Starting Right
Starting Right is a 5 minute Day Starter to help keep you motivated, encouraged, and focused throughout your day. DannyMac is a pastor, teacher, motivational speaker, husband, and father. His years of leading and training people have given him vast experience in helping individuals to accomplish change in their lives and meet their goals. He can help you set the course for your day by offering practical advice from God's Word in a positive and fun way. There is no better way to begin your day than by Starting Right with DannyMac.
Starting Right
When Baseball Becomes Something Greater Than a Game
What does true perfection look like? A father of a child with learning disabilities challenges our understanding with a profound question at a school fundraiser. Rather than measuring perfection through abilities or achievements, he suggests something revolutionary: perfection is found in how we respond to those who are different.
How might we demonstrate this kind of perfection in our own lives today? Join me Monday through Friday for more stories that will inspire you to start your day right.
Good morning and welcome to Starting Right with Danny Mac. I'm going to be here every Monday to Friday to help you get a great five-minute start to your day. So grab your cup of coffee, sit back, relax and let me help you start your day right. There is a Hebrew school in Brooklyn, new York, that caters to children with learning disabilities. Several years ago, at one of their fundraisers, a father was asked to give the speech. He stood up and told of the wonderful things the school had done for his son, shea, and how great the teachers were and how wonderful all of the staff and the curriculum was. But then he stopped for a moment and he said this when is the perfection in my son Shay? Everything God does is done with perfection, but my child cannot understand things as other children do. My child cannot remember facts and figures as other children do. Where is God's perfection? The audience was understandably shocked by the question. There was silence for a moment and the father said I believe that when God brings a child like this into the world, the perfection that he seeks is in the way people react to this child. And then the father told this story about his son Shea.
Speaker 1:One afternoon, shea and his father walked past a park where some boys Shea knew were playing baseball. Shea asked do you think they will let me play? Shea's father knew that his son was not at all athletic and that most boys would not want him on their team. But Shea's father understood that if his son was chosen to play, it would give him a wonderful and much-needed sense of belonging. Shea's dad approached one of the boys in the field and asked if Shea could play. The boy looked around for some insight and guidance from his teammates, but he didn't get any. So he took Madison to his own hands and said well, we are losing by six runs and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we'll try to put him up to bat in the ninth inning. Shea's father was ecstatic as Shea smiled broadly. Shea was told to put on a glove and go out and play in center field. In the bottom of the eighth inning, shea's team scored a few runs but was still behind by three. In the bottom of the ninth inning Shea's team scored again, and now with two outs and the bases loaded with potentially the winning run on base, shea was scheduled to be up next. Shea's father wondered if they would actually let Shea have a bat and give away their chance to win the game. Surprisingly, and without hesitation, shea was given the bat.
Speaker 1:Everyone knew that winning was now all but impossible because Shea didn't even Shea was given the bat. Everyone knew that winning was now all but impossible because Shea didn't even know how to hold the bat properly, let alone hit with it. However, as Shea stepped up to the plate, the pitcher moved a few steps forward to lob the ball in softly so Shea should at least be able to make contact. The first pitch came in and Shea swung clumsily and missed. One of Shea's teammates came up behind him and together they held the bat and faced the pitcher waiting for the next pitch. The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly towards Shea. As the pitch came in, shea and his teammates swung at the ball together and they hit a slow ground ball to the pitcher.
Speaker 1:The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could easily have thrown the ball to first base. Shea would have been out and that would have been the end of the game. Instead, the pitcher took the ball and threw it in a high arc to right field, far beyond the reach of the first baseman, everybody started yelling Shea run to first, run to first. Never in his life had Shea run to first. He scampered down the baseline wide-eyed and startled by the time he reached first base. The right fielder had the ball. He could have thrown the ball to the second baseman, who would have tagged out Shea, who was still running. But the right fielder understood what the pitcher's intentions were, so he threw the ball high and far over the third baseman's head. Everyone yelled run to second, run to second.
Speaker 1:Shea ran towards second base as the runners ahead of him circled the bases towards home. As Shea reached second base, the opposing shortstop ran to him, turned him in the direction of third base and shouted run to third. As Shea rounded third, the boys from both teams ran behind him, screaming Shea, run home. Shea ran home, stepped on home plate and all 18 boys lifted him on their shoulders and made him the hero, as he had just hit a grand slam and won the game for his team. The father, with tears now rolling down his face, said that day those 18 boys reached their level of God's perfection.
Speaker 1:Romans, chapter 12 and verse 10 in the English Standard Version says this Love is not just a feeling, it's an action. It means putting others' needs before your own and serving others selflessly. It means being generous with our time, our resources, our talents and using them to bless others, just like those boys did on that baseball field that day. I hope you have a great day, my friends. We'll talk again tomorrow. Thank you for listening today, and I invite you to join me Monday to Friday, right here on Starting Right with Danny Mac.
