Introduction: Becoming a Spiritual Athlete
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maintain focus on a goal rather than be distracted by whatever passing pleasures, rest, or pointless wastes of time get in the way. Second, he reminds the Christ followers that their goal is infinitely greater than the prizes that athletes of his time received—a laurel crown (the “perishable wreath”). Third, he suggests that Christians are in a kind of competition with others. Today, we might consider that in academia, in the blogosphere, and in popular media such as television, film, and journalism, there is a constant competition for market share, and that it is a challenge for anyone who would seek to get a message across to outwork and outdistance others who similarly devote themselves to proclaiming their truths. By the second century, a tradition of “spiritual athletes” began to develop in the church, especially among Syriac Christians in the lands of modern-day Turkey and Iraq. Figures such as Ephrem, Isaac of Nineveh, and Simeon the Stylite lived the most sparse lifestyles in order to show the kind of focus St. Paul called for. Their “spiritual exercises,” not unlike those of pre-Christian philosophers such as the Stoics and Epicureans (not to mention Buddhists, followers of