My CrossFit gym helps me think about the cross of Christ

Apparently ‘the journey to self-mastery begins in the physical province’. So says Greg Glassman, the founder of the CrossFit phenomenon.

When you arrive at your CrossFit gym, you enter a bare, box-like warehouse unit with simple equipment and your coach and mates ready to go for an hour’s intense training, just like yesterday and just like tomorrow. You hear the thudding echo of dropped barbells and the thump of weights hitting padded mats. You see sweat on the grimacing faces of those working out, and the grinning faces of those already finished.

Thinking inside the box

There are currently more than 15,500 CrossFit gyms (otherwise known as boxes), with more than 4million members, in 162 countries. Glassman sought to help stem the tide of an obesity and related illness tidal wave sweeping America. His vision is a healthier populace. His method is to create a community which strives alongside each other to be healthier, and therefore better, people.

CrossFit aims for personal transformation, accountability, community, social transformation, creativity and purpose. Harvard Divinity School conducted a study and found that CrossFit is not alone in attracting a host of millennials seeking deep connection in quasi-religious communities. But, within CrossFit in particular, Glassman is clear in arguing that when the physical province is attended to, the other areas of life – the intellectual, the emotional, the spiritual and the moral are all improved.

Thinking beyond the box

It is at this juncture then, that whilst physical exercise is of some use, it is necessary to add that it is only godliness that is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come (1 Tim. 4:8). To attempt to put the hope of moral improvement upon the strained backs of the CrossFit participants is perhaps a weight too heavy for them and their methodology to bear.

Many of their desires are commendable but fragmentary insights into God’s common grace. There is a desire to heal the sick and to end suffering, just as Jesus did. There is a longing for companionship and fellowship, which is exactly what Christ died to facilitate, namely His church. And there is a desire for moral improvement, of goodness, honesty, kindness and charity, all of which are ultimately exemplified in Jesus Christ.

So there are ways in which CrossFit can be seen as cross-shaped, but, as with all sin, this vision has been warped and twisted into a worship of self, rather than a worship of God.

The method of achieving their aims is revealing. To put it simply: hard work in = good results out. And herein lies the problem. There is no consideration of a God who exists outside the box, One to whom we are all required to give glory and honour. Theirs is a closed box, where they can save themselves from ill health, create community and improve themselves morally, all with a personal best and calloused hands.

When tested, though, these lofty aims fail to fully materialise. Health comes and goes; fit people die young, whilst unfit people live long lives. Communities form, but also fight and fragment; and moral virtues are adrift, unbound from any objective norm. There is God-given goodness in health, but the idol of health becomes all-demanding, and followers can become obsessive, addicted and enthralled to their idol, sometimes even resulting in illness.

Thinking upon the cross

As a participant in a CrossFit gym, there are many ways to think beyond the box, upon the cross of Christ. There is a need to be clear on what value the physical training provides. It provides some, but only some, value. What is ultimately necessary is grace, forgiveness, and a godliness that leads to eternal life. This identity frees us to love others for who they are, not for what they can offer, to be humble in a proud culture, and to give God the glory He is due.

It is only when CrossFit is seen through a cross-shaped lens that its misunderstanding can be exposed, so that those who don’t yet know Christ might be pointed to Him, and those who do can see clearly the dangers and the delights of life in a box.