Athlete, You Have Three Deep Needs

So how does knowing your identity in Christ help motivate you in sport and life? Think about some of the deepest needs we have as humans. Many would say we have 3 core needs as human beings.

Number one, a need for identity.  We all need to know who we are.  Every person everywhere has a need to know who they are and to be able to define themselves in some way.

Number two, a need for worth. This is knowing you have value. We need to know we matter.

Number three, a need for relationship or intimacy. It is critical to know you are loved and accepted.  

These three deep needs are woven into the fabric of how God created us. They motivate us whether we are conscious of them or not. We long to have them fulfilled and often organize our lives around there pursuit.  Many things in life help us attempt to fulfill these needs and contribute to their fulfillment, including family, education, friends, marriage, career, and other aspects of human experience. Our participation in sports may meet these needs in part through providing affirmation, reward, relationship, purpose, and other components built into sport culture.  

However, a mistake we make as athletes is to demand that our sport meet these needs CONSISTENTLY and COMPLETELY, satisfying our soul in a way sports were never created to meet.  In having this expectation, we make sport into god that takes the place of our heavenly Father, and we are doomed to experience deep disappointment as a result.  

Sport can produce great joy and satisfaction, but it was never intended to meet the needs of identity, worth, and intimacy and relationship fully.  Thus, we wind up in a horrible place of bondage to our performance and to other's perceptions about our performance.

Our heavenly Father is motivated to meet those needs in us and to do it consistently and completely. Our God wants to meet those needs based on His character and our relationship to Him, not on our performance. When we live out of our identity as a child of God we can experience the fulfillment of these three core needs.  We can then pursue sport for the pleasure it was intended to bring instead of clinging to it as a lifesource.  Let's release sport from trying to meet those needs and instead enjoy it as a gift from the Father!

Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst." - John 6:35

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