I've never been able to understand why some students never seem to take their Greek studies seriously. They easily lose interest. They seem jaded and bored, cynical even. Chesterton once said, "There's no such thing as an uninteresting subject. The only thing that can exist is an uninterested person." If you don't enjoy studying theology or the biblical languages or church history or pastoral counseling, it's your fault, not the subject's.
Of course, people are naturally drawn to some subjects more than others. I could never quite get into my philosophy classes in college, but I recognize that as a deficiency in myself and not the courses. If you're not interested in the NFL (I am really into this sport), it's your problem, not the game's. Philosopher George Santayana once wrote, "Watching a football game the whole soul is stirred by a spectacle that represents the basis of life."
This is one reason why sports is so important to me. It was to the apostle Paul, too. Only he among the authors of the New Testament used sports analogies in his writings. To what other vocation (save farming) do men bring such effort and dedication? It doesn't matter whether you are good at sports or not. (I'm not.) Paul may not have ever actually run a race in the stadium, but he seems to have had nothing but the greatest regard for those marvelously gifted and courageous people called athletes.
Like Christianity, sports doesn't care whether you're black or white or Republican or Democrat or a Northern Yankee or a Southern Hillbilly. Sports goes to the essence of living. It reveals how trivial most of our lives are.
"Whatever you do, do it with all your might" is a biblical principle. Perhaps some of what we see in the world of sports -- courage, passion, dedication, sacrifice -- can rub off on our educational pursuits. 52 years ago I took Greek for the first time. Suddenly when I read the New Testament everything was vital and fresh and new. I've never gotten over it. Now at 74, I can see Paul the theologian just as much as I can see Paul the football player or Paul the marathoner. The whole world is sacred. Every human vocation is capable of greatness.
What better place, then, to observe mankind excelling in human performance than in the Greek classroom? My beginning Greek grammar has 26 chapters, each of which, I tell my students, is one mile in the marathon we call baby Greek. I tell them that nothing can prevent them from mastering the subject as long as they preserve in their hearts a passion for growth.
Just another lesson drawn from human sports.