WHO AM I?

Seems that there have been several times in my life that I have asked this question. Who am I? Paul from the Bible makes an unforgettable statement when he says "I want to do right but when I try to do right I surely do wrong..."(Walden Paraphrase). Believe it or not I was at one time a sorta famous person. Playing football in college, setting records in track during high school, and championship coach. I remember once when I was playing softball on a church team we had a young guy come and join us. Now, it was only a couple of years after I got out of college and i was the bomb, the big stick, the oh no not him guy. This team had decided to embrace others who did not know Christ to be apart of our team as a means to lead them to Christ. This guy was a little wild and the coach thought it would make him feel more apart of the team by letting him play some. So who does he want him to play for????? ME. THe big boy, the rampster maniac. It was like the coach had gone nuts but was saying I'm sorry, but do you think it would be OK if I let this boy play in your spot. Well I didn't think much of it but the coach was kinda blown back when I told him it was fine because I had had my day in the sun. After the game the coach came back to me and asked what I meant by that. See, the coach had never been on Memorial Field, never had thousands of people yelling for him, never had newspaper articles written about him, never received trophies. I guess I was different from most but that stuff never impressed me a whole big bunch. When I explained to him that there are bigger and better things in life than showing out in front of a handful of girls and old folk at a softball game, he still didn't understand. I was just different than most guys I guess. There was another time this was in college when I spent a lot of time dating. I know you don't find that funny, seeing I was a star football player and not bad looking. It was the number of girls and the particular girls I dated that might have shocked you. These girls were not knock out beautiful looking peopleor the soroity girl types. They had two things going for them. One was that knew my LORD and Two they were nice girls that didn't get to go out a lot. Best times I had in college was spending time with the Christian sisters. NO smacky mouth or huggy bear just FUN FUN FUN. Most guys thought that was pretty stupid but I was different from most and i didn't miss many date nights. I'm still close friends with some of those girls. Once I had an opportunity to help at a local church's sports camp. Jay Barker, Alabama QB was going to be there and I thought it would be nice to meet him and spend some time with him. The Chief of that camp was a guy that I could not tell you his name for anything. He seemed OK but he had that swollen head problem. Oh yes, he was a Christian brother but the way he behaved gave me pause not to spend a lot of time with him. I've always stuck out in a crowd but I'm 6'4", this guy had to be the center of attention and I didn't know anything but his accomplishments in life. Don't take me wrong, he had purpose. Heck, he was planning on taking a group to China. A Christian Basketball team. The guy even asked me to go along. I didn't have the several grand to "PAY" him and didn't think it was for me. I hate basketball. I guess I was different from him in a lot of ways, different in most ways. My point is this." I urge you brothers and sisters to not be like the world wants you to be but be the man or woman God's wants you to be. Don't follow the world's way but let God's Spirit work in you to make you like Christ in EVERY WAY." ROMANS 12:1,2 (Walden Paraphrase). Man, the world offers a lot of stuff but God offers the best and that means that waiting for the best, no matter what it is will be worth it. Buying or getting something may just cost you a lot of cash. It maycost you a lot of time and effort and you just get something of lower quality that what you really deserve. I'm kinda different than most. I don't buy a lot of stuff. I see the value of others having and getting because it makes them "happy" or "safe" or maybe even "fulfilled". It don't take much to make me feel fulfilled. " They that wait on the LORD will mount up with wings like eagles... they will run and not be weary, they will walk and not POOP out... " Isa. 40 (Walden's Paraphrase of course.)

I guess I'm really trying to say BE YOURSELF, but remember whose you are, what you are inside, and how silly you look when you mess up but even then laugh at yourself.