Three Ways I Want the Grace to be More Worldly
In a profile of Becky Hammon in this week's New Yorker magazine, Louisa Thomas describes an airport encounter Hammon had with NBA coaching legend Greg Popovich of the San Antonio Spurs. Although Popovich knew her from her WNBA career, Thomas writes that he wanted to find out if Thomas was, to use Popovich's word, "worldly." The article describes Becky Hammon as a devout Christian. To devout Christians, the word "worldly" can be code for compromised in keeping with James 4:4's caution that friendship with the world is opposition to God. If typical of the prickly language sensitivity that defines both the Church and the secular culture, this encounter should have been a missed connection in more than the airport's sense of the word.
It wasn't. The fact that Hammon is now Popovich's assistant coach in the NBA is what drew the New Yorker's attention. There must have been an essence in what Popovich was attempting to convey with the world worldly that was congruent with the author's conception of a devout Christian. What? I run an admitted risk of co-opting whatever is admirable about Ms. Hammon as the sole property of her Christian faith. I read the article on National Sibling Day yesterday. I reserve the right as her brother also adopted into the faith to look over her testimony for any family resemblance to what I want to grow into.
(1) This kind of worldly isn't defined by one culture's assumptions. Becky Hammon grew up and played college basketball in the American Midwest. To pursue her dream of Olympic and professional basketball, she became a Russian citizen. Although this and the criticisms she faced show drive and courage, the Christian family resemblance that challenges me is in the reaction of her Russian teammates. As she engaged the people of her new homeland, they thought of her as Russian. She wasn't just passing through for professional expediency, subsisting on McDonald's and Netflix. She was engaged in the culture in which she found herself and with its individual representatives. She embodies more than I do 1 Corinthians 9:20 in which Paul confesses he is willing to drop or assume any cultural markers in order to engage the people around him for a larger purpose.
(2) This kind of worldly is courageous in speaking truth to power. Popovich queried Hammon on the flight they shared, "So, if I ever hired you and I ask you something, you tell me the truth?" Louisa Thomas interjects, "Hammon found the question curious." "I don't know why else you'd ask if you didn't want me to tell you the truth," she said. "Good," he said. I don't want a bunch of yes-men." Perhaps the courage not to conform in the individual encounters like Hammon's hypothetical disagreement with a prospective boss she admired flows from the first quality we examined. It may not be coincidental that the biblical figures of Joseph and Daniel famous for speaking Truth to power were transplants into a culture they knew was not fully their own.
If we see ourselves defined more broadly than a certain setting allows, where we grew up, where we were educated, or the norms of the workplace we where currently punch in, we are going to find the courage to speak up out of individual conviction. This assertiveness may be on the value of the box and one defense in basketball, or its equivalent in our own workplace team's quest for mutual excellence. From there, because we as Christians are more confident and we have a deepened relationship with the colleagues to whom we speak, we may be led to speak up about the differences between what underpins our faith and the assumptions spoken of or taken for granted in an office culture.
(3) This kind of worldly is alive to the value of present opportunities. Becky Hammon turned down an offer as head coach of the University of Florida's women's basketball program. Reflecting, she said there was still more to learn in her present position. "If you're interested in cars, it's like Henry Ford coming in saying, Hey, why don't I teach you about the Model T?"
This quality of contentment is interestingly counterintuitive to the first two we examined. If we manage to see ourselves as bigger than our place in one culture, or in relation to particular individuals, to borrow language from the mentor in Charles Dickens's Bleak House, our next danger can be a tendency to look around the edges of our present opportunity for the next one. Hammon may be especially insulated from this particular danger. The Fordeque qualities of her esteemed boss in an esteemed profession are easy to see. I suspect, even so, that each of her fellow Christians can find the Ford in our present situation. Every authority under whom we are placed is there by God's specific design and for a set duration according to Romans 13:1. What can we learn? What sincere gratitude can we express instead of looking around the edges of every situation for the shortest opportunity to advance to the next?
It wasn't. The fact that Hammon is now Popovich's assistant coach in the NBA is what drew the New Yorker's attention. There must have been an essence in what Popovich was attempting to convey with the world worldly that was congruent with the author's conception of a devout Christian. What? I run an admitted risk of co-opting whatever is admirable about Ms. Hammon as the sole property of her Christian faith. I read the article on National Sibling Day yesterday. I reserve the right as her brother also adopted into the faith to look over her testimony for any family resemblance to what I want to grow into.
(1) This kind of worldly isn't defined by one culture's assumptions. Becky Hammon grew up and played college basketball in the American Midwest. To pursue her dream of Olympic and professional basketball, she became a Russian citizen. Although this and the criticisms she faced show drive and courage, the Christian family resemblance that challenges me is in the reaction of her Russian teammates. As she engaged the people of her new homeland, they thought of her as Russian. She wasn't just passing through for professional expediency, subsisting on McDonald's and Netflix. She was engaged in the culture in which she found herself and with its individual representatives. She embodies more than I do 1 Corinthians 9:20 in which Paul confesses he is willing to drop or assume any cultural markers in order to engage the people around him for a larger purpose.
(2) This kind of worldly is courageous in speaking truth to power. Popovich queried Hammon on the flight they shared, "So, if I ever hired you and I ask you something, you tell me the truth?" Louisa Thomas interjects, "Hammon found the question curious." "I don't know why else you'd ask if you didn't want me to tell you the truth," she said. "Good," he said. I don't want a bunch of yes-men." Perhaps the courage not to conform in the individual encounters like Hammon's hypothetical disagreement with a prospective boss she admired flows from the first quality we examined. It may not be coincidental that the biblical figures of Joseph and Daniel famous for speaking Truth to power were transplants into a culture they knew was not fully their own.
If we see ourselves defined more broadly than a certain setting allows, where we grew up, where we were educated, or the norms of the workplace we where currently punch in, we are going to find the courage to speak up out of individual conviction. This assertiveness may be on the value of the box and one defense in basketball, or its equivalent in our own workplace team's quest for mutual excellence. From there, because we as Christians are more confident and we have a deepened relationship with the colleagues to whom we speak, we may be led to speak up about the differences between what underpins our faith and the assumptions spoken of or taken for granted in an office culture.
(3) This kind of worldly is alive to the value of present opportunities. Becky Hammon turned down an offer as head coach of the University of Florida's women's basketball program. Reflecting, she said there was still more to learn in her present position. "If you're interested in cars, it's like Henry Ford coming in saying, Hey, why don't I teach you about the Model T?"
This quality of contentment is interestingly counterintuitive to the first two we examined. If we manage to see ourselves as bigger than our place in one culture, or in relation to particular individuals, to borrow language from the mentor in Charles Dickens's Bleak House, our next danger can be a tendency to look around the edges of our present opportunity for the next one. Hammon may be especially insulated from this particular danger. The Fordeque qualities of her esteemed boss in an esteemed profession are easy to see. I suspect, even so, that each of her fellow Christians can find the Ford in our present situation. Every authority under whom we are placed is there by God's specific design and for a set duration according to Romans 13:1. What can we learn? What sincere gratitude can we express instead of looking around the edges of every situation for the shortest opportunity to advance to the next?
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