[Love] always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (1 Corinthians 13:7, NIV)
When my sports-playing sons reached high school, they were faced with a complicated decision. I am afraid I was a big part of the problem.
Though my own days on the baseball field ended rather precipitously once I had to move to the bigger dimensions with 90 feet between the bases, I never lost my love of the game. I may have played competitive golf in high school and college, but my eyes were full of awe at the strikeout prowess of Nolan Ryan, the hitter’s finesse of Rod Carew, and the stunning power of Willie Stargell.
So my sons grew up around two games. I coached them in Little League and also took them to the driving range. My youngest derived as much delight from trying to extricate himself from a “sand pit” as he did from making a diving catch on the outfield grass.
And thus, their own decision when it came to high school sports wasn’t easy, for both golf and baseball are played in the spring here in California. You couldn’t reasonably do both.
It occurred to me that I could spend the rest of my life working on the characteristics traced in this chapter.One of the factors they had to weigh may sound familiar to you: Golf is a game for a lifetime. Because this is true, maybe a “temporary sport” like baseball should take preference; but also because it is true, pouring all those available hours into golf when you are younger will allow you to enjoy it all the more as the years go on. Tough, tough call.
Life doesn’t confuse us so readily. We’re in it from beginning to end. And in fact, it has preached that if your goals don’t extend beyond this life, they are not big enough. If one powerful thing can be said for the millennial generation, it is that they are committed to thinking in the long, long term: What kind of world has been handed to them, and what kind of world will they leave?
I’d like to propose to them—and also to us older ones and to any reader here who is younger still—that the kind of world we should leave is one in which we who follow Christ are identified by undeniable adherence to the thing Jesus said should identify us: love.
A year or so ago, I was reading today’s passage, set in that small-but-mighty “love chapter,” 1 Corinthians 13. And it occurred to me that I could spend the rest of my life working on the characteristics traced there. Not a week, not a month, not even a coming year. A lifetime.
Is your love patient and kind, avoiding envy, boastfulness, and pride? Does it steer clear of rudeness and look out for others ahead of yourself? Do you refrain from anger? Are you quick to forgive? In love, do you disdain unrighteousness and rejoice in the truth? Do your efforts to love demonstrate a commitment to always protect, trust, hope, and persevere?
Today we step away from the holidays into the long walk of 2019. But as men and women in Christ, our walk is so much longer still. It’s to be a life of shining the love of Jesus. Will you take it from here?
—
Jeff Hopper
January 2, 2019
Copyright 2019 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.