By Ray A. Meyer
"Swingin' for the fence!"
All right! I know. Basketball season is not yet over, and here we are talking about baseball.
If you are like me, you dream of stepping up to the plate in the bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, trailing 7 to 4.
Besides that, it's a pennant race, and the series is tied 3 to 3. Exciting, huh? Ball one-- high and inside. Ball two--a slider that moves outside.
You wait for the next pitch--a fastball that catches the corner of the plate. Strike one. Then, ball three--high and outside. The next pitch looks perfect, but you hesitate an instant too long. Strike two.
Now you've got a full count, and it all rests on your shoulders. If you're dreaming, it is at this point you wake up, and you always wondered what happened--did I get a home run or not?
Let's use this word picture, which I found in a Promise Keepers' book titled Brothers! Calling Men Into Vital Relationships to describe this deficiency.
We don't like admitting we have deficiencies, but I guess it's true. My dear wife, Carol, has been telling me this for 28 years. Scripture and circumstances seem to agree.
Anyone who has been to a Promise Keepers event has probably begun to realize this deficiency. What it boils down to is that most of us men are relationally challenged. A pastor in another denomination described it like this: "Men are theologically pure, but relationally bankrupt." Ouch!
The Promise Keepers book talks about the Relational Diamond: "The process of building vital relationships among men can be likened to a baseball diamond in that there are four phases of development. The process starts as we step up to the plate with the desire and the determination to become more like Christ" (page 16).
Guess what! Most of us won't hit a home run in our efforts to form relationships.
Most of us are lucky to get to first base. At first base, our brothers in Christ are our acquaintances. To be at first base, the book says we must "accept one another."
At second base, our brothers in Christ are our friends. To be at second base, we have to "encourage one another."
At third base, our brothers in Christ are indeed our brothers. To be at third base, we must "exhort one another."
Then we head for home as communication and commitment to one another deepen. At home plate, we become Christlike, and the brothers Christ intends us to be.
What a trip! For most of us, it is one base at a time. Swingin' for the fence probably won't work.
Building these kinds of relationships takes time, concerted effort and a lot of prayer. Personal prayer, and prayer in small groups with our brothers, will lay a foundation upon which these relationships can be developed and strengthened.
In this way we can learn to love one another unconditionally, learn to trust one another with our lives, learn to be transparent with one another and learn to be accountable to one another.
Most of us have enjoyed baseball. But I suggest to you that this kind of baseball is also fun, and it is a whole lot more rewarding and life-transforming!
If you haven't yet begun to develop a men's ministry in your congregation, this old relationally challenged guy highly recommends it.
You can contact Promise Keepers for information on starting a men's ministry. You may write to them at P.O. Box 103001, Denver, Colorado, 80250-3001; call them at 1-800-888-7595 or visit their Internet website at www.promisekeepers.org
Ask your pastor for his support. And feel free to contact me on e-mail at Ray_A._Meyer@wcg.org for other resource information I could pass along.
Jan. 27, 1998, WN, page 18
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