A greater glory – JULY 2024

A greater glory

At the end of this month, our newspapers and TV screens will be full of all the events in the Paris Olympics, which begin on Saturday 27 July. The Games have not been held in Paris for 100 years. 

The 1924 Games were commemorated in the film Chariots of Fire, which tells the story of the two British sprinters, Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell, and their different attitudes to the quest for medals and victory. Liddell refused to compete in the 100-metre sprint, because the heats for this event were held on a Sunday, and he regarded Sunday as the Lord’s Day – the Sabbath – a day for worshipping God, not one for taking part in athletics competitions.

Many eminent dignitaries tried to persuade Liddell to make an exception for such a prestigious event, but his mind was made up – he could not, in all good conscience, run on a Sunday.

However, as Chariots of Fire tells us, Liddell was able to run in the 400 metres, and to gain the gold medal for that event. 

Harold Abrahams, with Liddell no longer a rival, duly won the gold medal in the 100-metre sprint.

When the 1924 Olympics were over, Liddell, at the age of 23, prepared himself to become a missionary in China, and set out in 1925, taking up a teaching role at the Anglo-Chinese College in Tientsin. Later he was a country missionary in Siaochang. 

During the Sino-Japanese War, he suffered at the hands of the Japanese and was imprisoned in a labour camp at Weihsien, on the Chinese mainland. While there, he preached on Sundays, and lived an exemplary Christian life, encouraging and teaching other prisoners in the camp.  He died of a brain tumour at Weihsien in 1945.

The DVD of the film Chariots of Fire is still available. This would be a good moment to re-live the story of those 1924 Games. The title Chariots of Fire is taken from the Bible (2 Kings 2:11; 2 Kings 6). Read those two chapters of 2 Kings to find out more.