Ever wonder why the USA men's soccer team stinks?
Seriously.
We should be good, right? It would only makes logical sense since the United States is one of the leading economical country in the world. We should be able to afford the best coaches, personal and physical trainers, doctors, and other people into this sport.
But that is part of the flaw. Although we are able to employ the best of the best, does this really result in the best soccer players in the country and the world?
I once had a conversation about this with a friend (I don't remember who... someone from another country). As the conversation went, this person pointed out that kids in some of these countries play out in the streets or local parks. They play "pick-up" soccer. There are no rules or boundaries. They just play. And most of the time, they play hard and they play rough.
No rules. No guidelines. Just a ball and a goal and good old playing rough. If we play on the national team, we'll learn the rules later (and get in trouble if we break them).
This revelations happened the other week when I was watching my cousin's son play in his soccer game. He's now 11 but when he was 4 years old, I remember watching some of his practices. The coach went over how to kick the ball and show the boundaries of the field and that the ball had to go into the goal. As they grow and mature, the kids learn more rules. The field got bigger, the rules got more complicated, with off-sides, and penalties, and how to hit the ball with your head, and how to juggle the ball, and so one and so forth. But so many rules, does one really learn the game of soccer?
Some times, even showing up to a live game, I somehow feel the game is in slow motion. There is no action. No speed. No passion. No emotion. What happened, what is going on? I realize these kids grew up learning a sport in a very organized fashion. They never learned to play rough. They never learned to just go for it. They learned that from 5:30pm to 6:30pm is soccer practice on Tuesdays and Thursdays and Saturday was game day. Unlike the folks from Latin America who play (for fun) everyday and as much as they can.
In Christian life, why can't we just go for it? As disciples, most of us in church-America, have grown up in environments where you have to tithe, and you have to dress up, and you have to go do confirmation classes, and you have do the acolytes, and you have to go to Youth Group on Sunday evenings.
But look at Jesus. He never went through rabbi school, yet he became the greatest teacher on earth. He never own much of anything, maybe his traveling clothes and a pair of sandles. Yet, he was the King. He never played by man's rule. He played by God's rule... He knew his righteousness was not under the laws (of man) but his righteousness is by the grace of God (written all over Romans).
Just as America had made soccer "legalistic", most of church-America has "legalized" church of do's and don'ts. Why can't we run free under the grace of God and just go for it?
