In recent days, talk about the Yankees have been centered around Alex Rodriguez doing steroids. It is sad to see that every great player in MLB today is probably doing some kind of drugs to enhance their offensive output or increase the velocity of their fastball. I watched A-Rod’s ESPN interview with Peter Gammons last week, and I also listened to parts of his interview with the press yesterday. It is sad that even though A-Rod has confessed to using steroids while with the Texas Rangers, he still can’t come fully clean with what he did. A-Rod is trying to make us believe that he didn’t know what he was taking -that for that period in time, this superior athlete who cares about his body didn’t know what kind of drugs he was taking. Of course it is a load of bull. A-Rod has to protect his image so I can understand why he would need an alibi, but I think this is a classic case of our human depravity.
We are all depraved as people and no matter how much we have screwed up we will always try to make things appear better than they really are. It is in our human nature. Very few people will come clean about how they messed up, especially if you are a public figure. In the end, we are all image managers. My personal view is that when we become an image manager then we lose touch of who we are. Brennan Manning calls this the “impostor.” Somehow the image that we have created becomes more important than who we really are. This is what happened to A-Rod. If A-Rod came clean and sincerely apologized to his fans about what he did and showed some brokenness, his fans and the media would support him, and possibly be more connected to him than ever before.
The truth is we all make mistakes and we shouldn’t be surprised when someone screws up. The thing that leaves a sour taste in our mouth is when people try to lie about why they made that mistake. Let’s just be man or woman enough to admit that we messed up without trying to justify our actions. A simple, “I’m sorry for what I did, there really is no excuse…” will go a long way.
What makes a person great is not their ability to be perfect, but to have enough courage to admit that they are broken and depraved.
God’s grace is most powerfully at work in our life when we have come to grips with our brokenness. We see that in scores of characters in the Bible. Take Sarah who gave birth to Issac when she was in her 90s. Or how about Moses who was called by God to approach Pharaoh and lead his people out of Egypt when he was old, had a speech impediment, and was a fugitive in Egypt. And when you think about brokenness you can’t leave out the Twelve disciples. They were broken people who experienced rejection from Jewish religious leaders due to their lack of spirituality and their blue collar vocation. Yet God used them to create the greatest movement this world has ever seen: Christianity.
Let’s remember that in our brokenness God’s grace is fully at work. We will make mistakes but let’s not forget that in our brokeness, God can do something powerful in our life.
we were just talking about at work about why nice people finish last. In this world, being aggressive is the popular way of getting to what you want, but in the long term being genuine and true to who you are is what lasts. Too much temptation for man to do the short cuts and with technology evolving to give us what we want quicker, will be too much for us to morally handle since we are weak.
This is so true Simon. I can totally understand why A-Rod took the steroids but I think it is important to come completely clean when you get caught. The Daily News reported today that A-Rod had a trainer who was notorious for injecting players with steroids in 2007. This was his greatest year production wise. MLB banned this trainer indefinitely. If this is true then this might totally destroy his image.