Some of you may have read previous articles and/or know our story about how we found the Lord through baseball!  It sounds crazy, and it might be, but it was my husband’s baseball career that really caused the transformation in our hearts and lives.  I’m still processing and learning lessons along the way but I’ve done a little reflecting over the years and wanted to share how I prayed for Brian while he was in the minors/majors, and how I not only pray for Brian but how it shaped my prayer life for our children.  Even though he is retired from playing ball, baseball still plays a huge roll in the life of our family. We have three kids.  Our oldest daughter plays softball and our two boys play baseball.  Did I mention that the ballpark is home away from home?  I could give you some pointers to make your day at the ballpark so much more enjoyable – but that’s another article.  For now, let’s talk about how to pray for our children, encourage our children and be the mom that God created us to be. Over the years I have gotten so many messages asking “How do I encourage my child?”  I can one hundred percent relate and my short answer is….PRAY.  You are the number one supporter of your children and naturally want to protect them from defeat and/or failure. You were handpicked, by God, to be the mom to your children.  He has given you everything you need to love, nurture, and mold them.  One of the most important things you can do is pray for your children: their activities, their heart, purity, their friendships, their education, their future spouse, etc. First and foremost, prayer changes us.  Prayer changes my heart toward my children and brings peace in every situation.  Prayer gives me the right perspective so that I can be confident to make decisions, respond to situations and helps me keep my emotions on lockdown!  I learned a long time ago that I could never find the perfect words to say to Brian when we were in difficult seasons, but once I began to pray I felt relief that I didn’t have to do this on my own.  The Lord was always faithful to lead me to a particular scripture or some encouraging word that I could share with Brian.  Nothing brings peace more than the love and truth that comes from the Word of God.   Before I share with you how I pray for Brian, I want to warn you that some of the ways or things I pray may sound weird or even silly to you.  I’m being very transparent here!  We are all unique and have unique ways of communicating – I am simply sharing MY way.  Your prayers won’t sound like mine and that is okay! When Brian and I first got married I knew very little about how to pray and even less about baseball!  My prayers were pretty short and generic. They probably sounded something like, “Please don’t let the ball smack Brian in the face and please keep him safe while traveling.”  (Don’t laugh. True story.) I prayed more out of fear than out of faith.  My lack of understanding was a result of not having a relationship with Jesus.  I simply didn’t know!  I worried constantly and I never felt guilty about asking for his safety, I just assumed that was a non-negotiable.  I just knew I needed him to be safe.  Clearly, I had a lot to learn in the prayer department, and so did Brian.  I think it is important to clarify that your prayers are heard and your prayer life can be powerful!  It doesn’t matter how eloquent your words are or how bad you stutter trying to get your words out, when you pray, and believe in faith, your prayers have power.  Believing is the key! Praying a pray that you don’t believe God will answer is more like a wish. So, you might have guessed that I pray a lot and I am just crazy enough to believe the things I’m asking for.  One thing I pray daily is for the Lord to increase my faith and I ask forgiveness for my unbelief.  Don’t be ashamed to admit to the Lord your struggles because He already knows! God is gracious and He met me right where I was – even when I didn’t know what I was doing. Over the years my prayer life has grown so much.  I learned pretty quickly that I needed to bring everything to Him.  In return, we began to walk in peace and strength like never before.  There is no doubt that without Jesus we would have walked away from Brian’s dream of baseball prematurely.  In our own strength, the grass looked greener on the other side.  The pressure to succeed was crippling and the pain of failure was disheartening.  Sometimes I felt like our theme song could be the song from the Shrek soundtrack, “I get knocked down, but I get up again!” Looking back, even in the midst of successful seasons, the pressure to continue to perform at the professional level was overwhelming. Prayer became my lifeline and I learned quickly that when I brought my concerns, questions and anxieties to the Lord in prayer, He began to give us a renewed and refreshed perspective.  We learned what it meant to trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” At the beginning of every season my prayer is for Brian’s teammates.  I ask God to give him at least one teammate that can be a brother in Christ.  A friend and someone who can help hold him accountable.  This is HUGE!  Being strong in our faith can be difficult in the sports world when success, money and power compete for our attention.  As much as I felt like I knew and understood Brian’s emotions through a full season, there were many times that I couldn’t fully relate to what he was experiencing.  God was always faithful to this particular prayer.  Brian had the opportunity to play with some amazing men who have helped him grow in his relationship with the Lord.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” Proverbs 27:17

