Play as Prayer
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RULE OF LIFE M8 SERMON NOTES April 18, 2010
TITLE: Play as Prayer
TEXTS: Ecclesiastes 3s:4; Zechariah 8:5; Isaiah 11:8
BIG IDEA: When we play, we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
On Christmas Eve, I talked how a young man in jeans and a baseball cap stood in a subway station in Washington DC and from a small case removed a violin.
The Washington Post was conducting an experiment to see if people would stop to listen to something truly beautiful, or if they would hurry past (all of this is caught by a hidden video camera.)
It was 8:00 a.m. on Friday morning in January--the middle of commuter rush hour. For the next 45 minutes the violinist plays six beautiful, famous pieces of music. Over 1000 people pass by. After three quarters of an hour, with hundreds of people passing by, few turned to even look at him and only seven people stopped what they were doing to hang around and listen to the music at least for a minute.
Who was the violinist beneath the baseball cap? One of the most famous in the world: Joshua Bell. Three days earlier, he had played his violin in Boston’s Symphony Hall with people paying $100 to hear him.
One of the few people who wanted to watch him play that morning was Evan. Evan is three years old. He is a cute black kid in a parka and he keeps twisting around to watch Joshua Bell, while his mother, Sheron Parker, tries to get him to go out the door of the subway, because she wants to be on time for her class. She deftly moves her body between Evan’s and his, so that Evan can’t see him playing the violin anymore. As they leave the subway station, Evan is still trying to pull away and get a look.
Almost all the adults hurried past Joshua Bell as he played.
But, every single time a child walked past, he or she tried to stop and watch.
We adults are so busy, or focused on “what needs to get done,” that we fail to enjoy the beauty that is clearly in front of our eyes. Children don’t need instruction on slowing down to enjoy life. They find what they like and do it. As we get older, we feel guilty for slowing down to enjoy something, or stopping to play. Many of us feel like we always to ought to be doing something “productive.” The irony is that we can feel guilty about working too much and guilty about playing, too (Banks, Stevens 853).
But, part of a healthy spirituality and therefore part of a life-giving rule or rhythm of life will include joy and play. A person who is engaged in faithfully following Christ will pray and play. In The Holy Longing, Ronald Rolheiser writes, “A healthy spirituality will combine prayer, social justice, and mellowness of heart.”1 If we are focused only on prayer and social justice, we can become overly intense and serious. He says that sanctity is as much about having a mellow, relaxed, joyful heart as it is about believing and doing the right thing, as much about proper energy as about truth.” Gustavo Gutierrez, the father of liberation theology, suggests by having a healthy spirituality we will feed our souls in three ways: through prayer, both private and communal; through the practice of justice; and through having those things in our lives: good friendships, good food and wine, creativity, and healthy leisure that keep our soul mellow and grateful.”2
Some us feel that if we were independently wealthy or retired, we would have the time to play. David Steindl-Rast has wisely said that leisure is not the privilege of those who have time, but rather the virtue of those who give to each instant the time it deserves.3
The beauty of living by a rule or rhythm of life is that we have a kind of monastic bell that enables to give each instance of life the time it deserves (not necessarily the time we feel like giving it). In the midst of all the time pressure in our lives, our monastic bell, our rhythm can help us, as they say, to stop and smell the roses.
Life is a gift. God longs for us to enjoy this gift. Unlike some ancient creation myths, God did not create us as slaves merely to do the dirty work of maintaining the earth, but made the earth for us to take delight in it.4 In Genesis 2:9 we read that “The LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food…”5 As we saw last week, the God did not provide food merely as fuel for human beings, but to delight our eyes and taste buds as well. The earth was created for God’s pleasure and ours as well.
We read in the book of Ecclesiastes that God ordains times to play: “There is a time… to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.”6
God promised Israel that when he would return to bless Jerusalem, a sign of that blessing would be that the streets would be filled with boys and girls playing.7 (Zechariah 8:5)
In Isaiah we read that on the new earth the child will play near the hole of the cobra, and the child will not be harmed… (Isaiah 11:8, TNIV).
God experienced joyful play at the creation of the world. In the first pages of Scripture, we see how God created the earth and delighted in his handiwork. The maker declares that all he has had made is very good.8 In the ancient Book of Job, we see how God’s creating the earth inspired joy. God appears to Job out of the storm and asks:
“Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?...
while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?”9
God’s act of speaking our planet into existence caused the angels to spontaneously sing for joy!
Jesus described God his Father as a person who would throw a feast with music and dancing when repentant sons and daughters would come home (Luke 15:11-32).
