Luke’s Notebook

So we’re only three games into the season, and already I think I’m going to retract what I said a week ago, in regards to setting goals for this year’s softball season. The biggie for me was I had set an official goal to try to end the season with a .625 batting average or higher. I finished last year at .617, so that’s definitely doable, although it wouldn’t be easy.

Anyway, I realized during our second game of the year, that maybe I should rethink this whole approach. I can see right now what’s going to end up happening over the next several months if I stick to this goal. I’ll be keeping a very close eye on my batting average. Every out I make, I’ll worry a little bit. When I start a game 0-2, I’m going to feel really pressured to get a few hits in a row. If I go 0-4 in a game, that’ll be a disaster.

Basically, if I have this goal, I’m going to be sucking a lot of the fun out of the game. Also, I think it’s bound to affect my approach to the game. Instead of possibly cutting loose and just trying to cream the ball, I might go for a safer base hit. I might become satisfied with base hits when I could be ripping doubles and triples.

So I’m deciding to officially to remove that goal, and I’m just going to have FUN this year. I’m going to try to not pay that close attention to my batting average. I’m going to just try to enjoy myself out there. I’m still going to try very hard, and hopefully my average WILL be good, as a result of me playing hard. But I’m just not real happy with the idea of having this standard that I’m going to constantly be checking myself against. If I finish the season above .625, terrific! If I finish below, that’s okay, too. The main thing is I want to have fun. I don’t want to worry about making an out. I just want to play my best all year, and then at the end of the season, if I want to then I can crunch my stats.

I am still hoping to improve quite a bit this year, but I am not going to let it come in the way of having fun! Fun comes first here, and that’s something that I need to remind myself, as I am very competitive on the field. If I’m not having fun, then who cares how well I’m doing or if we’re winning games? No, fun has got to come first!!

Speaking of fun, tonight’s softball game was just extremely fun. We had a slugfest, and we ended up winning 18-17 thanks to a seventh-inning rally. And so far, my free and easy approach has been promising — I batted 4-4 with two homers today. And, to be totally honest, I don’t even know what my batting average is now. I’m making it a point to just not think about that right now. I’d rather just try to pound the ball. It’s just much funner that way!

Lately, I think I have been understanding more clearly just what exactly it means to put faith in God. I think most Christians would say that they trust God, that they want to follow Him. That’s definitely me. I want to trust God in everything, to have complete faith in Him.

The problem is, I’m finding that the trust doesn’t always come so naturally to me. I will say without hesitation that I trust Him completely. But do I really? My actions are probably the best way to judge that, and I am still constantly finding my own self getting in the way, getting worried, and trying to take care of things on my own — instead of trusting what God has promised.

I’m far from where I want to be as far as trusting God, but even with that, I think I am still learning what it means to actually have faith in Him, to actually lean on Him. So often, I want to technically be trusting in God, yet I still want something tangible to grab on to, some solution that I can envision — “just in case.”

But when I read the Bible, I realize that that’s not real faith! In Romans, Paul wrote:

But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

What I am understanding is that genuine faith in God means, really, having no backup plan. And the reason I’m understanding it is because I’m living it right now! In many different areas of my life, I can get scared and think, “God, I think I’m following You; I think this is what You told me to do. If not, though, I really am making some mistakes.”

There are these areas where I have no failsafe plan, no backup. If my trusting in God was in vain, then I’ve just wasted a lot. But I guess this is what genuine faith is — it’s believing something that God has said without knowing just how in the world He will make it come to be.

For a long time, I have always had the idea of faith, and I knew that, yes, we should be trusting in God for everything, and, yes, we should be yielding our plans and our desires to His plan for us. But now I’m actually getting a chance to practice it, and it ain’t easy! It really isn’t, because it’s like jumping out of a plane with no parachute, only the promise that we’ll land safely.

But I guess there’s no way to have “safe faith,” meaning possessing enough faith to please God and to “get credit” as being a faithful person, while still retaining that Plan B, that savings account… just in case God doesn’t pull through.

So with a lot of areas in my life, it’s like a double-or-nothing bet, or going all-in on a poker hand. It’s kind of a scary feeling to not be in control but to just kind of do what I think God is saying without necessarily seeing how all of the dots connect. It means going against what I think might be the logical approach to an issue. It means trusting God’s reasoning more than I trust my own.

I believe, though, that the only way to trust God is to do so completely. So that’s what I’m trying to do. I’m praying that He will help me rely on Him and submit everything to Him.

This is hard, because I’m a thinker. I like to think about logical and safe approaches to any given issue. It’s not real comfortable for me to just let go completely and trust God. But I really know that this is the only way to do it. I have to make myself vulnerable in order to genuinely trust Him. There’s just no way to trust Him without, well, trusting Him.

