Never Give Up!

             Have you ever had one of those weeks when you were just dead tired, and everything seemed to be going wrong?  You know the kind I’m talking about.  Those are the weeks where you probably gave a 110% the week before, doing your job, caring for your family, and all the other responsibilities that you carry every week.  Though they may be routine, we must admit that some weeks are harder than others. 

            Sometimes it’s the completion of a project that you lived with almost constantly for days and finally, it is complete.  Other times, it’s a family event like a milestone anniversary or birthday, or a vacation that you have planned for months.  Now, it’s finally over and you want to breathe a sigh of relief.  The problem is that daily life doesn’t stop. 

            You may have reached that high that precedes exhaustion but that doesn’t mean that you can stop doing all the things that need to be done.  Life goes on!  So, what do you do?  The one thing that you don’t do is to give up.

            A few years ago, my great-nephew’s baseball team spent a week at a big tournament in Florida.  It was hot and the games just kept coming, and no matter how much you love baseball, I’m sure they were exhausted by the end of the week.  Coming out on top in the tournament didn’t change that.

            The next week they played in another tournament here at home, and to be honest, they were as bad as they had been good the week before.  The pitchers couldn’t pitch, the infielders couldn’t get their gloves down on the balls and the outfielders couldn’t catch a fly ball if it dropped in front of them.  They were all moving in slow motion with no passion for the game.  It was evident that most of them couldn’t wait for the game to be over.  They had given up!

            Finally, the coach put in a pitcher who didn’t normally pitch.  He did his best, but the rest of the team was lethargic and failed to make what should have been routine outs.  The pitcher was getting more disgusted with his teammates by the minute.  Suddenly, one of the batters hit a popup foul about 4 feet outside the first base line.  It should have been the first baseman or catcher’s play but out of nowhere, the pitcher, running as fast as he could, made a diving catch, coming up with the ball in his glove.  As the umpire yelled, “he’s out!”, and the pitcher lay sprawled on the ground, he said, almost under his breath, “That’s the way you play baseball!”

            Life isn’t always easy, and there will be days when you want to give up, but if we have breath, we have a purpose.  We may be hot and tired as I’m sure those boys were, but the battle doesn’t pause for nap time.  God has called us to be His ambassadors, no matter the circumstances.  I only hope that when the going gets tough, we’ll look to Him for strength and stand ready to say, “That’s the way you serve the King!”

Galatians 6:9

PS That pitcher was my great-nephew, and I couldn’t have been prouder of him that day because, despite the odds, he never gave up! Happy Birthday, B!