Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

Over the past two years, I've wanted to develop a solid, consistent spiritual base for this tennis team. So we started last summer at tennis camp focusing on 4 verbs. Recognizing what God is doing for us in the present, remembering the ways that God has been with us in the past, blessing others in the same ways that God has blessed us, and bringing everyone and everything under prayer in conversation with God.

Perhaps I have been a bit lax this year about in the face of the team with these themes, it has been a difficult year. And yet, God has been active in many ways. God has blessed us in many ways. And I think it is worth asking the question of ourselves: Have we noticed? Have we remembered our God? Have we cared for others? Have we been in prayer?

I know that the answer for me is "no" for some of those questions. And as much as it has been "no," I have been distant from God. We have gone through many trials this tennis season, and I, like a fool, have tried to take a lot of it on my own back. I can't handle it all. But the whole time I've been prideful in my own efforts, decisions, and accomplishments, God has been at work too. I believe it's about time to slow my efforts, humble myself, and recognize how God has been present.

Recognize
- God has blessed our goals, we have worked hard and we have improved. The tournament this weekend was testament to that.
- We have been given the opportunity to become a united team. Everyone that is/and has been giving, encouraging, helpful to others and worked toward the team goal of improvement has a community of friends around them supporting them.
- We have been given the opportunity to share in the success of others. Seth's undefeated run this weekend gave us one opportunity. Ben's lone victory against Fairfield gave us another. Kyle and Austin's comeback win against Westview was another chance to celebrate with others. Their have been moments of God's beauty that have come through.
- And as this season starts to draw to a close, and the blessings above begin to be seen, I feel that their really is a peace about this team. An assurance and a confidence is growing. We have matured and are still maturing at the same time. It is a peaceful journey, and we all have been a part of that peace.

Remember
- God has certainly given us memories this tennis season, from tennis camp through the first 9 weeks. I am thankful for those memories.
- I remember from further back though, I remember how I poured prayer over last year's team, and how God responded specifically to my prayers... for Jeremy Thomas to play his best tennis, for Daniel to keep his cool under calm and be blessed for his hard work, for Jared's ability to have confidence in his dominance, for Johnny to believe that he and Jeremy could compete with anyone. And God answered those and more...

Bless
- We still have the opportunity to thank God for the blessings by passing the blessing forward to others. How we do that is a question for all of us to think about.
- Can we bring unity to other situations we are a part of? School, family, church, etc.?
- Can we bring peace to situations in which we are causing conflict? With friends, teachers, family, others?
- Can we lift up the less fortunate in any way? Donating time, giving what we can, paying attention to how our actions affect them?
- How will we pass the blessing on?

Pray
I encourage us all to think about bring the recognition, remembrance, blessing all together in prayer. Communicate with God about all that is going on, and bring others before him as well.
- Pray for the other teams that we will play in Sectional. Pray for health, pray for good things to be happening in their lives, pray for them to play well.
- Pray for your teammates, especially those whose season is ending tonight or tomorrow. The younger guys need the blessing of having older guys come along side them.
- Pray for yourself, honestly. Bring burdens and stresses and joys before God. Let God hear you, loud and clear.
- Pray for others. Whoever they may be. The soccer team, your next door neighbor, Andrew Lanctot, whoever. Let yourself be a person of prayer.

These are my thoughts as we enter the last weeks of the season. I have been proud of this team, every one who has been a part of it at any point. We have grown on the courts, and I think we are growing as people. Let's keep both tennis and personal growth going strong.

Pray.

"We all know we're gonna reap what we sow... So why not just let us forgive everyone, everywhere, everything, all the time..."
--- mewithoutYou, "Bullet to Binary (Part Two)"

It's tricky to pray for your enemies. I mean, Jesus is pretty clear about the fact that we are supposed to pray. But sometimes it is not so easy to figure what we are supposed to pray. "Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you." Okay, and what exactly do I say.

Especially when those "enemies" are actually opponents. What do you pray for people that you have to face off in competition against? We want to win the match, and yet we want the best for our opponents as well. And sometimes, our opponents can make us upset, angry, feeling cheated or completely demoralized.

