THE ATHLETIC CRAZE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 13, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 15.

THE ATHLETIC CRAZE.

A LEADING San Francisco journal, whose editors are supposed to know, and probably do know, the trend of the reading public’s taste for “news,” gives over one-third of its reading space in one issue to an affair that occupied less than an hour and a half on the previous evening. The “event” was simply a brutal, bloody prize-fight between two young men. That the editors were evidently correct as to the public desire for such news in preference to anything else in that line, we have the fact that the receipts at the door amounted to $33,000, from an audience of about seven thousand people. The paper says of the winner, “He has proved again that Californians are a fighting race,”—which is a doubtful compliment. A terrible sign of the times is reflected in the statements—no doubt correct—that “he will be the idol of many young women,” and “men will point him out and crane their necks as he swings confidently by.” Verily the athletic craze has a terrible hold upon the people of to-day.

Yet, in the face of an abundance of evidence of a like nature, many men posing as “watchmen on the walls of Zion” are assuring us that “the world is growing better;” and the world and the church are being lulled to sleep in carnal security, confidently believing the terrible deception, so prone are they to believe that moral improvement is possible while indulging to the full the pleasures of the world, the lusts of the flesh. Well might the Lord repeat the question, “When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth?” The present outlook would indicate that the faithful in that day will be a very “little flock,” even “as it was in the days of Noah.” See Luke 12:32; 17:26.

There is, however, one lesson the Christian may learn from the worldly athlete, namely, his careful and temperate training for the conflict before him. The apostle Paul, referring to the athletic sports of his time, notes that “every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.” 1 Cor. 9:25. Therefore shall we not all the more make every possible preparation for certain victory? There is an incorruptible crown of glory for every overcomer.