Glory Where Glory is Due

1st Chronicles 16 contains a psalm of praise that can be useful to us as we reflect on God's presence expressed through our lives.  I want to pick up with verse 24:
24Declare His glory among the nations, His wonders among all peoples.25For the Lord is great and greatly to be praised; He is also to be feared above all gods.26For all the gods of the peoples are idols, But the Lord made the heavens.27Honor and majesty are before Him; Strength and gladness are in His place.28Give to the Lord, O families of the peoples, Give to the Lord glory and strength.29Give to the Lord the glory due His name; Bring an offering, and come before Him. Oh, worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness!

We can recognize that God has created us and called us into a love relationship with Himself through Jesus Christ.  As we humble ourselves before Him and commit to walk in obedience to Him, He will manifest His nature through us.  No matter what position we may attain in life, vocationally or otherwise, we can believe that if we are submitted to Him, He will bring honor to Himself - we will be instruments through which He can point people to Jesus.

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In 1st Corinthians 10, Paul gives a direct reminder concerning a chief purpose for our lives - to bring glory to God, to call attention to His name:
31Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.32Give no offense, either to the Jews or to the Greeks or to the church of God,33just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved.

In Major League Baseball, it all comes down to this - Game 7 of the World Series.  The San Francisco Giants, attempting to win their third championship in five years, squaring off against the up-and-coming Kansas City Royals.

Bobby Evans and Dayton Moore have known baseball success, but they also have experienced the abundant life through a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Evans is the assistant general manager of the Giants.  He is quoted on the Baptist Press website as saying, "You want your life to point people to Christ...It starts for me with my own relationship with Christ. That's going to direct and dictate what influence I have for Christ in my family, in my marriage and in the workplace."   He was saved as a 7-year-old living in Massachusetts. After attending college at the University of North Carolina, he went to work for MLB commissioner Fay Vincent in New York in 1991. Two and a half years later, he joined the Giants in a minor league administration role.

He has served in his current role since 2006, though his title has changed multiple times. Among his duties are negotiating all major league player contracts, helping acquire free agents and signing minor league talent. In the contract process, he is committed to being honest. He said, "It's really about integrity and about being able to be trusted by a given agent or for players to feel like you're going to be honest with them."

Evans has served on his church's leadership board for 18 of his 21 years as a member, and he makes worship attendance a priority. During the season he arranges his travel schedule so that he only has to miss six to eight Sundays. During the six weeks of spring training, he travels back to San Francisco for church two or three times. He says that some keys to a healthy marriage amid the rigors of baseball are "surrounding ourselves with other couples that are pursuing Christ" and not "compartmentalizing" life between Christian and secular activities, he said.

The Giants' chaplain is Golden Gate Theological Seminary president Jeff Iorg, who leads chapel services before Sunday home games. Evans says of Iorg's ministry: "We certainly have seen players come to Christ, seen marriages saved, seen people rededicate themselves to following Christ...We've seen people grow in their walk."

It was also 2006, when an assistant general manager for the Atlanta Braves received a call that certainly would change the course of his life.  The team had won 14 straight division titles, and Dayton Moore and his family were in a great situation, according to a piece on the FCA's Sharing the Victory website: "great town, great job, great family environment, great church. And his reputation as a savvy front office man was on the rise. Undoubtedly, that’s why he got the call." The call came from the lowly Kansas City Royals.   After praying about the decision, he took the position.  Through the experience, Moore said that God taught him:

Just to really depend on and sell out to Him, and know that He has a perfect plan for your life. As long as you are seeking His wisdom and His will, you are always going to be in His will no matter where He puts you, whether it is Kansas City, Atlanta, Boston, Arizona, Cincinnati, wherever. Truly, I don’t believe God cares as much that Dayton Moore is the General Manager of the Kansas City Royals. I think what He is most concerned about is how I use this platform to honor Him and how I use the gifts that I have been given.

He emphasized the importance of Baseball Chapel leaders who minister to the players. He said, "This game beats you up terribly. It is a game of failure, and if you don’t learn to manage failure, you won’t be successful. And the only way to manage failure, in my opinion, is to have a relationship with Christ."

There are all sorts of lessons that we can take away from these two prominent baseball leaders.  I believe that they recognize that they have been placed in their positions to make an impact for Christ.  And, that's a good word for each of us - we can regard our vocations as opportunities to serve the Lord, no matter what the position.   We can be sensitive to the Spirit and look for ways for Him to be glorified through us.

And, remember, worldly success, whatever the definition may be, pales in comparison to faithfulness to God.   We can make our decisions based on God's will for our lives.   If we attain worldly achievement, we can recognize that as a platform through which we can testify to the presence of Christ in our lives.   No matter who wins tonight, you get the sense that Bobby Evans and Dayton Moore might just have a sense of the Lord's higher purpose for them, and that they both may be giving God the praise.