That's why I think there is a really important prayer for us, that Jesus teaches us from the cross. "Father, forgive them..." Sometimes, in the heat of rivalries or in the heat of competition we can easily turn bitter and angry at opponents. Sometimes when we get our own emotions and self-worth tied up into what we are doing, the game we are playing, whether we win or lose; well, at those times we can feel as if we hate the opponents who just missed a call. Or who we thought missed a call. Or played with their strings to make us get a little tighter on the next serve. Or called a line judge because they thought we might have missed a call. Or... the list goes on and on.

Holding that frustration, that unforgiveness, can be very damaging to us as people. There is a release in letting it go. There is a realization that everyone makes mistakes, we do too, and things will even up. And even more, there is a trust in God.

Forgiveness is a statement that we believe God is working in all the world to make all situations turn about for the good. And maybe he is still working in the people we've been wronged by. But forgiveness is saying that I will not take revenge, I will not try to correct the problem, but I will let God continue to work.

I mean, we need forgiveness too. Just the other day, Russell called a ball out that was clearly in. He didn't mean to. He was convinced that the ball was out. But he made a mistake. We all do. And we don't want everyone holding everything against each other.

Instead, for our part, let's do some letting go when we need to. Let's pray that we will be able to forgive, willing to forgive, and that forgiveness will be extended to us when we mess up.

Pray.

In the last post on prayer, I pointed out how we can pray for ourselves just like Jesus prayed for himself. That we can be honest, be in relationship with God, and ultimately pray that our actions will match up with what God would want in all situations. But there is more to the way we live than just ourselves, and there is more to prayer than just ourselves.

Here, I want to tackle how we pray for our community. The people that surround us in daily situations. This could be family, church, classmates, and lots of others, but for us it also includes our tennis team. How do we live and how do we pray for those that we share a tennis court with 2 hours every evening? What is the purpose of going before God for those with whom we sit next to on a sweaty mini-bus ride?

Or, since we are trying to take a step to become like Christ, how would Jesus pray for his community?

From John 17: "I pray... that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you."

Jesus' prayer for those who were to believe in him was that they would all be one, just as he and the Father were one. That those who believe in Christ, their very essence would be tied up in one another. And that the essence of God would shine through that unity. That people could look at Christ's followers and identify the character of God within their unity.

So, how is the unity on the tennis team? Are we tied up into one another's lives? How about one another's matches? Are you as concerned with where Matt Ebersole will play as where you will? As concerned about Austin's match as you are about your own? Okay, this may be hard to do, but we want to be as one. That means we all commit to our goals, our aims, and to each other.

We need to invest ourselves into the success of others on the team. Don't forget that one of the blessings that we studied from Psalm 128 was that we would get to see the success of others in our community. That should be a source of joy for us, seeing others succeed, because they are us and we are them. We are one.

Selflessness does not come easily. Unity does not come without effort. That is where prayer comes in. It's a first action to take, a request and communication, but also a reminder of how we hope to act. When I pray for unity, for oneness, I am asking God to work in mysterious ways that I may never know to draw our team together. But in saying the very words, I should be reminded of my responsibility to promote that very unity.

Coming together is important. A united team will leave lasting memories and change our lives, our confidence, our worth, and our play more than anything. Be in prayer for this simple yet complex request. Be acting upon it too.

Prayer Wall 2009

As we come into a new season, starting Tuesday, we need a running spot to pray for one another. In the comments below, leave prayer requests, thoughts, concerns, and etc.

We talked in our team meeting Wednesday about three types of prayer: for ourselves, for our community, and then for others (especially our opponents and those we struggle with). Feel free to leave requests from any of those areas.

I can't wait to watch us grow in faith, throughout the year and the season. Here is a place to start.

Pray.

For the beginning of the season, one of our focus points is prayer. My highest priority for this season is that each one of you tennis players takes the next step of faith with Christ, whatever that may be. Perhaps you are already diligently committed to Christ, and now taking on God's likeness and character in your many activities and relationships is your next step. Perhaps you don't take faith seriously, and that is your next step. Perhaps you believe but never take action. Perhaps you believe but don't have any relationship with God. Whatever it is, I hope that we will all mature through the joys and difficulties of this season, myself included.

So one of the major ways we commune with God is prayer. This week I want to look at several of Jesus' prayers and try to see what we can learn from the way Jesus prayed to God. I mean, if being Christ-like is a goal, then perhaps we can be Christ-like in our prayers.

