One of my ministries this month is coaching young girl’s basketball.
I and four other racers, have had our
hands full the last two weeks. It is all
about the basics with these girls; passing, dribbling, shooting, offense, and
defense. If you where to ask anyone of us I believe we would all have the same
line of thinking “challenging”.
Every day, from four to six o’clock the five of us do our
best not to just pour in knowledge of the game of basketball, but love. To be examples that Christian living isn’t
just knowledge, but a life style. This isn’t always easy; especially, when you
have some super competitive coaches on the sideline, who have grown up in a
country that teaches them to dream and strive to be there best: where winners are praised for their level of
dedication and hard work day in and day out.
different. It doesn’t consist of lofty
dreams or far out ideas; rather it is filled with the reality of living in the
moment. Survival. A twenty point lead or
three game winning streak doesn’t even cross their mind during a practice. Rather they are filled with simple joy as we
hand out gently used shoes, that replace there tattered flip flops that have
created blister on the bottom of their feet.
I have struggled to push aside my ides of “winning is
everything” and just learn to enjoy the game. This afternoon, we played our
first game as a team. We lost, no I mean we really lost by a lot, but when the
day was over and I was able to put everything in perspective I remembered what
was important. We scored a total of
three points over two games and we fouled, traveled, double-dribbled probably
more than any team in the history of basketball, but the smile on the faces at
the end of the day reminded me that it wasn’t about the score. It wasn’t about
the statistics. All that mattered was the opportunity. All that mattered was
five Americans that showed some interest. All that mattered is that we showed
them love through a simple game of basketball.
