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TRYING TO NOT WIN THE WORLD SERIES

The insightful political writer, George Will, enjoys debating politics with Cokie Roberts and Sam Donaldson on their Sunday morning roundtable program on ABC.  And he has a big following with his back-page columns in Newsweek.  But he’s also a huge baseball fan, having written a couple of outstanding books on America’s favorite pastime.  He laments in one, by the way, that there are really only two seasons a year: baseball season and “The Void.”

Back in late 1999 he shared an essay in Newsweek which is rather timely as we keep on with our Bible studies on the question of faith versus obedience.  The title of his column is “The 158-Game Winning Streak,” and he points us to the rather shocking, but not-surprising, statistic that since the 1994 baseball strike which wiped out the World Series, there had been (up to the time of that writing) exactly 158 postseason games.  And get this: all 158 games were won by teams in the top two payroll quartiles.  Now, breaking down that expression, it means that if you take the team salaries for all 30 teams, clubs in the top half, or top two quarters, won all 158 of those games.  AND — here’s Part Two — teams in the top ONE quartile won every single World Series game during that period.  We immediately think of the New York Yankees, of course, operating at the top of the heap.  But his point is that the money teams ended up on top every single time when it came time to spray champagne in the clubhouse.

Then Will goes on to say this, and we’ll get to our spiritual discussion right here. 

“Competitive balance,” he writes, “will exist when EVERY well-run team has a regularly recurring reasonable hope of reaching postseason play.”

Right now, in his view, half the teams in the two leagues can take the field on Opening Day in April and know, beyond any real statistical doubt, that come October, they’re going to be home watching the big games on TV.  They won’t be playing.  They have no shot at the title.  There just aren’t enough bucks flowing through the turnstiles and the television contracts to buy the big marquee names that can get them into the postseason.  No way.  It’s not going to happen.

However, it’s still true that for all 30 teams, including George Will’s beloved Chicago Cubs, your GOAL, when you step onto the field for Game #1 in April, the first game out of 162, is this: to win the World Series.  A player should never say:  Well, I hope to win a few games here and there.  I hope to make a lot of money and fly first-class and sleep in four-star hotels.  No, the goal is always to win the World Series.

Now, friend, we’ve been saying for about two weeks now, and for 70 years on this radio broadcast, that for the born-again Christian, there IS such a thing as obedience.  Or we should say, trying to win baseball games.  Trying to get into the World Series.  If you have been saved by the blood of the Lamb, if Calvary is the BASIS of your eternal life, then your faith relationship with Jesus DOES involve following His example, DOES involve doing what He asks you to do, DOES involve trying to bring glory to God by your good deeds, as it clearly says in Matthew 5:16.

For the Christian, it’s also true that we ARE already winners.  We wear World Series rings because of Jesus’ victory at Calvary.  We are declared righteous — or “justified” — strictly and completely because of Jesus’ death on the cross.  But, for these threescore and ten years on Planet Earth, there are still ballgames.  There are temptations.  There are opportunities to obey God.  There are opponents on the ball diamond, and God invites us to pick up our bats and gloves and work hand in hand with Him to beat those opponents.  Especially the main opponent who goes around as a roaring lion.

With that in mind, I’d like to very cautiously share with you a verbatim paragraph from a Christian giant whom I really respect.  However, on just one line I don’t agree with him, and you’ll see why when we get there.  But the late, great Walter Martin was a keen Bible scholar.  He loved the Lord.  He dug into the Word and he led many people into truth and light.  He wrote the landmark book, Kingdom of the Cults, which I’m sure many of you have read.

Well, why do I bring him into today’s discussion?  While embracing my Adventist faith community as a part of the Body of Christ, he disagreed in a very forthright way with us on the question of the Ten Commandments — and particularly the fourth commandment, which talks about keeping the Sabbath.  Should Christians try to keep the Sabbath?  Should they observe the Ten Commandments here on this side of Calvary?  It’s a big, big question . . . and obviously, people in the worldwide Adventist communion have thought about this at length.  But here’s his quote, which comes word-for-word from a lecture he gave a number of years before he passed away.

