The Gospel of Baseball: Don't Put up Crooked Numbers

Gordie Gillespie, the winningest baseball coach in collegiate history says:

In 65% of games, more runs are scored by the winning team in one inning than the losing team scores in the entire game. (http://www.baseball-articles.com/defensiveconcepts.html)

In baseball parlance a good team—or a good pitcher— "doesn’t put up a lot of crooked numbers." In regular English, that means allowing in a single inning:

0 runs (a nice, round number) is great,

1 run (a nice, straight number) is OK, but

2, 3, 4, 5, or more runs (crooked numbers all!) is bad.

The conventional baseball wisdom is that crooked numbers will kill you, while 0’s and the occasional 1’s can be survived. Here we see an analogy to our response to trials and temptations in our lives.

James 1:12-15

Commentary

The biggest translation decision for these verses comes from the word group that is variously translated as trial, test, or tempt. Why translate it as "test" one place and "tempt" another? What gives? As long as we assume that temptation originates only from evil motives, we can usually sort it out OK. Generally, tests and temptations can be viewed as two sides of the same coin: a test looks forward to something better, while a temptation is glances backward to something crasser and baser.

v12 More literally, "becoming approved, he will receive the crown ..." Here is the positive aspect of the trial: by persevering, one now stands approved, proven to be genuine. 2,000 years ago, crowns were typically given to victors in athletic contests—recall the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, where the gold medalists were given crowns of laurel.

v14 Here is the negative aspect of the trial: by refusing to accept the trial, engaging in the trial halfheartedly, becoming distracted, or quitting, one becomes open to the possibility of going in the wrong direction.

v15 Notice the progression in v14-15. It’s not the initial distraction—the first glance or the first human response—that is sin. Rather, when we submit to our desires, we are reeled in. The term here translated as "dragged away" is a fishing term; a more poetic translation might be, "each one is tempted when, thanks to one’s own desires, one chases the lure, bites, is reeled in, is caught in the net, and begins to putrify."

Application

Remember the sermon a few weeks back about perfection, "We Did Everything Right but Win"? I said that the Biblical idea of perfection has more to do with being what you were created to be (mature and complete as James says in v4) than spotlessness. The maturation process usually happens through trial:

for our children to learn responsibility, they must be given chances to be responsible (and live with the consequences of their irresponsibility),

for us to learn mercy, we must be given chances to be merciful to scoundrels (and live with the consequences of a lack of mercy),

for us to learn how to love, we must be given chances to love, or withhold love from, the unlovable (and live with the consequences of a lack of willingness to value another as much as ourselves)

You get the idea. We would like to think that our spirituality comes down like tongues of fire bestowing spiritual attitudes without any effort on our part. The reality tends to be very different. When James says, "Consider it pure joy when you face trials of many kinds" (v2) he might as well have added, "for no pain means no gain." During a trial, we have a choice: continue forward in becoming what God has called us to be, or give in to the temptation to avoid the pain, the discomfort, the discipline and regress back to what we used to be.

We don’t have to submit to trials any more than our children have to submit to trials like: learning to walk; learning to feed and dress themselves; learning to use their words to solve conflicts; or learning to share with others.

Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. (Hebrews 5:13-14)

We’d think something horribly wrong had happened if we saw a 30-year old who never learned to walk, never learned to care for himself, never learned to solve conflicts amicably, never learned to care for others. So it is for us when we assiduously avoid trials—and, more importantly, avoid growing through trials: something horribly wrong has happened to us. After many years as a Christian, if there’s not a nickel’s worth of difference between us and a non-believer, then maybe we haven’t grown as we should. (Look at what 1 Corinthians 3:1-3 and Hebrews 5:7-14 say about moving on from spiritual baby food to real, solid food. What’s in your diet?)

Last week I was watching teams from Oregon and Georgia in the Little League World Series. They were, no doubt, some of the most talented and best-coached teams in the country; however, at a key point in the game—the big inning—Georgia got a runner on base, and then another, and another, and then disaster struck. The next batter lined a long drive to the outfield, the runners took off, and the fielders threw to one base (safe!) and then another (safe!) and then another (safe!) in a panic as two runs scored. Georgia went on to score two more times in the inning and cruised to a 9-4 win.

Herein is a picture of our sin and destruction as we lose focus and lose our way. The first runner was not the problem, probably neither was the second. But at some point the team failed collectively. they forgot who they were—one of the best Little League teams in the country—and played like a bunch of goobers. They worried about the wrong things and threw to the wrong bases. Perhaps the pitcher tried too hard to hit the corners of the strike zone instead of simply getting the ball over the plate and letting his fielders make some routine plays for outs.

We would be better off when we begin to lose our way to say, "Lord, I blew it here. Please lead me back on track!" Instead, we tend to ignore the problem—or worse, indulge ourselves in our petty or selfish fantasies—until the problem has grown larger (and, like any pest, is harder to eradicate). Once we’ve let an idea take root in our minds, it can be hard to shake—much harder than if we had never given it a foothold (Ephesians 4:26-28).

Points to Ponder

In training for the Casco Days 4-mile run this year, I decided to enter the 2-mile Family Fun Run the week before over in Sebago. I figured a 2-mile tune up would be good before running the longer race. I knew several of the other runners from high school track—they included some current and former Lake Region athletes, some parents of Lake Region athletes, and the odd coach or two. After the 2-mile run, one of them came up to me and said, "I didn’t know you were part of the fraternity of runners!" To which I responded, "I wasn’t, but I guess I am now," to which he laughed and said, "Yeah, I guess you are."

Therein lies a forward-looking picture of a trial: it changes us from what we were (e.g. a non-runner) into something new (a runner) and we can stand approved (in my case, now in the fraternal order of runners). My story could have gone the other way as well. What if, partway into the race I began thinking, "What did I get myself into? This is a horrible idea! I hurt all over! Oooh, a cramp, a cramp! Help me! I ought to quit now! In fact, I think I’ll turn around a walk back!" What would I have become then: a runner, or a quitter? Getting distracted, giving power to my desires by listening to them, eventually changing my mind and my direction, would have been a big step backwards from becoming a runner.

Disaster doesn’t come in the initial misfortune: a mild pain while running, a single man on base, an initial angry response when something goes wrong at work, or a word misspoken under stress. Disaster comes when we give in mentally or emotionally to the initial problem. We feed it with our fears; we feed it with our selfish hungers; or we feed it with our need for control ... and in the process we regress. We fade away from what God is calling us to be, and we return to our former way of acting.

My suggestion for this week: Call on God for help at the beginning of your struggle (James 4:7-10). Don’t wait until panic and despair have set in. Trust that God is close at hand especially during trials.