Outrun the Bear: Reflections on the Intersection of Sports and God

By Benno Kurvits

Sports are a microcosm of life. They provide goals to be achieved and obstacles to be overcome, they yield their share of joy and pain, and they’re a stage upon which the best and worst of humanity is displayed. They are also a gift of God, one that can be either treasured or abused.

In this book, you will:

• Learn how to fit your sports pursuits into the larger context of life in a healthy way.
• Be encouraged to reflect on the presence and blessing of God in your sports endeavours.
• Be challenged to participate in sports in such a way as to bring glory to God.
• Learn how to change to become more of the athlete and person you want to become.

Drawing from a lifetime in sports and over a decade as a pastor, Benno Kurvits shares his wealth of experience in Outrun the Bear, showing that there is a way for us to enjoy sports, and to seek to excel at them, while honouring both God and our fellow man in the process.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Word Alive Press
• Release date: Nov 6, 2018
• ISBN: 9781486617593

Book preview

Bibliography

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to thank the following people for reviewing my manuscript

and providing me with helpful feedback: Marian and John Ysinga, Mark Hudson, Katie Plaisier, and Dave Mantel.

Thank you to my five children—Ryan, Ben, Bethany, Owen, and Erin—who all enjoy sports and allowed me to coach them without too much exasperation on their part. They were my inspiration for getting serious about coaching, both in pursuing excellence in performance and, more importantly, excellence in attitude.

Thank you to my wife, Wendy. Because her main interests lie outside the sports realm, she often helped me to maintain some balance in perspective amidst the myriad of my zealous sporting pursuits.

Preparing a book for publication normally takes a coordinated effort from many talented people. I have much enjoyed working with the friendly and professional staff of Word Alive Press, namely Tia Friesen, Jen Jandavs-Hedlin, and my editor, Evan Braun. They’ve been superb.

And thank you to my Lord Jesus, who is not only the Saviour and the model of character to always strive after, but the One who gives us all things richly to enjoy, including the gift of sports.

INTRODUCTION

Two teammates on a college track team decided one day that they

needed a break from the pressures of school, training, and competition. Therefore, they determined to go on a weekend backpacking trip into the Rocky Mountains.

Three hours into their hike up the beautiful foothills, one of them spotted a large bear ahead of them on the trail, proceeding briskly toward them. When his friend also saw the bear, he immediately sat down on the ground and began to loosen his hiking boots and untie the running shoes strapped to his backpack. His buddy said to him incredulously, What are you doing? You’ll never outrun that bear! To which his teammate replied with earnestness, I don’t have to outrun the bear. I just need to outrun you!

Sports can bring out the best and worst in humanity. Athletes, in their quest for success and sporting glory, can often take things to an extreme and forget the more important things in life.

The bear in this story symbolizes all the bad things we should try to overcome as human beings and as competitors—like taking shortcuts to glory, or greed, or selfishness, or disrespect, or unfairness, or even lack of love and empathy for others, as the story illustrates. If the bear represents our bad attitudes—our sins, if you will—then it is noble to try to outrun the bear. If we fail to outrun it, the bear will overcome us, wound us, and maybe even kills us.

When athletes think it’s acceptable to take drugs to gain an unfair advantage over their competitors, the bear has caught them. When a professional football team decides to do even a subtle thing like change the air pressure in the game balls to their own advantage, the bear has caught them. When an athlete or her support team hires someone to break the leg of a competitor so as to eliminate that person from competition, the bear has caught them. When a baseball player disagrees with an umpire’s call at the plate so vehemently that he spits in the umpire’s face, the bear has caught them.

I think we can do better than this as a society, as athletes, and as sports enthusiasts. We can outrun the bear.

I worked at a national park in Canada for more than twenty-eight years, so I understand a thing or two about bears, particularly black bears. In real life, it may never be wise to try to outrun a bear—people experienced in backcountry travel usually advise wilderness enthusiasts against running—but the reality is that many people have run from bears, including myself, and have survived. It seemed like the right, instinctual thing to do at the time, regardless of whether or not it is wise. So please, just run with my analogy. It doesn’t constitute advice on what to do when you meet that fury creature in the wild. My aim is only to use the bear as a symbol of something close to home for all of us—our snarly inner desires which sometimes want to take us in the wrong direction. With the right approach, we can outrun, outmanoeuvre, outsmart, and if necessary even outfight this bear.

In this book, I share many of my own thoughts, experiences, and observations from the world of sports and my own understanding of divine things, all in an effort to encourage us to outrun the bear. In sports, we were never meant to devour one another or allow the potential hazards of competition to get the better of us and ruin our relationships or lives.

Who am I writing for and why? I’m writing this book to help athletes, coaches, and all those who love competitive sports to take delight in the positivity of sport. I’m also writing to help people spot the bear and avoid it.

I myself have been a competitive athlete for at least thirty years of my life, and a coach for nearly as long. I’ve always been a sports enthusiast, watching intently many sports on many levels. I’ve been a student of the game for a long time. I’ve also formally studied many sports and related topics through my undergraduate degree in Physical Education.

