Unshackled Moments ~ May 29 ~ The Chamionship

You can't control when you score a goal, but you can control your work ethic.

- Patric Hörnqvist; Pittsburgh Penguins (#72 / Right wing)

Tomorrow, in addition to being Memorial Day, is the start of the Stanley Cup final series. Whoever wins four games out of the next seven will be the champions of the NHL for the 2015-2016 season. This year, the Pittsburgh Penguins will be facing off against the San Jose Sharks, and for the record, since I have been a Penguins fan since the 80's, I will most assuredly be rooting for them.

But also for the record, I truly believe that both teams deserve to be there. They both have demonstrated the above quote. They worked. Hard. The all have talent, but they also work to improve their skills and learn how to better utilize the gifts that they have been given. Both teams have won games that they should have won. They have both won games that they should have lost. And they have both lost games without being too discouraged and defeated to fight and try again.

We all have gifts given to us by God, talents and skills to be used in service and to help others and to bring Him glory. But those gifts are just the starting point. We need to invest our time, energy and effort into them in order to improve our ability to use them, to learn how to use them more effectively and most of all so that we can put them into action at  a moment's notice. Sometimes we will perform as we should, sometimes we will actually do better than our abilities would indicate, and sometimes we will be defeated, at least temporarily. But if we keep listening to the Coach and doing as He says, let Him give us the power and ability to use the talents that He Himself gave us, we can rise up in grace to fight again and again until we stand before Him as champions.

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