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I wasn’t in the field to chase after the ball. I wasn't hitting. I wasn't pitching. I was on the bench. The same bench I had sat on for the last 3 games.

It was high school baseball in September, the weather was warm, the nights were perfect for a game. But, I wasn’t playing. You’d think, since it was just fall ball and none of the games counted for an official record, that the coach would rotate players in to get them some innings. In my mind, that’s how a team gets better. Everyone gets to play and improve. This wasn’t my coach’s approach.


A few games ago, the other team didn’t have enough players, so I got sent to play for the other team. It was the first game I had played that fall. I was thrilled. I thought that if I showed the coach how good I was, he’d surely put me in for a future game. I got a hit early in the game and the only out I made was a hard line drive to the third baseman. I pitched against my own team and did well. I thought for sure that I had made a great impression, showing that I was worth being developed for the future of the high school baseball team.


It didn’t make any difference. There I was, 3 games later, still sitting on the bench. By about the 4th inning of the 7 inning game, I got really sad. I felt like I was in a deep pit. I could see the game, but surrounding me was dark, cold mud. Thoughts started swirling in my brain. Some of them mad. Mad that I was wasting my time. After the game ended, I knew that I still had a bunch of homework I had to do. Why was I wasting my time here? “I know he’s not going to put me in.”


The coach hadn’t looked at me all game. I felt like he hadn’t said a word to me in at least 2 weeks. “What am I doing here?” I said to myself as the lump in my throat, the boulder of potential weeping that was building in my neck, crept ever higher ready to burst out as crying. “I don’t think he even knows my name,” I thought to myself. “I bet he wouldn’t even notice if I left.”


So, I quietly gathered my things and left the dugout. I walked quietly towards my house that was only a couple hundred yards away. As I walked away slowly, no one shouted after me, no one stopped me, no one noticed.

You may feel like no one notices you, no one cares about you, no one knows your name. You may feel like God doesn't notice you, care about you, or even know your name. You're not the only one who has ever felt this way. David sometimes felt that he was alone with no friends:


"My eyes are always on the Lord, for He rescues me from the traps of my enemies. Turn to me and have mercy, for I am alone and in deep distress. My problems go from bad to worse. Oh, save me from them all!" Psalm 25:15-16


David sometimes felt that God had forgotten about him:


"O Lord, how long will You forget me? Forever? How long will You look the other way? How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart every day?.." Psalm 13:1-2


We know that God has promised that He will never leave us, never forsake us (John 14:16). But sometimes, our feelings don't paint an accurate picture. The very hairs on our heads are all numbered (Matthew 10:30) and yet our feelings of being forgotten can linger sometimes, can't they? These feelings aren't accurate based upon what God tells us in Revelation.


"Peanut" is what Marvel's Ant-Man calls his daughter. Marvel's Wasp is called "Jelly Bean" by her mom. These pet names mean as much to the characters if not more than their given names. No one else knows them except the two characters involved (let's ignore that we know because of the movie). The special name is evidence of love, fondness, and history. I have a pet name for my wife that no one else knows but her and I. If I were to say it, it probably wouldn't mean much to anyone else and would most likely be confusing, but to my wife there is a history, a story, an idea linked to it. I think it means a lot to her. Did you know that scripture says God has a pet name for you? At least, I think He might. Check out this passage from Revelation:


“To everyone who is victorious I will give some of the manna that has been hidden away in heaven. And I will give to each one a white stone, and on the stone will be engraved a new name that no one understands except the one who receives it.” Revelation 2:17


Imagine the walls of fear and the barricades of self-protection that will fall when you learn His name for you. You won't be wondering if your virtues were shiny enough. You won't be frightened by a mountain of worry. You won't be feeling a chasm of distance between you and Him. Your shoulders will drop and your spirit will be warmed with relief when you realize how much He cares about you. I believe it will be one of the most comforting experiences of our existence.


Let that sink in for a minute. Linger with the idea that God knows your name, that He has a new and special name for you.


Max Lucado writes a story about someone who experiences this. You Are Special tells the story of a little wooden person named Punchinello who goes to see his maker Eli. Eli lives on the hill and is the maker of all the wooden people. One day, Punchinello climbs the hill in order to see Eli. He walks in and is overwhelmed by the size of everything. Scared, he turns to walk away. At that moment, he heard his maker say his name:


"Punchinello!" The woodworker said.