Jesus worked hard; he also enjoyed life. He had a thousand days to “save” the world, but spent several of those days celebrating at a wedding in Cana.10 When the wine ran at the reception, Jesus performed his first miracle, by supplying the wine. He ate, drank, and celebrated with people with such zest that he was accused of being a glutton and drunkard (Matthew 11:19. Look at Bruner). Jesus also had the most important mission ever, but he took time to welcome and enjoy the company of children. Enjoying the company of children, he would have played with them (Mark 10: 13-16; Luke 18: 15-17). Jesus had a great sense of humour. Seeing him through our cultural lens, we may not detect of all of his humour, but he taught with wit, irony, and hyperbole. His comment about how it is more difficult for a rich person to enter into enter heaven than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle would have had people bent over cackling in laughter.11 A movie portrayed Jesus as playing a ball game with some other men, Jesus leaping, catching the ball, and jostling his body with others as he did so. Some people were scandalized. But Dallas Willard rightly asks, “Why not?” 12 Why couldn’t we imagine Jesus throwing, leaping to catch a ball, tackling someone in a football game, or riding a snowboard?
God foreordains our play, God plays, and when we play we reflect the nature of a God who plays. In fact, if we belong to Christ as poet Gerard Manly Hopkins wrote, “for Christ plays in ten thousand places.” Through our “limbs” and “faces.”
God’s delight in our joyful play
Some people grew up experiencing the Sabbath as a dreary day of don’ts: don’t play baseball, don’t play games, don’t chew gum. Others who were raised in a home or a church where the emphasis was on thou shalt not. You may have an image of a God who frowns when people have too much pleasure.
But God delights in our joy.
When our son Joey had just turned one, we were at a park in our neighbourhood and a man was a lobbing a tennis ball to his dog just a few feet away. Five or six young children gathered around to watch. Joey shuffled to edge of the group. Each time the dog would catch the ball, Joey would arch his head back, and burst into convulsive laughing. As the dog twisted his body and jumped and caught the ball, our son would laugh so hard he would wobble, lose balance, and fall backwards on his bum. Seeing Joey’s joy, the children in group began to giggle with glee; they pointed to him they began saying, “He likes it… he likes it…” The dog owner started turning his head toward Joey each time he’d toss the ball to his dog. The middle-aged man would out break out in a grin, saying, “That’s a happy boy! That’s a happy boy!” I took great joy in the contagious joy of my son. As we can take sheer delight in seeing our own children light up with joy, God, our Father, takes delight in our joy as well.
I know a pastor who says, “I believe that God takes most delight in me, when I am water-skiing.” He feels God takes more pleasure in him when he pushes in the edge of his ski as it turns on the lake, creating a wall of water, than when he’s praying or preaching. I am sure this man’s statement could be misinterpreted as a way to rationalize a self-indulgent pleasure. But, if he feels most fully alive when he’s gliding across the water, and if we believe that like a loving parent God delights in our joy, then it not so far-fetched to imagine that God takes special delight in this pastor’s waterskiing.
What is play? Play is doing something for its own sake.
Though there are many benefits to play (including developing the neural networks in our brain, boosting our immune system, and fostering creativity), real play isn’t motivated primarily for some utilitarian result. Play something we do for its own sake. 13
One of my favourite movies is Chariots of Fire. The movie is based the true story of two runners who are preparing for the 1924 Paris Olympic Games: Harold Abrams and Eric Liddell. Harold Abrams is obsessed to achieve his goal of winning the one hundred meter dash. Only by winning Olympic gold does he feel he can validate his existence. When his girlfriend Sybil asks him if loves his running, he responds, “I am more of an addict. It’s a compulsion, a weapon.” As he waits to run in the Olympics finals of the 100-yard dash, he confides to his friend and teammate Aubrey his fear: “I have ten seconds to prove my existence.”
Eric Liddell, on the other hand, runs for the sheer pleasure of running. In the movie, his religious, austere sister Jenny expresses her disappointment with Liddell’s passion for running: “I don’t want God’s work spoiled with all this running talk.” Liddell responds, “I have decided to go back to China for missionary service.” Jenny is overcome with joy. But, then Liddell adds, “I’ve got a lot of running to do first, Jenny. You’ve got to understand. I believe God made me for a purpose, for China… but he also made me fast. When I run, I feel his pleasure…” When we do something for the sheer pleasure of it, for its own sake, whether we do it extremely well, like Eric Liddell (who went on to win a gold medal, shattering the existing world record, in the 400 in the Paris Olympics) or do it poorly, what we do is play.
