A Life Worth Living

As I take a brief interlude from finishing up some homework I figured it was a good time to write a blog post. I had a FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) meeting tonight and it sparked something inside my heart. The verse we read was Colossians 3:17 “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed don it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” We were talking about attentiveness and how we should approach life and our relationship with God. I thought to myself for a moment (not being attentive to what we were talking about though (that was a joke)), how often do I go through the motions in life? Really think about it, how many days go by when we just live our lives to get to the end of the day and do it all over again? Sometimes a week may go by when I realize that I did very little to truly add to my life and grow closer to God. Heck a month could go by and I realize that I have been slipping down the slope of sleepiness and a general lack of attention. So, how do we go about solving this problem we face? Well it is a very simple solution in that it is a short answer, but it is incredibly hard to follow through with. We just have to follow the verse, in everything we do, do it for God. Whether I be playing baseball, going to class, or helping a friend I should do it in the name of the Lord. Believe me, this is easier said than done. It takes a lot of hard work and effort, but the results are well worth it. I don’t want to live a life going through the motions, instead I want to do something great; not great in the sense that I get some sort of award but great in that I lived a life solely for God. A life lived for myself is a life wasted, no matter what legacy I leave on the world. A life lived for God is never wasted, no matter what lack of legacy I leave behind. Every day is a chance to live a life worth living, instead of facing a day thinking ‘gosh why do I have to get out of bed?’ I’ll face every day shouting out “How blessed am I to have a chance to live a life worth living and a life for God, no matter what I do.  

Notice

I recently (recently meaning 5 months ago) added advertisements to my blog. I do not choose these advertisements, they are picked based on the content of my writing. That said I have noticed a few political ones endorsing certain candidates, I just wanted to say that this is not a blog about politics, it is about my thoughts (usually centered on the Bible and Red Sox) and I in no way endorse anyone on the blog and hope to not alienate any readers as a result. Thanks and keep reading!

What do I Believe?

I was reading Luke 9 last night before bed and I noticed something that I hadn’t really taken the time to think about before. Earlier that evening I was watching the Republican debate and it seemed like many of the candidates wouldn’t answer a question directly, but instead try to clarify something beforehand or say they agree with someone else. The verse that struck out to me was verse 20 “’But what about you?’ He asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’” Here Jesus asked Peter what others said about Him, but then asked what Peter thought. The thing that stuck out to me was the fact that Jesus didn’t really care about what Peter knew of what others said, He wanted to know what Peter thought. I ask you (and myself) this: what do you believe. I find myself getting caught into the trap of “Well so-and-so said this, so I choose to agree with him.” Well, so-and-so could be wrong. Heck I could be wrong. What do I believe? Do I believe what my pastor tells me, what C.S. Lewis wrote, or do I believe what the Bible tells me? God doesn’t want to hear what our friends, parents, or pastors say; no, instead He wants to hear what we believe. While when answering the tough questions it is easy to struggle and fumble the answer a bit, I tend to search for some sort of clarification to back my answer up. But Peter didn’t, even when his answer was in conflict with what other people were saying. The others were saying that Jesus was a prophet, but Peter knew what he felt in his heart and said he believed that Jesus was “the Christ of God.” What do I believe? I believe in the Bible and that it is God’s word. While I may feel the need to bulk up my answer with someone else’ previous words, they aren’t necessary when it comes down to what I think. If I ever stray and change my position out of pride, I just need to remember what Jesus said in verse 26 “If anyone is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him.” Is it harsh, yes a bit; but remember this, God doesn’t care what our friends have to say about Him, He wants to know what we have to say.

