I want to believe it's true

Yay on my 200th post!

I receive an inspirational email several times a week. Sometimes they're drivel, good for nothing, hardly worth taking the time to read. Usually, they're thought provoking. Today's actually inspired a post. This is not the first time I've seen this story, but today it hit me differently.

The basic story (non-inspirational synopsis) is about a "challenged" boy named Shay whose dad asked some boys playing baseball if his son could play. The team of the boy asked was losing, so the boy said, "Sure". They caught up to tie the other team and still they allowed Shay to bat. Someone helped him bat, and both teams worked to allow Shay to run (the opposing team throwing the ball in the wrong direction, overthrowing, etc.) and finally make it home to score the winning run.

Having seen this story so many times and in slightly different forms, it's probably an urban legend and didn't really happen. Yet, I want to believe that a man hoped against hope that some random boys would be big enough to allow his son to have an experience he would not otherwise have, and I want to believe not only that the boys let him play, but they willingly gave up their own chance to win to enable this one kid to have an experience of a lifetime for him.

Isn't this what the Bible teaches us: That all of us have importance regardless of our ability to perform or contribute, that our existence is contribution enough and worth being loved. That we are to put aside our own selfish ambition and conceit to help build others up, to help make winners out of those the world deems losers. That we are to stand for the downtrodden and down-and-outs, to not just protect the same, but to embrace them.

I want to believe that I am there, that I am one who stands in the gap for those that others scorn. I know I'm not. Slowly, though, I can see my heart changing, not of my own volition, but by the working of the Holy Spirit. As I allow myself to be more open to God's leading, I can see my attitudes changing and the scope of my life shifting to become that person. Who knows where I'll wind up and what it will look like. I know, though, whatever it becomes, it is because of God working in me.