We contrast the word “amateur” with “professional” or someone who performs with “excellence.” Sometimes we use the word “amateur” to describe mediocrity. With derision we say, “He’s such an amateur.” But the word “amateur” means “lover.” G.K. Chesterton said, “A man must love a thing very much, if he not only practices it without hope or fame or money, but even practices it without any hope of doing it well.” This is the origin of Chesterton’s famous twist of the traditional proverb: “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”14
My wife Sakiko is a gifted artist. As an elementary school student she took first place in a multi-province art competition in Japan, but because she was raised in a country where almost everyone pursues an education to position themselves to get a job, Sakiko majored in political science at university and worked as a journalist, rather than pursuing art. Since coming to Canada she has occasionally taken classes at Emily Carr, but she is not drawing or painting to make money, but pursuing art for its own sake, for the sheer joy of it. She’s playing.
When I look back on my childhood and teenage years, I enjoyed playing competitive sports: ice hockey, baseball, basketball, and football—but my favorite memories of playing sports were those pick-up games of road hockey and football on the cul de sac in front our house. We would play until it was too dark to see the ball (props). Sometimes, of course, we would argue or about whether the ball crossed the goal line or if hard physical contact was intentional or incidental. But, I loved those pick-up games because I was playing for the sheer joy of playing--not to impress a coach or a girl or to build my resume. I enjoyed the games in our cul de sac for their own sake.
I am not an accomplished sailor, but I love to sail. A few years ago, my wife and I set out on a 6 day sailing course, on a modest 32 foot keel boat. As we crossed the Georgia Straight on our way to Vancouver Island we faced 5-6 foot waves. On the Gulf Islands, we picked and then feasted on clams from the beach and munched away on raw kelp we had pulled from the sea. We sighted eagles, otters, and sea lions. We saw a breathtaking, exquisite orange and hot pink sunset at Montague Harbour. I love being on the water. I love sailing, but I have chosen to not race, because I know that I am so competitive that if I race, sailing will no longer feel like play, but work, like a contest to win. Playing is doing something for the joy of it. If something becomes more important than the play itself, like winning, or your golf score, or impressing someone, even getting into good shape, it ceases to become play.15
There have been times when I have “played” competitive basketball, but it was anything but play. I was self-absorbed, preoccupied with my personal stats, fuming over a issed layup, or trying to impress a girl. Play is doing something for its own sake.
When we play we reflect the image of a God who plays. When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
While play is something done for its own sake, it also offers wonderful gifts for spiritual life.
Spiritual Gifts of Play
I also know play can also have a dark side. A person can get addicted to certain forms of play. It’s not that unusual for people who are addicted to video games to play for 48 hours straight (Brown 177). The Washington Post featured five guys in South Korea who were addicted to playing video games and who died from the blood clotting of sitting for several hours in the same position (Brown 177). Gambling is play, but it is addictive and causes you drift from God. Some forms of play cause us to drift from God… we can sense that, but play can also draw us to God.
Renewal
Play is also called recreation because it has the capacity to re-create us, to make us new. Play renews our mind. Stuart Brown, a medical doctor and former professor of at the University of California at San Diego, points out that play helps develop the amygdala (where our emotions are processed), the prefrontal cortex (where executive decisions are made) and cerebellum (which is responsible for attention and language processing).16 Play refreshes our bodies. Taking a walk, doing a few jumping jacks, even standing with one foot on a wobble board can energize us. Because our mind, body, and spirit are connected when our mind and bodies experience renewal through play, our spirits are lifted too.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
Window to God
Play can also serve as a window to God. In his autobiography, Surprised by Joy, C. S. Lewis describes play experiences as a boy where he was pointed to something beyond this world, to something transcendent. When he was six years old, he gazed at a miniature toy garden his brother made for him out of moss, adorned with twigs, and flowers. In his play he heard the voice of joy calling him. The voice of joy, he discoved years later, turned out to be the voice of God.
Play and contemplation
Play can lead us to God and help us contemplate God. One of the great obstacles to contemplating anything, including God, is self-absorption. Play can help to spring us free from our self-absorption. In their book, The Practice of Spiritual Direction, William A. Barry and William J. Connolly write, “If you have ever been so absorbed in watching a game, reading a book, or listening to music, that you have been surprised at how much time has passed, or how cold or hot you are, or the anger of a friend who has been asking a question for a few minutes, then you know the power of paying attention to something, and you have a personal example of a contemplative attitude….”17 (check this quote) Barry and Connolly who are both experienced spiritual directors suggest that what may help a person to engage in contemplation is looking at, or listening to, something other than yourself—music, nature, art—anything that will absorb a person.18 Contemplation is a form of prayer. Simone Weil, the French mystic, defined prayer as, “Paying absolute attention… The Poet May Sarton, says if one looks long enough at almost anything, and looks with absolute attention at a flower, a stone, the bark of a tree, grass, the snow, a cloud, something like revelation takes place. Something is ‘given’.”19 We experience pleasure.
