What does it mean to be on a team? What does it mean to be a part of the Gym-Masters specifically? These questions can be answered subjectively depending on who you ask, however, one thing echoes within the walls of the gym floor covered in blue mats: family.
Coming to Southern, or college in general, can be a challenging experience as one leaves the structure of home, family, friends or familiarity. The process of making friends, sustaining a schedule, finding or following a passion or solidifying your autonomous identity looms large. However, if you adjust your perspective to see it as opportunity for growth and possibilities you may find yourself in a position to expand your horizons. Gym-Masters provides a home away from home. That support system that you might find yourself distanced from can be established as a healthy outlet from the daily grind of stress, homework and a plethora of other obligations to balance. Once you are a Gym-Master, you are always a Gym-Master. You belong to a family.
What makes the Gym-Masters so different from any other team is the importance of each individual and what they bring to that team. Other teams may have a collective mentality, however, in gymnastics and acrobatics trust is one of the most important factors that attribute to success. With that level of trust comes a level of closeness that attributes to that family mentality.
Since we aren’t competing against other teams and are trying to showcase our talents that God has given us during shows, we support each other by literally and figuratively lifting each other up. In other sports, if someone gets injured or cannot practice, there are typically bench players or reserves to fill the spot of the teammate. If someone gets injured or misses a practice during the Gym-Master’s season, the whole team feels it. The moves can be adjusted, but never the same. It is this intricate balance of individual and collective importance each person has that reminds us we all play a role in gymnastics, in life and in God’s kingdom. When you realize your importance, it can push you to do your very best and trust those around you, especially God, to catch you if you fall; both in gymnastics but, more importantly, in life.
As with any great experience, comes the joy of sharing what we have with others. As we strive to perform our best and to improve our skill sets, the most important things that come from the Gym-Masters isn’t on the mats as you might think. Sure, it is important to perform well and show what is possible with hard work and trust, but the greatest impact we can make is showing how much trust we can have in God.
The trips, the vespers, the shows, the clinics and the fellowship we share when we tour is all made worthwhile when we can share God to others in a way that a sermon may never be able to articulate, in a space that is not in a church, but on blue mats. That is our blue “church” where we can make not only an impact for an hour-long show but for eternity. “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:18). Experiencing the Gym-Masters is a small taste of family that is similar to how we are as a family in Christ and what you get the moment you step into the gym and onto the mats.
Image credit: Gym Masters