Osmosis

I had a terrific weekend. I took my girls pee wee baseball team to a tournament in Vernon. We were a perfect 1 and 15 going into the tourney so I had very low expectations of my kids though I managed to work up a pretty convincing motivational speech (or so I thought). The first game of the tournament my girls overwhelmed me. They played the best game I have seen them play. Making tough plays, hitting some tremendous and exciting balls, and running the bases like pros! I think they played so well they even shocked themselves. Well to make a long blog short, the team advanced to the playoff round today (Sunday). They won their first game and played even better than the first game the day before! This meant that they could advance to the medal round. Because of our win loss record we ended up playing for the bronze medal. Unfortunately, my girls just plain old ran out of gas. The average temperature of both days was close to 30 degrees Celsius and it had really taken its toll on them. We did lose the game but what a fantastic feeling to come in 4th place. Especially when we had to beat teams that we had lost to during our regular season evening games. I have had a great time coaching and getting to know the parents of these girls and enjoying some great fun along the way.
I was thinking about how much time and energy it takes me to coach this team. I was wondered if it was worth it, and I was suddenly aware of the significant value in taking the time to befriend, train, encourage and mentor a few girls. My prayer is that one day my love for God and my love for others will pay off in more ways than just having fun together playing ball.
I wished I could see me from their perspective. What do they notice most about me? What do they think is crazy and what do they admire about who I am? What about me annoys them? But I suppose this is all just in my head. Maybe they don't even think about any of this. I hope that the Lord is somehow rubbing off on them by osmosis!