Revelation 21:1-7

1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 I also saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband.

3 Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: Look, God’s dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them. They will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and will be their God. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away.

5 Then the one seated on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new.” He also said, “Write, because these words are faithful and true.” 6 Then he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will freely give to the thirsty from the spring of the water of life. 7 The one who conquers will inherit these things, and I will be his God, and he will be my son.

Revelation 21:1-7 CSB

OVERTIME

We are the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, so, as you would imagine, we're pretty fond of sports. Our vision -- to see the world transformed by Jesus Christ through the influence of coaches and athletes -- is not always, but often is accomplished through the sports that they coach and play.

Sport comes in many different shapes and sizes (literally). We see everything from youth leagues, to clubs, to school teams that span from grade school to the collegiate level. Not to mention we've got a handful of billion-dollar professional leagues here in the United States!

For today I want us to consider some of these higher levels of sport: specifically college and professional sports.

Most collegiate or professional sports teams have been around longer than we've been supporters of those teams. Although some teams may have won a championship in their history, when a new season comes around everyone (the players, the coaches, and fans) starts 0-0 and is ready to chase that title once again. We've prescribed to a cycle that implies that yesterdays accomplishments don't guarantee future success. The Great Bambino even said it himself: "Yesterday's home runs don't win today's games."

For those of us who have been deeply invested in sports throughout our lives, it would make sense why this mentality may bleed over into other areas of our life. In some cases it holds up. For example, studying hard in the fall semester doesn't guarantee good grades in the spring, or last quarters sales don't guarantee a commission check this quarter. When you decide to associate yourself with any given team, it seems that this "what happened yesterday" cycle is what we sign up for.

Though many things of this world affirm this cycle, God operates differently. FCA has a resource designed to help us strengthen our faith called THE CORE. The first step is to join God's team. However, joining God's team is not like joining any other team. Joining God's team can be done by recognizing these four simple truths.

If you just walked through those steps and prayed that prayer for the first time, congratulations and welcome to God's team! Just like any other team, you aren't meant to walk alone. Please reach out to us and we will follow up with you!

Whether you're brand new to God's team or you joined God's team a long time ago, hear this truth from Paul's letter to the Romans.

"What should we say then? Should we continue in sin so that grace may multiply? Absolutely not! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Or are you unaware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we were buried with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be in the likeness of his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be rendered powerless so that we may no longer be enslaved to sin, since a person who has died is freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him, because we know that Christ, having been raised from the dead, will not die again. Death no longer rules over him. For the death he died, he died to sin once for all time; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So, you too consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus."

Romans 6:1-11

Notice a few things in the passage.

• "Christ... will not die again."
• "Death no longer rules over him."
• "He died to sin once for all time."

This is cycle-breaking language. When we join God's team we are not entering into a cycle of occasionally having to start from scratch over and over and over again. When we join God's team we are not joining a team that hope's to win, we are joining a team who already won the battle through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. A team that can never and will never lose again!

What comes with winning a championship? A celebration, of course! When a professional team wins a title, a few weeks later their home city will almost completely shut down all for the sake of celebrating the accomplishment of their team in the form of a championship parade. Similarly, God, through Christ on the cross, has won the ultimate championship over sin and death and a day is coming where the whole earth will shut down, in fact, it will be made new to celebrate the coming of God's kingdom!

So, if the battle is already won, and the "championship parade" is coming in the future, what do we do in the meantime? The task at hand is a simple one: Invite people to the "parade" to join the celebration!