Virga - Volume 18, Issue 4

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Repenting at the Line

Matt Whitling

His was the worst form I had ever seen in my life. As a junior-highschool basketball player, each time he went to the line, his free throws were an exhibition in some of the strangest contortions any of us had ever seen. He was a right-handed shooter who shot from the left side of his body, from the left shoulder, diagonally across the face and up toward the iron. It was unnatural, unattractive, and ergonomically dysfunctional. The dilemma? He also had one of the highest averages from the line on the team. He shot a consistent 65% during the first week of tryouts, and it was clear that he had practiced that shot over and over again in the back yard. Summary: bad form, lots of practice and perseverance, decent short-term results.

As this young man's coach, my first objective, for his own good, was to completely change the form that he had been diligently practicing for years. I knew that the best thing for him was to essentially start over from the very beginning. The trouble is that when you make a drastic correction midstream, the short-term results are always worse. In other words, you get worse before you get better. What happened to this player's shooting percentage when we moved his right arm back over to the right side of his body? His numbers went from first place on the team to last place on the team (30% on a good day). The temptation for the player, and his parents, was to start gathering all kinds of empirical data that shows that the coach doesn't have a clue what he is doing. After all, the proof is in the pudding, right? We all know that you will reap what you sow, and he was reaping the whirlwind after following my program for a week. The short-term results confirm the fact that the coach is ruining this kid as a basketball player, and the long-term results aren't anywhere in sight; therefore they don't exist.

Athletics is not the only realm in which this principle plays out. Parents who don't discipline when their children are young create a situation in which both they and their children have to figure out a way to function with bad form, and the longer this pattern continues, the better they get at surviving without godly love in the home. Parents may ignore, manipulate, bargain, threaten, or simply tolerate situations where they are called to love and correct. Children may reinterpret, manipulate, play Mom off of Dad, etc. and become a decent "shot" at living this way. Everything is going along tolerably until some coach (teacher, pastor, friend) comes along and seeks to address the problem that is beginning to catch up with the family. The long-term results are clear to the coach, the short-term results are clear and tangible to the family.

What will the family encounter if they follow the coach's advice? They see the problem and where it is leading, they commit to dealing with this situation in a godly manner, and . . . what will the short-term results look like? When changing bad habits that are deep-seated, you always get worse before you get better. This can be seen in a myriad of examples:

"Oh yeah, we tried spanking and it just didn't work for our kids. It only made them madder than they were before we disciplined them. Some kids need other forms of discipline. You should have seen our family when we were spanking. The kids were unhappy, my husband and I were frustrated and out of fellowship with each other. The behaviors that we were disciplining for were increasing instead of decreasing . . . I'll tell you, it was the worse weekend of our lives!"

"Principal Goardmouth, we have tried holding Thomas accountable to bring his homework home each day and show us what kind of progress he is making. We have disciplined for laziness and complaining, but the results are worse than before we came in. This can't be the right course of action, look at the fruit in our home, look at Thomas. We are frustrated, he's frustrated, and our home life is literally falling apart."

"Janet, what should we do? Chrissy won't eat anything anymore. First, it was the normal foods that kids have trouble with, but now she refuses to eat peanut butter and jellies. French fries, she won't eat French fries! Last week I looked in her locker at school, and there were apples and pretzels from lunches that she refuses to eat. She says they make her feel sick. Every time we get into it, there's a big showdown and no one smiles for days. I wish it didn't have to be so hard."

"Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it" (Heb. 12:11). Earlier in this chapter we are instructed not to despise the discipline of God because it is a sign that we are His children. In verse 11 the issue of short-term and long-term fruit is addressed. First, we find that discipline (chastening) seems not to be joyful in the short-term: it hurts and brings tears, but afterwards, the long-term yield will be peace and righteousness.

This is a fundamental element in all true repentance: death and then resurrection. We are called to take up our cross and follow Christ. The Christ that we follow came to die, and afterward He rose from the grave. When you repent of something that was not right in your life, often you will see immediate results that look worse, not better. Repentance is hard. Making restitution can be painful. Owning up to your sin is humbling. But afterwards all these things bear the peaceable fruit of righteousness. As parents we need to beware of our own nearsightedness. When you shoot a free-throw, keep your eye on the goal not the ball.