Full confession, I belong to a local church in Kampala; in fact, some of my fellow church members know my sometimes “ordered” love for another Premier League club—Manchester City.
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So this is in no way a veiled rattling about a rival sports club; after all, if indeed Jesus is risen, the Spirit is active, and the church is indomitable, we all have a right to step out of Premier League shallows and think better eternal things, which modern sports often distract us from.
See, I appreciate the recreational place of sports among believers, and I try to keep it there. I’ve sometimes tried to “warm up” random young guys with a football question, especially as far as it “lays ground” for spiritual friendship and conversations. The game is rarely the end; Jesus is.
Isn’t that the purpose of all our earthly gifts anyway, including English soccer, to enjoy them while we keep another eye on eternal things? But do we?
In fact, as of this writing, I have an invite from Arsenal supporting students our ministry reaches, to share some good meat this weekend; I’m looking forward to it.
But all that aside, Jesus risen and working in us by his Spirit is still what keeps us primarily meeting up. Yes, we banter each weekend, but just enough to remember what grows and builds us, namely, God’s word and the people he’s put in our lives.
All season, sometimes with much restraint, my football friends and I have ensured lighthearted chats about last night’s scoreline continue without letting them cross the line of spiritual urgency; we’ve remembered how our breath is borrowed and how our favorite sports teams won’t be the main subject about us in the mourners’ tent outside our funeral home.
We recognize our need for grace so that our conversations incline to confessing weaknesses, sins, and prayer, rather than ducking behind the latest transfer news or political headlines.
Therefore, questions about sins we are battling and killing, a devotional life we are trusting Christ to keep, become more pressing than 12 highly paid multicultural men chasing a leather ball on television.
Sports is usually a “conversation starter” rather than the “conversation itself.” Yet even then, the temptation to quickly swing to the “light stuff” always lingers; we sometimes catch ourselves starting to comment on jerseys more than we comment on Jesus.
And when we’ve not been careful or planned in our conversations, young men have easily walked back to their rooms with a dimly lit and domesticated Jesus, as they, once more, get knocked out by pornography and other worldly passions that “war against the soul.”
In other circles, we “hear about” some women whose conversations apparently quickly drown into fashion and TikTok threads, soon malnourishing Eve’s daughters as they succumb to envy and lust in their inboxes and Instagrams too.
Meanwhile, across the pitch, the devil taps his feet and whistles with joy at a bait slowly hooking the roof of the believer’s mouth, female and male. He knows, even if we still have our Lord constantly mentioned on our lips, our sight of Jesus has gone dull because we’ve successfully hidden Jesus, the wellspring of our lives, when it mattered most—when other lovers showed up.
Jesus once described the kingdom of God as a man who discovered a buried treasure and, “in his joy,” went and sold all he had so he could buy a field where the gems were hidden.
The gems weren’t the problem; it was “his joy in them” that motivated his sacrifice. Maybe it’s time we asked questions too: do our deepest joys lie in the things eternal, the things we heartily sing about on Sunday morning? Or the things dominating our Instagram and sports feeds?
Just this week, during a meeting with the two young men from the same church group, we once again “bit our tongues” regarding another conversation (about politicians and Rolls-Royces), a savvy current affairs edition that was delaying our accountability questions around personal worship. Happy to report that we successfully fought for our joy.
But I am now increasingly afraid that our personal caution around sports and politics isn’t shared by many of the churches surrounding us. They succumb to whatever is dominating the news or congregation’s ears to become more “relevant” than the Bible.
This week’s Premier League celebrations saw churches themed in Arsenal colors. The Church of Uganda archbishop, for example, has been reported to be more vocal about his Premier League club than on moral issues that will not save his skin.
See, the human heart is wired for glory and, like St. Augustine said, “is restless until it rests in thee.” No matter which club jersey we don on Saturday afternoons, we are hardwired to seek joy even if it’s tucked in a Manchester or North London stadium 3,000 miles from us. So, if some of the shepherds supposed to lure us back also find sports an irresistible pull, what will be the future of their sheep Jesus asked them to feed?
Stadiums are set up the way they are for this reason: to focus on one spectacle. Tony Reinke, in his book Competing Spectacles, says the Church of Christ, ordinary as it is, is also set up to focus on one spectacle, Christ, a sight we arrive at every Sunday and behold, as we are changed from one glory to another.
Someone in my feed, upon seeing hordes of Premier League fans march into a Ugandan church with gifts, aptly commented, “Perhaps the gospel has become so boring in that church.”
He was right; if Jesus and the ministry of his word, demonstrated through historical, contextual, and expository preaching of the Bible, are not the highest appetites of a congregation, the next trending thing on social media or in the neighborhood will be waiting to malnourish a people once imagined to be thirsty for God. Even if it’s a mere trophy.
Lord help!
