Thursday, April 22, 2010

Lessons From a Tennis (Soccer, Baseball, Football...) Ball

Back in '01 a friend and I had the opportunity to go to the US Open Tennis Grand Slam Tournament at Flushing Meadows, New York. It was a delightful experience. I had thought it would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Then, the next year, having been offered the privilege to go again, my youngest son and a couple of our friends returned to the USTA National Tennis Center for a day of Grand Slam tennis.

That having been said, some of you may be wondering what is so exciting about watching men and women whack a fuzzy little ball back and forth across a net. For that matter, consider all of the excitement that people feel when they watch men hit a white ball with a bat and hope that none of the nine guys on the opposing team will catch it. Then, too, there are the fellows who carry a whole bag of clubs for the express purpose of hitting a little white ball over acres of nicely manicured lawn. Or, how about groups of men or women who try to kick a ball away from each other and down a field toward a goal. Or, after changing the size of the ball and stretching it out, they make it into something to be kicked and carried by one guy while several other players try to jump on him. The varieties of ball-like games are amazing. Flatten the thing and you have a "puck" to be knocked around on ice. Put a net on the end of a long stick and you have a game called "lacrosse." Indeed, what is so fascinating about knocking a ball around? It is a valid question. And, like Tevye in "Fiddler on the Roof," I'll tell you why - I don't know.

There seems to be some question as to the origin of our word "ball" as applied to the thing we throw, hit, carry and kick in the name of a sport. My sources tend to look for the origin in a prehistoric Germanic root. While I am by no means an etymologist, I would like to suggest that the German may have been influenced by the Greek. In the New Testament there is a word - "ballo" - that means to throw or cast. It is a significant word. Let me tell you about it.

"Ballo" is a very intense and often a harsh word. In some texts it is used of putting something somewhere. While, in Mark 7:33, where Jesus placed His fingers in a deaf man's ears, there is the character of sensitivity, generally, the passion and resolve of throwing something is involved. The disciples "cast" their nets into the sea (Matthew 4:18). Worthless salt was "cast" out onto the highway (Matthew 5:13). The soldiers "cast" lots for Jesus' garments at His crucifixion (Matthew 27:35). The unsaved will be "cast" into the lake of fire (Matthew 13:42; Revelation 20:14-15).

With that in mind, "ballo" is a word that may speak to the way we feel about our lives from time to time. There are those days (weeks, months) when we feel pretty much like a ball in someone's game. We hurtle helplessly through the air of life's circumstances, get whacked solidly by some unexpected crisis only to find ourselves racing toward the next calamity. Charlotte Elliott described it as, "Tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, fightings and fears within, without."

However, the word, "ballo," occurs in a significant text that lets us know that this ball-in-the-air feeling is not an accurate understanding of our days of turmoil. The text is 1 John 4:18 - "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts (ballo) out fear: because fear has torment. He who fears is not made perfect in love."

This passage is speaking of our relationship to God through the circumstances of this life. Its point is that, having embraced Jesus Christ by faith and understanding ourselves as objects of God's love by grace (Romans 5:8), we may know beyond all doubt that we are not a ball in some divine tennis match. We have not been given a "spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind" (2 Timothy 1:7). Satan would like us to think of ourselves as hapless balls being battered back and forth. God, on the other hand, tells us that it is Satan and his lackeys who are giving us grief and then taunting us with their lies (Ephesians 6:12). God does not take us out of this world when we trust Christ (John 17:15). He has a purpose for us here (Romans 8:28-29). Instead, He goes with us through this world (Psalm 23:4) and urges us to lay hold of His promises that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). Christians are not exempt from the pummeling of life in a fallen world. But we are assured that, because nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ (Romans 8:31:39), we are not balls, we are players - we are not victims, we are victors.

If, today, you are feeling like you are getting hit back-and-forth by some pretty mean racquettes, please consider two things. First, have you personally received God's love in Jesus Christ (John 3:16)? The full third and fifth stanzas of Charlotte Elliott's poem are intended to encourage you to take this step.

Just as I am, though tossed about
With many a conflict, many a doubt,
Fightings and fears within, without,
O Lamb of God, I come.
Just as I am! Thou wilt receive,
Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;
Because Thy promise I believe,
O Lamb of God, I come.

Secondly, if you have received Christ, are you becoming more and more firmly acquainted with the character and confidence of that love and how it functions in a hostile world?

Both of these questions are vital.

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