Is it OK to pray that my team (or my candidate) will win?

Is it OK to pray that my team will win, or that my candidate will win a political office, or a job, or an Oscar, etc.?

Well, God knows our hearts, and if that sort of outcome is one of our top desires, then we might as well pray it, because He knows. But perhaps praying of that sort isn't wise, and perhaps we should have more God-centered top desires.

The outcome we desire may not be the one that God wants. 

Here are some possibilities:

1) Perhaps God calculates which team is most deserving -- has practiced harder, prepared more thoroughly -- and awards a win to that team. Only God could do that. Does He? Who could know that? Would it be necessary for God to award the victory? Most of the time, the more deserving team would have won without divine intervention. Maybe the team that hasn't practiced and prepared so well has better players, and God counts that as most deserving.

2) I doubt very much that God adds up the number, length, and fervency of the prayers for team A, and the same for team B, and makes sure that the team with most prayer behind it wins. Only God could do that, but I really doubt that He does so. Prayer in the New Testament, and throughout the history of the church, shows little or no hint of that sort of prayer.

3) Perhaps God doesn't really care who wins.

4) God may have some particular outcome(s) in mind that we know nothing about. For example, a player might be injured, and, as a result, cease being an athlete, and enter some sort of Christian service. A player on the winning team may glorify God in a public way, influencing others, because of a win. Or a player (or coach) may be humbled as the result of a loss, and repent of some sin. I guess it's possible for a player, or a coach, or a fan, to tell God that she will obey Him if He lets her team win. I doubt that this would work, though. God surely could use the outcome of a game to subtly, or strongly, influence fans, players, coaches and referees for good, in many different ways we can't imagine, tailored to each of the individuals involved. We aren't likely to see such influence, unless we are personally involved.

Situation 4), that God uses events, including contests, to influence many people in various ways, for their good, and His glory, seems most likely, to me. And it seems to me that I shouldn't spend a lot, or any time, praying for a particular winner in athletic contests, and perhaps not even in political ones. (I ought to be praying that God's purposes, whatever they are -- we usually don't know all of them -- will be advanced, by my candidate, or the other one.)

I think it's OK to play for the safety of the players and coaches, and the audience, and that participants and fans won't be tempted to sin (for example by hating the opposition, or the referees, or being proud if their side wins) because of an athletic event. And the most important prayer, for an athletic contest, must be to pray that God will be glorified through it.

The same sort of actions by God could, I guess, be true of political contests. And dare I mention war? God did intervene in various ways in military contests in the Old Testament, sometimes, it seems, more interested in making some combatant the winner, or sometimes more interested in letting one side -- often the sinful Israelites --   be defeated. Perhaps God still intervenes in battles and wars in the 21st Century. Battles and wars usually must be more important than, say, the World Series.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to comment.

Sunspots 496

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Education: A former University of North Carolina football player has filed suit, claiming that the university did not provide him with the substantial education that he was promised when recruited. (The university apparently let some students "take" classes that they didn't even attend.)
Health: (or not) We're running out of chocolate, according to The Washington Post and other outlets.
Science: Wired reports on how a study of the cat genome sheds some light on how domestic cats are genetically different from their wild relatives.

National Public Radio has a fine series on color. One post is about how our perception plays tricks on us when we are considering color. Another is about how animals get color from what they eat, partly -- flamingos are an example -- and how rare blue coloring in animals is.
Wired also reports on nudibranches, sea slugs, who eat defensive mechanisms from other creatures, and use them to defend themselves. They are also spectacularly colored -- some are blue.

 Image source (public domain)

I'm thankful for sports/athletics/exercise

I’m thankful for sports/athletics/exercise. Paul said that bodily exercise did people some good, and the Bible uses athletic contests as symbolic of the Christian life. Besides that, most people in Bible times walked wherever they went, so they took exercise for granted. Sports for young people can, and do, make them physically fit, give them purpose, teach them discipline and teamwork, introduce them to new friends, and allow them to achieve. In my experience as a college teacher, women athletes were usually among the best students, probably because they had to prioritize and organize their lives more than non-athletes. Sports participation for older people can keep us from dying, as well as give purpose and discipline. I need to exercise regularly, body and brain, and I’m thankful for my wife’s insistence on our walking sessions. There are excesses, to be sure, such as dedicating one’s Facebook page, or front lawn, to some team, so that that is your identity, rather than you being known as a follower of Christ or a loving family member; bad behavior in the stands, or by athletes; idolizing and/or overpaying coaches and players; fans spending too much on tickets, food, travel and paraphernalia; exploiting or abusing athletes; using sports as a vehicle to advertise unwholesome things; universities being identified by their teams, not their scholars; putting priority on games over worship; and too much emphasis on winning come to mind as some of the excesses. It’s too bad that there are excesses, and we should try to eliminate them. If Jesus were alive today, perhaps He would tailgate, but I imagine He would be concerned about the problems of the fans and the participants, rather than caring who won, or how.

Thanks for reading. Now get up and exercise.

Sunspots 425

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: My church, The Wesleyan Church, has a position paper on homosexuality. A good one. (Note -- it was published in 2010, so is not just a reaction to the recent Supreme Court decision.)

Health: The Guardian says that the source of pain in fibromyalgia has finally been identified. It's nerve fibers in the hand.

The LA Times reports on a "reverse vaccine" for diabetes. It helps prevent the immune system from attacking the cells that make insulin.

Science: Linguistic science, that is. Business Insider has published over 20 maps of the continental US, showing differences in pronunciation (or vocabulary) by region. Interesting.

Sports: (Sort of) The Telegraph reports on an unusual group of football matches, being played between robot teams, with the, er, goal, of being good enough to beat humans in a couple of dozen years or so. (that's the football that everyone besides some North Americans call football -- we mostly call it soccer)



Image source (public domain)

The Case Against Perfection, by Michael J. Sandel

I recently read Michael J. Sandel's The Case Against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007).

It's a small and short book, considering various aspects of what has been called human enhancement, especially in athletics, and in genetic engineering of embryos. As the title suggests, Sandel is generally opposed to such enhancement. His arguments are of this sort:

The real problem with genetically altered athletes is that they corrupt athletic competition as a human activity that honors the cultivation and display of natural talents. From this standpoint, enhancement can be seen as the ultimate expression of the ethic of effort and willfulness, a kind of high-tech striving. (p. 29)

He has a similar objection to genetic engineering of human embryos -- he says that it would make us less human:

It is sometimes thought that genetic enhancement erodes human responsibility by overriding effort and striving. But the real problem is the explosion, not the erosion, of responsibility. As humility gives way, responsibility expands to daunting proportions. We attribute less to chance and more to choice. Parents become responsible for choosing, or failing to choose, the right traits for their children. (p. 87)

Are there religious objections to enhancement? I find them hard to draw. We take it as given that we are expected to purchase glasses for our children, the best equipment, such as shoes, for our athletes, and provide sometimes expensive training for both our kids and our athletes. So why draw the line at allowing, or even demanding, that the athletes take hormones, or injections of extra copies of normal genes, which will cause them to produce larger quantities of materials that will enhance performance? Yet most of us think that such treatment is unfair. Going down the path of enhancement, Sandel says, would logically lead to having the Super Bowl played by teams of robots. Do we want that? Do we want to genetically engineer our children for supposed superiority in some academic or physical endeavor, when, perhaps, they would not have chosen to live the life suggested by their enhancement?

Interesting questions, and interesting, if non-definitive answers. I'm glad I read this book. Thanks for reading.