Bottom of the Ninth #97 - Seeking Legacy
by Brandon Owen, Valor Baseball Coach
As much as I'd like to, Wednesday, October 17, 2014 is a day I will never forget. I had not been feeling well for a while, I figured, because I had just accepted a position working with Autistic Kids and that since kids can be great germ incubators, that I was catching every bug they had to share. I went to the doctor expecting to hear about things like diet and exercise maybe some vitamins and/or antibiotics to help me feel good again. What the doctors found was a tumor. I felt overwhelmed, I'd been given a diagnosis of cancer. To me cancer is one of the most frightening words in the English dictionary. I was thrust from thinking about what I needed to do in order to get healthy, into what I needed to do in order to survive! I wondered is Chemo really as bad as it seems? Eventually, I settled on the idea that I was going to expect the worst but hope for the best.Cancer has made me think more deeply about things. I spent a lot of time reflecting about my legacy and what that means. Is my legacy going to be about wins and losses, or is it going to be about relationships? What will be said of my legacy long after I am gone? I looked at the life of Christ, what was his legacy? Was it about accomplishments or was it about something deeper? It became evident to me that the legacy of Christ at least in part is this: Christ invested in his disciples, he invested in relationships with his disciples so that they could branch out and teach what Christ taught. Anything I do whether it’s a job, coaching, or just my day to day relationships in my little corner of the Earth, I want to be able to say that when I leave, I left His creation in a better condition than when I found it. Who has invested in your life? Who are you investing your life in? I challenge you that when you leave Valor to leave a legacy and after your four years here are up, leave Valor in better condition then when you arrived.
In closing, seek to leave a legacy at Valor that will last long after you are gone.
2 Timothy 3:10-14 (NIV) reads: "You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings - what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evildoers and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it."
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