West Cocoa Chat

First, I know Randy (The Big Unit) Johnson doesn't play first but I couldn’t find a picture of a first baseman arguing with an ump.

My son executed a fine (in this veteran high school baseball announcer’s opinion) piece of base running last night in our game against (no kidding Steve) Space Coast High School. He was inserted in the game as a courtesy runner for our catcher. He consequently stole second on the first pitch to the batter. On the next pitch, our batter attempted to bunt Steven over to third. He bunted the ball down the first base line which allowed Steven to go to third. The pitcher fielded the ball and then bobbled it trying to get it out of his glove. It appeared that he still made the throw in time to throw out the runner at first but the ump called him safe. This incensed the first baseman who turned and argued with the field umpire. In the meantime, my son rounded third, saw that the first baseman was distracted, and took off for home. He easily beat the throw to home which really made the first baseman look silly. BTW, we ended up winning 12 to 2 in 5 innings.

The distracted first baseman reminded me of myself last week. Long story short, we had a bit of a crisis in our church’s leadership last week and when you only have 2 elders and 2 ministers in a church of about 250, things tend to be magnified or if I’m honest with myself, blown up out of proportion.

In a nutshell, two of us were at odds with each other. One felt the other was out of control and needed controlling. He was calling on me to help him “put the hammer down” or he was going to resign. The other player in this drama felt the first guy was out of touch and out of control himself. Then there was me. I felt a relationship needed to be restored and the words of Jesus in Matthew 18 heeded concerning conflict resolution regardless of an impending resignation or not.

Summary:
I made numerous phone calls, advice sought, prayers were offered, meetings arranged, and praise God, resolution occurred.

But I’m still bothered because as I contemplate last night’s distracted first baseman I think about my box score from last week:

Members Visited – 0
Prayers Offered for members of the Church – 0

I wonder in spite of the results of my efforts or rather, God through me, if God is pleased with my shepherding efforts last week?

I wonder if Satan is smiling saying, “Cecil, you play a nice first base.”