The Sand Storm

This week has been crazy!  I feel like I say that a lot, but this has been the most exhausting/liberating/frustrating/providential week I  may have ever had.  This was the first of the "routine" weeks (if there is such a thing) and there was nothing routine about what God has been teaching us.  (And by "us" I mean "me.") The girls have been hard at work, planning and organizing for the volleyball camps that are rapidly approaching, training in the gym, and getting touches on the ball on the beach.  We also are hosting high school nights and college nights, where we get professional players to come and speak to volleyball players at a younger level.  Every weekend that we are able, we enter the girls into a sand volleyball tournament so that they can get some experience playing competitively in the sand.  One of the interns was injured, so I filled her spot.  When we showed up to the beach, the winds were absolutely ridiculous and by the semi-finals, it had picked up so badly that it was a small miracle if we could get the ball over the net on a serve.  I can count on one hand the number of actual rallies we were capable of playing.  Needless to say, we were frustrated.  Two teams of twelve-year-olds were in our pool.  (First sting to our ego.)  Then we played them and they had better ball control in the wind. (Strike two.)  And then we find ourselves so agitated by being outplayed by girls half my age, that we shut down.  (Strike three and we were OUT.)   I really learned that there is so much more that God wants to pry out of my heart; pride that hasn't yet died and a temper that needs some serious taming.  We fell completely short of our goal of representing Christ through volleyball and as the "leader," I take full responsibility for not being able to assess the situation and provide guidance to my girls while in the heat of the moment.  This has definitely been a learning week and praise God that He's not finished with me yet.  I still have a lot of dying to do while living here on this earth.