Response to a Question

It seems to me that very well justified claim about Christianity’s beliefs on the afterlife has become popular. This claim concerns the doctrine of Heaven and Hell, and either follows a path that concludes that a just God wouldn’t send people to Hell, or that God because He is just doesn’t send people to hell.  Unfortunately the Bible says very little about the afterlife other than Jesus’ mentioning of the life that He brings, and it says even less about Hell. So I suppose it is up to theologians (and amateurs such as myself) to come up with an answer to the presented question. Now this is my line of thinking, and I’m not saying I’m right because we simply don’t know. I think that the doctrine of Heaven and Hell is perfectly in line with the concept of a just and loving God, and that is because I don’t believe that God sends people to hell. Now you may be thinking ‘wait a minute Tay Tay, if God doesn’t send people to hell then who does?’ I then ask you to think about it this way; the people who supposedly go to hell are those who, although they were given a chance to accept God, chose to live a life separate from God. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” the option of going to Heaven really is open ended. I then ask you to think about those who refused God for whatever reason, it may be non-belief, anger, stubbornness… do you really think that they want to spend eternity with God? Think about it, if I don’t want to believe in God then I don’t want to spend an eternity worshipping Him in Heaven. So where do I go? Well, a place where God isn’t, which would be Hell. I don’t think Hell is so much a world of fire and brimstone as it is an absence of God, and thus an absence of all the good things that He has created. Now I may be wrong, but this is just my thoughts on a subject that I have noticed comes up often. 

Wait for Your Pitch

Before I went to bed last night I had a thought, and so as to not forget it I wrote it down in a notebook I keep on my night table. It was a simple thought, but I felt that it was important enough to write a blog post about, so here it is. I’ve been thinking about some bad decisions I have made over the years, everyone has those moments where they say “Oh if only I hadn’t done that, I ended up in such a situation!” When those moments come it is easy to beat yourself up, when really you should look at it in the following way. I like to think that God can speak to us in many forms, and that in this late-night train of thought God was getting me back on track. This is a baseball related analogy; I love to play baseball so it would make sense that this would come to my mind. Anyway, as a hitter you want to be selective as possible without waiting around too much. Meaning wait for your pitch, but know when the time to swing has come. If I step up to the plate I might take the first pitch, and then wait for something I can drive, which for me is belt high or lower, and on the outside half of the plate. It doesn’t do me any good to jump on that first inside fastball I see, or the lazy junk curveball floating out of the strike zone. I should wait for my pitch. It’s kind of the same in life. Often there are situations in life where we seem to jump at the first opportunity that presents itself. Instead we should wait on God to bring us “our pitch.” There were times in my life when I chased after the wrong thing, I thought it looked pretty good at the beginning, but then I realized it was nothing but a big curveball pulling a trick on me. I guess one thing God has taught me is to be patient and not make quick or rash decisions, I need to wait for my pitch before I can hit a homerun.

We Have to Put Down our Swords and Open our Hearts

This is a post I wanted to write a while back but forgot to. When I read Luke 6 this morning (and I am glad I did because I almost neglected to) I was reminded of my post. A few weeks ago I wrote a post about going to the juvenile detention center with my father. That got me thinking about Holy Cross’ message about loving others and living with others (I believe the motto is “men and women with others). So that got me thinking about loving my neighbor and then I asked the big question, “Who is my neighbor?” Fortunately someone beat me to the punch about 2000 years ago and asked Jesus the same thing (good Samaritan anyone?), but I still want to write about it. In Luke 6: 27-28 Jesus says “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” That’s a pretty tough command to follow. It is easy for me to love my friends and family, sure I get mad at them sometimes but at the end of the day I love them a lot. It is also fairly easy for me to love those in my community; nothing gives me greater pleasure than to serve whether it is a neighbor down the street or a kid in jail who needs encouragement. But it is often hard for me to love my enemies. When someone mistreats me my first instinct isn’t always to pray, instead it is to get even. As the saying goes “don’t get mad, get even.” And I admit, sometimes I do desire to get even with those who harm me, whether it be verbal, physical, or emotional. But that isn’t right. My dad use to tell me that “hurt people hurt people.” It takes a broken heart in a person for them to cause pain in someone else. Does that mean what they do is ok? No, but it does mean that my enemies may be hurting and instead of hatred need love and understanding. There have been people in the past who have treated me wrongly, taken advantage of me, and left me. Instead of getting back at them I choose to see them as God does, I choose to love them as God does. As Jesus said in verse 36 “be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” It may be challenging to quell the desires for revenge, but you have to do it. 

