One of my favorite authors and podcasters is former Navy SEAL Jocko Willink. Jocko and I have pretty much nothing in common. He is a successful writer and one of the strongest and baddest people on the planet. People are constantly looking to him for leadership advice. I have yet to be called a successful writer, and, when people call me bad, they actually mean bad. As of this writing, no one has yet to ask me to write a leadership book.
I appreciate Willink’s simplistic way of addressing problems by using the word “good”.
We have problem- “Good. Now we have an opportunity to figure out a way to solve it”.
I didn’t get promoted- “Good. Now I have more time to get better”.
We got beat- “Good. We had an opportunity to learn”
As we took the field at Avon Park CI, we faced another day of heat and a muddy field. While I was sweating and standing in muddy water, I was secretly saying to myself, “Good. Now I have an even better story to tell on my blog!”
We had a HOT morning for sure but we won a pretty close and competitive game. We had a larger but more spread out crowd. I had 4 good conversations with guys out in the prison yard while Chris Onken and John “Chiz” Chisholm shared the Gospel. I talked to a few guys who knew the Lord and we talked about some struggles and frustrations that they were having. I had a chance to pray with them and hopefully encourage them. I also talked to a guy who was Hebrew Israelite
For lunch, we had a nice air conditioned meal at the local Walmart Subway. I haven’t dined in too many Subways but I was thrilled to have some air conditioning and a light meal on such a hot day.
As we were leaving Subway and the Walmart, it began to rain, and rain some more, and eventually, there was even more rain with thunder and lightning. We made it through security but we were delayed and nearly cancelled for the second half of our day.
We got to go to the chapel and sit through the beginning of another outreach ministry’s service for a little bit. Eventually, the storm stopped and we were allowed back onto the field.
The field was in awful condition but we got to play a full game. We finally lost on a walk off single in the last inning. Losing isn’t fun but it was cool to see the other team celebrate on the field.
I was able to share my testimony during this session. I will often start my testimony by talking about the day I got cut from the Limestone Community High School baseball team. It is sort of a funny story that ends in me as a freshman crying about being cut but the premise of the story is that I wasn’t sad that I got cut as much as I knew I didn’t belong. I then go into explaining about how I heard the Gospel during an Easter Sunday service as a 7th or 8th grader. I heard about our punishment for sin and how we deserved hell. I then heard about why Jesus had to die on the cross. I made a decision to follow Jesus that morning. I knew that I made a decision to follow Jesus then but my life didn’t quite reflect someone who was born again. When I was a young adult, I started to attend the church that I currently attend and got involved with the men’s softball team. It was there that I built friendships and saw how seriously some of the men took their walk with the Lord. It was at that point that God really used them to help disciple me and took me from being someone who had made a decision to follow to someone who wanted Jesus to be my Lord.
After my testimony, Phil Cunningham shared the Gospel. While Phil preached, I was able to hand out Gospels and talk with a couple of men with Jeremiah Haffner. They were believers but has questions about unanswered prayers and predestination. This was a good conversation. I was able to share what I knew and encourage them that while we don’t always understand God’s ways, that He is still a good God and worthy to follow despite our lack of understanding.
We made it back to the hotel, got cleaned up, and enjoyed a fun team meal and some ice cream.
We finished our 3rd day of team devotions on the topic of “What is a Missionary Athlete”. Wayne did such a good job with this. I enjoyed as we studied the model for a missionary in Acts. I enjoyed studying about our role in evangelism and God’s role in salvation.
