I love the game of golf, although on the few occasions I get to play, I do so very badly. If I make a single par in a round of golf, I go home quite happy.  Knowing how difficult the game is, I watch the pros whenever I can to admire their skills.

On Sunday I watched the Masters, and with many other people, both in person at Augusta, Georgia, and watching on various media outlets, saw a well-known figure in this sport stage an incredible comeback from devastating injury and years of inability to compete at the extreme level of performance required to win at his sport.

On Monday, while volunteering as a starter at Laurel Hill Golf Club, for which I am allowed the the right to beat a golf ball to death without paying the normal greens fees,  I found this article on the ESPN website. The writer, Sarah Spain, clearly describes the conflict that I, and perhaps many other people as well,  felt as we watched Tiger Woods march to his victory. I can honestly say that I have over the past several years had the same emotions which Sarah describes as I have watched Tiger try and fail to return to golf. His personal failings were both disgusting and sorrowful as the man destroyed his family with the wrong choices he made. Yet there was something tragic about seeing such talent disappear, and I longed to see that skill on display again as it was this past Sunday. While still disappointed with his personal moral failings, it was nonetheless amazing to watch the result of years of tough physical therapy and long practice sessions come to fruition with his stunning victory.

But as great as Tiger’s comeback was on Sunday, every year there are far greater victories which are more quietly won and more joyfully celebrated than his. These victories will not make national media, nor will they be widely celebrated around the world. In fact, many of them will be roundly criticized, and even persecuted,  because they do not fit what has become the societal norms of the world. The world does not celebrate victories which rebuke immoral choices and wrong-headed thinking.

John 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.  

As great as Tiger’s victory over injury was on Sunday, even greater has been Walt Heyer’s personal victory over the demons which drove him to self-mutilation, thinking that he was a woman trapped in a man’s body The lie we are told is that sexually confused people are “born that way” and cannot change. Some states are even passing laws which will punish those who attempt to help gender confused persons regain their God-given identity. Walt Heyer is living proof of the reality of a comeback victory over sexual delusion. But you will never find his story in the mainstream media. It is not the narrative they or the world wish to hear.  His story is light that rebukes the darkness of the transgender lie.

Another immense comeback victory, perhaps making more news than Walt Heyer because of the movie UNPLANNED, is that of Abby Johnson, the former high-level abortion clinic director. She is representative of an ever-increasing number of women who have freed themselves from the lie that abortion is the only answer to a problem pregnancy. Her repentance from actively supporting abortion has been coupled with an equal drive and determination to spread the word that the killing of the unborn is morally wrong. She is the founder of And Then There Were None, a ministry designed to assist abortion clinic workers in transitioning out of the industry. To date, this ministry has helped over 430 workers leave the abortion industry. But her story is another that you will not hear on the mainstream media. Her story is light that rebukes the dark lie that abortion is a “woman’s right” and “women’s healthcare.”

Their stories, along with my own personal story, are  part of the greatest story ever told, the greatest comeback from destruction ever seen – the victory over sin and death by God through His Son, Jesus our Lord. This Sunday, in Christian churches around the world, the Resurrection of the God/Man will be joyfully celebrated by millions who like me have been delivered from their enslavement to sin. Our wrong choices have been forgiven, our confused understanding has been given clarity of sight, and our humanity restored to us. Throughout the centuries, the message of God’s victory over death has given joy to the despondent, forgiveness to the guilty, love to those unloved, and hope in a hopeless world.

It has all been made possible because the Living Word, He who is ever one with the Father and the Holy Spirit as God, took on a body of our flesh and has healed broken human nature. The Crucifixion which we remember on Good Friday, and the Resurrection which we joyfully celebrate on Sunday, offer to each individual their own personal comeback from sin. All that remains is for each individual to approach God in repentance and take advantage of the healing that is available through Christ.

Yes, Tiger Woods made a great and impressive sports comeback at the Masters Tournament. But the real comeback that I have wished to see from him for years would have been to have publically restore his marriage through whatever he needed to do to have his wife forgive him. Through all the celebration of his victory, the sad reality that is not being talked about is how his divorce has affected his children. No victory hug at the 18th green will suffice to overcome the emotional devastation that his children now have to struggle with. All this is glossed over, unspoken, not discussed in polite company. The sadness of his wife, the reality that his children may grow up with serious emotional problems caused by his actions, the fact that he is still in need of correcting a serious wrong are ignored, and the golfer is celebrated.

Tiger’s full comeback – the one that really matters – is still waiting to be accomplished.