Olympic Judgments

In an incredibly cliché move on my part, I am writing this week’s article about the Olympics. This year’s Olympics in Beijing have been rather exciting thus far. From Nastia Liukin’s gold medal in the women’s gymnastics all-around to the simply uncanny performance of Michael Phelps, there have been many spine-tingling moments of triumph. I have a feeling that there is an underground group of geneticists constructing super humans for the country offering the right price. China has to be purposely building super athletes or very lifelike robots. At their current rate, China will win as many gold medals this year as they have in all other Olympics combined. If they are robots, it might be a good idea to make the gymnasts look older than the age of 12. I kid. I just wanted to join the very vocal Olympic announcers in their pursuit of harsh criticisms. Some of them really seem to be reaching in their assessments. My jaw was agape when I heard an announcer rip apart the performance of most likely the world’s greatest tennis player, Roger Federer. And, I know a few of them are former athletes or coaches, but we are looking at the performances of the best athletes ever. Do they really have to pick them apart with such scrutiny? I suppose I really have no room to talk. When I get together with a few friends, we have a ridiculous amount of fun cringing or chanting as one when an athlete makes a highly visible mistake. How else am I supposed to cope with never making it to the Olympics and instead gaining a tremendous amount of girth?
We are very quick to make judgments regarding our fellow man. I remember when I was elementary school age and my parents would tell me the other kids would make fun of me “because they were jealous”. Then, through tears I would respond “They are jealous of being really fat and nerdy!?!” Wow, it’s really sad to type that out. But, sometimes we are jealous. Sometimes we just want to push every person below us on our rise to the top. Those who attend church regularly and study the Bible often have the tendency to forget how little separates us from the sinners we love to condemn. I know that I personally have felt as if I have obtained some special level of clairvoyance. Romans 3 tells us that we are all sinners. We are reminded that it is only through the grace of God that we exist and that we have the opportunity to be redeemed. We all make mistakes, no matter how well disciplined and trained we might be. But, we all have the opportunity to correct those mistakes. The church exists so that we can overcome our sin together. We are not here to knock off .2 for a mistake. We are here to offer grace.