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Day 16: Keep your eye on the ball

In American culture it is an undeniable tragedy that we have an idolatry problem. One of the greatest idols that we worship is sports. There is a not so fine line between enjoying the entertainment or rooting for your team and spending time and treasure investing in our fandom. With that being said, there are great life lessons we can be taught by playing sports in our youth. Well, if we do not worship at the altar of winning at all costs, that is. Learning to hit a baseball can give us some fantastic life advice. It has been said, and it is 100% correct, that “hitting a round ball with a round bat squarely is the hardest thing to do in sports.” So, learning to do so at a high capacity takes effort and hard work. 

                  

In my time as a baseball coach, I came across a lot of players whose parents had paid an arm and a leg for their personalized hitting lessons, recruitment services, and showcases. Some of them were great hitters, and others were painfully below average at the college level. I learned early in my coaching that many players had forgotten, or maybe never knew, the most important aspect of hitting. So, every year during the first week of baseball activity I would address the hitters and break it down from the first and most important lesson any kid should hear in baseball, “Keep your eye on the ball.” You can have the prettiest swing known to man, yet if your eye is not on the ball, you’ll never produce. I have had, and probably was one of them, plenty of players with less than aesthetically pleasing swings, who had wonderful production because of their eyes.

                  

Often in our spiritual lives we fail to keep our eyes on the ball. Way too much effort, time, talents, and treasures are spent on the mechanics of our faith instead of the object of our faith. Look what the writer of Hebrews challenges us to on this subject, I like how the NLT puts it:


Hebrews 12: Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. 2 We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith.  Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne. 

We are called, as believers in Jesus, to run this race of life loosing every chain of sin that hinders our fruitfulness, and the only way that is possible is by keeping our eye on the ball, which is Jesus. I love this scripture and the picture it paints of Jesus. First, He is the author, or initiator, of our faith who can perfect our faith if we keep our eyes on Him. Second, it reminds us that He disregarded the shame of a Roman crucifixion because He had joy in the work He came to do. That work was paying the price of our salvation and now He sits upon the throne of Heaven. If we are going to be who God has called us to be, we must fix our eyes on Jesus.

                  

Keeping our eyes on the ball of our faith involves our fixed gaze upon the Son of God, but it also involves keeping our eye on the ball of our call to share the Gospel. If we are going to produce the fruit of our salvation, which is to bring others to Jesus, we must also keep our eyes on the call. Let me remind you of what 2 Corinthians 5 challenges us to:


2 Corinthians 5: 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

God is making His appeal to the lost through us! Keep your eyes on the ball! 

                  

I’ll leave you with this thought today. Sometimes when we get our eyes off Jesus a little bit, we lose our vision for the call to bring others to Him. Sometimes we need corrective lenses. There are times where we have to refocus on Jesus and ask His help in seeing the people we are called to reach for Him in the same light that He sees them. In other words, if we are going to keep our eyes on the call, we need the eyes of Jesus. Bradon Heath came out with a song several years ago that was a prayer along these lines. Here's the chorus of the song titled “Give me your eyes.”


Give me Your eyes for just one second

Give me Your eyes so I can see

Everything that I keep missin'

Give me Your love for humanity

Give me Your arms for the broken-hearted

The ones that are far beyond my reach

Give me Your heart for the ones forgotten

Give me Your eyes so I can see


If we are going to keep our eye on the ball of our faith, Jesus and His call for us to share the Gospel, maybe we need to correct the way we see the lost around us. Maybe we need to train our eyes to see people as Jesus did, worth dying for. Yes, even the lost relative who makes fun of your faith. Yes, even the vulgar coworker. Yes, even the addict. Jesus died so they could all have the opportunity for reconciliation, and He wants to make His appeal to them through us! Keep your eye on the Ball! 

                  

Today in our prayer time let’s ask the Lord to do a work in our heart so that we can see the world how He sees the world. Let’s lay down or move aside the things that might be blocking our vision from Him, as we read in Hebrews. Then let us pray the prayer of the song, “God give us your eyes.” If we are a church with our eye on the ball, Satan will not be able to stop us. 

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