Sports Mania
If your child participates in sports you probably try to be there, if possible, to cheer them on. There you are yelling from the sidelines, encouraging them. Hopefully, you are not THAT parent; usually there is at least one, acting the fool. I admit that too often I let the moment become too important and didn’t see the big picture with my kids. I have never been very “sporty”, but I always wanted my kids to do as well as possible and sometimes I pushed too hard. Winning is not everything. If it is, then we have really lost the purpose of involvement in sports and it goes from positive to negative pretty quickly. Really, learning how to handle losing is probably one of the best things we ever learn. Life is filled with winning, but it is also filled with losing.
Zephaniah 3:17 (NASB95) “The Lord your God is in your midst, A victorious warrior. He will exult over you with joy, He will be quiet in His love, He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy.
This is promise specifically for the remnant of Israel, but in Christ we are one and are invited into this promise. So get this in your spirit today, “God rejoices over you”. This is not talking about when we get to heaven, then God will finally be able to rejoice over us. Not when we finally get our act together and stop doing stupid things. This is talking about right now, while we are still doing stupid things. Because of Jesus, because we have been justified in Christ, thankfully God sees us through the lens of Christ’s perfect and complete sacrifice.
So rejoice over your kids the way the God rejoices over you. In the scheme of things this game, this activity, this dance recital is just a tiny moment in your child’s life. Don’t make it bigger than how much you love them.
I love you also, Pastor Randy