The other big part of my life impacting this book is the fact that I’ve been a committed Christian for forty years. I’ve put in a lot of time studying and teaching the Bible. I have preached many messages, both in my church and in other churches. Both sports and theology have been close to my heart for a long time.

Although the bear imagery captures the negative side of sports, I work hard to also display the beautiful side of sports. I think there’s much to marvel over. I reflect upon the connections between sports and God, and I try to get us to contemplate things beyond sports—like our attitudes and the things of God. As I do, I seek to spot not the elephant in the room but the bear along the path, and offer suggestions on how to overcome it.

I believe we can, by the grace of God, outrun the bear.

CHAPTER ONE

What Does God Have to Do with It?

…he himself gives everyone life and breath

and everything else. (Acts 17:25)

Fred Couples was leading the 1992 Masters Tournament by three

strokes heading to the twelfth tee in the final round of golf. This hole is the shortest one on the course, but the tee shot can be the trickiest. The winds often swirl, making it difficult to judge how far you have to hit the ball to land it safely on the green.

Couples either misjudged the factors involved or mishit his shot, for the ball landed short of his target and began to roll back down the slope towards Rae’s Creek. Those who have watched that type of shot on this hole over the years are used to seeing the ball continue down into the water, making par almost impossible.

But on this occasion, Couples’s ball hung on the slope.

Local journalist Furman Bisher claimed he had never before seen a ball stop on that slope in 42 years of covering the Masters, but Couples took full advantage of what he called the biggest break in my life to save par and go on to win by two shots.1

Catching big breaks is often part of winning a championship.

In my own small-potatoes sporting career, I remember winning a badminton tournament that came down to one final rally. I had kept my cool well the entire tournament and was playing some of the best badminton of my life. But in this deciding rally, with the score tied fourteen all, I got nervous. I served the shuttlecock up to my opponent, who smashed it at me hard. I took a pitiful stab at the bird to try to return it. It careened off the frame of my racket and just barely made it back over the net. My opponent, fooled by the shot, was a bit late in reacting to the bird, and he stroked it into the net instead of over it. I had sheepishly, but still happily, won the tournament—my first-ever win against this particularly good opponent.

I knew in my heart that it was more than luck.

Sometimes athletes get up the nerve to reveal personal things which they believe impacted their performance at an event. For example, after Zach Johnson won the 2007 Masters he spoke about how he had felt Jesus with him on that day. I know some have criticized Johnson’s theology—they thought it sounded too feeling-oriented. But I liked it. Such comments require boldness, especially when spoken on national television. They encourage me to keep believing that God isn’t distant but close at hand and interested in the nitty-gritty details of our lives.

Some people may shake their heads at such a comment and ask, What does God have to do with it? Good question. Let me seek to answer it.

If you don’t believe in God, then God could not possibly have had anything to do with it. If you do believe in deity (or deities) but think he, she, or they have no interest in such petty things such as sports, you too would have a hard time accepting that God had anything to do with Johnson’s performance.

But religious people throughout human history have sought to reach out to higher powers who they’ve believed had at least some interest in their personal lives. In mythology, Hermes was deemed to have been one of the twelve major deities of the Greek pantheon, one of the twelve Olympiad. One of his roles was to oversee games—we could call these sports, I suppose. Surely there were athletes back then who sought his assistance in their performances.

The God revealed in the Christian Bible, the true and living God, cares about everything, even the mundane aspects of people’s lives. He is not one who can be put in a box and limited in what He can do. He is not only the Creator of heaven and earth, but also the sustainer of life in the universe and the overseer of even the smallest events. Jesus taught that God knows the number of hairs on the head of every human being (Matthew 10:30). He has given names to all the stars in the universe, stars which He Himself created (Isaiah 40:26). He sustains all things by His powerful word (Hebrews 1:3) and He controls all events from the dawn of time—He works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will (Ephesians 1:11). There really is no such thing as an accident from God’s perspective.

He is also perfect in His character and the moral judge of every thought and action that has ever flowed from the lives of angels and humans since time began.

The Flight of an Arrow

An interesting example of God’s personal control over our lives can be seen in the death of Ahab, a famous and wicked king of Israel who lived in the ninth century B.C. You may remember him better for his notorious wife, Jezebel.

After many years of leading the northern tribes of Israel into idolatry, and after killing the righteous man Naboth and stealing his property, Ahab sought to recover some land from the Arameans (Syrians). As he did so, he sought the assistance of King Jehoshaphat of the southern kingdom of Judah. Having been warned against going into this battle by the prophet Micaiah—The Lord has decreed disaster for you (1 Kings 22:23)—Ahab nevertheless headed off to war.

Deep down inside, he must have suspected that this endeavour wouldn’t go well. He probably had that I have a bad feeling about this moment. In an attempt to avert catastrophe, he purposely disguised himself before entering the battlefield, hoping that the enemy wouldn’t come hard after him. He was correct. They went hard after King Jehoshaphat instead, mistaking him for Ahab. However, when they discovered their mistake, they stopped pursuing Jehoshaphat.