First of all, did Jesus pray for himself? I mean, Jesus talked a lot about loving others, praying for those who persecute you (and we'll get to that), and so on and so on. But did he pray for himself ever?

"Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done." --- Luke 22:42

So the answer is yes, Jesus did pray for himself. Right in the middle of that verse, Jesus prayed for what he wanted: "take this cup from me." Don't make me have to go through the suffering, don't make me have to go through the betrayal of my friends, don't make me have to go through death. He prayed for himself. But there is so much more inside this simple prayer.

Look at how Jesus addresses the prayer, for example. "Father." Now, we can debate if God is male or female or neither, but that's not the point. Father is a personal term, a term of relationship. It can be a good relationship, a bad relationship, a strained relationship, or whatever. But it is a relationship. So Jesus prayer is addressed as personal. Not to some god out there somewhere that might be listening, but to a God with whom Jesus had a relationship.

Secondly, and maybe most importantly, Jesus is brutal honest in his prayer for himself. Remember, Jesus knows why he has to suffer and knows that it is necessary. And yet, despite his perfect character and sinless, he doesn't want to do it! And he tells God so.

If prayer is a way to communicate in a relationship, then we must be honest. It allows us to get everything out on the table with how we might be feeling and then move on from there. It allows God to know that we are not holding back from the relationship. It voices our desires and frees us from the anguish of them, sometimes. God often answers honest prayers. Back in Genesis, God is going to wipe Sodom and Gomorrah off the face of the earth, but Abraham confronts God and tells him that what God is about to do is unfair. And God listens! God doesn't mind honest prayers in the least. When we pray for ourselves we must be honest.

But...

Jesus is prayer is framed by two VERY important phrases: "if you are willing... not my will, but yours be done." Jesus understands his relationship to his Father. He understands that he must be humble and submit himself to God. God cannot be a vending machine. We cannot treat God as if God must do everything we ask God to. If our Lord did everything we honestly asked, then God would no longer be a God. God would just be a slave. Our slave. And that view makes for a very weak God and very prideful humans.

Instead, let's recognize that God is in control. God created the world in power, God created us to be in relationship together and with God's very being, and God loves us very much. But the world will work in the way God desires it to. Their are consequences to our actions that God may not want us to escape from. If we want to really be fully like God, we also must experience suffering and disappointment, because those are things God has experienced too. There are many other reasons for pain and disappointment, but let's realize we can't order God around.

And because of this, that brings us back to Jesus' personal and relational nature of the prayer. If he is not ordering God around, then this is a prayer to deepen their relationship and strengthen Jesus before he does God's will. All prayer is personal and relational.

So, to sum it up, personal prayer, prayer for ourselves is:
1) For relationship with God
2) Honest
3) Humble

In this tennis season, let us relate with God. In thanks for our good performances, in petitions for our mental and emotional states during matches, for strength and concentration to practice, for love and acceptance of our teammates, for forgiveness when we've done something wrong, for understanding when something has happened that we can't handle. For many things... but let us pray.

Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

I left aside the usual Thursday to come back to something more important today. As the school year drags on and we get further away from tennis season, further away from the influences and blessings that God placed in our lives, we also may tend to lose what we learned from that time.

I forget often about the value of hard work in completing a task successfully, about how the Lord will bless the labor that we do if we honor God with it. I forget the importance of praying for those who annoy or oppose me. I forget the blessing that I can be to many of my students.

So I wanted to put this back out here for comments.

What lessons do you remember learning throughout this past year?
In what ways is the Lord working in your life right now?
Do you see places where others need you to be a blessing?
Have you continued to pray for the annoying, the opposing, and your enemies?

I hope we can continue thinking about these themes for quite a while!

(By the way, the picture says recognize, remember, bless, and pray in Hebrew)

Holiday Season: Pray

This was supposed to automatically post on Christmas Eve, but I just noticed it never did. It is a short simple message for all of us to remember.

Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

Recognize: Answered Prayer.
--- From the "Prayer Wall"

"May we eat the fruit of our labor; may blessings and Your presence be with us."
So far, answered.

"Be with everyone's health and strength and allow us to play our best when it counts the most."
So far, answered.

