We observed yesterday how liberal Protestantism can kill a church, and I have a related example right from the pages of our local Colorado Springs newspaper, the Gazette. First the setup:

A friend of ours is serving on the pulpit search committee for a small relatively conservative church in a mainline denomination. Our friend is very conservative and was dismayed to find that one of her colleagues on the committee expressed hope that they might find a pastor who was “culturally progressive.” I advised her to ask that person why she wanted their church to get smaller since culturally progressive churches are hemorrhaging members while many Bible believing, Bible teaching churches are growing.

After reading a story in the Gazette, I have a better question: “Which vibrant evangelical church do you think will buy our facilities when we can no longer maintain them?”

First Christian Church of Colorado Springs is one of eight downtown churches established by Colorado Springs’ founder General Palmer, who wanted the city to be “Christian.” They’ve been in a magnificent building since the 1930s.

In the 1990s, they were hosting the men’s chapter of Bible Study Fellowship (BSF). I was part of it and was there every Monday night with hundreds of other men. The church would have had to have conservative leadership to offer their facilities to BSF. The church was doing so well that they were able to invest in a new pipe organ. BSF men were among the volunteers to help unload the parts. But…

Faced with declining membership and financial issues, 93% of First Christian’s members voted to sell the property in October 2023. – Gazette, February 13, 2025

Why? The theme of the article is about changes being made to the facility by the new buyer, Woodmen Valley Chapel, a multi-site mega church in the area. Among the changes was the sale of the pipe organ to a church in Albuquerque since Woodmen’s contemporary worship style had no need for a pipe organ.

The paragraph that grabbed me, however, was this one:

Rainbow banners won’t be on display, as was a focus of First Christian Church, a member of the Disciples of Christ Protestant denomination that since 2013 “affirms and welcomes LGBTQ+ people in all aspects of church life, including leadership roles.”

Can you say, “culturally progressive”? By contrast,

While nondenominational, Woodmen Valley Chapel takes a traditional Christian stance on matters of human sexuality, gender, marriage and clergy.

First Christian Church is now meeting in a small chapel attached to First Methodist Church a few blocks away.

Sad.

Apparently, it’s not a new problem:

Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude, verses 3 and 4, NKJV)

There are a lot of ways to do church badly. As I wrote yesterday, even good churches can drop the ball by over-concentrating on the Sunday morning service at the expense of relational disciple-making activities.

Another way is worse: quit preaching the gospel altogether. I was shocked to read a paragraph from a weekly newsletter from Dr. Ryan Danker of the John Wesley Institute. Dr. Danker introduced an essay on the “new birth” by describing his experience teaching it in a liberal Methodist seminary:

[The new birth was] uncharted territory to the vast majority of my students but it struck one of them harder than the rest. She had grown up as a Methodist and was now preparing in a Methodist seminary for ministry in a Methodist denomination and she had never even heard of the new birth. No one had told her that God wants to make her alive in him. And she broke into tears. – Ryan Danker, February 6, 2025

I wrote to Dr. Danker:

As a non-seminary-trained guy, I’m trying to figure out what we do in our seminaries (and who we recruit to our seminaries). Here’s my problem: the doctrine of the new birth is not some deep, esoteric piece of arcane theology. It’s taught quite plainly in the New Testament. John 3, of course, and also 1 Peter 1.23. “No one had told her that God wants to make her alive in him.” That, of course, is clearly presented in Ephesians 2.

What I’m hearing you say is that most of your students had never read the Bible. If seminary students aren’t reading the Bible, it’s no wonder that their parishioners aren’t reading the Bible either. – Bob Ewell to Ryan Danker, February 6, 2025

The good doctor was kind enough to respond:

The problem that you noted is one found amongst progressives in the mainline. My students were raised in mid-Atlantic United Methodism and for many of them the faith was something that comforts, but not something that transforms. They had been taught liberal Protestantism. Transformation was not personal because we are already accepted as we are – all are welcome – and the role of the church was to tell people that they are welcome, not to change them. Any change would be societal or political. 

I taught at the liberal seminary as a token conservative. Another joined the faculty while I was there, but we have now both gone on to other things. 

