On Tuesday night of this past week I fulfilled a baseball “to do” on my list of parks to visit… Yankee Stadium. What a blast. As we crossed the 161st Street bridge and approached the stadium, I noticed a small, open and grass covered area just adjacent to the ballpark. In the modest green space was a team of very small, identically dressed boys. They tossed a ball back and forth, following the instruction of an adult who seemed to be doing his best to coach the team.
Twenty minutes later I was sitting in a seat on the opposite side of the stucco exterior of Yankee Stadium, not more than a hundred yards from where we had witnessed baseball practice in action. What a difference one hundred yards makes.
On one side of the stadium wall, boys dream and aspire… on the other, they make good on the promises they make. On one side they play in anonymity… on the other, they wear pinstriped uniforms with their last name stitched on the back. On one side they pay to play… on the other, the collective fortunes of the team amount to over $194 million in a year. On one side the encroaching darkness pronounces the activities complete… on the other, cascading electricity produced light ushers in hours of entertainment. On one side, boys dream in the shadows of Yankee Stadium… on the other, gifted athletes perform at the peak of their personal performance.
One hundred yards. Just one hundred yards… and yet a world away. Proximity is no license for entry; no ticket to the field of play. For Alex, Derek, Jason, Mike, and Johnny, there were no shortcuts to this venue.
In the 14th chapter of the book of John, Thomas, the disciple, asked Jesus to describe “the way.”
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
The only way to move the impossible distance to God is with Jesus. On the one side, dreams of significance, hope, life; on the other, we are children of the living God.
One hundred yards… no shortcuts. Jesus alone.
No longer in the shadows, but in the wonderful, eternal light.
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