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Playing sport |
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What
should a soccer player, or a basketball player, or a volley player, or a
baseball player etc., do after his conversion to Christ? He must stop playing.
You will ask: ‘Why?’ For the following reasons. Because the sporting world is
perverse. You can hear bad words, blasphemes, and see fits of rage during the
trainings as well as during the championship matches. In addition to this,
those who play soccer and basketball sometimes must use cunning and that’s
something which is not fitting for the saints. Nor is fitting for the saints
to use violence towards a player of the opposite team by causing him to fall
to the ground or by tripping him up, or by striking their elbow in his
stomach or in his face (running continually the risk of harming both themselves
and the opposite player). Furthermore, the sport environment is an environment
where you have to show off your body, your muscles, and obviously everybody tries
to make his own body more beautiful by playing body building for instance, or
by using all kinds of creams and so on. And this is not a right thing in the
sight of God. Then the sport environment is full of fornicators and
adulterers, and many women with a crafty heart into whose traps it’s very
easy to fall. Another reason is that both the trainings and the official
matches cause you to miss sometimes all the worship meetings and some other
times just some of them. |
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Finally, I
want to warn you, brothers, against the soccer games between churches which
are so in fashion in these days. Do not play them, lest you wear shorts in
the presence of those sisters who come to see the match, you trip up and kick
some brothers, and you get angry very often with the risk of saying bad
words. “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness” (Ephesians |
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Are the
saints forbidden to do any bodily exercise then? No, we cannot affirm that
they are not allowed to do any bodily exercises. However, even though we are
allowed to do some bodily exercises, the Scripture says that “bodily exercise
profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things” (1 Timothy 4:8
– NKJV). Therefore, the Scripture with these words does not encourage
believers to spend their time doing bodily exercises rather it encourages
them to pursue godliness. |