Grace in isolation

I made a joke about this the other day, but it bares repeating, the American coverage of the Olympics really does take some getting used to. So far today all we've seen is repeats of the American swim relay team win, the American volleyball team, and the USA mens basketball team. No mention so far of Rebecca Adlington's gold in the pool. She beat an American you see. And this is NBC, not even the USA Channel which advertises itself on the basis that it's only showing American people. NBC of course stands for No Boring foreigners Covered, or NoBody else Counts.

There is a point to this, it all came to ahead during the womens team gymnastics last night (Rachel made me watch it). We followed the American team from the floor to the bars to the horse to the balance beam. They were the only ones we saw, the Chinese team were mentioned, but we were never actually given any evidence that they were there. This really affected the way you watched the American team. There was no context to set them in, there was no way of knowing whether they were doing well or not. They were just doing.

It got me thinking about how we live the Christian life sometimes. It's easy to be a Christian in church on a sunday morning or when the day starts with a Bible and coffee, but what about when we walk out of the door? All our study and knowledge is meaningless unless we live it out with those around us. Unless we really do all things for the glory of God...meaning all things, then we're contextless American gymnasts plodding round without really doing anything meaningful.

We need to not only read and study and pray, but also do, and do surrounded by other people in the shop, in the factory, in the academy, then i'm not sure it really means anything, or, at least, no one will know what it means. Christians need to be out there in the grime and grit of life, or our sunday mornings don't mean anything. This is what we're supposed to do, live and speak. But really live, out there, beyond the church door.