"Please help me to conquer my fear of losing in sectional."
Answered.

"Keep more rain off us, but when it does rain, enable us to use the extra time well. Help the rain to be a blessing in some way.
This was previously answered. We added and won the Penn match because of the rain.

"Help me to remember how to play the kind of clutch tennis I could last year."
So far, answered.

"Be with all the teams approaching sectional, and help everyone to be sportsmanlike and make good line calls, and for those who play their last match, help it to be fun and not a huge let-down."
I think Fairfield would say it was fun.

Remember: What it feels like to play well, with confidence.
Take this blessing of the Lord's into our next matches.

Bless: Our opponents again.
We have been playing well, we have been playing fairly. Let's continue this into the Regional, hoping that others will play well also. Let's enjoy our matches!

Pray: Continuously.
Let us keep this cycle in our mind, and continue to bless others with our prayer as well. Our families, our teammates, our classmates, our opponents all can be the recipients of our prayers. Let us bless them and seek the Lord together in a journey of discipleship.

Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

This cycle has been critical to our development as disciples this year. As the season drags longer, we get wrapped up in so many things. This cycle can bring us back to where we need to be. Most of it is the "thinking" part of our "think and act" mantra. It allows God to again become a part of our thoughts, so that our actions flow out of praise, thankfulness, and truth and not the other kind of mixed up emotions that bombard us throughout life.

So what do we recognize God doing among us right now? We're all healthy heading into the tournament. We're all still in good relationships with our teammates and coaches. We've been able to come together as one, and that's exciting because it lessens the pressure come tournament time. Like Johnny said, we're not going to be disappointed in anyone, we're still going to love them. I recognize that this love and relationship-building between players happens on a small level, but to have 7, 8, 10, 12 or even more guys supporting each, their is a spirit of God at work among us. I praise God for the Spirit's presence here with us, at this point in our season.

What do we remember that God has done for us this season? I remember Johnny and Mikey's timely recovery from injury. Quicker than expected in Johnny's case. I remember the rain wiping out the Warsaw Invitational, and because of that we got to pick up Westview, Concord, and Penn. I don't know what God's involvement really was in all that, but for me, that is an example of how God steps into bad situations and makes them turn out for the good. It's such a big part of God's character to redeem bad situations and make them turn for the good. So perhaps the rain was just a natural consequence of a natural hurricane during normal hurricane season, but the natural situation was still turned for our good. I thank God that bad situations are never hopeless, because we know the Lord is at work.

How are we blessing right now? Well, the unity of the team comes to mind. And that we are hopefully lifting the other teams in the area up in prayer. And that we have been preparing to bless others because of the way that the Lord has blessed us. And that I'm constantly reminding us to think of being a bless, so much that it's all you'll probably remember of me when you all graduate and are coaching your own tennis teams. But I guess it's an okay thing to remember. I've been blessed by the way you guys take faith fairly seriously and allow me to speak about it. Let us continue to be a blessing.

And pray. The place where everything comes together. The place where we tell God of our love, and how we recognize God's work, the stories we remember of God's presence among us. The place where we ask God who in our life needs a blessing, and how we can provide it. A place of honesty, of humility, of thankfulness, of praise. A place to plead for God's presence, blessing, grace and mercy. I am not ashamed to say I will be praying right up and through the tournament, no matter what happens.

Because I have recognized that God's works all situations for good.

Bless Others, Pray for Others

In this time leading up to Sectional, it is easy to forget our ideas this season of blessing others and praying for our enemies as we instead focus our prayers on our own goals, hopes and fears. While it is very important to take the issues we are dealing with before the Lord, we should not let ourselves become the entire focus of our spiritual thoughts.

Because I care so much about tennis, so much about the season, so much about each of our players, that it is very easy for me to let that consume all of my thoughts and prayers. It crowds out my wife, it crowds out my son, it crowds out my school work, it crowds out my study of Scripture, it crowds out my work at my church, it crowds out my work in the community. In short, tennis can become an idol for me if I'm not careful. It can become something for me that I judge my whole faith based on how tennis is going. It's really intensely selfish.

So this simple reminder is to keep our eyes out for others this week. Perhaps praying for the other teams in Sectional, perhaps helping out around the school, perhaps cheering up the JV players who are suddenly done with their season. I hope that we can keep ourselves open to how God is working all around us, and not be consumed with tennis every waking hour.