So, yeah, it is kind of hard, to be honest, because I can get scared and think, “Wow, what if I’m wrong here? What a fool I’d have been!” But I do know that God is so completely trustworthy, and when I remind myself of that, the worries turn to excitement. For anybody who’s played poker, you know it can be a really scary feeling to push all of your chips into the pot. But when you know you’re holding the winning hand, suddenly you’re not scared anymore, and you start to feel pretty good.

I went 0-1 tonight with a walk in a loss. Nuts. Bad start! That’s okay, though. It’s a long, long season. I wasn’t expecting to bat 1.000, after all. And, my one out was a well-hit ball on a high and inside pitch that I really had no business swinging at. It was a 2-1 count, and that was going to be a third ball, I’m pretty sure. It was my first AB of the year, and I was just not as selective as I should have been.

Tomorrow’s a new day, though! Here’s hoping for a hit… or three.

Well, here we are! It’s April 7th, 2007, which is Opening Day for our men’s softball league. We actually play in three 18-week leagues, with games on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday evenings. The season will take us into mid-August, and then after that, we typically will play in another seven-week fall season, which puts us near the beginning of November, usually.

All in all, we have roughly 70 or 80 games to look forward to over the next several months. And I just can’t remember being so excited to play in such a long time. I mean, I always look forward to the softball season starting up again, but this year especially I have just been really giddy.

At the beginning of last year, I had written about a goal I had set for myself to manage to bat .600 in 2007. Well, I didn’t know if I would actually be able to come through with it, but I ended up batting .617, which is by far my best average ever. I also had 17 home runs and 122 RBI.

I have been thinking about setting a new goal for myself, but I want it to be reasonable, reachable. I thought about .650, but realistically, that will be hard. I honestly don’t know if I can do that. Let’s say .625, okay? That’s five-for-eight, five hits out of every eight at-bats. That’s doable, I think. It would be very hard, but I think I can make it. I think there’s an outside shot I can even hit that .650. But I guess my official mark will be .625.

I also suspect my power numbers are going to go up quite a bit. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I have a few things working for me: One, they are using better balls this season — softballs that fly farther, basically. Two, Paul and I bought a bat, an old favorite of ours, that we think is one of the “hottest” bats around. Thirdly, this offseason, I have been working out more intensely than I ever have in any other offseason. And I just think that I have got to be stronger now than I was in 2007, and that should lead to more hits, more RBIs, and more home runs.

So I’m pretty excited to get things underway! I know I set these goals and analyze the stats and all, but really, it’s just a lot of fun. To be out there, playing with the family, playing against teams, getting exercise, hitting the ball around — it’s just great fun.

I am very competitive and obviously want to win, but I try to keep this part of me in check. If I can’t lose and still have fun, then I think I’m taking it too seriously. After all, we are still paying to play a game. Although I definitely want to win, I need to constantly remind myself that it is more important to stay loose and have fun. You don’t ignore the problems, but you manage to have fun while still constantly trying to do better. I really would rather bat .300 (which isn’t real good in softball) and have a great time than bat .800 (which is, like, very good) and be so tense.

So, here we go. Time for another year of softball! Let the games begin.

The other day, Jude and I were talking about our life and just how incredibly much we have to be thankful for, how many things we just take for granted day-in and day-out. We have so many conveniences, it’s amazing. We really have it just so good.

I’m in a house — a solid house. This house doesn’t blow over from the wind, water doesn’t pour in during a storm, and we have precious few bugs crawling around. In this house, we have electricity. That means lights, as if it were daylight, any time.

We have air-conditioning and heating. When it’s 99 degrees outside, we’re nice and cool inside! When it’s zero degrees outside, we’re nice and warm. It’s amazing.

We have plumbing! Indoor restrooms! Running water! Showers. Hot water on demand! Pure drinking water… whenever we want it.

We have a refrigerator a freezer, a microwave, and an oven! Food stays fresh. We can have ice anytime we want! We can have a hot meal in minutes.

We have TVs. Yeah, more than one TV! We have a satellite dish, which brings us more channels than I can keep straight or even have the time to start to explore. But there are hundreds and thousands of shows and movies available for my entertainment.

We have phones. Landlines and cell phones. Anybody, anywhere can enter in 10 digits and get in touch with us. Thanks to the cell phone, anybody in the world can literally get a hold of me within seconds, no matter where I am.

And we have this thing called the Internet. Within milliseconds, I can connect to anywhere in the world, look up anything, stay in touch with people, and do a million other things. And, thanks to wireless networking and laptops, I can do that wherever I want, even from my own bed.

I am so incredibly blessed. I’m so rich. How in the world could I ever complain about not having enough, about needing more? It makes no sense, yet I find myself doing that all of the time. God, please help me realize just how blessed I am. Help me not take these things for granted, not to assume that I’ll always have them. Help me be thankful day-in and day-out.

Thank You, God. I have it so good. Help me not forget this. And this is just in regards to this house. There’s also my family, job, friends, and so on.

I… really have some thanking to do.