“Can you be a good Christian and live in disobedience to the law?” he asks.  “That’s a trick question.  It should be answered — straight out.  And without a moment’s hesitation.  I always answer it this way.”

Now friend, I’m going to give you his answer, word for word.  And let me share my comments as I read from the transcript.

“Nobody ever HAS and ever WILL live in a perfect obedience to it.”

That right there is an absolutely true statement.  Nobody ever has.  Nobody has ever won 162 games in a season.  You don’t keep the commandments perfectly, and neither do I.  You CAN’T keep them perfectly; neither can I.  Dr. Martin is absolutely correct.  Let’s go back to his statement.

“Nobody ever has and ever WILL live in a perfect obedience to it.  ONLY Jesus Christ.”  Again, that is absolutely the truth.  That is the gospel.  But now notice what he says next: “You DON’T, by trying to keep it every day, and I can’t.  SO . . . I’M NOT GOING TO TRY.”

And right there, friend, I have to say that I disagree with this wonderful, eminent Christian — God rest his soul.  Because the Bible very clearly teaches that we SHOULD try.  We SHOULD strive.  “If you love Me, keep My commandments,” Jesus said.  Will we do so imperfectly?  Of course we will.  Will we stumble and fall?  Yes.  Are we grateful that our performance is not the basis of our home in heaven?  You better believe it.  But we are always, in the Word of God, encouraged to TRY, to strive for the goal, to honor our Father by our best efforts.

Let’s go back to Wrigley Field and opening day for the Chicago Cubs.  If we could say that Sammy Sosa and all the Cubs were going to receive, by some gift of grace, World Series rings at the end of the season, due to the kindness of some benefactor, what would still be the goal as they played Game One?  To win, of course.  To score more runs than the opposition.  How many times that season would they try to win a game?  Exactly 162 times.

Go with me into any university classroom in the world.  You have geniuses sitting there, and B students, and C+ people, and right down the line.  You have the bell curve, and we’ve all had our bell rung, so to speak, when we were on the bottom end of that curve.  But when you take a test, what’s the score you always shoot for?  A hundred, certainly.  What GPA should every student in the world strive for?  A four point.  You aim to do the best, even if your acceptance into some wonderful job or club or heavenly home is based on some other criteria.

To me, this really solves the whole hot debate in the Christian church about perfection.  Does the Bible teach perfection?  Yes.  Does it teach perfectionISM?  Absolutely not.  If you could be perfect, whatever that means, would that earn you a home in heaven?  Friend, it wouldn’t earn you a single gold brick in the driveway.  But does God invite us to be perfect, as a way of being a light to the world, and of bringing honor to His own name and His own cause?  Jesus Himself said that was the goal, right in His Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:48.  Would we expect Him to invite us to strive for IMperfection?  To strive to LOSE games?  Strive to get C’s and D’s in life?  Strive to NOT keep the commandments, which are an expression of His own character and will?  Of course not, but thank God the basis of our forgiveness and the basis of our salvation is over across the way on a hill called Calvary. That’s why we CAN obey, borrowing again from that unforgettable line from C. S. Lewis, “in a new way, a LESS WORRIED WAY.”

I want to return to Dr. Walter Martin, because he truly was a champion for the Lord Jesus.  Even after our point of disagreement, he goes right on, and this is wonderful:

“I get up every day saying, ‘I have been redeemed by the blood of the cross.”  True.  “Set free from the curse of the law.”  True.  “My life is brought into conformity to the law of God . . . how?  By Jesus’ grace and perfect obedience.”  True true true.  Wonderfully true.  “He gives me HIS perfection.  And that perfection transcends all law, because He is the Lawgiver.  He’s God.”

It’s a good way to close HIS sermon . . . and mine: AMEN!