I find the woods a powerful place of renewal where I am drawn outside of myself, transfixed by the mysterious beauty of God’s creation all around me, by the different shades of green in the leaves, the rays of sunlight that spill through the branches above me, the cool breeze that runs through the through the trail: all these gifts of God—gifts of play help to feel God’s pleasure and pray.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
Play also helps to foster deep bonds with other people.20
When couples feel like they are drifting, a marriage therapist will encourage them to play together, to do something novel the together. When a couple plays together they laugh, touch each other. If they are doing something novel, they experience a boost in dopamine levels in their brain and they bond.21 But this is also true of course in our friendship with others. As we play together, laugh, sweat together, we feel a greater level of attachment. Some of the best times we have had as a Board of Elders have been when we have hiked, or sailed, or skied together. These times of play have built on our relationships and made our work more fruitful. Recently some of the staff went curling together. Everyone said they, “I’ve never played. If you saw us, you would have believed us. But we had a good time.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure and when we play with others we feel God’s pleasure in our shared pleasure.
Create a Rule (or rhythm) of Play
A healthy rule of life will include a rhythm of play. Much like you take time to nourish yourself with food, take time to experience the nourishment that comes from play. There may be times, of course, when we curtail our play for other priorities. When we are facing final exams, crunch time at work or a new child comes into our world, certain activities in our lives will get dropped—a life-giving rule will be flexible. But, taking time to play when we feel we can afford it least, may be the most beneficial time to play. When my friend’s second baby came along—on the one hand he felt like and he and his wife would need to give up their running—a source of renewal for them both—but upon reflection he and wife realized they were so exhausted from parenting a new born and a toddler, that they decided to find a way spell each other off baby-care so they could experience the renewal of running for themselves—and each other, and their babies! One of the serendipitous gifts of play is that it increases our energy for work, whether parenting or for creating something new. You likely know the experience of working on a seemingly intractable problem and then took some time to relax or play, or perhaps you had a nap or a shower, and then serendipitously you experienced an “a-ha” moment and the answer presented itself. Like honoring the Sabbath, we may find play yields its most valuable gifts when we feel we feel most tempted to cut it out.
Take your play history
Take your play history. Was there something as a child you loved to do? Something that gave you unfettered pleasure? Earlier I described how my wife loved art as a child, but felt she had to give that up to concentrate on more practical studies that would help land her a job. Now as an adult, she is rediscovering her love for art. A friend of mine loved road hockey and desperately wanted to ice play hockey as a boy, but being raised in a single parent home in relative poverty, he was unable to pursue that dream. Now as a middle-aged adult he loves playing ice hockey in one of the local leagues.
Be yourself
Try not to be self-conscious. One of the things that inhibits us as adults from playing is self-consciousness: seeming incompetent, uncool, or looking goofy. Years ago, we had a family reunion north of Tokyo at my grandfather’s country club. After dinner one night we walked to the karaoke room. It was February in the off-season for golf so we our family and relatives were the only ones in this party room. When it was my turn to sing, I sang a duet with my sister Hana and we gyrating our hips and throwing out heads back in mock imitation of a rock star as we belted out Go Johnny Go. Since the audience was just family and relatives, I felt less restrained and (in a rare moment) was able to cut loose and ham it up. When you play give yourself the permission to do something you’re not especially good at, to try something new and even look a little foolish.
Keep in simple
Keep it simple. Recreation is a big industry and can consume our lives. Loving play doesn’t mean we get caught up in getting all the most expensive fancy equipment. Play can be as simple as taking a walk or throwing a tennis ball to a dog.
Prayer
Let play become a form of prayer for you. Remember that when you experience joy, as Eric Liddell Liddell experienced, God experiences joy in you. Knowing this can make our play a prayer. I typically have sailed with a group of people who don`t believe in the existence of personal God. As we have sailed on along beautifully the Sunshine Coast, I sense I am moved and grateful for this beautifully at deeper level because I experience this beauty and joy and play as gifts from God. Choose play that ennobles and draws you to God and others.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
RULE OF LIFE M8 SERMON NOTES April 18, 2010
TITLE: Play as Prayer
TEXTS: Ecclesiastes 3s:4; Zechariah 8:5; Isaiah 11:8
BIG IDEA: When we play, we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
On Christmas Eve, I talked how a young man in jeans and a baseball cap stood in a subway station in Washington DC and from a small case removed a violin.
