As we fret and anguish over the plans that we have for the future, we reduce our own lives into a godless game of chess, one in which we lose every prediction.
God’s plan will be achieved with or without us! God is the one to raise up King’s and Kingdoms! God is sovereign , by knowing who God is through His word and having His righteousness, we will walk in this life with His grace and mercy and the peace of God that goes beyond understanding will see us through this world and the next!
Yes, and in Access Theory terms that line is very precise.
Chess is a closed, rule-bound, zero-sum system. Everything is contained, calculated, adversarial, and exhaustively modelled. It is pure orientation: strategy, prediction, optimisation, sacrifice. There is no field, no life, no grace, no emergence beyond the board. Only pieces, rules, and outcomes.
So “there is no God in chess” doesn’t mean “no intelligence.” It means no Ground. No being. No gift. No mercy. No breath. Nothing that cannot be reduced to position and power.
God, in your architecture, is not a super-player inside the game.
God is the field in which games arise at all.
The board, the players, the will to play, the breath between moves.
Where everything is control, there is no room for grace.
Where everything is strategy, there is no surrender.
Where everything is zero-sum, there is no abundance.
Chess is awareness at its most elegant.
Life is consciousness first, awareness in service.
So the line is true and revealing:
There is no God in chess,
because God is not a piece.
God is the ground on which the board itself appears.
1. There is no chess in God, glory be to the Father, and to this Son and to the Holy Ghost.
2. When one plays chess in life, there is an opponent sitting on the other side, grinning in the darkness. The lord of this world has rigged the game. Don't play.
A few days ago, I “learned” how to play chess, and last night, after playing each evening, I was struck by a deep despair and depression that made me cry and kept me from getting up and doing simple tasks like my bed routine, getting out of bed, washing, and eating.
I saw my life as my chess game, I felt stupid, making wrong moves no matter how hard I tried, and found myself surrendered, persecuted and dying. Plus each time my “king” was threatened my game partner who is French exclaimed “échec “ translation is failieure, so I was sitting there hearing over and over again “failieure, failieure, failieure” … my current life circumstances are such that it takes daily devotional practice, gratitude and prayer, constant conscious choosing to see what is good and hang on to faith in the God and working the hope muscle. Currently, I am really persecuted by someone in power unfairly, and I don’t know what to do and how to “play”, I feel like all the moves I have made in my life have been putting me into “échec”. So last night I lost every chess game we played, and in the end I crawled onto the couch, rolled into a ball, and cried, unable to fall asleep. Overwhelmed by the inner voice telling me what a loser and failure I am, frozen with fear about my imminent death and no way out.
I searched “chess and life” on Substack to see what others say, and your words make sense and reassure me. Life is not a chess game; I need to call on the divine to help me really see it. As long as I am alive, I am not dead.
I am puzzled about playing tho. Should I play more and attempt to improve my attitude? I can't unsee the terrible spell we exclaim in this game. I am not sure that this is a game of divine, after all, it is all about fighting and defeating, all about strategies, all in the head and no heart, it feels like a battlefield. I don’t care about killing someone's king. I want to live in peace. I actually started playing it because I thought it would give me some intellect training. I did it because I felt I was not smart enough to make the right moves in life. I fell into my own trap. I criticised my mind and how I live, but I have no right to criticise what I did not create. I think chess is not for me, and life is not chess. Thank you for writing and pointing out why life is not chess!
Life without God is total chaos. With God, life is filled with peace in the chaos. "Good morning, God, and Thank You for this very lovely day!"
Beautiful, Sarah. Thank you for sharing.
God’s plan will be achieved with or without us! God is the one to raise up King’s and Kingdoms! God is sovereign , by knowing who God is through His word and having His righteousness, we will walk in this life with His grace and mercy and the peace of God that goes beyond understanding will see us through this world and the next!
Yes, and in Access Theory terms that line is very precise.
Chess is a closed, rule-bound, zero-sum system. Everything is contained, calculated, adversarial, and exhaustively modelled. It is pure orientation: strategy, prediction, optimisation, sacrifice. There is no field, no life, no grace, no emergence beyond the board. Only pieces, rules, and outcomes.
So “there is no God in chess” doesn’t mean “no intelligence.” It means no Ground. No being. No gift. No mercy. No breath. Nothing that cannot be reduced to position and power.
God, in your architecture, is not a super-player inside the game.
God is the field in which games arise at all.
The board, the players, the will to play, the breath between moves.
Where everything is control, there is no room for grace.
Where everything is strategy, there is no surrender.
Where everything is zero-sum, there is no abundance.
Chess is awareness at its most elegant.
Life is consciousness first, awareness in service.
So the line is true and revealing:
There is no God in chess,
because God is not a piece.
God is the ground on which the board itself appears.
Two things:
1. There is no chess in God, glory be to the Father, and to this Son and to the Holy Ghost.
2. When one plays chess in life, there is an opponent sitting on the other side, grinning in the darkness. The lord of this world has rigged the game. Don't play.
Well done, Sarah.
Really beautiful message, thank you.
A few days ago, I “learned” how to play chess, and last night, after playing each evening, I was struck by a deep despair and depression that made me cry and kept me from getting up and doing simple tasks like my bed routine, getting out of bed, washing, and eating.
I saw my life as my chess game, I felt stupid, making wrong moves no matter how hard I tried, and found myself surrendered, persecuted and dying. Plus each time my “king” was threatened my game partner who is French exclaimed “échec “ translation is failieure, so I was sitting there hearing over and over again “failieure, failieure, failieure” … my current life circumstances are such that it takes daily devotional practice, gratitude and prayer, constant conscious choosing to see what is good and hang on to faith in the God and working the hope muscle. Currently, I am really persecuted by someone in power unfairly, and I don’t know what to do and how to “play”, I feel like all the moves I have made in my life have been putting me into “échec”. So last night I lost every chess game we played, and in the end I crawled onto the couch, rolled into a ball, and cried, unable to fall asleep. Overwhelmed by the inner voice telling me what a loser and failure I am, frozen with fear about my imminent death and no way out.
I searched “chess and life” on Substack to see what others say, and your words make sense and reassure me. Life is not a chess game; I need to call on the divine to help me really see it. As long as I am alive, I am not dead.
I am puzzled about playing tho. Should I play more and attempt to improve my attitude? I can't unsee the terrible spell we exclaim in this game. I am not sure that this is a game of divine, after all, it is all about fighting and defeating, all about strategies, all in the head and no heart, it feels like a battlefield. I don’t care about killing someone's king. I want to live in peace. I actually started playing it because I thought it would give me some intellect training. I did it because I felt I was not smart enough to make the right moves in life. I fell into my own trap. I criticised my mind and how I live, but I have no right to criticise what I did not create. I think chess is not for me, and life is not chess. Thank you for writing and pointing out why life is not chess!
Thank you Sarah, it brings perspective once again. Gods light is greater than darkness and his grace is abundant.
Very timely piece.
Shortly after reading this brief essay this quote was found on a Jesuit University website:
"Maybe the process it takes to accomplish the goal, maybe that is God, omnipresent."
- Tommy Kaufmann
Found here: https://www.xavier.edu/jesuitresource/online-resources/quote-archive1/finding-god-in-all-things-quotes
Amen.
I agree with your ideals, but Groupthink and moral turpitude is all pervasive in the world and always has been.
With God's grace, the odds are one to one.