Hello,

     A couple of weeks ago as I was scrolling my way through facebook, a clip that someone had posted caught my eye.  It was taken at a professional baseball game, and as I began to watch it I wasn’t sure what was taking place.  It was a clip of a young man being escorted onto the field by an middle aged man, which in and of itself was not so remarkable.  But the thing that caught my eye was that the young man was sweeping the ground in front of him with one of those lone white canes that blind folks use to navigate.

     When the two of them reached the mound, the young man handed his cane to the older man, and the older man handed the young man a baseball.  A catcher took his spot behind home plate, crouched down in position, and hit his glove a couple of times.  The young man, who apparently couldn’t see a thing, wound up as if he was Fergusson Jenkins, himself, (now there’s a name that is a blast from the past for any of you 1969 Cub fans!) and…….

     Well, I was ready for the young man’s throw to sail way over the catcher’s head, or bound 6 feet on the ground in front of the catcher.  After all plenty of sighted first pitch throwers have done just that.

…..and he took a bit of an awkward step toward the plate, hurled the ball plateward, and threw a perfect strike!  The catcher didn’t even have to move his glove!  Amazing!

     Those of you who have known me long, know that in my younger years, I was a pitcher.  So, I know just how hard it is to throw a ball as hard as you can and have it pass over a slab of rubber 17 inches wide, above the batter’s knees and below the batter’s shoulders.  To do so, one had to concentrate.  Lock one’s eyes in on the catcher’s glove….looking away would lead to disaster.

     And yet, this young man, in front of a baseball stadium full of people that makes professional pitchers nervous, threw a perfect strike without being able to see the catcher’s mitt at all! 

     How did he do it?  My guess is that he used his ears.  His ears locked in on those couple of pops that they heard when the catcher hit his glove.  His ears located the spot to which he was to aim….and his ears served him well.  Strike!

     In this world where evil and violence can be so blinding, I am sometimes asked, “How can you believe that there is a God…especially a God who is said to be loving?”

     I find myself with only one answer, “I use my ears.”  The thumping of the nails, pounded through two hands and two feet.  The cry of victory from that cross, “It is finished.”  The roll of a boulder opening an Easter tomb.  The voice coming from that tomb, “He is not here.  He has risen.”  The splash of water cascading with the words, “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”  Bread and wine given to me at the altar, permeated with the promise, “This is my body…this is my blood…for you.”

     Like that young man on the pitcher’s mound, I who find myself often blinded by the evil and violence in the world, hear the popping of a mitt and my ears are locked in on it.  And with the concentration and focus of my days on the mound, I find myself hurling my life in the direction of that noise. 

     Do I always throw a perfect, sightless strike?  No.  But every time I toss my life in the direction of that noise, I hear another noise….the noise of my life hitting that mitt and the voice of one saying, “I got ‘cha.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

By the way….if you want to hear my sermon from yesterday entitled, “Why can’t Christians just all be the same?”, you can go to felchurch.org, tap the “worship” button,  then tap the “Sermons” tag, and you’ll be able to listen to it.  It’s 17:10 minutes long….got a little long winded!