What would be on your Christmas list if you could choose ten things and money was no object? In the lead-up to the World Cup, GQ magazine asked a number of famous footballers to name ‘Ten things you can’t live without’. Those they interviewed included Dutch defender Virgil van Dijk, Germany winger Serge Gnabry, and England trio Declan Rice, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Bukayo Saka. You can watch the results on YouTube. Some of the answers are predictable – football boots, trainers, fancy watches, and iPads for watching TV shows while travelling. There were also an eye-opening amount of grooming products mentioned!
One item most people wouldn’t have expected to be included was a Bible. However that’s exactly what Arsenal and England’s Bukayo Saka pulled out. He said that he tries to read it every night before he goes to bed. Sakha’s interview has currently been watched almost 2 million times, and that quote was picked up on at a press conference in Qatar. Earlier this month a journalist asked Saka if he was still reading his Bible every night. The 21-year old replied that he was, because it was ‘really important’ to always have the presence of God in his life. ‘The main thing for me’, he said ‘is having faith in God’.
For me, one of the great joys I have is seeing people who would never have picked up a Bible in a million years, starting to read it. To see homes in this community where there is now a Bible for the first time. To see people’s new-found enthusiasm as they read a physical copy of the Bible, read it on their phones, or listen to it. Not because Bible reading is an end in itself, but because it points us to Jesus. ‘The Scriptures’, Jesus said, ‘bear witness about me’. That includes not just the parts of the Bible written after he was born – but also the parts written beforehand. In fact, some of the most familiar parts of the Christmas story were written seven centuries before Jesus was born: ‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son’…’Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given…of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end’. The same prophet – Isaiah – also described in detail Jesus’ death in the place of his people and explained what it would all be about: ‘by his wounds, we are healed’ (Isaiah 53:5).
When he was interviewed on Desert Island Discs a number of years ago, Comedian Lee Mack said it was an odd thing that people didn’t read the Bible. One of the questions those on the show are asked is which book they would take to a desert island, along with the Bible and the works of Shakespeare. Mack said this about the Bible: ‘I'm glad you get the Bible, because I would read the Bible. I think it's quite odd that people like myself, in their forties, are quite happy to dismiss the Bible, but I've never read it. I always think that if an alien came down and you were the only person they met, and they said, “What’s life about? What’s earth about? Tell us everything,” and you said, “Well, there's a book here that purports to tell you everything. Some people believe it to be true; some people do not believe it to be true.” “Wow, what’s it like?” and you go, “I don’t know, I’ve never read it.” It would be an odd thing, wouldn't it? So, at the very least, read it.’
So let me give you an invitation for 2023: Would you be willing to read the Bible with me? One of my fellow football chaplains, John MacKinnon (Clyde FC), works for an organisation called ‘The Word One to One’. They produce little booklets containing John’s Gospel, divided up into different ‘episodes’. The idea is that two people will sit down together, for 30 minutes at a time, to read through this New Testament book which explains who Jesus is and why he came. Some helpful explanatory notes are included, as well as some questions to help get discussion going.
If meeting up seems too daunting, I can just give you a copy of the first booklet, and it will serve as a guided read through of John chapter 1. Or just look up the gospel of John or Mark online. In the words of Lee Mack – ‘at the very least, read it’. You might be surprised!
Published in the Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 29 December 2022