Be Adrian, Not Derek

Any athlete can testify to the fact of how horrible a hard fought loss feels.  It's almost nothing worse than pouring it all out during the burning heat of competition, only to be rewarded with an "oh-so-close."  But the one thing that probably does sink a little lower is being hampered by an injury during the battle; then having to leave your teammates to finish the job because your body won't allow you to.  Instead of your will being imposed on the field it's only imposed in your mind...as you watch, and wait, and wait...until you reach the even more challenging road to recovery.  Since your healing began, one of your most repeated prayers was to not just be a remnant of your former self.  You hoped to still be as quick...as strong...as explosive...as dominating.  During rehab the physicians tell you you're ahead of schedule, so you feel great.  Your practices appear to be productive and supportive of your comeback, so you feel better than great.  Yet there's still one more thing to conquer - your mind.  See the thing is, does your brain...with the memory of the painful injury...still trust the ability of your body, or is it hurt like your knee.  You see, that's the difference between being an Adrian Peterson or a Derek Rose.

Job Readiness

Walk with me.

You're a not-so-recent college graduate and have been in the hunt for a dynamic, well paying gig since you strutted across that stage a few years ago.  Tired of working crappy jobs; depressed and totally hopeless, you begin to entertain thoughts of earning money by way of illegal means.  These notions dominate your mind as you take the humbling trip to the Department of Social Services to hop on public assistance.  But on the way, your phone rings with an opportunity to be interviewed for what you think is a customer service position at JP Morgan Case & Co., the nations' largest bank.  Dressed in your best business gear which is...well at least it's clean, you show up only to be interviewed by the president of the company.  All ready in shock, you're offered a position as a marketing executive for the Central Virginia region (which includes four cities and five counties) within 35 seconds of the meeting.  And if that wasn't enough, a personal promise of promotion is spoken to you from the big man.  You have a little trouble getting your head together.  Being considered for this position, one that you're certain you're not qualified for, is putting more questions in your head instead of just accepting the job.  Nearly with tears in your eyes, you say yes; and right after you passionately thank the president he leads you to a training room and says, "be back in 20 minutes so we can start working."

Act Like You Know

Traditionally, Matthew 8:5-10 has been taught from the perspective of blind faith.  We have the centurion of the Roman infantry approaching Jesus with an issue concerning his slave; and being confident that Jesus, as Lord, could heal him just at His speaking.  This is indeed was a brave move; as we know that a man in Caesar Augustus' military (or territory) acknowledging a Jew as royalty is treason and punishable by death.  Then for this man to confirm Jesus' power before he actually saw it for himself is also impressive.  However, I tend to believe that this military man had additional points of verification that lead him to ask Jesus to perform such a task.  Of course with no Bible, mega-church, or televangelist to preach the Christ, for a heathen Roman to recognize Jesus' unchallenged authority and healing ability says a lot about his study of and connection with the Lord God.  Yet when reading verse 9, we get to not only picture the centurions' faith, but we also see his rationale.  In layman's terms he tells the Savior, "I'm also a boss; and I know when bosses speak, things move."

Plantation Life

For a little over 6 years I've been at the front of guiding an organization that has helped families all over Virginia get the expensive help they could never pay for.  At least once a month, I hear the theoretical slogans about being husband; which lately have been accompanied by the other theoretical slogans about being a father...and how I'm doing such a bang up job.  Primarily, because of these two things I've received some pretty flattering comments from those close and not so close to my situations.  And I can't lie, it makes me feel pretty good knowing that people even think so highly of me.  Yet I don't allow those feelings to go past a minute of consideration; for in reality, all I do is take orders.

Embrace Compliance

My dad used to watch the reruns of Gomer Pyle USMC faithfully when I was a kid; and I loved it.  Outside of sports and cartoons, there wasn't too much that came on the tube that I enjoyed more than Gomer Pyle.  It also had me wanting to get down with the Marines.  Because as a child, when you see G.I. Joe whuppin' evil with ease for 30 minutes daily; and then you see how much fun Private Pyle was having at his base, you can't help but to think the military is the place to be.  That's until you realize that a small percentage of both of those programs were real; and they neglect to show a grown man yelling instructions at you for about 10 weeks.  Didn't take long for me to understand any branch of the military wasn't for me...merely because I had a huge problem with compliance and being disciplined if I didn't see any logic in it.