We take our spiritual insights wherever we find them, even from Sports Illustrated. Theologian Martin Marty recently drew my attention to an article in that magazine [March 1999] with some bittersweet spiritual lessons. The article profiled a team that has the dubious distinction of being one of the worst basketball teams in recent memory. But the story has to do not only with lopsided scores and discouragement, but also persistence and attitude.
The girls’ basketball team of ChristWay Academy in Duncanville, Texas, has seen hard times this season. According to Coach Jennifer Marks, playing Arlington Oakridge was certainly a low point. As Marks tells the story, when Oakridge pulled ahead 37-0, she thought, “IF ONLY WE COULD SCORE,” and then later she began to pray, “IF ONLY WE COULD GET THE BALL TO MIDCOURT.” Calling time-outs didn’t help. ChristWay lost 103-0. Marks’ husband, a theology student, helped her get through the sleepless night that followed. “He did the best thing he could do, which was to just hold me and listen.”
ChristWay lost two more games, 86-7 and 76-15. John Walters puts it this way – and this is our lesson for the day: “A funny thing happened to the ChristWay girls: nothing. Nobody quit. Nobody whined. Nobody, including Marks, blamed anyone else.” Almost all the players were new, just learning to play.
How about a happy ending? Late in January, ChristWay played Gospel Lighthouse of Dallas, which had a 1-19 record. Gospel Lighthouse only had five girls to suit up for the game. Then followed examples of un-Christianlike conduct, with Lighthouse players having to leave the game because of technical fouls, ejections, and foulings out. Despite this, Gospel Lighthouse was still ahead 43-40 with 17 seconds left, and the ball – with only one player remaining! but this was a critical problem – she had no one to whom to pass the ball inbounds. “Game over!” shouted the referee. Officially the score became a 2-0 victory for the non-quitting, non-whining ChristWay Academy. It was their first and only win of the season. [Holwick: how does 40-43 become a 2-0 victory?]
I love the fact that a Sport Illustrated writer sits up and notices that these kids and their coach didn’t do what most people would do in their shoes: point fingers, complain, and quit. They just kept going. No one wants to cheer a losing team, but you’ve got to hand it to the ChristWay team for their attitude and persistence.
There’s an old saying: “90% of success is just showing up.” In the spiritual life, we might modify that: “90% of success is just keeping going.”