So prayers for each other and for the Sectional are appreciated and needed, our hard work and focus at practice is needed, but let's ask a little more of ourselves. Let's bless someone other than a teammate this week. Let's pray for others too.

Pray

Prayer has been the place this season when everything comes together. Prayer is the place where we have been able to recognize and thank God for what God's work and presence in our team. Prayer is the place we have been able to remember God working in years and months past and ask God to do these wonderful things again. Prayer is the place that we have been able to stay open to blessings, asking God to keep our eyes open for opportunities to support others. Prayer has even been a blessing that we sought blessing on behalf of our opponents.

The team has teased me this year that if they had one word to describe me and what I talk about it would be "bless." I'm flattered by that, I want these great guys on my team to grow and mature into servants of all. But I don't want to lose the importance of prayer. Blessing others without allowing the Spirit of God to influence your actions ends up being pointless. You end up relying on your own wisdom to decide where to give time and money and help, and then you'll end up just being tired. Prayer rejuvenates, prayer is a time of rest, prayer is a time of thought, prayer is the time of repose.

As we head toward the end of the season, I hope prayer will be in the forefront of our thoughts. We should still pray for our opponents, because though we will compete we want the ultimate good for all people. We should be praying for our teammates, because we all struggle and we all need support. We should be praying for ourselves, because we all become tired, injured, and disinterested and sometimes we just need someone to hear our cry for mercy.

So let prayer and blessing define the last several weeks of the tennis season, together. Pray and bless, bless and pray. Repose and movement, movement and repose.

Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

Are we seeing and recognizing God's presence anywhere as of late?
--> Perhaps taking the bad situation with the rain and making it better by providing an opportunity to play Concord, Westview, and Penn?
--> Perhaps the JV getting another match against LaVille is a blessing, it's always good to play more!
--> Perhaps you can think of something else?

Are we carrying with us the confidence that God will continue to be our hope in the present and future because of what God has done in the past?
--> God has taken poor performances and turned them into beautiful endings.
--> God has helped everything come together at the right time.
--> God has done many other things for you personally, what are they?

Are we blessing others?
--> Do we sincerely care about those around us?
--> Do we look for places to serve others?
--> Do we encourage our teammates and classmates?
--> Do we respond to God's blessings with blessings of our own?

Are we praying?
--> For our teammates?
--> For our families?
--> For our school?
--> For our "enemies"?
--> For our world?

Pray.

We head into our last couple weeks of practice and play with a lot in our minds. We are off to a better start than we've ever had before, we are playing well, and I think most of us are enjoying the season.

When times are good, I think that it is the hardest to remember that our strength comes from the Lord. There just seems to be little that is truly pressing, truly desperate, truly troubling, so we often just put God away until those things pop up. Right now, we've gone through a stretch of matches that we've handled easily, we're into a routine at school, I hope that we haven't fallen completely into a routine with our prayers, especially if that means that we're not praying at all.

I just want to bring up the large picture, and then give God time to keep changing us. We pray that the season will continue injury free, that we will keep playing to the best of our ability, being rewarded for the work that we've put in. We pray for the ongoing concerns that have been posted on the Prayer Wall. We pray that we are able to continue to keep our focus and our desire. We pray for our continually developing relationships and friendships. We pray for our opponents.

Times are pretty good, God is pretty good. Let us recognize that as well. Thank You God for the beginning of this season, continue to be with us as it goes on.

Prayer Wall

As we approach the start of the 2008 season, I want to reflect on our theme for the year: Recognize. Remember. Bless. Pray.

We have talked at practice about recognizing how the Lord is blessing us right here and now, how God has provided for us knowledge and strength in the past, and we have participated in an activity of blessing others. Which leads us in this cycle of verbs to the final one, to pray.

So I put this here on the website and will link it on the side so that all year, this post will reflect our prayer requests and how God blesses us throughout the year. In the comments section, simply leave whatever it is that you want prayer for, tennis related or not, and as a team we are going to commit to pray for the things that are left in this space.

If you check the comments, you'll see that I've already left the first request of the Lord for this season. Let's come together as one this year as we lift ourselves into the care and recognize the presence of the Lord.