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This past week, as a sports junkie, I was in heaven. Dramatic finishes are what you want from sporting events and they were plentiful in this amazing week of sports. The two most prominent are from two vastly different sports, yet, they were bound by a seemingly common thread. Golf and basketball have little in common other than the fact that they both require a round ball to go into a hole for their scores to be tallied. In those two sports the dramatic ending came crashing in at just the right time.

Tiger Woods has already established himself as perhaps the finest that his sport has ever seen. That is high praise coming from me. I am an Ohio boy born and bred. I cut my golfing teeth on Jack Nicklaus, a Columbus boy who attended Ohio State and wore the Scarlet and Grey with both dignity and flare. He then went on to become the standard against which every golfer since has been measured and against whom one Eldrick Woods set himself as a lad. Tiger Woods has chased Jack Nicklaus from his knee britches on up. This past Monday he took another step in catching him and then took a step backward as he is now done for the year after winning his third U. S. Open.

When those who have followed professional basketball hear the name, Boston Celtics, they automatically think titles, championships, the creme de la creme of the National Basketball Association. Cousy, Russell, Jones, Havlicek, Byrd, McHale; the littany of names is a who's who of the best the sport has ever seen. They all wore Celtic green and wore it with honor and pride as they made their mark by winning championships. From 1957 through 1969 the Celtics won eleven NBA championships. This past Tuesday night the Celtics wrote a new chapter in their championship legacy as the new names of Garnett, Allen and Pierce are now etched in the annals of Celtic lore as they drubbed the LA Lakers and Kobe Bryant 4-2 with a decisive game six win, 131-92.

The stuff of legends. The best. The top of the heap. They achieved glory because that was what they sought. Tiger now has 15 major wins in the PGA. The Celtics now have 17 championships in the NBA. What do we have? Whoa there, preacher! We're not supposed to be reaching for glory, we're servants. God gets the glory while we do the work. True. Yet, how were those servants of old described in the Word of God by God's Spirit? The Hebrews writer described them as those "...of whom the world is not worthy." Hebrews 11:38 They transcended the world's mundane concept of servanthood.

That is why the Hebrews writer then begins chapter 12 with, "Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses..." Hebrews 12:1 Those of whom the writer wrote in such glowing terms in the previous chapter are those who surround us with their testimony. That testimony is that we can take servanthood and, by God's might and blessing, escape the world's bounds in a glorious display of our Lord Jesus Christ. He was and is the stuff of legends. The best. The top of the heap. If we are to wear His name, to take His mantle, then let's do it with glory.

"Chip Shots from the Ruff of Life" from Tom Kelley

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