Here’s how the rest of the story unfolds:

But someone drew his bow at random and hit the king of Israel between the sections of his armor. The king told his chariot driver, Wheel around and get me out of the fighting. I’ve been wounded. All day long the battle raged, and the king was propped up in his chariot facing the Arameans. The blood from his wound ran onto the floor of the chariot, and that evening he died. (1 Kings 22:34–35)

Even the seemingly aimless flight of an arrow was determined by God to hit its mark, right between the chinks in Ahab’s armour.

Lucky shot, you say? I think not.

As an athlete or coach, or anyone directly involved in sports, you can rest assured that God is way more present than you may realize. He is much more interested in petty events than we may think—and sports, in the grand scheme of things, are relatively petty. But the person who looks to God with faith and sincerity, even in the small things, be it giving thanks for food and drink or feeling healthy before a big game, can be confident that God hears and cares.

The Apostle Peter firmly exhorted his hearers, Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you (1 Peter 5:7). The true and living God is not aloof from the details of life. Golf balls, badminton shuttlecocks, and warriors’ arrows may be propelled by our strength, but their exact flight is under His control. Someone is indeed in charge, and that someone is an all-powerful God who himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else (Acts 17:25).

Think about this for a minute. When you go to bed at night, what guarantee do you have that you’ll wake up the next morning? None. If you do wake up, what guarantee do you have that you’ll feel healthy and alert, that the air quality in your home or city will be good, that the forces of gravity and molecular attraction will continue to operate just as you have known them to all your life? None. What guarantee do you have that you’ll think clearly and not awake with some mental dysfunction caused by a tiny break in a blood vessel in your brain? None. What guarantee do you have that your physical capabilities and motor skills won’t be seriously impaired for one reason or another? None.

Whether we ever bring ourselves to admit it or not, we are all dependent on an all-powerful and gracious God—the One who keeps everything functioning properly. That’s why the great Apostle Paul declared to his know-it-all Greek audience one day long ago in Athens, For in him [God] we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28).

Therefore, when Zach Johnson or other athletes express, whether in feely language or not, that God was with them, helping them, their theology, their grasp of reality, is way better than those who would deridingly ask, What does God have to do with it?

Magical things happen in life and sports, and it’s not because of luck or chance, as many would say. It’s because we have a magical, if I may use that word, and magnificent God who loves to enter our world and do mysterious and strange things that cause us to marvel. These things should also cause us to worship and trust.

CHAPTER TWO

Keeping Things in Perspective

Love the Lord your God with all your heart… Love your neighbor as yourself.

(Matthew 22:37, 39)

In 2017, the Houston Astros were having a tremendous season, ripping the cover off the baseball. They were a powerful hitting team. Heading into their afternoon home game against the Toronto Blue Jays on August 6, they were leading the American League West Division by fourteen games over the second-place Seattle Mariners.

That August day, I had already spent four hours in church. I’d preached a sermon entitled Freedom Indeed, from John 8:31–36, and then enjoyed a nice potluck lunch. I followed that up by leading the church in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, reminding everyone of the freedom we have as believers in Christ, based on our union with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection. I read and commented on the heavy theology of Romans 6.

When I got home, I was tired. I flipped on the television to see how my favourite team, the Jays, were doing. It was only the first inning and the game was still tied. In the third, the Jays went ahead 2–0 and I decided to turn off the game and take a nap. An hour and a half later, I awoke and checked the score again. It was the seventh inning and the Jays were up 4–3. They soon extended their lead to 6–3. I decided to watch how the rest of the game unfolded.

Being an Ontario native, and the Jays being the only Canadian team in Major League Baseball, I understandably pull for them. I would describe myself as an avid fan. I invest myself in following them throughout the season, watching many of their games on the screen and checking closely where they are in the standings. I bear with them through the many ups and downs. It’s usually an emotional rollercoaster.

I’ve also coached sports for over twenty years—mainly the sport of badminton. So when I watch sports, I watch with my coach’s cap on.

The Jays were in last place at this time in the American League East, nine and a half games behind the division-leading Boston Red Sox. The Jays had a ton of talent, having made it to the American League Championship Series the last two seasons. But talent alone does not win ball games. The Jays had a terrible start to the season in April and had made only a slight recovery since.

But being an avid fan and knowing that anything can happen in sports, I hadn’t given up. I pulled hard for them, hoping that if they could win a few series in a row and go on a winning streak, they could be right back into contention to make the playoffs. This game, if they could win it, could even be a turning point in their season.

Knowing that Houston was such a good hitting team, I really hoped the Jays could add to their lead in the eighth or ninth inning. They were close to doing so, putting two men on base with no one out, but they couldn’t push another run across home plate. I feared this might cost them.

Sure enough, even with their very talented young pitcher, Roberto Osuna, on the mound in the ninth to try to close the game out, the Jays gave up four runs and lost 7–6. I was emotionally deflated.

Just as the game was ending, I received a phone call from a friend in the hospital. I had been visiting him over the last month as he was struggling with a bad foot, having suffered from diabetes and circulation problems. I told him I would be there soon and