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Location: Blogs Brad's BlogMid-Week Missive |
 | | Posted by: Brad Miller | 9/24/2008 4:36 PM | Greetings on this beautiful fall day!
Several of you have asked me when I was going to write about baseball again. Well, maybe not several of you. And maybe it wasn’t, “When are you going to write about baseball again?” But just a few people interested in how the Detroit Tigers are doing.
Okay, okay, I confess: it wasn’t several, and it wasn’t even “a few”. one person made a comment about how much they admired my loyalty to such a disappointing team. Or something like that. I know there was something in there about the Tigers being horrible. And me being disappointed.
Well, I am disappointed. And I’m sick of it.
I’m tired of getting my hopes up so high because Sports Illustrated and the Sporting News and ESPN and every clown with a teleprompter in front of them picked the Tigers to win the World Series this year. But where are they now? Are they fighting for a championship? Are they resting up, getting ready for the playoffs? Are they preparing to return to the great heights of 2006 and their last World Series appearance?
No, no, and no.
As of this minute, the Tigers are in last place in the American League Central Division. Last place!!! Behind the Kansas City Royals, the team we used to employ as our measuring stick for futility. Well, guess what? We are behind them. Looking up. At everyone.
What went wrong? Oh, too many things to mention. The team did not gel as championship teams must. They became a team of 25 individuals, some of them making enormous sums of money. 25 guys; 25 limousines. There were some key injuries to Curtis Granderson and Jeremy Bonderman and virtually every relief pitcher on the team. But mostly, they just stunk most of the summer. They started 0-7 and never recovered.
What am I to do? Why do I keep rooting for them? They came so far the last couple of years, only to fall back so fast. Why do I keep caring? Why? Why? Why?
(Note to reader: this is where I try to make some spiritual/religious connection between my loyalty to the Tigers and our faith journey….with an amazingly straight face.)
We are people of hope. We know what we have been promised and we know how we have felt God’s presence in the darkest of hours. We continue to hope and believe, even in the worst situations, because we have seen the miraculous before, and we sit in joyful anticipation that a miracle will indeed come again. Baseball is like our faith journey in another way, too. The only score that counts is the one at the end of the game. You can trail the whole game, score in the ninth and win. We can make mistake after mistake in life, but if we seek forgiveness and seek to turn back to God, everything that happened before that is forgotten, wiped away. And like baseball, we get to try over and over again. Every day is a new day. Every day is a chance to get it right. And so we continue to have faith, to remember what has been done in the past and hope that the future is as bright as our most pleasing memory.
And you know what? The hope of God’s promise will see us through anything, and the hope of the Tigers possibilities will warm me over the winter until next spring, when we get to do it all over again. There is always, next year. And besides, the Detroit Red Wings start the season in a couple of weeks….and EVERYONE, I mean EVERYONE says they will win the Stanley Cup this year!
Ain’t hope grand?
For an updated prayer list and list of upcoming events, go to www.brookhavenchristian.org
For your prayers: Judy Mowrey had corneal surgery this afternoon and is now in recovery. The doctor said things went very well and she will be back tomorrow for a follow-up and a better sense of exactly how well. Please keep Judy and Jim in your prayers as they await more good news. And Judy’s sister Carol had a great report after cancer surgery yesterday. The doctor believes they got it all, and the initial tests back that up. They will have more complete results tomorrow.
Upcoming events: Don’t forget to bring toiletries by October 19th for our homeless brothers and sisters. We will be using them to put together hygiene kits at More Hands for God Day on October 25th. And don’t forget the canned goods as we continue to participate in the “Miracle of Abundance” by sharing with folks who need a little help.
I hope you can make it to worship this Sunday as we once again celebrate the Lord’s Day together. The scripture lessons are Ezekiel 18:25-32 and Psalm 25:1-12 and the sermon is titled “Asking Too Much?” Have a great rest of the week.
Be peaceful,
Brad | | | Permalink | Trackback |
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