The Washington Post was conducting an experiment to see if people would stop to listen to something truly beautiful, or if they would hurry past (all of this is caught by a hidden video camera.)
It was 8:00 a.m. on Friday morning in January--the middle of commuter rush hour. For the next 45 minutes the violinist plays six beautiful, famous pieces of music. Over 1000 people pass by. After three quarters of an hour, with hundreds of people passing by, few turned to even look at him and only seven people stopped what they were doing to hang around and listen to the music at least for a minute.
Who was the violinist beneath the baseball cap? One of the most famous in the world: Joshua Bell. Three days earlier, he had played his violin in Boston’s Symphony Hall with people paying $100 to hear him.
One of the few people who wanted to watch him play that morning was Evan. Evan is three years old. He is a cute black kid in a parka and he keeps twisting around to watch Joshua Bell, while his mother, Sheron Parker, tries to get him to go out the door of the subway, because she wants to be on time for her class. She deftly moves her body between Evan’s and his, so that Evan can’t see him playing the violin anymore. As they leave the subway station, Evan is still trying to pull away and get a look.
Almost all the adults hurried past Joshua Bell as he played.
But, every single time a child walked past, he or she tried to stop and watch.
We adults are so busy, or focused on “what needs to get done,” that we fail to enjoy the beauty that is clearly in front of our eyes. Children don’t need instruction on slowing down to enjoy life. They find what they like and do it. As we get older, we feel guilty for slowing down to enjoy something, or stopping to play. Many of us feel like we always to ought to be doing something “productive.” The irony is that we can feel guilty about working too much and guilty about playing, too (Banks, Stevens 853).
But, part of a healthy spirituality and therefore part of a life-giving rule or rhythm of life will include joy and play. A person who is engaged in faithfully following Christ will pray and play. In The Holy Longing, Ronald Rolheiser writes, “A healthy spirituality will combine prayer, social justice, and mellowness of heart.”1 If we are focused only on prayer and social justice, we can become overly intense and serious. He says that sanctity is as much about having a mellow, relaxed, joyful heart as it is about believing and doing the right thing, as much about proper energy as about truth.” Gustavo Gutierrez, the father of liberation theology, suggests by having a healthy spirituality we will feed our souls in three ways: through prayer, both private and communal; through the practice of justice; and through having those things in our lives: good friendships, good food and wine, creativity, and healthy leisure that keep our soul mellow and grateful.”2
Some us feel that if we were independently wealthy or retired, we would have the time to play. David Steindl-Rast has wisely said that leisure is not the privilege of those who have time, but rather the virtue of those who give to each instant the time it deserves.3
The beauty of living by a rule or rhythm of life is that we have a kind of monastic bell that enables to give each instance of life the time it deserves (not necessarily the time we feel like giving it). In the midst of all the time pressure in our lives, our monastic bell, our rhythm can help us, as they say, to stop and smell the roses.
Life is a gift. God longs for us to enjoy this gift. Unlike some ancient creation myths, God did not create us as slaves merely to do the dirty work of maintaining the earth, but made the earth for us to take delight in it.4 In Genesis 2:9 we read that “The LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food…”5 As we saw last week, the God did not provide food merely as fuel for human beings, but to delight our eyes and taste buds as well. The earth was created for God’s pleasure and ours as well.
We read in the book of Ecclesiastes that God ordains times to play: “There is a time… to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.”6
God promised Israel that when he would return to bless Jerusalem, a sign of that blessing would be that the streets would be filled with boys and girls playing.7 (Zechariah 8:5)
In Isaiah we read that on the new earth the child will play near the hole of the cobra, and the child will not be harmed… (Isaiah 11:8, TNIV).
God experienced joyful play at the creation of the world. In the first pages of Scripture, we see how God created the earth and delighted in his handiwork. The maker declares that all he has had made is very good.8 In the ancient Book of Job, we see how God’s creating the earth inspired joy. God appears to Job out of the storm and asks:
“Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?...
while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?”9
God’s act of speaking our planet into existence caused the angels to spontaneously sing for joy!
Jesus described God his Father as a person who would throw a feast with music and dancing when repentant sons and daughters would come home (Luke 15:11-32).
