Take me out to the ballpark...

I love baseball. I love to watch baseball and I love to play baseball. In Atlanta we have the Braves. I love the Braves. Before I moved to Atlanta I would occasionally go to see the nearby minor league team play ball. Now that was good baseball. Those players weren’t pulling down the mega-salaries that today’s major leaguers are. They were still playing baseball for the love of the game – silly minor leaguers!
Speaking of the love of the game, did anyone see the movie, For the Love of the Game? You know the one with Kevin Costner as an aging pitcher, struggling to find that last glimpse of glory. It’s not a bad movie. Costner ends up pitching in one last game – one last masterpiece if you will. Along the way, he has a lot of time to reflect on his life, etc, etc, yadda, yadda, yadda… you know the way those movies go. At one point in the movie, Costner walks on to the field, amidst the cheers, the boos, the obscenities and all the other baseball related noises, he takes the mound, leans forward to take the sign from the catcher and deliver the first pitch. It’s noisy - he can hear all the noise and see the overwhelming activity taking place all over the ball park… so… he leans over and says, to himself, “Clear the mechanism…” At that point the noise becomes hushed and all the extra-curricular activity becomes nothing more than a blur. The only things in Costner’s line of vision are home plate, the batter and the catcher. Allowing the distractions to take over his mind would have eliminated any chance of pitching a respectable ballgame.
Pretty cool, huh? Think about it. By eliminating the distractions around him he was able to focus in on the task at hand. He didn’t allow the hustle and bustle of the ballpark to distract him from his goal – pitching a baseball game. Wouldn’t it be amazing if we had a scripture that we would remind us to do that in life? Something like, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Oh, wait… we do! (Romans 12:2a)
There is little we do in the course of our day that doesn’t bring us in contact with ‘the patterns of this world’. We turn on the TV, ‘the patterns of this world’, open the newspaper, ‘the patterns of this world’, drive to work, ‘the patterns of this world’, surf the ‘net’, ‘the patterns of this world’, have a conversation with our co-workers, ‘the patterns of this world’, attend a church business meeting, ‘the patterns of this world’. See what I mean. So what happens? As we’re exposed to, over and over again, ‘the patterns of this world’, what happens to us? Are we conformed to those patterns? Or, are we transformed by the renewing of our mind? In order to be conformed to ‘the patterns of this world’ all we have to do is NOTHING… if we do nothing, the world will do the work for us. When we do nothing the world’s job of conforming us to its patterns becomes virtually effortless. On the other hand, to be ‘transformed by the renewing of our mind’ we must stay focused on God and be intentional about our relationship with Christ (Matthew 6:33, Hebrews 12:2), we must be aware of what is going on in the depths of our mind (2 Corinthians 10:5), we must know what God’s Word says to us (Psalm 119:97), and we must stay, always, in contact with God (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
It’s easy, in the flurry of daily activity, to begin to do the accepted thing according to the world’s standards. It’s quite painless to simply float downstream with the rest of the world and it’s no trouble at all to fall in line with the status-quo. But, it becomes more difficult to resist the values and standards of the world, it’s exhausting to paddle upstream, against the world’s current and stepping out of the world’s line and into Christ’s line takes courage – no matter how often you do it.
Over the span of the last few years, there have been a few times when I have said to myself, “Clear the mechanism” - a few times, but not nearly often enough. What I realize, when I’m truthful with myself, is that I need to be deliberate about ‘clearing the mechanism’ several times each day. The Message translation says it this way, “Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.” (Romans 12:2) So what do we do? Once again, looking to The Message, “We use our powerful God-tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ.” (2 Corinthians 10:5)
Let’s all work hard and be intentional about eliminating the distractions around us so that we will be able to focus on the task at hand. Let’s not let the hustle and bustle of life’s 'ballpark' distract us from our goal – to fight the good fight, to finish the race, to keep the faith.
Clear the mechanism!

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. (2 Timothy 4:7)