For the past several weeks, I have been a youth soccer coach. (I am not exaggerating when I say the league was desperate: I had no prior soccer experience whatsoever.) Yet, suppose I developed a taste for it: how might I go about becoming a good – or at least, a better – soccer player?
I would probably learn something if I actually watched some games. Just one a week would be more than I’ve done before. I would start to pick up on the rules and maybe even notice some patterns – things the successful teams do, issues that lead to foul trouble, and so on.
That’s all important, but is it enough for me to become a good soccer player myself? Of course not. My muscles still wouldn’t have built the strength to kick the ball or the precision to send it the right direction. My lungs would still lack the capacity to run up and down the field. Now, I might be able to tell you a lot about the game – maybe even enough to point out what other players are doing wrong – but that still wouldn’t make me much of a soccer player.
Christianity’s no different. Suppose you become a Christian and start going to church once a week. There, you’ll get to talk about how to be a good Christian. You’ll learn the rules. You might even get to see how some people who are really good at worshiping God or encouraging others do it. In fact, go to enough services and I bet you will start noticing what someone should have done differently – the religious equivalent of “C’mon, he was wide open!”
But none of that is the same as actually doing it yourself. Just look at how the Apostle Paul described it: “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it” (1 Cor. 9:24 ESV). You don’t win a race simply by knowing where the finish line is. You don’t receive prizes from the bleachers. You have to run.
And that takes effort – even for someone like Paul: “But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified” (1 Cor. 9:27). Being a disciple – a completely devoted follower of Jesus – requires discipline. We can’t just study about Him: there are no prizes for spectators. We must be ready to run in His footsteps ourselves. If we intend to run that race well – and ultimately to win it – then we better start practicing.