‘Twas the day after Christmas, and all thru the place
Everyone began going back to their old, normal pace.
The tree and the decorations were all neatly put away,
With holiday wishes tucked in the closet they’d stay.
The children were playing with new toys and things,

She spoke with authority, which was appropriate since she was the absolute authority at the Sectionals tennis tournament my team was participating in. The head referee was explaining the rules of play which would govern this tournament at a captain’s meeting, and she made it clear that her judgments were final.

It was her parting words to us that evening that really struck a chord with me.

On most mornings I spend about thirty minutes prayer walking a trail that winds through the woods and down to a lake near my home. Before heading out for this time of refreshing with the Lord, I usually ask my wife and son if they have any prayer requests or praise reports for me to bring before our Heavenly Father.

One morning I asked Jacob, who was eight at the time, the usual question. He noted, after briefly looking up from his coloring sheet, that he didn’t have any requests that day. I resisted the urge to say, “Maybe you should pray that you can keep your crayons within the lines!” and instead asked, “Do you have anything that I can thank God for this morning.”

One morning during a recent trip I got up to work out in the fitness center of the hotel we were staying in. As I got on the treadmill, I noticed something interesting.

The treadmill had increments of incline from 0% (which is level) all the way up to 15% (which is like walking up a steep hill). I immediately thought, “Well, there’s no way I’ll ever be using the 15%, that’s for sure!”

So, I started out at 1% grade, walking slowly to warm up. After a few minutes, I bumped the incline to 2% grade and started walking a bit faster. A little while later I was walking even faster. The grade was now up to 7% incline.

As I peeled the price tag from the cover of a new book I had purchased, I placed it on the shirt my seven year old son was wearing.

My wife, who was looking on, pulled Jacob to her and asked, “How much is he worth, daddy?” As she read the price from the tag, she playfully said aloud, “I don’t know if anyone would pay that much for him.”

“Well, that depends upon whether they see him on a good day or a bad day,” I continued the teasing.

Have you ever noticed that just when you think something is there for you…it isn’t? That morning, we had kind of a shock at the Brown house.

Many years ago, we put in an above ground pool in the back yard. It was about 4 1/2 feet deep and 24 feet round. In other words, it was a good size pool — holding about 15,000 gallons of water. Remember that fact. 15,000 gallons of water. That’s going to be important here shortly.

When I was growing up, I couldn’t wait until the day I made it to the seventh grade. Seventh grade was the year in which football was first offered in my hometown and I longed to play football.

It wasn’t until about twenty minutes into our first practice that I realized I suffered from “3S” … I was skinny, slow and scared! For those of you who aren’t familiar with football, this is a combination that does not make for a good player. More often than not, it makes for someone who spends more time as a tackling dummy than anything else.

I’ll never forget the day that I finally got to play in a real game as a member of the kickoff team.

Last summer a friend of mine was staying with us for a week in order to get some work done and one of the things we did during his visit for “recreation” was play wiffle ball.

Well, one evening we were out there playing and it got dark. It was so dark during my last at bat, that I honestly couldn’t see the ball at all.

Well, my friend was up by three runs on me, it was the bottom of the 9th inning, the bases were loaded, there were two outs and I had two strikes on me.

Last fall, we drove to Niagara Falls during our vacation. I had always heard that it was a beautiful sight, but in the back of my mind I kept thinking, “It’s a waterfall – what’s the big deal?”

When we got there, I was in awe. What I saw just took my breath away. No picture or video or words can describe the beauty of God’s creation. If you haven’t been there, I can’t explain it … especially the scenery from the tour boat that drives you so near the bottom of the falls that you must wear a raincoat because of all of the spraying water that hits you.

It’s easy to cheer when you’re in the “home team’s stands”. The real measure of your devotion comes when you’re in the enemies’ camp.

Several months ago, the high school basketball team from the town in which we attend church, made it to the state finals. We excitedly made the two and a half hour trip to the State Capital to watch the championship game.

When we arrived, we didn’t know which side of the stadium we were supposed to sit on to support our team.

It was shortly after tip-off that we realized we were surrounded by fans from the opposing team.