So the problem you mentioned is a systemic one in which theological educators over many decades trained clergy who didn’t preach the fullness of the gospel. The result is a dead Methodism, particularly in areas of the country in which these seminaries exist. – Ryan Danker, correspondence with Bob Ewell, February 13, 2025

His response needs no further clarification except to point out that “liberal Protestantism” is really a separate religion, at least according to the book Against Liberal Theology by Roger E. Olson. Here’s a portion of the introduction:

[Liberal Christians’] theology is seriously flawed to the extent that true liberal Christianity ought not to be considered authentically Christian. Honesty calls for liberal Christians to admit that they have “cut the cord of continuity” between their religion and historical, classical, orthodox Christianity to the extent that their religion is a different one…My opinion, based on many years of studying liberal Christianity, is that liberal theology is not authentically Christian because it departs so radically from biblical and traditional Christian orthodoxy. — Against Liberal Theology: Putting the Brakes on Progressive Christianity by Roger E. Olson

And the result is “a dead Methodism,” a shame since the founder of Methodism, John Wesley, was a man of the Word who experienced the new birth and taught biblical engagement. I’ve used some of his stuff, especially when working with Methodist churches.

“And to the angel of the church in Sardis write, ‘These things says He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars: “I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead.” (Revelation 3.1, NKJV)

PS Naturally, not all Methodist churches are dead neither are all mainline churches of other denominations. I’ve worked with some good ones over the years. The “remnant” maybe. But many are dead or dying. Stay tuned for a close-to-home example.

Yesterday, I shared Larry Sanger’s testimony. A very compelling read. If you stayed with it until the end, you discovered that he hasn’t yet settled into a church. At least one of the hundreds of comments addressed this issue, and that comment is worth sharing. It’s by Matt Jacobson, whom I don’t know and of whom I had not heard, who has a ministry to men, Faithful Man. Matt writes to Larry:

Thank you for sharing. May I humbly offer suggestions regarding being part of a church?

1) Jesus said he would build his church… That means there is only one church… One body

2) In John 17, Jesus made it clear….He wanted this one church to have the same unity that he has with the father for the express purpose that the world would believe that he came from the father.

3) It follows then, the churches you see around town are not the church that Jesus built, but the churches that man built… In contradiction to what Paul commanded in 1 Corinthians 1, at the embryonic stage of denominational development.

4) The church met for 4 main purposes: a) teaching of the apostles’ doctrine, b) fellowship… which is Koinonia… The definition of which is absolutely critical to what should be happening in the church meeting, c) the breaking of bread… enjoying a meal together, including the Lord’s supper, d) and prayer. [See Acts 2.42]

5) Any structure, physical or programmatic, that restricts teaching and prayer to one person, and that guarantees attendees will never walk in an accountable, deep, participatory, Koinonia level with the other people in the auditorium, mitigates against what the Church meeting is for. Biblically speaking. The church meeting is not to resemble a hospital ward, but rather, a top-flight medical school. [I’ve never heard this one. I guess he’s saying the church should be teaching its members to serve in hospital wards, not be the hospital ward. Ephesians 4.11, 12]

In my humble opinion, the typical corporate structure and operation of the average church guarantees the immaturity of the people. – Matt Jacobson, comment to Larry Sanger’s testimony, February 11, 2025

“…guarantees the immaturity of the people.” Strong language, maybe too strong because there are certainly mature and maturing Christians in many churches. But churches all over the world are running the same Sunday morning “play” and wondering why they’re not growing mature disciples.

I write about this often, most recently in What Makes a Difference?, How to Help the Flock?, and What gets measured gets managed. My version of the hospital ward versus a medical school is General Contractors or Trade Schools? I compiled a lot of such essays into my latest book That’s Not Church! And Other Essays about Disciple-making in the Local Church.

And speaking of spiritual immaturity, I had a shocking wake-up call a few days ago. Stay tuned.

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ… (Ephesians 4.11, 12, NKJV)

I don’t want you to miss a hot-off-the-press story: Larry Sanger, a co-founder of Wikipedia (that I use a lot!) has become a Jesus follower after a lifetime of being a skeptic. Here’s the introduction to his story on his own blogsite:

It is finally time for me to confess and explain, fully and publicly, that I am a Christian. Followers of this blog have probably guessed this, but it is past time to share my testimony properly. I am called to “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”¹ One of the most effective ways to do so is to tell your conversion story. So, here is mine.

If you did not know this change, and if you knew me before 2020, this might be a surprise. Throughout my adult life, I have been a devotee of rationality, methodological skepticism, and a somewhat hard-nosed and no-nonsense (but always open-minded) rigor. I have a Ph.D. in philosophy, my training being in analytic philosophy, a field dominated by atheists and agnostics. Once, I slummed about the fringes of the Ayn Rand community, which is also heavily atheist. So, old friends and colleagues who lost touch might be surprised.

For one thing, though I spent over 35 years as a nonbeliever, I will not try to portray myself as a converted “enemy of the faith.” I never was; I was merely a skeptic. I especially hope to reach those who are as I once was: rational thinkers who are perhaps open to the idea, but simply not convinced.

