Monday, June 28, 2010

Small Ball

Don Copeland, one of our DR 2010 team members, concrete maker extraordinaire and a lousy boat driver, shared this devotional during one of our evening devotions. I thought you'd enjoy it.

Small Ball for God

I receive an email periodically from Jason Cruise of Outdoor Ministry
Network called the Man Minute. It focuses on things in everyday life that
point us towards the Lord. This past week I received the email and it was
about Jason and his son attending a minor league baseball game in Nashville.
Jason was excited to be there because one of his baseball heroes, Ryne
Sandberg was there coaching the opposing team. The devotional linked to
Sandberg’s Hall of Fame induction speech. I took the time to read his
speech and was inspired by his humility and love of the game.

What can baseball have to do with faith? I’ll tell you what it taught me.
Sandberg was a second baseman, noted for his hard work every day and his
love of the game. He played for the Cubs – a team that has only one two
world series in its 137 years of existence (1907 & 1908 for the record).
He played the game like it was meant to be played, selflessly.

In his speech he talked about the importance of playing for the team and not
for self, learning how to advance the runner, how to take a strike in order
to allow a base runner to steal a base, and how to condition himself to be
ready for anything the game might throw at him. He did what he did because
it was his responsibility, not for his own glory, but for the betterment of
the team.

I’m going to mention some phrases – see if you can find something that they
all relate to:

- Single
- Double
- Triple
- Home run
- Balk
- Passed ball
- Wild pitch
- Throwing error
- Catching error
- Stolen base (home)
- Fielder’s choice
- Sacrifice

Add bases loaded to the mix
- Hit by pitch
- Walk
- Catcher’s interference

What do all of these result in?

A runner scores from third base with less than two outs.

So - you might say. What does that have to do with faith, what does that
have to do with me, here in the DR on a mission trip? I say to you – it has
a lot to do with us here today. How did that player get on third? Triple?
Single and two stolen bases? Walk and two stolen bases? Single, stolen
base, sacrifice fly or ground ball to advance him to third? The list is so
much longer than the list for how he can score. The key is that he or his
team managed to get him to third base with less than two outs. If he was on
second or first the list of ways he can score is greatly diminished. What
if the second baseman on his team had made an error on an easy play the inning
before? Would they even be at bat yet? Perhaps that error made getting that
run home from third that much more important.

Is there more glory in stealing home or being the man who sacrificed to
advance him to third? Does he steal home if he’s still on second?

Where am I leading with this? We are all players on the Lord’s team. Every
day we are here we will be called on to make the routine play, cleanly
fielding a ground ball, hitting a ground ball to second with no outs and a man
on second, choosing the right opportunity to steal a base. While some of
these things may seem unimportant, they really aren’t. We are not always
going to hit home runs or base clearing doubles. Sometimes (in fact most of
the time) we are going to be called on to advance the runner.

As we go about our days here let’s try to keep in mind that God wants us to
play small ball. When we play small ball we sacrifice ourselves for the
betterment of the team. God’s team – His kingdom. Routine play on a
ground ball – painting a neglected wall of an orphanage in the DR, sacrifice
fly – providing words of encouragement for a fellow mission team member,
getting a clutch hit – reflecting God’s love through your service to others.

Make sense?

When we all play the game for the love of the game and think of the team
first (God’s team) – the Team Wins. When we don’t win, we dust off our
uniforms, pat each other on the back and hit the showers with anticipation
of tomorrow’s game.

Why?

Because we love the game.

No comments:

Post a Comment