Once our season was in full swing, I still prayed for his teammates but my prayer focus turned to Brian as a player.  I have to apologize that I do not know who to give credit to for these prayer suggestions – I can honestly say it wasn’t me. Maybe the Lord was just teaching me to pray as I became more willing and committed to figuring it out.  Sometimes that is all it really takes! What I CAN take credit for knowing that I needed major help and found it in HIM!  Everything I share with you today I learned from spending time in the Lord’s presence.  I simply carved out time to spend with Him and I let him whisper to my heart. I love when I come across a scripture I can add to my prayer arsenal and apply to my situation. I would pray that scripture over Brian in my quiet time and probably one hundred times while he was pitching.  He played.  I prayed! It was all I could control in moments that I felt helpless.  I knew without a doubt that I was doing all I could to support him by praying for him.  It was also the only thing that brought me peace and that peace wasn’t dependent on the outcome of the game. The more personal growth I had in my prayer life, the more I could sit back and enjoy the crazy ride of baseball.  One was definitely contingent on the other. A scripture that I turned into a prayer for Brian is found in the book of Luke.  It speaks of Jesus growing in wisdom and statute and in favor with God and man. I would confess that over Brian; that he would grow in wisdom and stature on and off the field and that he would have an impact for the Kingdom.  I prayed that the favor of God would be on him so that he wouldn’t lose his job…haha! I’m serious about that!  At the end of the day baseball is a business!  This prayer helped me to remember that ultimately the Lord was in charge and that He has the power to put us wherever He needs us.

“And Jesus grew in wisdom and statute, and in favor with God and man.” Luke 2:52

Last year I read a book called The Circle Maker by Mark Batterson.  It is about praying circles around our biggest dreams and also our biggest fears.  He goes into great detail about how and why praying promises from the Bible over your life are powerful and beneficial.  If you haven’t read it yet I strongly encourage you do find a copy.  He actually prays Luke 2:52 over his children. Another prayer that I pray daily for Brian is for him to have faith like Moses.  I know the Bible is filled with “faith giants” but I especially love the story where Moses parts the Red Sea (which can be found in Exodus 12.  My prayer is that when Brian is faced with his own “Red Sea” that he would never doubt that God had already made a way for him to cross it!  For example, an example of a “Red Sea” in baseball might be a situation where the bases are loaded with no outs.  For a pitcher, that can be a pretty lonely place on the mound.  My prayer is that Brian would never feel alone out there but that he has the confidence that God has already made a way for him to overcome!

Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid.  Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. …The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.”

In the middle of what seemed like a hopeless situation and a tragic ending, Moses stands firm in the knowledge that God will protect him.  We see God answer Moses in the next scripture:

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to one on.  Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground.” 

Did you see that????  I love that we get to witness that even though Moses believed God would provide a way he cried out to him nonetheless.  I pray that Brian would remember in those moments of hopelessness to cry out to God for help and not try to do it on his own.  I pray that he is overwhelmed with a confidence that God is for him! Another prayer from scripture that I pray over Brian is from the book of Joshua.  After Moses died, the Lord promises to be with Joshua as He was with Moses:

“I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses.”  Joshua 1:3

“Be strong and courageous.  Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

