I knew several of the staff members, but I only knew 1 other baseball guy that I would be working with for 3 days. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to. I wasn’t sure if I had the time. I wondered if this was what I was supposed to do. All those thoughts ran through my head as the time drew near for EPOS camp this week. This is originally the EPIC camp that I wrote about a couple of years ago. We didn’t get to have it last year due to Covid. So it had been 2 years. It is a faith based sports camp. Athletes come from all over to experience what it has to offer. I knew it was a good thing, but I honestly just had mixed feelings about me being there for several reasons.
I have talked on here about the ups and downs of the Christian life. I have discussed my ups and downs and how sometimes we get into a rut or a lull and it is hard to get out. That’s where I have been the last few months. That is why I haven’t written on here since February. I actually didn’t realize it had been that long until I got on here tonight. I got busy this spring with school activities and coaching and parenting that I just lost track of time.
With that I also lost some of my fire for God. I slipped into that rut and just went through the motions. So I showed up this week to EPOS with only one other guy helping with baseball from the previous year. We had been in a group text with all the other guys, but I didn’t really know what to expect. But I put on my big boy pants and went up to Stillwater to see what happened. It wasn’t that I was dreading the camp. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe in what it was about or that I didn’t think it was a good thing. I was just in a rut. But, it is funny how God works.
If the foundation of Christ is there, it never leaves you. He never goes a way. So I go to the camp to help instruct it as well as help the athletes from a personal and spiritual standpoint as well. We talk with them and pray with them as well as instruct them on their specific sport. So Sunday I meet up with the other baseball instructors. We spent part of Sunday and all of the next 3 days together and I came home in a different spiritual realm that I have been in a long time. Hopefully I touched some people along the way this week. Hopefully I influenced some people in a positive way this week. But let me tell you, I was the one that came back enriched and recharged.
I prayed to God before I went up there that we would have a great week, and did we ever. I prayed with young men, I talked with young men, and I got to play baseball with young men for 3 days. It was such an uplifting experience. To cap it off, I got to do all of that with my oldest son. He was old enough to get to go to the camp with me this year. That was awesome in itself. We are home tonight and he is writing down our baseball saying in his notebook before he goes to bed tonight that says, “God gives us strength, God gives us power, God gives us encouragement.” And He absolutely does those things.
The other coaches that I had the pleasure of being around this week were incredible. I was uplifted by them. It honestly felt like after 3 days that we had known each other for 20 years. What a special team that EPOS has put together from the top down. It was just what I needed at just the right time.
You see, God is always there. Even when you go through a few months like I had where I got overwhelmed and just went through the spiritual motions. It happens to everyone. But, God will stay true to us. He will work in our life if we let him. With God’s help, we will overcome satan’s plan for us to go through the motions. Sometimes we don’t see it at the time, but that is Satan saying you don’t need to be on fire for God. Just go through the motions. Just be a lukewarm Christian. Jesus says in Revalation 3:15-16, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other. So because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold-I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” That verse is still powerful to me every time I read it. We can all be lukewarm at times.
If you are in a rut, I challenge you to this week to pray to God that He will help lift you out of that low spot. But, we also have to listen once we ask that. We have to act on where the spirit leads us. We have to trust his lead without hesitation. I had someone once tell me that baseball, as well as life, is like climbing a mountain. You work really hard to get to the top and be the best you can be. Then at some point you get to the top. You are ridin’ high at that point. Then what is the next thing to happen? You have to go down at some point too. You won’t stay at the top forever. You have to go down one side or the other. It’s up to us how far we fall before we pick ourselves back up and start working to get back to the top. That illustration has stuck with me since that day.
We have to start with self-reflection and realize that we are in that situation to begin with. That can be humbling sometimes. But, if we trust God, He will lead us out of that rut and lift us up again. That comes in all different ways. He might just accomplish this by having you spend 3 days with mostly strangers that are on fire for God. They might just be the encouragement you needed to get back on track again (Thanks to a lot of people for that this week). Thank goodness that His plan is greater than ours!