. In John 8, Jesus instructed the woman that had been caught in adultery to “go and sin no more”. I think he meant what he said! Like her, we too have been forgiven with the expectation (and capability) to “sin” no more.

Unfortunately, we are not yet totally free from the ability to sin or sin’s effect, that will happen when we are completely “made like Him” (1 John 3:2) in the consummation of all things. In the mean time, I think it is important to keep in mind what we are up against. The consequences of the Fall are realities that we will continually wrestle against every day throughout our entire lives. First, it should remind us that “sin” is that one thing that truly hinders us and keeps us from becoming who God fully intends us to be. Second, just as it did to the cosmic order, sin in our lives rakes havoc upon our own well-being and those around us. It is the one thing that should be avoided at all cost. Finally, it should remind us that this life is not the all in all. St. Paul writes, What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! Ultimately, it will be through death that you and I are set free from sin and its effect upon our lives (of course, unless the Lord comes again before we die). As for now we begin to work towards and participate in this ultimate life to come by learning to live and grow in God’s grace on a daily basis through the practices of the church. When we do, we begin to gradually see sin rejected, dispositions change, and lives transformed.