Eric Camp for MS House District 111

This is the first season of the men’s softball team at Oasis and just in the past week or so I have been asked to take over the coaching responsibilities. I love coaching. It’s what I do for a living! It’s my calling! Being a Sr. Pastor,  I am a life coach everyday! Coaching is more than putting together a line-up and deciding who to play and where and when to substitute.

Before I go any further with that thought, the fan base that has come out to the games from Oasis… WOW! You guys rock! The crowds have been great and by far more of our people have come out than any other church we have played! The crowd has been large and loud! I love it! The Crowd in itself is motivation for the team. Without the support of the crowd, it would be difficult to stay motivated when we play in a slump or make an error or strike out or whatever.

The Crowd can also be challenging when you do make that error, because more people are watching and more people get disappointed when you do mess up. Case in point, I am a pretty aggressive base coach. If I think the runner can beat the throw, I am more likely to send them home than play it safe and remain on base. Twice this season I have made a bad judgement call and got the runner thrown out at home. It happens. The Crowd was disappointed. I was disappointed. The runner was disappointed.

With that foundation being made, Life is alot like softball. There will be the up days and the down days. Sometimes we make some bad calls, sometimes we make some right calls, sometimes we get a hit and sometimes we fly out. Sometimes we will be disappointed and sometimes we will be extremely joyous! Being a life coach and the coach of the softball team go hand and hand too. You have to place people in the right positions, which is where their strength and ability is, it is wise to place them in the right part of the lineup for better effectiveness of running through your batting order. (fast guys as lead off men and strength toward the middle of the lineup to bring them home). In life, people need to serve and do where they are gifted and talented in order to complete the picture of the puzzle of God’s Church.

We also however have to learn some valuable lessons…

You wont win every challenge. You wont always come out on top. The crowd will not always be cheering. You will make some mistakes. But  at the end of the day, even though the competition is tough and you want to win, we always have to remember that when it is all said and done, our character and class will be remembered far longer than whether we won or lost. I would rather lose every game and have loads of fun than go out there and play with tension and stress and lack of class any day!I’ll pull someone off the field for an attitude quicker than I will for making a fielding error.

Even with the crowd cheering and the roar of success when we achieve it, the most important voice is the voice of God. We are representing Jesus in every area of our lives. Listening to the One Voice that guides us and directs us is far more important than listening the voices of the crowd. Dont let the crowd drown out The One in your life.

In the midst of a crowd, I can pick out my wife’s or my son’s voice above all and I could hear them individually even in a crowd. The reason is because I am more familiar with their voice and they are my ultimate priority.

Make the Voice of The Holy Spirit your ultimate priority and whether you win or lose or the crowd is loud or silent, you know and understand in everything you do, you are really still playing for an audience of ONE.