In an excellent blog post titled Taking Out the Garbage, Rev. Tony Cooke includes the following story first told by John Killinger…
The manager of a minor league baseball team who was so disgusted with the center fielder’s performance that he ordered him to the dugout and assumed the position himself.
The first ball that came into center field took a bad hop and hit the manager in the mouth. The next one was a high fly ball, which he lost in the glare of the sun—until it bounced off his forehead. The third was a hard line drive that he charged with outstretched arms; unfortunately, it flew between his hands and smacked his eye.
Furious, he ran back to the dugout, grabbed the center fielder by the uniform, and shouted, “You idiot! You’ve got the center field so messed up that even I can’t do a thing with it!”
Now, I don’t know exactly how true this little story is; but I love it nonetheless. We all know what it is like to make mistakes. Sometimes, our goof ups may be quiet small and go unnoticed by others. At other times, they may loom large and unfold in full view of others.
And sometimes, we may even feel like we have messed up so badly that there is no one who can fix it - no one at all. But the good news is that no problem is too big for God! No mess that we have created in our lives and/or the lives of others is so bad that God cannot do something constructive with it!
Through Isaiah the Prophet (41:10), God speaks this promise to each of us: “Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”
So, my friend, take heart. If you are at a place in your life where you are suffering the ignominy of some big mistake (or, to use the jargon of baseball, if you’ve just marked up another big “E” in the record book of life), do not despair. To err is human; but to forgive is divine. And our divine and merciful God is also a capable God. He can and will help us work through and overcome any shortcoming we might face.
For this very reason, the Psalmist joyfully proclaimed (121:1-2): “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD.” No doubt, the same God Who helped him, and gave him that great and confidential testimony back in his day, will do the very same for us when we mess up here in our day.
SOURCE: http://www.tonycooke.org/articles-by-tony-cooke/taking-garbage/.
The manager of a minor league baseball team who was so disgusted with the center fielder’s performance that he ordered him to the dugout and assumed the position himself.
The first ball that came into center field took a bad hop and hit the manager in the mouth. The next one was a high fly ball, which he lost in the glare of the sun—until it bounced off his forehead. The third was a hard line drive that he charged with outstretched arms; unfortunately, it flew between his hands and smacked his eye.
Furious, he ran back to the dugout, grabbed the center fielder by the uniform, and shouted, “You idiot! You’ve got the center field so messed up that even I can’t do a thing with it!”
Now, I don’t know exactly how true this little story is; but I love it nonetheless. We all know what it is like to make mistakes. Sometimes, our goof ups may be quiet small and go unnoticed by others. At other times, they may loom large and unfold in full view of others.
And sometimes, we may even feel like we have messed up so badly that there is no one who can fix it - no one at all. But the good news is that no problem is too big for God! No mess that we have created in our lives and/or the lives of others is so bad that God cannot do something constructive with it!
Through Isaiah the Prophet (41:10), God speaks this promise to each of us: “Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”
So, my friend, take heart. If you are at a place in your life where you are suffering the ignominy of some big mistake (or, to use the jargon of baseball, if you’ve just marked up another big “E” in the record book of life), do not despair. To err is human; but to forgive is divine. And our divine and merciful God is also a capable God. He can and will help us work through and overcome any shortcoming we might face.
For this very reason, the Psalmist joyfully proclaimed (121:1-2): “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD.” No doubt, the same God Who helped him, and gave him that great and confidential testimony back in his day, will do the very same for us when we mess up here in our day.
SOURCE: http://www.tonycooke.org/articles-by-tony-cooke/taking-garbage/.