Part 4 of 4: Our Contribution to the Journey
Pastor Anthony preaching on “Our Contribution to the Journey.” Scripture focus is Deuteronomy 34: 1-9. Preached on August 1, 2021.
This is the fourth sermon of a four-part series on: “Let Your Life Speak.”
Copyright 2021 by Rev. Anthony J. Tang and Desert Mission United Methodist Church.
Today is the ninth day of the Olympics and wow have there been some surprising developments.
Naomi Osaka, believed by many to be the best hardcourt tennis player in the women’s game and the number 2 ranked tennis player in the world, expected to earn a gold medal for Japan, was knocked out of the tennis tournament in the third round Tuesday. Osaka has previously mentioned struggles with anxiety and depression. Add in the pandemic, the delay of the Olympics by an additional year, difficulties with health restrictions, oppressive heat in Japan, limitations on staff and social support networks, and the added pressure of her being “the face” of the Japanese Olympics and Osaka was not her normal dominant self.
Shortly after Osaka exited her medal hopes, Simone Biles withdrew from her gymnastics competitions.
Initially, she said, “I just felt like it would be a little bit better to take a backseat [to] work on my mindfulness and I knew that the girls would do an absolutely great job and I didn’t want to risk the team a medal for my screw-ups because they’ve worked way too hard for that so I just decided that those girls need to go in and do the rest of the competition.”
In answer to another question, she responded, “No, no injury, thankfully, and that’s why I took a step back because I didn’t want to do something silly out there and get injured so I thought it was best if these girls took over and did the rest of the job which they absolutely did. They’re Olympic silver medalists now.” (https://youtu.be/2-1nOsX_7oA)
Then, on Friday, she elaborated further by explaining that she was suffering from a condition that gymnasts call, “the Twisties” where their minds seem to disconnect from their bodies so that they’re out of sync and they’re unable to tell where they are in the air and therefore have no idea of whether they’re going to land on their head, hands, feet or back. With the hard surfaces of the competition, that could prove to be extremely dangerous. (https://www.instagram.com/simonebiles/) (https://www.nbcsports.com/northwest/tokyo-olympics/simone-biles-shares-videos-explain-twisties-answers-questions-instagram)
Of course, that didn’t stop internet trolls from accusing her of selfishness or fragility.
Byron Heath, a dad of two girls in Blackfoot, Idaho, has since written a viral post comparing the experience of Biles with that of Kerri Strug.
The 18-year-old Strug competed in the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta Georgia. In the final rotation, the US team was on vault and Strug was the final US gymnast to perform. On her first attempt, she fell and injured her ankle.
Apparently, Bela Karolyi, her coach, told her to vault again, despite the fact that she couldn’t feel her leg and the US team had a commanding lead over the Russians. This, of course, led to her practically one-legged landing off the vault followed by her collapse. For this, she was called a national sports hero.
But at what cost? Her injury forced her to retire from gymnastics and she never competed again.
The dad in Idaho, Byron Heath summarizes his post this way:
Today Simone Biles--the greatest gymnast of all time--chose to step back from the competition, citing concerns for mental and physical health. I've already seen comments and posts about how Biles "failed her country", "quit on us", or "can't be the greatest if she can't handle the pressure." Those statements are no different than Coach Karolyi telling an injured teen with wide, frightened eyes: "We got to go one more time. Shake it out."
The subtext here is: "Our gold medal is more important than your well-being."
Our athletes shouldn't have to destroy themselves… for our entertainment or national pride.
Please hear me when I say that I am not comparing Osaka or Biles to Strug. All three of them are amazing athletes. And I’m not criticizing Osaka for losing or Biles for walking away, nor am I criticizing Strug for choosing to listen to Karolyi and vaulting again while injured.
Strug has done very well for herself and her life and I’m sure that Osaka and Biles will continue to do great things in their own lives.
My question is this: in the moment of a competition, doing our absolute best, giving a perfect performance, and winning may be the only thing on our minds… but when we step back and take a look at our personhood and our lives, is that what’s really important?
Over the last month, we’ve been following the life of Moses through the book of Exodus as we look at the journey of our own lives and how we may be faithful in our vocation.
Today’s scripture finds Moses at the end of his life. Moses stands at the top of Mount Pisgah and looks to where God is leading the Hebrew people and he sees before him, all of the Promised Land. Surely this is not literal, but you get the idea right? He is within sight of the destination he and the Israelites have spent forty years searching for, forty years they have been wandering to get to this point. He has almost made it, and God tells him, right there, that his time is done and his feet shall never step into Promised Land. He will die before having ever reached his goal.
I read this, and I admit that there’s part of me that is so filled with disappointment and frustration. Why God? Why not let him at least step one foot into the land and then let him die? After spending his whole life serving God, can’t he have just that one thing?
For some athletes, it’s like winning the silver medal.
I once read that if you watch the awards ceremony, some of the happiest people you will see will be the gold medalists and the bronze medalists, while some of the most unhappy people will often be the silver medalists. Why is that?
Well, the gold medalists are happy because they won.
The bronze medalists are often happy because they made it onto the platform. You can hear the joy from Pablo Carreño Busta of Spain when he won bronze in men’s singles tennis. He said:
“It’s an incredible feeling winning this bronze medal,” Carreño Busta said. “It’s not a title, it’s not the world, but I’ve never felt anything like this.” (https://www.wsj.com/articles/novak-djokovic-tokyo-olympics-golden-slam-11627734411)
But why are so many silver medalists usually so unhappy? Because they just missed a gold medal by that much. They were standing on the edge of the Promised Land, and they missed it. Of course, this isn’t everyone, but it happens often.
But again, that’s often in the middle of all of the emotion, the hype, the drama, and the excitement. When we step back from the event, and we take a bigger picture of not just the Olympics and not just the Exodus from Egypt, but when we step back far enough to get a perspective on life, what’s really important?
Naomi Osaka once said, “No one really knows all the sacrifices that you make… just to be good.”
I believe that she has in that one statement, encapsulated and articulated the core issue for so many of us.
Why do I feel the need to succeed?
Why do I feel the need to win?
Why do I feel the need to make a mark on the world?
Why do I feel the need to leave a legacy?
Why do I feel the need to prove myself?
And, let me add into this list: Why are I and others so afraid to die, when we believe in eternal life? Ultimately, the answer is always the same: because I don’t recognize that I’m already good enough.
This is not a statement against achievement or against winning or against gold medals. I am not advocating that we give up all accomplishments.
In the late first century, [Rabbi Tarfon] said: “It is not your duty to finish the work, but neither are you at liberty to neglect it.” (https://www.sefaria.org/Pirkei_Avot.2.16)
My point is this: succeed or fall short, win or lose, leave a legacy or leave nothing. In a hundred thousand years, no one human will ever remember our names or what we did. God will remember and cherish our names and all the love we have shared.
Kerri Strug, the Olympian who won gold on an injury, herself, has said, "And I think for me, clearly everybody knows me as the Olympic gymnast who landed the vault, but the highlight of my life thus far is my children. They're my biggest accomplishment." She gets it. (https://youtu.be/tAPJjbnkM48?t=115)
Simone Biles wrote, “the outpouring love & support I’ve received has made me realize I’m more than my accomplishments and gymnastics which I never truly believed before.” She starting to get it. (https://www.instagram.com/p/CR5oCyRhfS3/)
If you ever raise a question about the value of your life as far as what you have or have not accomplished… we’re asking the wrong question. A better question is: who have I loved and how have I love them? That’s our contribution to this journey.
