My son has waited six years to play football. He has been watching football since he was in kindergarten. For some reason, he fell in love with the game. I use to be able to amaze people by having my first grader count by 7's. Why did he know how to count by 7's? Because that's how many points you get for a touchdown and extra point. He could also count by 3's pretty well too.

Even when he was in 3rd or 4th grade I would catch him on a Saturday morning watching Sportscenter rather than cartoons. He would also watch various college games too. He was basically a football fanatic. Men at church would ask him various things about the game, or how a NFL team was doing, or other similar questions. He wouldn't miss a beat.

Adding to the mix was his love of playing Madden Football on his XBox. He got pretty good too. I would play him and he understood defenses, offences, etc. He knew what defense to play by just knowing how many receivers and tight ends I had in the formation. He would sit at the high school games and give running commentary onto how the team could change their formation to stop the full back from eating up yards.

He couldn't wait to get out there and play. Since we are pretty engaged on Sunday mornings, he never was able to play Pop Warner football. That meant, he would have to wait and play football at the school, which meant, he would have to wait until 6th grade.

I was reading Looking for Jesus by Adrian van Kaam and stumbled upon this wonderful passage:

Clearly, there is no greater thing we can do than to be faithful to the work of God in the most simple events of our daily life. we must do the common work of every day in an uncommon way-doing this work in loving union with Jesus. It may sometimes seem easier to do great things than to do small ones. The grandeur of an enterprise, the excitement of a splendid project, the interest of others carries us forward. Their admiration sustains us in such moments more than Jesus' grace. We act, then, not because of him but because we feel successful, important, liked, needed. We become spellbound by praise, so much so that we no longer hear his voice in the depth of our hearts. Bewitched by the projects of people, we become estranged from the Father's work. Spoiled by success, we may become alienated from him. - pg 102.

Wow. I believe he nailed it. I find it is easy to get off track of following God's will because the pull of the 'grand plan' is so strong. Instead of being faithful to what God has called me to, I run off following my own dreams and visions. I'm not sure it is a problem just with me. How many of our plans are really of God?

Early in his ministry Jesus had to face these same temptations. Satan took him aside and started suggesting how he could make a grand statement by changing stone to bread, leaping off the temple, or even worshiping Satan himself! Perhaps Jesus knew that God calls us to be faithful, and at times that faithfulness is shown in the small matters and not necessarily in grand expressions.

Maybe it is time for me to put my dreams and my visions on hold and allow Jesus to live through me, even if that requires simple dreams and visions. As van Kaam writes, success can spoil our relationship with God and even alienate us from him.