It's Never "Just Another Day"

Lately I have been reading Luke. Now, I’ve noticed that I haven’t been blogging a whole lot about what I’ve been reading in the Bible. Lately I have let a lot of things cloud my view of God, and cast my eyes down on things that don’t really matter. I’ve had a bit of a rough time, but God has brought me out of it. So here I am continuing my Bible reading and writing this post. I was reading Chapter 5 last night, which starts off with Jesus calls Peter to follow Him. This may seem like a common story, but for some reason it stood out a little differently to me. Lately I’ve been thinking a great deal about where I am in my life now, and how my life at Holy Cross has developed a bit differently than I thought it would. I’ve been saying to myself, “Gosh if I had only known I’d end up here!” Well, Peter must have thought along the same lines (although his reasons to are a bit happier than mine). Imagine what was going through Peter’s head, he was at work all night and probably wanted to go home and sleep that morning but God had different plans for him. Peter probably figured that day was a normal one, just like any other day of his life but in the end it couldn’t be more different. Instead of going home after a long night’s work Peter met the Son of God and took a chance to follow Him. I guess this passage stood out to me, not because there is anything truly deep to learn, but because I can identify with Peter a bit. I thought that in going to college I wouldn’t miss home that much, I’d do well in classes, and make a few friends. Instead God took me on a whirlwind journey, full of joy but also some moments of sadness as well. But that’s the thing about life, and about God’s plan for us. Little do we know of the great places God will lead us, but we need to trust Him first. Peter had to trust in Jesus to see His true power, and it is the same for us. Before we can go on the journey we need to recognize the call and say “yes” when we hear it. God led me through some interesting situations, but all along I always knew that behind the scenes God was at work in my life, and He does the same for all of us.

Tebow, Religion, and Radio Stations

Well anyone who considers himself fairly knowledgeable about sports will know that the Denver Broncos won earlier tonight and will advance to the playoffs. He will also know that Tim Tebow, the Broncos quarterback has taken the football world by storm. Now Tebow is (from what I hear) an average quarterback, but he gets a lot of attention because he leads the team well and is also a man of very strong faith. Unfortunately he also gets a lot of negative attention for having faith as well. Recently I was listening to the radio in the car and the speaker was talking about religion and politics and saying that the happiest countries are also the least religious. Now what do these two events have in common? Well nothing, other than that they both caused me to question why it seems the world has such a problem with religion. It seems to me that religion is seen in a negative light nowadays, that people like Tim Tebow are being cast more as villains and the punch lines of jokes than the decent men that they are. I would ask those that have a problem with Tebow (or any other religious men in general) what is the alternative? Yes, many terrible things have been done in the name of religion (we all learned these in our 7^th grade history class: the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, Religious wars…). But look at the other end of the spectrum; what about atheist societies? While terrible things have been done in the name of religion, possibly even worse have been done in the absence of religion. It is the absence of God that brought Hitler’s Nazi’s, Stalin, Castro, the catastrophe in Rwanda, and the Albanian Genocide. What is my point? Without a belief in God, human life means nothing. Is it harsh? Yes, but it is not false at all. If I am a mere combination of atoms that was thrown together by chance then what reason do I have to live? What right do I have? I am no different than any other animal that dies in the wild and my death should be treated as such. But we have a completely different reaction, and that is because we view human life as sacred and that projection can only come from a belief in the divine. It seems that religious men are cast as the problem, that they are preventing our own happiness. Well what if we lived in an atheist world, what if our laws meant nothing more than what men ought to do because… well, someone said so a while back. Yes terrible things have been done in the name of Christianity, but without the true followers of Christ who live out His message of love towards others no matter what, where would we be?

Red Sox Top 10

Well it has been a while since I wrote about the Red Sox so here is my top ten list of things I look forward to most in the 2012 season (and possibly hope to happen (not necessarily in order of my anticipation)).

1)   How will Ortiz do, can he follow up his tremendous 2011 season or will he collapse once and for all?

2)   Lester’s return, he had a subpar year last season and has a fair amount to prove, what with the beer and chicken and all. I'm expecting 18 -20 wins.

