Over the many decades I have been a basketball player… coach… trainer… fan, I have witnessed many different styles and philosophies of play; and of course, over the many decades I have been a believer… teacher… missionary… minister, I have witnessed different styles and philosophies of living.
The thing that came to mind for this week’s devo is the style/philosophy in which we face adversity. Many “players” attempt to deal with pressure by avoiding it… yet, I have always had a mentality that the best way to handle pressure is to attack it.
A common approach when I was younger was to always try to get into the “belly” of the defense… or the idea of taking the ball right at a shot blocker…
I remember playing in a 4v4 tourney years ago and facing a very stacked team with a 7-footer in the middle. The guy had played division 1 college ball and was home in the off-season from his overseas pro gig… I, on the other hand, was already greatly out of playing shape (unless looking like you have a basketball under your shirt is being in shape…) Basically, we had a group of guys that got into this tourney to simply have some fun and we ran into a team of guys that were young, athletic, and still competing at a very high level. I decided to set the tone for our team; knowing we were greatly outmanned, I decided the best approach for us was to simply “attack” …
I will tell you that we surprised them greatly and were tied with them at half… eventually dropping the game 114-100 (I think was the score.) How did I set the tone to “attack”? On my first touch, I took the ball down the baseline and went up to throw down a dunk on the 7-footer; he proceeded to throw my attempt into the seat (I still think he fouled me; and in all honesty, even if he wouldn’t have, I couldn’t dunk anymore at that point of my playing days), BUT I had let my team know we were not going to try to avoid adversity, but instead face it head on!
When I think about my playing days, I truly was a MUCH BETTER shooter when under pressure. In fact, some guys that played against me regularly would tell their teammates to lay off of me outside… basically the more the defender got into my space, the more focused I would become, resulting in better mechanics. When the game was on the line, I became a dynamite free throw shooter, as I tended to mentally lock in better.
Basically, I am reminiscing about the “good ole days” because I see how so many people, including Bible teachers, act as thought the goal of the Christian life is comfort and avoiding pressure. I’m just not sure what Bible folks are reading, as I see that much of the ink used to write it was concerning how we face struggles, not how we avoid them. Therefore, even our prayer lives revolve around being rescued more than around how we can “get into the belly” of the pressure.
Yesterday at church I was reminded of Paul and Silas in jail, when the earthquake jarred open the cells and broke their chains… they determined they were not freed to run from, but freed to run to making a difference in people’s lives…
Romans 12 gives us a really cool picture of what our “team philosophy” should be… and in verse 12 it even tells us how to face pressure: “…persevering in tribulation…” (NASB2020)
That word “persevering” has the idea of remaining and enduring… doesn’t sound like the goal is remove it but to use it…
Pressure is simply opportunities to Go MAD (Make A
Difference)!
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