"You know my name?" Punchinello asked.


"Of course I do, I made you." said the maker.

While my family continues to sleep, my pre-work breakfast at 4:30am usually contains 4 things: a bowl of granola, a pickle spear, a banana, and a bit of Kombucha. I like how pickles are sour.


I thought that my breakfast wasn't very meaningful. It's just food. Not a big deal. But recently, I've begun to think it is significant. That it connects me to others. I like the idea that my breakfast has more meaning than just what I need to start the day.


As I stared at the pickle on my fork, I wondered who helped grow this pickle. Where did they live? How big was their family? Had they been farming this land for generations? How much money did they make? Did they use lots of machines or is much of their work done by hand? Did they live near a big city or many hours away from an urban center? What chemicals were they exposed to as part of their job? Do they have kids? If so, how old are they? Have they heard of Crash Landing On You?


I'm my mind, I envisioned the farmer, maybe a hired farm hand or two. Depending on how the pickle was grown and where it was grown, it might have been harvested by a tractor or it might have been picked by hand.


There were several people involved in growing this one pickle.


Then I thought about my granola that has oats, sugar, crisped rice, honey... Each of those crops had someone, probably many people behind them.


The banana, and the kombucha, each have their own sets of people behind them. And this doesn't include the people involved in the processing, packaging creation, shipping, and other tasks required to deliver my breakfast.


If I had bought a different brand of pickle or a different box of granola, a whole different group of people with a different set of life and work circumstances would have been behind my breakfast. My decision to choose the pickles I bought, the granola I purchased, and the bananas I grabbed at the store, determined the lives my breakfast was going affect.


Who knew that my breakfast would connect my life with so many other's lives. It turns out, breakfast changes a lot of things.



I find myself discovering things I have inherited from my parents all the time: the love of NPR’s Car Talk, my blisteringly fast walking pace, my fondness for hymns, and my fascination with exploring new ideas, are just a few that come to mind.


Aging parents often share their fears of being a financial burden to their kids. I share that sentiment. It would make me groan inside my core if my daughter ever had to bear the burden of a debt I created.


A good person leaves an inheritance for their children’s children, but a sinner’s wealth is stored up for the righteous. -Provers 13:22


Monetary windfalls or debt burdens might not be the only thing my daughter inherits from me. Some signs I have seen recently have started to make me worried.


The placard at the Detroit River stopped me in my tracks a few years ago. It was a warning to not eat many of the fish in the river because of chemicals like DDT, dioxins, and PCBs. If you do eat the fish, there are special precautions to take to avoid the chemicals that reside in certain parts of the animals.


A few months later, I saw a similar one at the Huron River, which is a popular fishing spot in Southeast Michigan and where a few years earlier I had caught a beautiful smallmouth. “Do not eat the fish”, it said. This time it was about PFAS chemicals in the water. Both of these signs made me depressed.



These days, a fisherman can’t even eat what he/she catches.


2 weeks ago, I saw a different placard at the Detroit Zoo.I looked at my daughter, who was with me at the time, and thought about what condition the world is going to be in when she is my age.


Will the world my daughter inherits be one that is safe and clean or is it going to be one with more warning signs popping up? Will they have to install advanced water filters for their drinking water and air purifiers to clean the air in their homes? Will her generation have to place warnings on all of their rivers? Will my granddaughter’s history lessons include descriptions about a time when the water and air wasn’t polluted? Last month, I found someone who wants to do something about it because he realizes that at some point his daughter might ask him some tough questions.


“I don’t want to be in a position as a dad in 30 years time where the world around us has changed with my daughter asking me: ‘What did you do about it?’ I want to change things and I think we can, but there’s nothing worse than thinking you’ve let your kids down.” -Michael Doughty, CEO of Hylo Athletics, who makes running shoes that are made from renewable materials that can be recycled or composted at end of its useful life.


I don’t want my daughter or any of her children to be burdened by an environmental debt that they never chose to take on. I think it would make me groan inside just as much as leaving a monetary burden.


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