Recently I took my daughter to her first soccer practice. Full disclosure: I am a baseball and (American) football fan, in that order. Soccer is nowhere in the realm of my favorable sports. It is my humble opinion that God gave us arms for a reason and it is blasphemous for us to organize a sport where we are not allowed to use them. It is just unnatural.
All joking aside, the running, dribbling, passing, and getting kicked (parents should be advised to wear shin guards too), was a learning experience for both my daughter and myself. She learned a little about kicking a ball, I learned a lot about God.
Strike a balance
This group of three to five-year-old children was the perfect personification of organized mass chaos. After 30 minutes of playing with the soccer ball, my daughter looked at me with all the seriousness she could muster and said, “Daddy, do you know what I’m going to do when it snows?” Before I could answer, she fell flat on her back and began making a “snow” angel in the grass.
Immediately after getting covered in grass that would inevitably find its way into the car I just cleaned, it was her turn to run a drill. Without hesitation, she jumped up and started dribbling the soccer ball to the coach and followed his instruction, completing the drill.
While she was the only child making snow angels in the grass, she was certainly not the only child mixing random play with soccer play. I saw kids doing cartwheels, throwing their soccer balls in the air and letting it hit the top of their heads, picking their noses, and everything but kicking a soccer ball. But for the vast majority of them, when it was their turn to play soccer they stepped up and did what was asked of them.
Children intrinsically know something I as an adult have forgotten: it is ok to have fun, even when I am supposed to be focused on something specific. Too often I get caught up in writing, reading, fixing, building, or whatever other project I am working on. It gets to the point that I forget to have fun and blow off steam.
Performance is not the goal
My three-year-old is not a master kicker. When she winds her leg back the only place you know the ball will not go is straight. And that is absolutely fine. I rejoice with her that she can just kick the ball forward. I would never put the pressure on her to kick a goal from 30 feet out. Nor would I expect her to master passing the ball with only one hour of practice. That is not just being a decent dad, that is being a decent human being. We would never dream of placing that kind of pressure on a child.
And yet, if I am honest, I often do not see God that way. When I fail, when I fall, I often see God as disappointed and let down. I know that I have not met his expectation and my performance is not up to His standard.
Matt Chandler says it much more eloquently than I can. He puts it like this:
Moralists see the fall and believe that the Father is ashamed and thinks they're foolish. So, more often than not, they stop trying to walk because they can't see the Father rejoicing in and celebrating his child.
Church of Jesus, let us please be men and women who understand the difference between moralism and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Let's be careful to preach the dos and don’ts of Scripture in the shadow of the cross's "Done!" Resolve to know nothing but Jesus Christ crucified. We are not looking to conform people to a pattern of religion but pleading with the Holy Spirit to transform people's lives. Let us move forward according to that upward call, holding firmly to the explicit gospel.
Please let me encourage you to go and read Chandler’s article in its entirety. It has certainly blessed me and I know it will bless you.
Patience is more important than passing
The first words my daughter’s coach said were a question. He asked, “What is the most important part of soccer?” I thought he would say kicking because this blasphemous game refuses to allow people to use their arms. But he quickly answered, “Passing. If you watch the great teams, you will see they are constantly passing, constantly trusting their teammates, constantly moving the ball.”
That may be true for professional teams, but I think the most important part of children’s soccer is patience.
During that one-hour practice, I saw parents place their children’s feet where they needed to be, and then move their kicking legs so they would know what a proper kick felt like. I saw coaches get on one knee to help these kids understand some aspect of the game. I saw kids immediately forget what they were just shown and start making snow angels.
While I am studying Scripture or sitting under Christ-centric teaching, I really feel like I am beginning to understand and apply scriptural truths. But when I get back to work or am confronted with a problem, I easily forget and regress. I take one foot forward and one mile back. But God patiently reaches into my heart again, reminding me that I am His child. He patiently reteaches me His His grace, mercy, and truths. Again and again, he brings me to the foot of the cross to understand that He did not die for a future, better version of me but for the present, messy, clumsy, sinful me.
Maybe this sport isn’t so blasphemous after all.
