The Never Ending Gifts

“I just want you to know I’ve only played one time before.” I scuffed the dirt with my shoe as my fingers fumbled with the unfamiliar disc.

“That’s okay.” Joey’s cheerful tone gave me confidence to look up into his smiling eyes. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll do fine.”

It turned out this disc golf game our friend brought us to included pairing the best player with the worst one to make the teams fair. So Joey, who I barely knew, got stuck with me.

My heart lifted, however, when I found out we were playing “best ball,” or “best disc” in this case. Each player got to throw from where his or her team’s best previous throw landed.

“You go first.” Joey’s kind voice prodded me up to the starting line.

I shifted my weight back onto my left foot, curled my right arm back across my body, and then slung the disc as hard as I could, with a flip of the wrist for extra power. My disc sailed a whopping thirty yards—landing about seventy yards short.

Next, it was Joey’s turn. His disc flew with practiced grace and landed twenty yards to the right of the goal.

I picked up my disc on the way to where Joey’s landed. Once I spotted his red disc, I walked over and positioned myself above it, and then slung my blue one toward the goal. Not bad—only ten feet short.

Joey’s next shot glanced the goal and plopped down a few feet from its base.

“Go ahead, Kris. You make the shot.”

I stepped sheepishly toward his red disc, then stood tall as I tossed my disc into the basket—a slam dunk.

We both beamed.

At each successive hole, I was able to relax, do my best, and enjoy the game without pressure to perform. I didn’t have to fear my shots would hurt my team because Joey could throw like the wind.

That disc golf experience reminded me of life in God’s kingdom. I can relax, try my best, and enjoy life, knowing my righteousness is based on what Jesus did, not on what I do. I don’t have to worry about falling short—Jesus covered my sins once for all when he died in my place on the cross.

Since I accepted God’s free gift of forgiveness and joined Jesus’ team, I’m free to try and fail. No matter how I do, Jesus is there cheering me on.

What a relief to know I don’t have to perform to be loved, accepted, and pleasing to God.

This life without pressure—connecting with Jesus throughout the day, and then just doing my best—is so different from the regular gotta-have-it, go-and-get-it, pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-designer-bootstraps kind of life, it’s like living in another world. I feel so free in my parallel kingdom—the Kingdom of God.