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It’s that time of year again. Let the games begin. As most of my friends know, I bleed pinstripes. I usually don’t follow baseball much during the off-season, but this year has been different. Thanks to a couple of Yankee blogs, I feel I know the team as much if not more than I did when I was a kid, scoring the games at night beneath the covers with a transistor radio and a flashlight.

We ordered Comcast’s MLB extra-innings package for the first time this year. So now, we can watch live or delayed fast mode (tivo) every game.

For any Yankee fans out there, here are a couple of great Yankee blogs.

The LoHud Yankees Blog

On the Yankees beat

My prediction for the year?  Yankees win!  The Yankees Win!

“Tiger Woods Wins!” That’s stating the obvious, isn’t it? Well, not really. Sure he just won his 5th straight tournament and 64th PGA win of his career. What I mean, is he has beaten me too.

To quote a friend, my favorite golfer the last ten years has been ABT. (Anybody but Tiger.) The reason being, I grew up a Jack Nicklaus fan. I didn’t want Tiger to replace my golf hero, the Golden Bear. Well, even though Tiger still needs five more majors to surpass Jack’s 18, and is way behind in 2nd place finishes for majors, he has won me over as the greatest ever.

Take a look at his last 40 starts at the Official World Golf Ranking. He’s won 17 of 40 tournaments. That is absolutely amazing. He is a once in a multiple generation type of player. It is not like all these other guys are slouches, but Tiger makes them look…well…pedestrian.

Golf is not supposed to be a win/loss type of sport. You play 25-30 tournaments a year. The very best usually get at most a few wins and a handful or two top tens. Tiger is racking up wins in 42% of his starts over the last two years.

Let me put it in a different perspective. Phil Mickelson is 37 and Vijay Singh is 45. They are two really, really, really good golfers. Combined they have been playing golf on the PGA tour for 31 years and have 64 PGA wins. Tiger has been playing for 12 years and has 64 PGA wins.

Since becoming followers of Jesus, my family has always sought fellowship in small groups. Sometimes those groups are part of a larger church program, but more often it is simply friends who are walking together for a season. During the last several years there is a particular group of friends we’ve been intentionally walking with. We enjoy meals, share life, and walk out our journeys with God together. This includes a weekly gathering along with occasionally going to movies, hiking, or doing other things. It’s like having an extra set of brothers and sisters. In fact, we share the same spiritual Father and have His DNA flowing through us so we truly are family.

There is no particular pattern to our gatherings other than we meet weekly for dinner and a time to be together. Dinner ends up being a couple of hours of conversation and, of course, includes dessert. The gamut of topics from the mundane to the extraordinary could be discussed on any given night. And sometimes we have gone from one end to the other so fast it makes our heads spin. Along with general dinner conversation we often do some type of bible study, devotional, or discuss something we’re reading. Once in a while we sing songs, pray, and worship God together.

The beautiful thing about our times together is that it is truly like a healthy family. There are no set rules or pattern of meeting to follow. There are no hidden agendas or forced spiritual topics that must be covered in a certain time. If one of us has had a really rough day, we may blow off anything we planned to do and sit around and eat and talk for a few hours or call off our get together entirely. Also, as a healthy family, we are free to disagree with each other on various issues, yet maintain the love that binds us together because of our common bond in Christ. We teach each other, learn from each other, encourage each other, and support each other.

We recently hosted a gathering of about seventy friends of Paul, Wayne, and Brad (author and publishers of The Shack.) I personally enjoyed the book and my relationship with God was and continues to be edified by what I read.

I have read many of the reviews of this book published on the Web and thought a few of them were quite off the mark. Wayne responds to those reviews on his blog. It’s a wonderful response that directly, and eloquently rebuts some of the unwarranted and erroneous criticisms that The Shack has received.

At times I find myself discouraged after reading what the truth police have to say. How can people who claim to love the truth so misrepresent the Truth in their conduct with others? Then God speaks softly to my heart and reminds me of some of the things he taught me about myself when reading Chapter 11 of The Shack. How often we do sit in the seat of judgment. Papa is especially fond of those critics.