March Madness – Those at Rest Do Their Best

"The good news is that Christ frees us from the need to obnoxiously focus on our goodness, our commitment, and our correctness. Religion has made us obsessive almost beyond endurance.  Jesus invited us to a dance...and we've turned it into a march of soldiers, always checking to see if we're doing it right and are in step and in line with the other soldiers.  We know a dance would be more fun, but we believe we must go through hell to get to heaven, so we keep marching." - Steve Brown (A Scandalous Freedom: The Radical Nature of the Gospel)

I love basketball.  I always have because it was a sport I could play alone.  I had five sisters, no brothers and my dad worked a lot to provide for our family.  A lot of my “guy time” was spent alone, and the basketball court was my constant companion.

People ask me if I was good.  The answer depends on whom you ask and in what context they played with me.  If you talk to college buddies who played intramurals with me, they’d tell you I was really good.  If you asked people who played pick up games with me throughout high school and college, they’ll tell you I was good.  If you ask my teammates on my high school team, they’d tell you I was just o.k.

Why the difference?  Simple.  Pressure.  “Real” games to me featured a coach, referees, a crowd and our school’s reputation on the line.  In certain situations, I was money.  Four different times my senior year of high school I successfully shot free throws to ice victories.  I did have one game where I choked and our team lost.

But the general flow of my game was stunted because of nervousness.  My coach was a “perform or get taken out” guy, so my fear of failure stifled my performance.  When I compare the basketball of my high school years to the less pressured intramural games of college, I realize something really important:  When I’m at rest…I do my best. 

Never once did I have a coach assure me that if I played badly, he wouldn’t bench me.  If I had, it would’ve made a huge difference in my performance.  There is just no way I would have lazily walked up and down the court, carelessly approaching the game.  The joy and freedom from the security I had would’ve caused me to play with the same zeal with which I played in intramurals.  It most certainly would’ve made me do better.

I liken this to how people “perform” morally.  I constantly meet people who once claimed a religious affiliation, but at a certain point in their lives they threw up their hands and realized they couldn’t perform well enough morally to satisfy their conception of God.  Most of the time, these folks grow frustrated with the notion that an angry God is sitting on the sidelines just waiting to scream at them for screwing up.  Because of this, they quit dealing with Christianity altogether and/or redefined their faith in such a way to compensate for feeling like a failure.

Perhaps this is your story.  I know it’s mine.  Growing up, my understanding of the Christian faith was that Jesus saves you…but only if you continue to try real hard.  If you get tired, if you fail, if you have a season of struggle; well, you might fall away from Christ, eventually lose your faith and go to hell.  If you’re struggling in your faith, just try harder.  Here’s the problem with that philosophy: when we feel pressure we actually perform worse.  It makes you want to quit.  And why?  Because instead of hearing the compassionate, sympathetic voice of the Savior (Hebrews 4:15-16), we hear the angry impatient voice of a despot who says “try harder!”

“The only people who get better are people who know that, if they never get better, God will love them anyway.” – Steve Brown (A Scandalous Freedom: The Radical Nature of the Gospel)

This is why I believe so strongly that God will never leave or forsake the Christian (see pages 115-116 of Three Tips for Campus Survival).  If you’re not secure in His love, your obedience is then motivated by your desire to impress God, others or live “morally” so you can feel superior to others.  None of these motivations are selfless and obedience founded on any of them is displeasing to the Lord.  That’s why Jesus had such impatience with the religious leaders of His day.

“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.  We love because he first loved us.” – 1 John 4:18-19

Do you want to love God more?  Good.  Just remember that what got you to this place was His love for you.  If you’re wavering in your commitment to Him and feel a compulsion to “try harder,” why not try harder to comprehend His love for you? 

Trying hard to rest may seem oxymoronic.  But remember:  Those at rest do their best!