The big news in the pro-football world this past weekend was the announcement by Andrew Luck, franchise quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts, that he was retiring at the age of 29. In his announcement he cited the toll the game had taken on his body and that for the past 4-5 years he’s played it’s been a continuous cycle of injury, pain, and rehab. When you read the list of his injuries, it’s a wonder he’s played this long. He said that the enjoyment of playing football was no longer there and noted it was the hardest decision of his life.
I was stunned that many fans booed him when the announcement was made following the game. One fan made a point of removing his “Luck” jersey and tossing it away. That made me wonder how long some of those angry fans would last on a football field themselves!
Injury, pain, and rehab. Unfortunately, that can be a cycle of life as well as for football. It isn’t always physical injury or pain which plagues us, often it is emotional or spiritual. We make bad choices in many areas of life that leave us wounded. We expose ourselves repeatedly to temptation and sin. We are hurt, pain sets it and it take months or sometimes years to recover, if we recover at all.
I truly believe that the only way to break that cycle is to surrender to God. The writer of Hebrews tells us that God disciplines us so that we might live and that it is a good thing to submit to Him. “How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! … God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness.” [12:9-11]
God has a plan for our life. His desire is that we have His life in us to the fullest. That requires that we submit everything to Him, our desires, our goals, our decisions, our choices. Only then can we make a clean break with the things of this world that have brought nothing but injury and pain into our lives.