I pray that this exercise in autobiography is not too vain. So I will try to state the unvarnished truth, on the theory that a story with “warts and all” will ring truer and persuade better. But if I am going to tell this story properly, I must start at the beginning, because my experience with God goes back to my childhood, and many waypoints in my journey since then have been relevant to more recent developments. – Larry Sanger, February 5, 2025

He goes on for 12,000+ words! I commend the story in its entirety. If you need a bare-bones summary, I asked ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence service, to summarize it. You can access that summary here.

A friend of mine, upon beginning to read the story, may have come up with the most succinct summary of all (epistemology is the theory of knowledge):

It looks like Sanger’s epistemology came head to head with God’s epistemology. – Ray Bandi, thinking of Ephesians 3.19

…to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge…

As a pastor said recently, “No one’s past is past the grace of God.” The Apostle Paul wrote:

And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry, although I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man; but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. However, for this reason I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show all longsuffering, as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life. (1 Timothy 1.12 – 16, NKJV)

I’m bringing together two disparate events…please stay with me.

June and I recently watched the relatively new documentary Mother Teresa: No Greater Love, made in 2022. Strongly recommend. We saw it on Prime Video, but there are other outlets as well. Mother Teresa, a tiny nun from Albania, made a huge difference in the world doing what: going to “the poorest of the poor” and telling them that God loved them and Jesus died for them. It’s a very moving movie, including toward the end the testimony of a young man who had been in prison. Mother Teresa visited the prison and told the inmates what she told everyone: “God loves you. Jesus died for you. It doesn’t matter why you’re here.” The man said:

That message changed my life. This is not the “God is out to get you” God that I grew up with.

Reminds me of Romans 5.8:

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (NKJV)

In the days around watching the movie, I was reading What It Means to Be Protestant: The Case for an Always-Reforming Church by Gavin Ortlund. A friend of mine, who has converted to Roman Catholicism, had recommended a book on some Catholic teaching that I found very difficult to swallow. I’m reading the Ortlund book to clean my brain out a bit. There’s an excellent review of the book in Christianity Today: The Best Argument for Protestantism Is Its Catholicity.

In the chapter on “The One True Church,” Gavin explains one of the reasons for the split between what is now the Roman Catholic Church (western church) and the Greek Orthodox Church (eastern church). I was shocked to find out that the split hinged on which version of the Nicean Creed you accepted. Did the “Holy Spirit proceed from the Father,” as the original version states or did the “Holy Spirit proceed from the Father and the Son,” as a later version, now used by the Roman Catholics, states?

Really? I’m not sure I have an opinion on that nor do I even know what it means. But to the Greek Orthodox, it’s life and death:

The One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, following in the steps of the holy Fathers, both Eastern and Western, proclaimed of old to our progenitors and again teaches today synodically, that the said novel doctrine of the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father and the Son is essentially heresy, and its maintainers, whoever they be, are heretics, according to the sentence of Pope St. Damasus, and that the congregations of such are also heretical, and that all spiritual communion in worship of the orthodox sons of the Catholic Church with such is unlawful. (What It Means to be Protestant, page 25, quoting a Greek Orthodox source)

But, as has been said before, the Western Church, from the tenth century downwards, has privily brought into herself through the papacy various and strange and heretical doctrines and innovations, and so she has been torn away and removed far from the true and orthodox Church of Christ. How necessary, then, it is for you to come back and return to the ancient and unadulterated doctrines of the Church in order to attain the salvation in Christ after which you press. (What It Means to be Protestant, page 26, quoting a Greek Orthodox source)

Do you see it? If you want to be saved, if you want to “attain the salvation in Christ,” then get your thinking straight and come back to the “ancient and unadulterated doctrines of the [Greek Orthodox] church.” Otherwise, you’re a hell-bound heretic.

Back to Mother Teresa. I’m not sure that she gave a lot of thought to the version of the Nicean Creed that the Roman Catholics use. What she did give thought to and express often is what the real criterion for judgment is. Not your creed but how you’ve treated the poor. it comes from Jesus himself:

When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory. All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats. And He will set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on His right hand, “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.” Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, “Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?” And the King will answer and say to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.” (Matthew 25.31 – 40, NKJV)

I just cited this text recently in the context of Jimmy Carter.

Let’s don’t miss this. Are we saved by the fine points of our theology? Or by what we do? We know we’re not saved by our good works, but those good works are evidence of real faith. Mother Teresa was big on Jesus’ words in Matthew 25: “You did it to me.” And Jesus was clear in Matthew 25 that our care of the poor was the criterion at the judgment. Scary stuff since I don’t do much directly for the poor.

