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Well we've just had another State of Origin
series and New South Wales
lost yet again. It only came down to one measly point. But there's a lot of
importance in that point. It meant that Queensland
won and New South Wales
lost. And in the end, how close they were, and how well they played, doesn't
really count for too much at all.
As usual, at the end of the game, there were a lot of
comments about how well the losing side played. But I don't think any of those New South Wales players
were thinking 'Oh well, it doesn't matter that we lost. We played well and it
was a good game and who cares what the end result was.' They lost. The other
team won. Everything else is irrelevant.
Not everybody watches the State of Origin games. But of those that do, most have
a particular team they want to win. I don't think I've ever heard anyone say
'Well I love rugby league and I love the State of Origin
games, but it doesn't matter to me whether New South Wales
or Queensland
wins.' When you watch State of Origin ,
you go for a team - and it matters. Often it matters big-time. Grown men cry
over their team losing footy matches.
I took my son to another rugby league game this week, the
Raiders versus Dragons game. Usually, I would go for Raiders against Dragons.
But I also really wanted my son to have the experience of seeing his team win.
So when I went, I actually thought I wouldn't really care either way. And it
was not the same as watching my own team play. I didn't have too much invested
in it. But I ended up cheering for St George quite a lot more than I thought I
would. There's something about being at a footy game that makes you take sides.
So what does all this tell us? Are we humans predisposed to
see things in terms of sides? We barrack for a certain side, see the other side
as the opposition, and hope that our side wins?
Last week, I was talking to my son about some of the
polarising issues in Australia
today, including the carbon tax and homosexual marriage? The first question he
asked me was, 'Well, where do you stand on those issues?' Yes, I have a stance
on those issues. But what I really wanted to get through to him is that these
issues becomes polarising because we automatically pick a side and hope that
our side wins. We treat these issues as if they're footy matches.
But it shouldn't just be about scoring points over the
opposition. For issues this important, we need dialogue and understanding. We
also need compassion for people who think differently to us. In the end, there
should be no 'winner' and no 'loser'. And while ever we think in terms of
'winners' and 'losers', we're not going to be prepared to give an inch of
ground to the other team.
What's scary is we often think in this way about faith too.
Christians are the team we're barracking for. The other teams include all other
religions and those with no religion. We see faith in terms of Christians vs
Atheists or Christians vs Muslims or Christians vs Secularists, Christians vs
Homosexuals and even Christians vs Environmentalists.
There's going to be a winner and there's going to be a
loser. And all Christians should make sure they're going for the Christian
side. And often there's the presumption that God is on our side. So if we do
happen to see things from the other (opposition's) point of view, then we're
not backing our team (or God) the way we should be.
There were sides in Jesus' time, too. There was the
Sadducees vs the Pharisees, the Jews vs the Samaritans and the Israelites vs
the Romans. When the Sadducees asked Jesus a question about whose wife a woman
would be in Heaven, if she had married seven brothers sequentially, they were
really asking which side Jesus was on? The same with the question about paying
the imperial tax. What they really wanted to know was, 'Who are you barracking
for, Jesus?'
But Jesus refused to be drawn into barracking for a certain
side. Instead, he saw the wider picture. Life was not just about who wins and
who loses. It was about so much more than that.
Taking sides is all very well in football games. And maybe
we do naturally pick a side and hope that they win (whatever the game or the
issue). But in the really important stuff, the issues related to life and
faith, maybe we need to start looking beyond 'sides'. In football games, how
well people played might be irrelevant. But in life and in faith, it's more
important than who scores the most points.
Maybe we need to realise that while ever there is a winner and a loser,
no-one really wins at all.
