This year, I was roped into a fantasy football league. Being a novice, I really had no idea what I was doing, beyond common sense, in the preseason draft. As it worked out, I made all the right picks, and my team now sits at the top of the league standings, much to the chagrin of those who invited me to join the league and to my own delight. Great fun.

I really enjoy football, but it, and the NFL in particular, does seem to be a major distraction for many Christians. Why it can be a problem even for Christians is perhaps best illustrated by one of this year's advertisements for the NFL that states: "The players make the game glorious, but for the fans, the game is their glory" (emphasis original).

Wow. What a statement. It can't get much more idolatrous from a biblical perspective. That in which we glory is the thing we hold in highest regard. By contrast, Psalm 105:3 calls us to “Glory in his holy name”, and Psalm 106:5 asks God to “Remember me, O Lord…that I may glory with your inheritance”. Abraham, we are told, “grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God” (Romans 4:20). Our calling is to grow strong in faith by recalling who God is and what he has done.

The tendency of God’s people throughout biblical history was to stray and glory in other things. Psalm 106:20 says: “They exchanged the glory of God for the image of a Colt that eats field turf in the Dome” (Amplified Indianapolis Version). The enormous inscription “Believe in Blue” on a conspicuous downtown building is quite a statement of faith in Indianapolis, whether people admit it or not. In the Old Testament, God never took “cute” worship of other gods lightly. The reality of the matter is that far too many people are glorying in their favorite team – it is the thing that consumes their thoughts and speech. They extol the players (who “make the game glorious”) and take great joy in them and their accomplishments. Thus, the creature, rather than the Creator, is worshipped. For at least eight weeks every fall, the largest worship service in Indiana is at the RCA Dome as thousand forsake the worship of the One True God to gather for the purpose of glorying in and extolling the One Blue god.

Issues of the Lord’s Day and other topics could be discussed here, and they would certainly fit. However, I’m more interested in the hearts of people at this juncture. A thousand objections could be raised to some of the statements I’ve made, but what we all need to do is look at our hearts and ask what is the object of our greatest affection? In what do we really glory? What do we think about most?

God has given us one day in seven, in particular, to glory in him – to train our thoughts for the rest of the week. We will grow weak in our faith and doubt the Lord if we do not take advantage of it. I have one very good football-nut friend who was in a fantasy league last year and yet realized that it was dominating his thinking. To play fantasy football, you don’t have to do a thing on the Lord’s Day, and yet he was thinking about it even while sitting in worship morning and evening. So he quit it this year. That’s wisdom. Like Abraham, his faith has been strengthened as he has glorified God. Not everyone has the same struggle, and wisdom is needed in determining what activities to be involved in and what not to be involved in for the sake of our faith. We need to honestly evaluate our activities in the light of Scripture and our own tendencies and make sure that in it all God is glorified – made supreme – in our own thoughts and actions.