But what’s really scary is all of us setting up these theological criteria of who’s in and who’s out. The Bible never does this beyond the person and work of Jesus.

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. (James 2.14 – 17, NKJV)

Here’s what one of my math teachers called an “obviosity.” We have A LOT of psalms, in which David is praying for deliverance. Yesterday we looked at excerpts from Psalms 28 and 30. Today:

To the chief musician. A Psalm of David. In You, O LORD, I put my trust; Let me never be ashamed; Deliver me in Your righteousness. Bow down Your ear to me, Deliver me speedily; Be my rock of refuge, A fortress of defense to save me. For You are my rock and my fortress; Therefore, for Your name’s sake, Lead me and guide me. Pull me out of the net which they have secretly laid for me, For You are my strength. Into Your hand I commit my spirit; You have redeemed me, O LORD God of truth. (Psalm 31.0 – 5, NKJV)

Why was David always praying for deliverance? Because he frequently needed deliverance! That is, life for David wasn’t easy. Sometimes it was his fault, but sometimes not, as in all those years running from King Saul.

And so his lament and prayer continues:

Have mercy on me, O LORD, for I am in trouble; My eye wastes away with grief, Yes, my soul and my body! For my life is spent with grief, And my years with sighing; My strength fails because of my iniquity, And my bones waste away. (Psalm 31.9, 10, NKJV)

But, as almost always, he ends the psalm with a promise. One that I’m claiming in my (temporary!) bout with an enlarged prostate:

Blessed be the LORD, For He has shown me His marvelous kindness in a strong city! For I said in my haste, “I am cut off from before Your eyes”; Nevertheless You heard the voice of my supplications When I cried out to You. Oh, love the LORD, all you His saints! For the LORD preserves the faithful, And fully repays the proud person. Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart, All you who hope in the LORD. (Psalm 31.21 – 24, NKJV)

“I felt cut off…but you heard the voice of my supplications…the LORD preserves the faithful…Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all you who hope in the LORD.”

I want to do a quick fly-by on several psalms. When we read the Bible devotionally, what we see is nearly always influenced by what we’re going through at the time. In my case, the only thing that’s been going on these past three weeks is a prostate issue.

So I’m seeing David’s prayers for deliverance:

To You I will cry, O LORD my Rock: Do not be silent to me, Lest, if You are silent to me, I become like those who go down to the pit. Hear the voice of my supplications When I cry to You, When I lift up my hands toward Your holy sanctuary. (Psalm 28.1, 2, NKJV)

And his thanks when he experiences that deliverance:

Blessed be the LORD, Because He has heard the voice of my supplications! The LORD is my strength and my shield; My heart trusted in Him, and I am helped; Therefore my heart greatly rejoices, And with my song I will praise Him. (Psalm 28.6, 7, NKJV)

A Psalm. A Song At the Dedication of the House of David. I will extol You, O LORD, for You have lifted me up, And have not let my foes rejoice over me. O LORD my God, I cried out to You, And You healed me. O LORD, You brought my soul up from the grave; You have kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit. Sing praise to the LORD, you saints of His, And give thanks at the remembrance of His holy name. For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning. (Psalm 30.0 – 5, NKJV)

We think we have it made…until we don’t:

Now in my prosperity I said, “I shall never be moved.” LORD, by Your favor You have made my mountain stand strong; You hid Your face, and I was troubled. (Psalm 30.6, 7, NKJV)

And then it’s back to prayer…with justification.

I cried out to You, O LORD; And to the LORD I made supplication: “What profit is there in my blood, When I go down to the pit? Will the dust praise You? Will it declare Your truth? Hear, O LORD, and have mercy on me; LORD, be my helper!” (Psalm 30.8 – 10, NKJV)

And by the time the psalm is written…

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness, To the end that my glory may sing praise to You and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks to You forever. (Psalm 30.11, 12, NKJV)

“You have put off my sackcloth…” It’s not sackcloth and ashes, but I do wear nothing but loose-fitting sweats right now. I’ll be glad to wear something else and go somewhere!

There’s more, so let’s save it for another day.

Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. (James 5.14 – 16, NKJV – the elders didn’t come over, but the pastor prayed with me)

Update: I saw the urologist on Monday, and we have scheduled a procedure for February 27, 2+ weeks away. In the meantime, I’m functioning with the catheter out. A big answer to prayer!

