Day 3 - Involving Christ

One of my closest friends on my university basketball team graduated, and will not be around next year. For his sake, I will not mention his name; however, he was an amazing shooter and even more amazing person off of the court. What is more, he had a profound influence on my spiritual development over the course of this past year. After a heart-wrenching season where we did not end up making playoffs, I decided to have a conversation with my friend to see what he felt was the cause of our lack of success this year. My friend raised a great point and said, "We had everything that we needed to be contenders to win a national championship this year, and we didn't even make playoffs. Individually, we can point fingers at this reason, or that reason, or this player or that coach; but the bottom line is that God was not on this year's team."

It is understandable for most people to assume that because we are representing a Christian university, each member of the team should uphold some degree of faith; however that is not the case. While most guys on the team would probably agree that religion is important, there are individuals whose spiritual development is very minimal. Before every game, we would pray and Thank God for blessing each of us with the talent and ability to play the game we all love; however, outside of our prayers before the game, there was no real evidence that any of our players or coaches had a true relationship with God that they were willing to share and motivate the team with. We had all this talent and potential and we would constantly claim God, but very seldom would we come together in Christ's name.

I’m not saying that this is the utter reason why our season was so unsuccessful; however, I do believe that had we come together in Christ’s name, we would have been able to relate better with each other and use our spirituality to determine who was best fit to lead such a large group of men. This year, our team had 22 players on its roster, which is a lot of players for a basketball team. Likewise, our coach is pretty stern, which makes trying to gel together so many different personalities a bit nerve-racking. I look at all of the talent and potential that we had on the team this past year, and I am baffled by how the season transpired. However I think God used this year as a way to teach us a valuable lesson in humility. What is more, I believe that given the fact that we didn’t even make playoffs I was able to acquire a deeper understanding of how, without God, nothing is possible.

I was not able to play this year, and, in all honesty, I am glad. God taught me so much about how to be a leader by requiring me to be a positive influence from the bench, while having to watch my teammates endure such a rough season. However, for this next year, I want to strive to include God as much as possible; and, it starts now. I am sure that at some point during this Africa trip my teammates are going to want to go out, have drinks, and make this trip as exciting as possible. By no means, do I want to discourage my teammates from having fun, however, I feel like God is calling me to hold myself to higher standards. I ask you guys to please pray for me that I am able to sustain a keen sense of morality, and keep God close at all time during this trip in the midst of peer pressure. By the start of season, I want my teammates to respect me as the man of God that I know that I am, and feel comfortable and honoured in following my lead. What is more, through my example, I intend to spark a revival of this team’s spirit; so that we might, truly, come together as a cohesive unit and pursue our goal of winning a national championship with Christ-like determination.

~Tristan