  Joshua 1:9

I realized that praying for Brian to own every field his foot touches would be crazy, so I began to pray that he would have success on every field his feet touched.  I am not just praying for what baseball defines as success.  I’m praying for success on and off of the field!  I prayed that Brian would be a light on the mound and in the locker room.  Success on the field helped give him a platform and is really just icing on the cake.  True success is off the field where he walks in integrity and leaves a true legacy. Here is where my prayer might seem silly…hehe!  It’s fun though!  I love how God used David’s perfected skill of a sling shot to overcome a giant!  Like, what??? This fit perfectly with Brian’s relentless discipline and work ethic.  Brian practiced, stretched, threw and did all the things to perfect his craft.  I know that technically the other team isn’t trying to kill him but sometimes it can feel like life or death out there.  Ask any athlete and I’m sure they would agree!  So yes, I prayed that God would use Brian’s arm and a ball to defeat his opponent.  It took Brian a long time to understand that his dream of playing professional baseball didn’t have to be a selfish dream that God couldn’t use.  Once he realized that dream was planted in his heart from God to serve a bigger purpose it was a total game changer for him.  He was no longer pitching for himself or for the approval of others.  The game became fun again!  So this prayer is pretty high up on my list of favorites.  Nothing brings greater satisfaction than God using your passion for His will! Pretty cool, right? There’s another reason I love this story and find it so relatable to our life.  If you get an opportunity, read the story of David defeating Goliath in 1 Samuel 17. What is interesting to me is that David initially put on someone else’s armor: a helmet, a breastplate, and was given a sword.  He quickly recognized he wasn’t able to use it because it wasn’t made for him and he wasn’t skilled using it.  It was too big. It was burdensome. It was bulky. It was awkward. It was a big no. God had already prepared David with the skills he would need to take down the giant that day.  David took off the armor and was confident in the skills the Lord had given him.  He had mastered the sling and the stone and that’s what he fully intended to use to kill Goliath.  This is so similar to what ballplayers experience and even what many women struggle with as we compare ourselves to other women.  It is so important that we find our strengths and be the best we can be instead of trying to be like someone else or wishing we had the gifts that someone else was given. (I’ll save that for another day).  I just love how confident David was in knowing the protection that God would give him as he approached Goliath.  It’s as if David knew with his whole heart what his purpose was and because he knew that all fear was removed.  He just stepped up and got the job done. Ok…so, I would be lying if I said I never prayed for an occasional strike out or double play, but for the most part I prayed for a healthy heart and body.  When your heart is in the right place and your body is healthy, it just does what its created and conditioned to do.  I tried to focus and pray on matters of the heart, things that mattered for eternity and things that were important to the Lord and I found that those were always answered quickly.  When we line our prayer life up with what the Lord wants you tend to pray for things in line with His will.  It just works! I remember one season specifically, I prayed daily that God would do something so big through Brian that season that there was no doubt God was in the middle of it.  I also prayed that Brian would play a huge role in winning a Championship.  Boy did I wish I was more specific as to where I would have liked all that to take place…lol!  The Lord answered big time, but unfortunately He didn’t think it needed to happen in the big leagues.  I am so thankful that our pride was broken years before that so we didn’t turn bitter and we were able to actually enjoy that season and enjoy the game. I will spare you all the interworking of the baseball world, but just know that what Brian was asked to do that year could be labeled tough and the success he had while doing it was nothing short of a miracle.  He would be the first to tell you that there was no way he could have done what he did without the favor of God on him.  He had to completely rely on the strength of the Lord and it was so fun for me to get to watch!  All the glory is His! That season ended and his team had a losing record so the changes of playoffs looked pretty grim and at that point Brian playing in a championship game didn’t even seem like a possibility…BUT God!  Every crazy thing that needed to happen for his team to advance happened.  They went on to win the Triple A Championship! How in the world does a team with a LOSING record for the season win the entire championship?  Only God! I hope that some of you find this helpful, or at least a starting point for beginning to pray.  This is a journey that is full of fun and surprises, sometimes even hard, but it’s worth it when you are able to look back and see the Hand of God and how He moved in your life and the life of your family because you prayed. Be encouraged! Start small! Get a journal!  You can do this! Prayer for Today: