“You see, his faith and his actions worked together. His actions made his faith complete.”

It is that time when the Major League Baseball season has started.  This time of year we read and hear many baseball analogies (happens again during the World Series) so I might as well fall for it as well.  I do a lot of career “advicing”.  That is different from career counseling as counseling involves going deep into one’s skills and trying to ascertain where and how those skills can best be used.  My “advicing” is more about trying to help people understand what it is they broadly are dreaming about doing and then trying to assist them in the different paths and choices that they might take.  This is where the baseball analogy comes into play.  A baseball player at bat gets a maximum of six in-play pitches before the at bat is over.  A “full count” consists of three balls and two strikes.  The next pitch determines what will happen next: a walk on four balls, a strike out on three strikes, contact of bat to ball on the sixth pitch that results in a hit or an out or continuing pitches because foul balls went out of play. What does this have to do with career advice?  Well, even in the day of many more jobs that one may hold in their career than ever before, we can come back to that we, on average, will work for maybe 5-6 companies that make up our career.  Which should force us into being very deliberate and thoughtful before we “swing” at a new job that is pitched our way. There are many ways to get on base and to get that best job, but being very patient to wait for that high fast ball before changing jobs may be the best career advice I have. To swing at anything less, the odds go up that we might not make it to first base.

God does not limit the number of opportunities that He puts in front of us to represent Him and bring glory to Him in our work.  It might even be easier to say that He is constantly providing those to us. In these cases, and when He does, it’s not up to us to determine what will happen after we swing at the pitch He has given us.  What I am pretty sure of is that when we swing and do so with obedience and faith, that He turns it into the high fast ball that He wants us to hit.  It’s us that let’s ourselves get to a full count. But, the gift is that if we keep swinging, He loves to keeps us at the plate.

Reference: James 2:22 (New Living Translation)