I'll See You Tomorrow: Building Relational Resilience When You Want to QuitSample

Team Sport

The game of life isn’t a solo sport. It’s a team sport. The goal isn’t to just keep playing. It’s to keep playing together. You may be able to play a quarter by yourself, but we are called to play the long game. That’s done through community. We win together, and we lose together. We are called to see beyond today’s disappointments with the people we live in community with and still see their value. If there’s one thing this nation is desperate for, after all the political carnage and isolation caused by COVID, it’s community. It’s remembering that humanity was always called to play the infinite game. What if playing looks like just showing up? We would need a team to do that. Consider your team to be the inner circle of people you interact with daily. Whether it’s your spouse, your friends, your children, or the people at your workplace, it’s whoever you interact with on a daily basis. The players may change, but the game of life continues.

So, what if the age of self-sufficiency is over and a new one has begun? A season where we recognize we need each other to keep playing? One that learns to pass the ball and leans on our teammates to get the rebound? One that understands it’s okay to have a seat on the bench because there are other players in the game as well? There is a reason why Christ chose twelve disciples and not just one. He needed a team. He saw their potential and knew they would go further together in accomplishing his mission if the twelve learned to play as one.

Jesus said, “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:20–21).

When Jesus prayed, he prayed that we, together, as a people, would become a team. Faith is not a solo sport. You are meant to join an infinite team. Get your jersey. Lace up your shoes. Let’s strike a match and start a blaze like this world has never seen.

Pray

Lord, I thank you for the teams you’ve put me in. Show me how to be a better teammate—how to give and receive with the people in my life and how to play in the infinite game of community.