a Greater Glory

The world we live in is interesting to say the very least.  I remember my father always telling me that a man is only as good as his word.  In other words if you say you are going to do something, make sure you do it.  Jesus believed this same idea as seen in Matthew 5:33-37:

Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but keep the oaths you have made to the Lord.’ But I tell you, Do not swear at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.

It seems that this idea of letting your “Yes” be “Yes”, and your “No”, “No” has been forgotten in professional sports, specifically the NBA.  Just yesterday there were reports of LeBron James telling free-agent Trevor Ariza  that he would be staying in Cleveland past this year.  Today, there have been reports that this is not necessarily true.  If LeBron said he was going to stay he needs to step up and say, “Yes that is what I said”.  Unfortunately that will never happen.  If LeBron James stepped up right now and said “Listen, I am planning on testing free agency next year, but Cleveland is my first choice” would anyone have a problem with that? It could possibly affect some of the free-agent signings they make this year, but there is always a possibility that something could happen where LeBron never plays again.

There are numerous examples in the NBA where yes no longer means yes. Joe Dumars could not give Avery Johnson a straight yes on whether he would retain him past one year (see “When coaching isn’t enough” for more on Dumars), so Avery pulled his name from consideration for the Detroit Pistons job.  All Dumars needed to do was be straight with Avery and say, “You know I will probably be looking for another coach in a years time, you are more of a stop gap for this year, until 2010.  We are going to try and make a run at LeBron James and I want to bring in a coach that fits LeBron’s style”.  Hedo Turkoglu went back on his acceptance of the Portland Trailblazer’s offer and decided instead to sign with the Toronto Raptors.  Carlos Boozer did a similar thing to Cleveland in 2004.  Clay Bennett the owner of what is now the Oklahoma City Thunder originally had said he wanted to keep the Seattle Sonics in Seattle, when he was really just lying to keep people off of his back.  The examples could go on and on in the NBA.

Obviously not everyone will follow the idea of letting your “Yes” mean “Yes” and your “No” mean “No”, but how different would the NBA, professional sports, and the world look if people followed the simple idea of keeping to your word, even if it means having to do something that is unpopular or not what you personally might want to do. What do you think?

Sports commentators love to make bold assertions like, “He is the greatest to ever play the game” or “Nobody is more dominant than him.”  When I hear these bold proclamations, I often laugh and then I kind of shiver.  The shivering isn’t because I am cold, instead it’s because that is a scary thought.  The greatest there ever was, really?  One of the first things that I learned about sport was that there is always somebody who wants to knock you off of the top and they are working extremely hard to do that.

If we had a time machine and I could go back to 1972 and watch and listen to the sports commentators talk about Jack Nicklaus, I could sit there and chuckle to myself.  I am sure at that point in time they would have been calling him the greatest golfer to have lived (and up to that point, they could possibly be right).  The reason I could chuckle?  I know this guy who will be coming up in the near future and will take the golf world by storm, you know, that Tiger guy.

These same claims are starting up again as Roger Federer goes for his 15th championship.  This is a record in tennis and is a feat that should be loudly applauded, but does this mean that he gets the title of “The greatest tennis player to ever live”?  In the sports world there will always be somebody who is going to be the next big thing.  it’s crazy to say, but in 15-20 years we could be sitting and looking back at Roger and Tiger and be remarking how they were good, but so-and-so and so-and-so are leagues ahead of them.

The coolest part about all of this, is that within Christianity the idea of the greatest, is completely backwards to that of the sports world.  Listen to what Jesus said in Matthew 18:1-4:

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus never wanted the person who was the best, the person who was the most popular, or the person who pumped their fist and banged their chest.  Jesus took the cast-outs, the neglected, and the people who humbled themselves like children. What if the commentators based their “Greatest Player” ideas on the players who not only played well, but were outstanding people?  It’s likely we would be praising a bunch of guys who for the most part we have never heard of.  Sure you hear of the more prominent ones (i.e. Mariano Rivera, Kurt Warner, etc.), but what about the guys who lived their faith and evangelized in their leagues like there was no tomorrow, then we could call them “The Greatest”