Jesus worked hard; he also enjoyed life. He had a thousand days to “save” the world, but spent several of those days celebrating at a wedding in Cana.10 When the wine ran at the reception, Jesus performed his first miracle, by supplying the wine. He ate, drank, and celebrated with people with such zest that he was accused of being a glutton and drunkard (Matthew 11:19. Look at Bruner). Jesus also had the most important mission ever, but he took time to welcome and enjoy the company of children. Enjoying the company of children, he would have played with them (Mark 10: 13-16; Luke 18: 15-17). Jesus had a great sense of humour. Seeing him through our cultural lens, we may not detect of all of his humour, but he taught with wit, irony, and hyperbole. His comment about how it is more difficult for a rich person to enter into enter heaven than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle would have had people bent over cackling in laughter.11 A movie portrayed Jesus as playing a ball game with some other men, Jesus leaping, catching the ball, and jostling his body with others as he did so. Some people were scandalized. But Dallas Willard rightly asks, “Why not?” 12 Why couldn’t we imagine Jesus throwing, leaping to catch a ball, tackling someone in a football game, or riding a snowboard?
God foreordains our play, God plays, and when we play we reflect the nature of a God who plays. In fact, if we belong to Christ as poet Gerard Manly Hopkins wrote, “for Christ plays in ten thousand places.” Through our “limbs” and “faces.”
God’s delight in our joyful play
Some people grew up experiencing the Sabbath as a dreary day of don’ts: don’t play baseball, don’t play games, don’t chew gum. Others who were raised in a home or a church where the emphasis was on thou shalt not. You may have an image of a God who frowns when people have too much pleasure.
But God delights in our joy.
When our son Joey had just turned one, we were at a park in our neighbourhood and a man was a lobbing a tennis ball to his dog just a few feet away. Five or six young children gathered around to watch. Joey shuffled to edge of the group. Each time the dog would catch the ball, Joey would arch his head back, and burst into convulsive laughing. As the dog twisted his body and jumped and caught the ball, our son would laugh so hard he would wobble, lose balance, and fall backwards on his bum. Seeing Joey’s joy, the children in group began to giggle with glee; they pointed to him they began saying, “He likes it… he likes it…” The dog owner started turning his head toward Joey each time he’d toss the ball to his dog. The middle-aged man would out break out in a grin, saying, “That’s a happy boy! That’s a happy boy!” I took great joy in the contagious joy of my son. As we can take sheer delight in seeing our own children light up with joy, God, our Father, takes delight in our joy as well.
I know a pastor who says, “I believe that God takes most delight in me, when I am water-skiing.” He feels God takes more pleasure in him when he pushes in the edge of his ski as it turns on the lake, creating a wall of water, than when he’s praying or preaching. I am sure this man’s statement could be misinterpreted as a way to rationalize a self-indulgent pleasure. But, if he feels most fully alive when he’s gliding across the water, and if we believe that like a loving parent God delights in our joy, then it not so far-fetched to imagine that God takes special delight in this pastor’s waterskiing.
What is play? Play is doing something for its own sake.
Though there are many benefits to play (including developing the neural networks in our brain, boosting our immune system, and fostering creativity), real play isn’t motivated primarily for some utilitarian result. Play something we do for its own sake. 13
One of my favourite movies is Chariots of Fire. The movie is based the true story of two runners who are preparing for the 1924 Paris Olympic Games: Harold Abrams and Eric Liddell. Harold Abrams is obsessed to achieve his goal of winning the one hundred meter dash. Only by winning Olympic gold does he feel he can validate his existence. When his girlfriend Sybil asks him if loves his running, he responds, “I am more of an addict. It’s a compulsion, a weapon.” As he waits to run in the Olympics finals of the 100-yard dash, he confides to his friend and teammate Aubrey his fear: “I have ten seconds to prove my existence.”
Eric Liddell, on the other hand, runs for the sheer pleasure of running. In the movie, his religious, austere sister Jenny expresses her disappointment with Liddell’s passion for running: “I don’t want God’s work spoiled with all this running talk.” Liddell responds, “I have decided to go back to China for missionary service.” Jenny is overcome with joy. But, then Liddell adds, “I’ve got a lot of running to do first, Jenny. You’ve got to understand. I believe God made me for a purpose, for China… but he also made me fast. When I run, I feel his pleasure…” When we do something for the sheer pleasure of it, for its own sake, whether we do it extremely well, like Eric Liddell (who went on to win a gold medal, shattering the existing world record, in the 400 in the Paris Olympics) or do it poorly, what we do is play.
