Tennis anyone?

This week, a local church in town hosted “The Great Commission Conference”. Hannah and I attended the first two nights along with a couple of hundred other people. In a word, the conference was awesome. The dad/daughter time was even better.

Dr. T.V. Thomas was the featured keynote speaker. Dr. Thomas emphasized being Christ’ witnesses more than doing evangelism. After all, Jesus said in Acts 1:8, “… you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem…and to the ends of the earth.” Without diluting the need to present the Gospel, he encouraged us to seize divine appointments to “defrost our frozen world” with acts of kindness in Jesus’ name.

On the third night, Hannah and I thought we were taking a break from the conference to attend The Dubai Tennis Championship. In reality, the evening turned out to be a “lab experiment” to apply what we had learned the previous two nights! You might call our lab experiment, in tennis terms, a “lob” from heaven.


THE WARM-UP

Dubai is currently hosting some of the world’s best tennis players at The Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships. Some friends of ours enjoy going every year and this year is no exception. But their schedule prevented them from going Wednesday and they kindly offered us their two tickets. How this would work with family in town, I wasn’t quite sure. But I quickly said “yes”, figuring this was too good of an opportunity to pass up. Surely someone in our family would be able to go!

As it turned out, Hannah and I made the “sacrifice” to go and spent our third night in a row together. We arrived about 45 minutes early before the day’s featured 2nd round match: Roger Federer (SUI) vs. Daniele Bracciali (ITA). Federer, still maintaining his # 1 ranking in the world, is carving out his place in tennis history as one of the best players of all time.

As we walked into Center Court Arena, there were still plenty of seats to choose from. We surveyed the grandstands but the view looked better from the other side. It always does. We found some great seats, took a few pictures before the camera batteries died, and settled in for the big show as we sipped on our frappocinos. (I know what you’re thinking… “really suffering for Jesus, huh Matt?”)




Soon the empty seats next to us were filled. A professional looking man from Sri Lanka sat down next to me along with his family. I introduced myself and we began to talk. We enjoyed each others company and prepared to watch some world-class tennis.


THE LOB

The match was done in roughly 90 minutes. Federer was… well... he was Roger Federer. Even on an off day, he advanced relatively easily, 7-5, 6-3.

That’s when it happened! Federer approached the net to shake hands with his latest victim. He took a ball and struck it high into the air. It sailed… in our direction! I thought to myself, “Hey, I’ve got a chance to catch this thing.” The thought dissipated though as the ball sailed over my head by a good 20 feet. I had almost turned away, when the ball, as with some “heavenly english”, came bouncing back in our direction!! I stood on my toes, clutched the coveted ball with both hands, and pumped both fists with pure joy! As I handed Hannah her souvenir, a memory was made.


THE VOLLEY

My new friend, sitting next to me, congratulated me on my stroke of “good luck”. I replied that it was the Lord who had blessed me.

We sat down. The ball hadn’t been in Hannah’s jacket pocket 5 minutes when the Lord volleyed back, “That ball isn’t yours; it’s mine. I want to use it for My purposes.” As a good friend of mine says, “We’ve been blessed, to be a blessing.”

Somehow I knew what the Lord wanted us to do. My friend next to me had a son about 12 years old who was with him. The son loves tennis. He loves playing tennis. He loves watching tennis. This ball, straight from Roger Federer’s racquet would mean the world to him. That was it - the Lord wanted us to give our “trophy” to the boy. Afterall, what are the chances that we would sit in those seats, next to this family, the night AFTER two great nights of teaching on seizing divine appointments to be Christ’ witnesses? Another good friend of mine would answer, “100%... when you’re a willing witness.”

I whispered the idea to Hannah. She smiled and sealed the deal when she said, “Besides, I didn’t even know who Roger Federer was until tonight!” Having put the tennis ball on the altar, the next question to be settled was how we were going to do it? With the conference teaching still fresh in mind, we knew however we did it, somehow we needed to exalt Jesus Christ and not us.


THE SERVE

The second match of the night featured the world’s #2 ranked player, Rafael Nadal from Spain. His opponent was a tough Russian, Igor Andreev. Nadal advanced after a hard-fought match that went all the way to a tie-breaker in the last set.

We were just a few games into the first set of this match when the Lord gave me the idea. I slipped out of my seat to get some nachos and popcorn. I borrowed a pen from the concessionaire, scribbled a note on a napkin, and stuffed the napkin in my pocket – ready to be pulled out at the right time. I made my way back to my seat.

After our “meal”, my friend and his family began to stir. This was it! They were getting ready to leave and we had to act fast. I motioned to my friend to wait. Hannah handed me the ball, I wrapped it in the note/napkin, and I told him secretly, “We want to give this to your son. There’s a note on the napkin. Please read it and give it to your son.”

My friend from Sri Lanka couldn’t believe it. Stunned and smiling, he said, “Thank you.” He said he wanted to stay in touch with me and proceeded to give me his mobile number. Mission accomplished.


ACE!

Oh... the note... what did it say? (I almost forgot!) Simply this:

"Jesus Christ once said, 'It is better to give than to receive.' He told us to give you this ball. We hope you will receive it as a gift from Him. Your friends, Matthew and Hannah"

Do you ever get amazed at God’s creative ability to demonstrate His love and kindness to those who are lost? Truly He is willing that NONE would perish. So go ahead - BE Jesus’ witness today. "Defrost your frozen world" by serving up an "ace" of kindness in His match-less name!