Luke 11:9-13
Baseball offers you a thousand ways to hurt your arm. If you want to protect yourself from injury, you must strengthen your muscles in the weight room. You also have to do what players call “long toss,” gradually throwing the ball to a partner further and further away, stretching out your ligaments each time in order to strengthen your muscles.
This game of catch may be my favorite metaphor for what happens to our spiritual life when we pursue God and spend time in prayer.
I think God loves a good game of spiritual catch.
We throw all kinds of things at God, trusting God will catch them: our worries, our pain, our sadness, our fear. We may toss our hopes, dreams, and well-wishes for others in God’s direction too. We throw all kinds of things at God, trusting God will catch them.
And God does, every time, no matter how far the distance seems to be between us.
Even better, God always tosses love back to us. We throw our worries to God—God catches it and throws back love. We confess our sins to God—God catches it and throws back love.
When I read these verses in Luke, I imagine that what God really hopes we desire when we ask, seek, and knock is for us to go outside and play a good game of catch.
Consider
What do you “throw” at God that you hope God will catch? In what ways has God responded to you by returning love?
Pray
God of infinite love, help us recognize the love that you send our way. Help us learn to enjoy our divine game of catch. Amen.