Volleyball Tourney - Devotional

I was thrilled when Brandon asked me to speak at the first annual Next Step Volleyball Tournament. He asked me to pass on some tips as a world class volleyball star, and humble Christian man. For my undergrad, I went to UCI: University of California, Irvine. For those few people who don’t follow NCAA men’s volleyball, UCI is top-notch in the volleyball world. Now we did not quite win the NCAA championship the years I attended there; but some in the know have noticed that I did not play those same years that we did not win. Coincidence? You decide.

Having established my volleyball cred, regardless of actual volleyball skills or performance this afternoon, I now will speak for the next two hours about how Volleyball is like life.

Life is like life

Volleyball is like life in that volleyball is a team sport. If you have ever seen anyone bump-set-spike all on their own… well, that’s amazing. In volleyball you’re not expected to get the ball over by yourself, in fact if you just hit the ball back over on the first shot, it rarely turns out well. You work together as a team to get that ball up in the air so someone can smash it down in the other team’s faces.

Volleyball is like life. Not in that you try to smash other people’s faces, but in that you are never called or expected to go it alone. The truth is: none of us have life completely figured out. You look around and you’ll see people who are still trying to figure things out.

The Big Questions

What am I supposed to be when I grow up? How can I be a better friend, father, husband, wife, mother, daughter, son…? How can I succeed in life? How can I be a better person, how can I achieve my dreams?

Perhaps, most fundamentally, how can I be happy? Where do I find joy? What is the purpose of my life and how do I go to there?

You look around and you see people trying to figure that out, just like you. Most of the time we find distraction and entertainment, but in the deep moments of life, these are the questions at the center of who we are.

American, Western individualism teaches us that we have to discover those answers, or even create those answers for ourselves. But that isn’t really how life works, that isn’t how we learn most things of importance. We learn first by watching others, exploring possibilities in the lives of the people we know and respect, and we piece together the best answers we can. For many things, there are no redos or replays. The point is won or lost.

Your teammate

Since this is the Next Step Volleyball Tournament, chances are you were invited by someone who attends Next Step Christian Church just up Grant st., here. Or you were invited by someone who was invited by someone from the church.

So as you are looking at your team in life, the people around you that you like or respect, and you are trying to piece together answers to life’s big questions. I want to ask you to pay special attention to the person who brought you here. We don’t think we have everything figured out and our lives are perfect, but we do believe we have discovered an Answer, in fact the foundation on which all other answers can be built. We believe we have discovered the purpose and meaning to our lives.

Let me tell you our story.

We believe…

We believe that this world was created by a loving God. He created us, creatures who are able to make free choices, and, as we so often do, we often used that choice to do some stupid things, some wrong things, and looking over our history, some unquestionably evil things.

But that Creator God loved us, his creatures so much, that he decided to take responsibility for the wrong and even evil choices we have made, onto His own person. Becoming a human being, like us, in the person of Jesus Christ, he died in place of our punishment, for our choices or what we call sin, and in promise that God would restore and recreate us and this world as it was meant to be, Jesus Christ was resurrected from the dead and observed by thousands of people.

Now some of those things may sound crazy to some of you. I want you to be watching the person who invited. Hopefully it is someone who you like and respect. That person has made these beliefs, this story, the foundation of their life. Watch them, and see what difference it makes. The eyewitness accounts of that death and resurrection said it changed their whole lives and would change the lives of those who believed and followed Jesus.

Jesus said he came that we might have life and have it to the full. That means eternal life, but it also means hope and joy here today. I challenge you to watch those among you who claim to follow Jesus. Does it make a difference? And if so, and I believe it makes all the difference in the world, ask.

Life is a team sport. I will set you. You are here because we love you and we want you to know about the greatest life discovery we have made and the most important person in our lives. Also, volleyball, but mostly, Jesus.

Thank you for your time, let me pray for all of us now.