Kingdomball

I’ve been playing Senior Softball this winter here in Fountain Hills. This experience has revealed two things. 1) It’s improved my opinion of how good I used to be. 2) Jimmy showed me how important it is to live the Kingdom simply.

I don’t think Jimmy did this on purpose. He’s a personal fitness trainer who is about 55 years old and still throws people out at home plate from 270 feet away. I remember making throws like that… 25 years ago. I’ve caught some of his rifle throws this month. I’m playing catcher because I can’t throw the ball more than 100 feet now. Counting the roll.

Jimmy is his own best ad. I mean, if a 50something guy can still fire the ball like that (did I mention his speed and agility?), then he knows something about how to condition an aging body to play softball. He’s living proof. He performs as if he’s 35, not 55.

Most of the other guys on the field are more like me. You can tell some of them used to be good. They try to do things you wouldn’t attempt if you didn’t remember doing it. But like me, their bodies don’t cooperate. Someone will charge (trot) to catch a fly ball but it bounces off the tip of his glove. I even saw one fly ball bounce off the top of a guy’s head. We swing the bat, make solid contact, but the ball only flutters out of the infield like a renegade kite.

I went to Jimmy’s storefront today. Jimmy tells me that my problem is that as I’ve gotten older I’ve tightened up. He poked around my armpit, then demonstrated a couple of easy movements he asked me to repeat. I started into the motions, but couldn’t complete them. Too tight.

I wonder if we Jesus-followers have gotten too tight. Has 2,000 years tightened us in places where we once played more fluidly and powerfully? I keep identifying places in my head where I’ve believed things are really important yet Scripture simply ignores them. I keep finding spots where I act as if some religious practice is vital that the Bible says absolutely nothing about. What would happen if we only required what Scripture requires and let the rest go? What would happen if we took the Bible’s commandments and disciplines seriously but just forgot about the rest of the religious add-ons and “improvements”?

I talked to my friend Jen about this. She said she’s giving up religion for Lent.

Maybe Jesus’ followers can be living proof when it comes to living the Kingdom. But we’ll never get there if we stay all wound up about things that didn’t matter enough to God for Him to inspire them to be written into the Bible.

As for me, I’ve made a personal training appointment with Jimmy. Maybe next year I’ll throw him out at the plate.