3)   Salty’s first full season as the starting catcher, he has the reigns and it is his job to lead the team to victory, I’m guessing .260 average and around 20 HR. Oh, and he finally get’s the respect of the pitching staff.

4)   Crawford, last season was bad, I have a feeling this year will be pretty good.

5)   Of course, how could I forget the Bobby Valentine show?

6)   Ellsbury. That’s all I have to say there.

7)   Gonzalez should have a better year given that his shoulder is completely healed, I’m pegging him for .330-.340 avg. and 30-35 HR.

8)   Bailey, can he make us forget all about Pap (considering the loss in September it shouldn’t be too hard).

9)   New rivalries. Not only is it the Yankees and Rays, but now we hate the Orioles too.

      October 2012, expect the Sox to be there

Disclaimer: My estimates for statistics are based on no facts whatsoever and should not be taken with any serious consideration. But if I am at all close then I will say "See, I knew it all along."

New Years Resolutions and Whatnot

Well it’s New Years day and you know what that means, resolutions (and wasted gym memberships). It seems that this time if year everyone comes up with a change they want to make so that the next year is better than the last. I was never big on resolutions, I believe that changes should last a lifetime not just a year, and also that I don’t need a calendar to tell me when a good time to start changing my life is when there is no better time than the present. Anyways, I digress. A lot of resolutions seem to be health related so that got me in the mood for this post. I try to maintain a high level of physical fitness; although I may not be a competitive athlete anymore (I hope this changes though) I still enjoy running, swimming, biking, and lifting weights to stay fit. It hit me the other day that if I work so hard (like many this time of year) to keep my body fit I should be working infinitely harder for my spiritual fitness. At best I have 50 years left on this earth (assuming I live to be 70-ish), but my soul will live forever. So why do I put four days a week into my earthly body but one day into my spiritual one? Now this is not to say that working out is good, what service to God am I if I die at the age of 35 from a heart attack? Likewise, what good am I if I have the body of a pro athlete but the heart of a… well, bad person? This is not so much a resolution (already said I don’t like those) as it is a life choice. No more will I allow myself to get caught up so carelessly in the things of the world, and no more will I allow myself to get spiritually fat. Instead I will strive for spiritual fitness, as should we all, because above all that is what matters the most. My body will eventually break down as I veer farther from my “prime” but my soul will last forever. Instead of focusing so much on the material I’d saw it is best to focus on the eternal because that is what matters the most.

New Year's Prayer

As I enter my fifth year in the blogosphere I feel that a short reflection on 2011 and a prayer for 2012 is in order. First, I want to reflect. 2011 was an interesting year, and I find it very encouraging that God answered my prayer. Here is a short piece of my prayer for the New Year: “I don’t pray for comfort or that everything will go my way, but I do pray that when things go wrong I will not give in and forget God’s promise – that He is with me to the end. I pray for growth, that I may grow in understanding of God’s word, and that I may grow closer to Him.” 2011 certainly had its fair share of troubles, most seeming to congregate around the past few months. Yet while I may have lost strength I never lost faith or hope. I’ve realized that life will often turn the way we don’t want it to, but that doesn’t mean we are alone. No, God is with us, and He speaks to us constantly, whether it is through the Bible, prayer, or even a friend. I know God has been with me, even though I may not always walk with Him. I also know one thing about my future for sure; God will continue to be with me all the days of my life. Yes things might not go as I want them to, but God is there always; as the saying goes “God’s fingerprints are all over this.” Now for the prayer: God you taught me a lot in 2011 and I pray that you continue to teach me and lead me down the right path. I’ve allowed myself to get distracted by things of the world, and I pray that I will hear your voice and see your presence in my life. I pray that I listen for your words and follow your command and that I get on the track that I am supposed to be on. While my future may be uncertain, I pray that your direction will not be. Amen.

Happy New Year!

I just wanted to take the time while I am still somewhat awake to wish all my readers a happy New Year. 2011 has been interesting to say the least, but I'll postpone the reflection for tomorrow (or is it later today?). Thanks everyone for reading and writing comments, it has been a great year and I know God will lead me to even greater and wilder places in 2012. Until then I will get some rest, and ya'll should as well.