How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings. (Psalms 36:7, NIV)
Golf is a tough sport. It only allows for one winner in every event. Many golfers compete, but only one can win any particular contest.
We see this phenomenon every week on television, where the best of the best compete against one another, dealing with both their desire to win and the unlikely possibility that they will. Every Thursday, each player puts herself out there to compete and risks the possibility that she might finish dead last. I’m sure that in some ways it might seem easier to skip playing altogether.
As in all things golf, I see the correlation between this aspect of the game and how God calls us to live.
Every person who trusts in and believes in Jesus has an appointed purpose that no other person can accomplish.We are all called to run the race without knowing exactly how it will work out. Actually, we do know that our efforts to please God will ultimately be rewarded. What we don’t know is what that race will look like. Will God use us in a clearly visible way, or will we have a hard time seeing how we fit in to his overall plan. Will we wonder if what we are doing really matters very much and if our life really counts? Should we just take the salvation promise and hang on to it and let someone else do the work of the kingdom because they are smarter or better suited? Should we just skip running the race altogether because we see ourselves as too untalented to do better than finish last?
Fortunately for all of us, it doesn’t matter to God whether we are high or low or first or last in the eyes of the world, because his unfailing love covers all of us. God knows each of us personally and individually and takes whatever we have in the way of talent and ability and uses it if we are willing to let him. He is not concerned about whether we are a winner in life as the world defines it, but he urges every one of us to take what we have been given and give it back to him. Each one of us is uniquely positioned in our own little world to be an ambassador for him. We are not competing against any other Christian and are not measured against other people’s worldly success. What God judges in the end is how willing we were to use what we have been given to glorify him.
There are no losers in the kingdom of God. Every person who trusts in and believes in Jesus has an appointed purpose that no other person can accomplish. Some will be used to help save hundreds and others may only be appointed to help one other person. We can all find refuge and purpose in the shadow of his wings covered by his priceless unfailing love. He doesn’t ask us to win, just to run with everything we’ve got.
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Linda Ballard
February 7, 2019
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.