Getting Hit In The Chest (Blurb)

 

 

My Niece and Nephew picked up the hobby of playing Softball and T-Ball, respectively, this ball season.  It caught Melanie and myself by surprise, because when Kyley found out, she expressed a desire to play.  It is possible, we could have signed her up, but we knew we could not get her on the same team as her cousin (which is what she really wanted).  So we did the next best thing.

We went straight to Walmart to buy her and Eli their own gloves.  The deal became; 'For the next year you can watch your cousin; and play catch while we teach you the basics.  If you still have the desire to play next year - we will sign you up'.  Good deal!  We headed home to play catch for the first time!

It was heavily ingrained in my mind while I was playing ball to always throw to the chest, so my throws to Kyley were thusly thrown.  I could tell she was fearful of the ball, but she was being quite brave.  I would throw grounders as well, because she wanted me to, but anytime I threw an honest 'catch' throw I aimed for her chest.  

We actually had a great time and she was very excited about doing it some more.  We went to My inlaw's home and decided to play catch there as well.  I still followed my same principle... until .. Kyley did not get her glove between her and the ball.  Her fear of the ball was causing her to turn her head and stop actually looking at the ball, so because her glove was not where it needed to be.. she got hit square in the chest with the ball.

I am not going to go into detail the things that followed but I do have a question.  When you find something is a bit harder than you imagined - do you find the easiest way to quit, or do you get back up and push through the pain to learn how to do it better? 

Either way, here was the problem we were having: It takes one person not doing things 'right' for someone to get hurt.  We need to either learn how to properly teach the correct way to do things - or revise our methods to better fit the strengths of the other person.  In my case with my daughter the former is the only option.  I need to teach her properly - modifying the method will only hurt her in the long run when she starts to play for real.

Being the coach/teacher/pastor/leader of a "team" you have to learn how to properly use the latter method.  Everyone has SOME kind of strength - being able to create a way to bring it out and 'exploit' it an amazing feat - and God does it all the time, though... backwards.

He brings the fearful to speak... to speak.  He brings the fearful to move... to move.  My thought is not that those things are not our strengths, but our enemy has decided to attack our strengths so early we have begun to believe them to be weakness.  God knows us better than we do.  He wants to bring OUT the strengths He KNOWS we have.  The next time you are fearful of the thing you have been asked to do.. Don't look away.. you may get hit in the chest.  Trust you actually can do it.. and put the glove (you) between you (failure) and the ball (fear). 

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