As I’ve stated before, I’m a Crossfitter. I really enjoy Crossfit. So much so, I built a site dedicated to helping people get fit. I’m also a web developer, so obviously I built a site about that, then I’m a dad, so I built my kids sites, and last but not least, I built a site for my wife to use in the kitchen.
I tend to obsess about whatever my current crush is whilst in the middle of it, then the fire dies and I go back to my normal life…or I lose time to devote to whatever it is, and the excitement wears off. Last night, my wife and I were watching a short documentary called “Killing the Fat Man“, in which a guy starts Crossfitting as an effort to regain control of his own fitness. It was really interesting, but the thing that stood out to me as a Christian was how excited he is about it once he gets into it, how he can’t shut up about it.
As I was watching this guy gain new control, and go through what can be called a salvation experience, I immediately noticed how evangelical he became about fitness, nutrition and the subject of health in general. He wanted others to experience what he had experienced, he wanted his family to feel good about themselves in the same way he did. He might not be able to articulate it, and might be driving them crazy with his newfound life, but he wanted his joy to be their joy. He was experiencing something he never thought possible. He thought he would be a candidate for open heart surgery at an early age.
He couldn’t avoid being “evangelical” about his situation because he couldn’t stop thinking about it. He was so amazed that he could be in the place he was, that he was continually dumbfounded. I know this feeling…and I so identify with him. I never thought I would be in this place either.
I see this same passion in the story of the woman at the well. In John 4, Jesus meets a woman who no longer believes in herself. She has no husband, and is living with a man who is not her husband. If you read between the lines in this text and try to put yourself in her shoes, you see a familiar picture of a woman who has lost hope in herself, and has resigned herself to the misery that is her life. Then she meets Jesus. After her experience with him, she runs into the village and tells everyone, and others believed in Jesus because of her.
Much like the man in the documentary, this woman couldn’t and wouldn’t shut up. She had been redeemed.
Her struggle was not about fitness, but about a dream, a vision, an idea of a life that she grew up with as a little girl that was completely lost. In fact, just thinking about my daughters, and what I want for them, it breaks my heart to think about all the women in the world who don’t see themselves as beautiful and worthy. In God’s eyes, we’re all worthy of redemption, we’re all worthy to be loved. This is one reason Jesus speaks so strongly about judgement (Matt. 7:1-2), because we’re unable to love unconditionally like God.
And by the way, your feelings about God don’t and never will change the way he loves you.
Romans 5:7-8
7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
God wants to redeem our busted life and make us into new people that we never thought we could be. When that happens it’s exciting, and hard to keep quiet.
As a closing note to men, Love your wives and your daughters, affirm them and let them know they are beautiful and loved.
This your job, don’t drop the ball.