Sahil Bloom recently promoted his new book Five Types of Wealth with this timely reminder about the folly of measuring success solely by money:

Our scoreboard is broken. It forces us into a narrow measurement of wealth, success, happiness, and fulfillment entirely defined by money.

Hence his book which defines “wealth” in five ways, not just one way: time, social, mental, physical, financial. [I would have added “spiritual,” I think.]

Then he makes this poignant statement about measurement – a word that’s good for churches, I think:

And what you measure matters.

In a famous articulation often attributed to Peter Drucker, the Austrian-­born management guru:

What gets measured gets managed.

The statement implies that the metrics that get measured are the ones we prioritize. In other words, the scoreboard is important because it dictates our actions—­how we play the game.

Broken scoreboard, broken actions.

If we fix the scoreboard to measure our lives more comprehensively, our actions will follow.

Right scoreboard, right actions. – Sahil Bloom, February 3, 2025

Churches most frequently measure attendance, followed closely by their budgets, and their buildings: bodies, bucks, buildings. Listen in on almost any conversation among pastors, and you’ll hear talk about how many are coming on Sunday morning, how many services they have, etc.

And according to Peter Drucker, if most of what churches measure is attendance, they’ll work on ways to increase that attendance, mainly attendance at the Sunday morning worship services. I’m not against large church services as long as we understand that large services alone won’t make disciples any more than concerts produce trained musicians.

We have to figure out a way to measure quality disciples. Maybe there’s hope. The same day I read Sahil Bloom’s quote about measurement, I discovered this website: https://stateofthechurch.com/ Among their offerings is a survey to measure “15 Dimensions of Church Thriving.” check them out – I know nothing about the organization, but at least they’re trying.

The apostle Paul wasn’t interested in “the attendance scoreboard.”

Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. (Colossians 1.28, NKJV)

Nor did Paul want church leaders satisfied with the attendance scoreboard.

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ… (Ephesians 4.11 – 13, NKJV)

I wrote How to Help the Flock? on January 22, making the point that you don’t disciple “the flock,” you disciple individuals in the flock. Some pastors would take offense at that, believing: “I do make disciples. Every Sunday morning at 10a.”

But some pastors get it. Jim Singleton, former senior pastor at First Presbyterian, Colorado Springs, used to say, “Preaching is my day job. My ministry is investing in men.” And he did, four different men each year meeting in a disciple-making group from September – May.

Another pastor who gets it is my friend James Conley out in Delta, Colorado. He wrote me a note about the January 22 blog:

I COPIED your blog from Jan 22, 2025, How to Help the Flock?  I read it and discussed with our Tuesday morning crew, four of us were together.  I appreciate your comments immensely.  After thirty years in the pulpit and thirty years of walking alongside of Christ’s church I still see my most lasting work as being the 1 on 1’s I have with people in this journey.  Whether in family, the church, or out and about in community I see the healthiest fruit from these interactions from day to day. 

To God alone be the glory!

Brother James

Paul’s instruction to (Pastor) Timothy remain:

You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. (2 Timothy 2.1, 2, NKJV)

Well, the game didn’t turn out the way anyone expected. I know I expected it to be a close game that could go either way. Nope.

Eagles 40, Chiefs 22

Not a misprint, and the game was not nearly as close as the score would indicate.

But that’s sports – it builds character among other things. I subscribe to World, a Christian news magazine. Every Friday I receive an email from their arts and culture editor, currently a young lady named Chelsea Boes, not a sports fan. She wrote on Friday before the Super Bowl:

As a lifelong nerd, my core question about sports is, “Why can’t they all just get their own ball?”

Chelsea doesn’t get it, and I had to write and tell her so:

— Beginning of my email —

I know you’re trying to be cute, but you’re missing the point. Life is filled with battles, going back to Genesis 3. The Apostle Paul talked about the real battle:

Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. (Ephesians 6.10 – 13, NKJV)

Paul also uses sports as a metaphor for the real battle:

Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown. Therefore I run thus: not with uncertainty. Thus I fight: not as one who beats the air. But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified. (1 Corinthians 9.24 – 27, NKJV)

Years ago, I taught at an Air Force leadership school where we used sports to teach a variety of lessons. On our playing field, prominently posted, was a famous quote from General Douglas MacArthur:

On the fields of friendly strife are sown the seeds that on other days, on other fields will bear the fruits of victory.

You don’t have to watch, but please don’t deprecate the idea of sports.

— end of my email —

I wrote yesterday that God would get a shout-out no matter who won, and I was right:

God blessed us. So I want to give thanks to him. Thank you God. Thank you, Jesus. – Philadelphia Eagles’ Coach Nick Sirianni

Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. (1 Corinthians 9.24, NKJV)