We contrast the word “amateur” with “professional” or someone who performs with “excellence.” Sometimes we use the word “amateur” to describe mediocrity. With derision we say, “He’s such an amateur.” But the word “amateur” means “lover.” G.K. Chesterton said, “A man must love a thing very much, if he not only practices it without hope or fame or money, but even practices it without any hope of doing it well.” This is the origin of Chesterton’s famous twist of the traditional proverb: “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”14
My wife Sakiko is a gifted artist. As an elementary school student she took first place in a multi-province art competition in Japan, but because she was raised in a country where almost everyone pursues an education to position themselves to get a job, Sakiko majored in political science at university and worked as a journalist, rather than pursuing art. Since coming to Canada she has occasionally taken classes at Emily Carr, but she is not drawing or painting to make money, but pursuing art for its own sake, for the sheer joy of it. She’s playing.
When I look back on my childhood and teenage years, I enjoyed playing competitive sports: ice hockey, baseball, basketball, and football—but my favorite memories of playing sports were those pick-up games of road hockey and football on the cul de sac in front our house. We would play until it was too dark to see the ball (props). Sometimes, of course, we would argue or about whether the ball crossed the goal line or if hard physical contact was intentional or incidental. But, I loved those pick-up games because I was playing for the sheer joy of playing--not to impress a coach or a girl or to build my resume. I enjoyed the games in our cul de sac for their own sake.
I am not an accomplished sailor, but I love to sail. A few years ago, my wife and I set out on a 6 day sailing course, on a modest 32 foot keel boat. As we crossed the Georgia Straight on our way to Vancouver Island we faced 5-6 foot waves. On the Gulf Islands, we picked and then feasted on clams from the beach and munched away on raw kelp we had pulled from the sea. We sighted eagles, otters, and sea lions. We saw a breathtaking, exquisite orange and hot pink sunset at Montague Harbour. I love being on the water. I love sailing, but I have chosen to not race, because I know that I am so competitive that if I race, sailing will no longer feel like play, but work, like a contest to win. Playing is doing something for the joy of it. If something becomes more important than the play itself, like winning, or your golf score, or impressing someone, even getting into good shape, it ceases to become play.15
There have been times when I have “played” competitive basketball, but it was anything but play. I was self-absorbed, preoccupied with my personal stats, fuming over a issed layup, or trying to impress a girl. Play is doing something for its own sake.
When we play we reflect the image of a God who plays. When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
While play is something done for its own sake, it also offers wonderful gifts for spiritual life.
Spiritual Gifts of Play
I also know play can also have a dark side. A person can get addicted to certain forms of play. It’s not that unusual for people who are addicted to video games to play for 48 hours straight (Brown 177). The Washington Post featured five guys in South Korea who were addicted to playing video games and who died from the blood clotting of sitting for several hours in the same position (Brown 177). Gambling is play, but it is addictive and causes you drift from God. Some forms of play cause us to drift from God… we can sense that, but play can also draw us to God.
Renewal
Play is also called recreation because it has the capacity to re-create us, to make us new. Play renews our mind. Stuart Brown, a medical doctor and former professor of at the University of California at San Diego, points out that play helps develop the amygdala (where our emotions are processed), the prefrontal cortex (where executive decisions are made) and cerebellum (which is responsible for attention and language processing).16 Play refreshes our bodies. Taking a walk, doing a few jumping jacks, even standing with one foot on a wobble board can energize us. Because our mind, body, and spirit are connected when our mind and bodies experience renewal through play, our spirits are lifted too.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
Window to God
Play can also serve as a window to God. In his autobiography, Surprised by Joy, C. S. Lewis describes play experiences as a boy where he was pointed to something beyond this world, to something transcendent. When he was six years old, he gazed at a miniature toy garden his brother made for him out of moss, adorned with twigs, and flowers. In his play he heard the voice of joy calling him. The voice of joy, he discoved years later, turned out to be the voice of God.
Play and contemplation
Play can lead us to God and help us contemplate God. One of the great obstacles to contemplating anything, including God, is self-absorption. Play can help to spring us free from our self-absorption. In their book, The Practice of Spiritual Direction, William A. Barry and William J. Connolly write, “If you have ever been so absorbed in watching a game, reading a book, or listening to music, that you have been surprised at how much time has passed, or how cold or hot you are, or the anger of a friend who has been asking a question for a few minutes, then you know the power of paying attention to something, and you have a personal example of a contemplative attitude….”17 (check this quote) Barry and Connolly who are both experienced spiritual directors suggest that what may help a person to engage in contemplation is looking at, or listening to, something other than yourself—music, nature, art—anything that will absorb a person.18 Contemplation is a form of prayer. Simone Weil, the French mystic, defined prayer as, “Paying absolute attention… The Poet May Sarton, says if one looks long enough at almost anything, and looks with absolute attention at a flower, a stone, the bark of a tree, grass, the snow, a cloud, something like revelation takes place. Something is ‘given’.”19 We experience pleasure.
