Discipline and Growth

As a sports fan, I have my favorite teams that I always follow but I also have another category in which I put some teams and athletes. It’s what I call the “love-to-hate” category. I’m not a boxing fan but a handful of years ago, there was a boxer that fit nicely on my love-to-hate list; Mike Tyson. “Iron Mike” is known as one of the greatest fighters of all time. During his glory years in the 80’s, Tyson was the only boxer to ever hold three different heavy weight belts at the same time. He was dominant and it made him rich. Tyson’s career earnings crested $400 million in the late 80’s. But, there was something that I just didn’t like about him. He was brash, loud and arrogant and you could just tell that at some point he was going to do something stupid. I couldn’t wait for him to fall.

While the 80’s were good for Tyson, the 90’s were his demise. In February of 1990, Tyson was unexpectedly knocked out in the 10th round by the virtually unknown Buster Douglas. This blow would usher Tyson in a complete downward spiral not only as a boxer but as a person. In 1992, Tyson was convicted of sexually assaulting a beauty queen in Las Vegas, for which he served three years in prison. After being released from prison in 1995, he engaged in a series of comeback fights. In a 1997 rematch with Evander Holyfield, the fight ended when Tyson was disqualified for biting off part of Holyfield’s ear, an incident that he never recovered from in the public eye. In 1999, Tyson was arrested again for assaulting two people at a traffic scene. As a heavy user of cocaine, Tyson filed or bankruptcy in 2003. Iron Mike was gone from the sports scene. Once, one of sports most dominate figures, Tyson became a public outcast.

Last week, I stumbled on a Sports Illustrated article featuring Tyson (August 2-9 issue). Because of my disgust for the way he treated sports and people, I almost just flipped the page to find something more palatable to read. But, a quote jumped off the page. “I’m a joke, I want to count for something- to do nice things so my kids can respect me.” In one statement, Tyson had expressed something I’d never heard from him; humility and kindness. Could Tyson have grown? Could the man have changed? Once known as the Baddest Man on the Planet, Tyson talked in the article of his loving wife Kiki and their beautiful daughter, Milan. “I realized that if I wanted to have a healthy life and if someone was willing to love me, then she deserved the best I had to offer,” Tyson says. “She deserved the best of me physically, emotionally, spiritually. And it wasn’t easy, trust me... I just knew that in order to make this work, all that other stuff in me had to die.”
As a boxer, Tyson knew about personal discipline. For years, he had disciplined his body to be the most feared man in the ring. But, over the past decade, Tyson’s character and person has gone through a significant discipline that has brought about transformational personal growth. A self-centered, arrogant, abuser turned loving husband and father.

God smiles when we allow the pain of discipline to be redemptive toward change. What's your growth story? What pain has God used in your life to bring positive change?