How many things?

I love the game of basketball.

I have played basketball for as long as I can remember, and I play it whenever I get the chance. I go to open gyms whenever I get the chance and wherever they may be, and if I am on my way home and I am not loaded with homework, I will stop at the YMCA to work on my jump-shot.

I played basketball all four years of my high school career, but that didn’t mean I necessarily “played.” My first three years in high school I was a very chubby, slow kid. My freshman season I maybe played a minute a game on the junior varsity team--but I went to most of the open gyms and would always say to myself after each year, “this is the summer that I’m going to change.”

My junior year I was called up to the varsity team late in the season and got the opportunity to suit up for varsity the rest of the season--sitting on the bench. I was so proud of myself for making the varsity team, and felt I had a great shot to be a starter the next season. Then, the summer before my senior year, my coach told me, “I see you as the eighth` man next year.”

A verse in the Bible that I discovered in high school was Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Notice this verse does not say “a few things” or “some things,” but it says “all things.”

A standard for making the varsity team in try-outs each year is that you have to be able to run a 6:30 mile before the first game. All my years in the basketball program I had believed this to be impossible. My sophomore year I ran a 10:30 mile and followed that up my junior year with a 9:45 mile. There was no way I could run a 6:30 mile.

The summer before my senior year I worked harder than I ever had before. No longer was I just going to open gyms, but I was going to go to the weight room too, even if I had to go by myself. Just about every day that summer I went to the weight room or hit the track to do some running. By the start of my senior year I had felt different than I ever had before -- but I still had to put my work to the test.

During the first mile times, I felt confident I could run a record mile time, but I finished with a time of 6:45. I only had two more days to run a 6:30 mile. I decided to rest my legs the next day, giving myself one more mile run before the first game.

I went out to the track, giving my brother the stopwatch -- I had so much adrenaline and could feel myself running faster than I ever had before. As I sprinted across the end of the mile, my brother showed me my time--I had just run a 6:18 mile ... I ended up starting every game my senior year.

Nothing is impossible for my God!

I am not trying to say that God is going to give you a billion dollars because I have learned that ultimately He has a plan--but I know that finishing that mile was not me, that was all God.

For me it was making the varsity basketball team, for many people in the Bible it was the blind getting the chance to see, or the lame being pulled up to their feet. For someone else it may be surviving and beating cancer.

What things could Christ do for you?