I find the woods a powerful place of renewal where I am drawn outside of myself, transfixed by the mysterious beauty of God’s creation all around me, by the different shades of green in the leaves, the rays of sunlight that spill through the branches above me, the cool breeze that runs through the through the trail: all these gifts of God—gifts of play help to feel God’s pleasure and pray.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
Play also helps to foster deep bonds with other people.20
When couples feel like they are drifting, a marriage therapist will encourage them to play together, to do something novel the together. When a couple plays together they laugh, touch each other. If they are doing something novel, they experience a boost in dopamine levels in their brain and they bond.21 But this is also true of course in our friendship with others. As we play together, laugh, sweat together, we feel a greater level of attachment. Some of the best times we have had as a Board of Elders have been when we have hiked, or sailed, or skied together. These times of play have built on our relationships and made our work more fruitful. Recently some of the staff went curling together. Everyone said they, “I’ve never played. If you saw us, you would have believed us. But we had a good time.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure and when we play with others we feel God’s pleasure in our shared pleasure.
Create a Rule (or rhythm) of Play
A healthy rule of life will include a rhythm of play. Much like you take time to nourish yourself with food, take time to experience the nourishment that comes from play. There may be times, of course, when we curtail our play for other priorities. When we are facing final exams, crunch time at work or a new child comes into our world, certain activities in our lives will get dropped—a life-giving rule will be flexible. But, taking time to play when we feel we can afford it least, may be the most beneficial time to play. When my friend’s second baby came along—on the one hand he felt like and he and his wife would need to give up their running—a source of renewal for them both—but upon reflection he and wife realized they were so exhausted from parenting a new born and a toddler, that they decided to find a way spell each other off baby-care so they could experience the renewal of running for themselves—and each other, and their babies! One of the serendipitous gifts of play is that it increases our energy for work, whether parenting or for creating something new. You likely know the experience of working on a seemingly intractable problem and then took some time to relax or play, or perhaps you had a nap or a shower, and then serendipitously you experienced an “a-ha” moment and the answer presented itself. Like honoring the Sabbath, we may find play yields its most valuable gifts when we feel we feel most tempted to cut it out.
Take your play history
Take your play history. Was there something as a child you loved to do? Something that gave you unfettered pleasure? Earlier I described how my wife loved art as a child, but felt she had to give that up to concentrate on more practical studies that would help land her a job. Now as an adult, she is rediscovering her love for art. A friend of mine loved road hockey and desperately wanted to ice play hockey as a boy, but being raised in a single parent home in relative poverty, he was unable to pursue that dream. Now as a middle-aged adult he loves playing ice hockey in one of the local leagues.
Be yourself
Try not to be self-conscious. One of the things that inhibits us as adults from playing is self-consciousness: seeming incompetent, uncool, or looking goofy. Years ago, we had a family reunion north of Tokyo at my grandfather’s country club. After dinner one night we walked to the karaoke room. It was February in the off-season for golf so we our family and relatives were the only ones in this party room. When it was my turn to sing, I sang a duet with my sister Hana and we gyrating our hips and throwing out heads back in mock imitation of a rock star as we belted out Go Johnny Go. Since the audience was just family and relatives, I felt less restrained and (in a rare moment) was able to cut loose and ham it up. When you play give yourself the permission to do something you’re not especially good at, to try something new and even look a little foolish.
Keep in simple
Keep it simple. Recreation is a big industry and can consume our lives. Loving play doesn’t mean we get caught up in getting all the most expensive fancy equipment. Play can be as simple as taking a walk or throwing a tennis ball to a dog.
Prayer
Let play become a form of prayer for you. Remember that when you experience joy, as Eric Liddell Liddell experienced, God experiences joy in you. Knowing this can make our play a prayer. I typically have sailed with a group of people who don`t believe in the existence of personal God. As we have sailed on along beautifully the Sunshine Coast, I sense I am moved and grateful for this beautifully at deeper level because I experience this beauty and joy and play as gifts from God. Choose play that ennobles and draws you to God and others.
When we play we feel God’s pleasure in our pleasure.
posted by Shigematsu at 6:13 PM
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