BY REV. TOMMY WILLIAMS, SENIOR PASTOR

In the big Olympic gold medal game ("Of Miracles and Men") there is a power struggle taking place between two teams. The Soviet players reflecting on their loss say, “Can you imagine going from glory to disgrace in an instant?”

Theirs was the position of favorite and this loss on the biggest stage was devastating because of what it represented for their homeland.

How does it feel to have the tables turned on you? How have you reckoned with loss?

One of the players commented, “Maybe the gods deemed that day that the Americans deserved their own miracle on ice.”

It seems to me that this player was doing what we all do and that is to try to make meaning out of life. To make sense of something helps us to grapple with it. And then sometimes our own rationales don’t work or fit so we look beyond for that meaning.

In this same point in the film another Soviet player said, “We were watching them (the Americans) celebrate, looking deep down in our souls, what did we do wrong that we lost?”

What do you think about the theology inherent in the player’s statement?

Does God play that kind of role in our lives? If not, where do you experience God during celebration and loss?