St. Marks United Methodist Church

This past Sunday night, St. Mark’s hosted the second annual Staff versus Youth Basketball Game.  The proceeds from the game are used to help fund the youth group’s annual Appalachia Service Project mission work.  For those who may have forgotten like I tried to, the youth won last year’s game in convincing fashion.  So this year’s game provided a chance at redemption for the staff. 

Eric Hagman, our Director of Youth Minitries, organized and attempted to ‘coach’ the staff team.  He scheduled two practices and a film session.  While that may sound like a lot, in reality it was little more than a chance for most of the staff to touch a basketball for the first time since last year and the only film that was shown was a recap of some really bad line dancing we did for the introductory videos that were shown right before the game started Sunday night. 

During practice last Tuesday, Eric passed out our ‘jerseys’.  Okay so ‘jersey’ may be a little bit of an overstatement.  In actuality the so called ‘jersey’ was little more than a green crew t-shirt with navy sleeves.  The ‘jerseys’ had no numbers and no names on the back.  I did however happen to notice as I went to pull on my so called ‘jersey’ that the tag in the back of the shirt read FADED GLORY.  How appropriate for a bunch of middle to slightly older aged, desk-jockey, out-of-shape, has-been church staff members!  Faded Glory is not only a great brand name for shirts from Wal-Mart… it is also perfectly describes the staff team. 

Even a casual observer of warm-ups the night of the game would have been able to tell you that the youth were going to crush the staff.  The youth were bigger, taller, faster, and actually making shots.  One youth even dunked a few times.  Not intimidating at all…

The game started and the youth quickly raced ahead.  But thanks to a spot on the floor – behind half court – that was labeled 10 pts. and Eric’s sharp shooting, the staff stayed in the game.  At the half the youth were ahead but not so much that a comeback by the staff seemed impossible or improbable!  Yea, right!  Seriously!  The second half was full of runs and at one point the game did look out of reach.  The youth were something like 24 plus points ahead.  But Eric hit 2 key 10 pointers and with 2 minutes left we were down by only 4 points.  I quickly called a time out and we huddled up.  Once play resumed we quickly cut the youth lead to 2 pts.  On a subsequent drive down the court I got fouled and went to the line.

The score was 90 to 88.  Seven seconds remained on the game clock.  The ball was in my hands.  It is the moment every kid who ever picks up a ball in his driveway dreams about.  I dribbled twice, caught the ball, eyed the net, and then released the ball…swoosh…nothing but net.  A second time I dribbled twice, caught the ball, eyed the net and then released the ball…only this time the ball rimmed out.  A youth grabbed the rebound, threw the ball down court to a teammate who proceed to score on a layup as the buzzer sounded.  Another year…another loss for the staff.  So far we are 0-2. 

I told the seniors on the youth team after that game that I missed the second foul shot intentionally.  I told them it was my “gift to the seniors”.  The truth is I wanted to win so bad.  I hate losing.  I didn’t try to miss that shot.  I wanted it to fall.  I wanted to be the hero.  I wanted the glory.  But alas it wasn’t meant to be!  As the ball rimmed out so did my chance at glory…it faded away right there before my very eyes.  So I guess the label in the back of the ‘jersey’ was prophetic in a sense…Sunday night my basket ball skills were little more than Faded Glory. 

My years as a youth are long gone (the aches and pains I felt the next day are testimony to that reality).  My dreams of playing in the NBA have faded. But my love of Christ is stronger than ever.  He truly deserves the glory and praise not me.  What a joy just to get to play and what a joy to know that the proceeds will go the help fix homes in the mountains of Appalachia in the name of Christ.  For that cause I’ll suit up and play anytime anywhere…Glory be to God!  Amen.