I play basketball a couple of times a week. Over time I’ve discovered that because I am generally shorter than the other players their elbows and shoulders have a tendency to find my face. Or, for those of you with basketball savvy, there are times when I use my face as part of my stifling defense. J Several weeks ago it was time for hoops, and I discovered I had left my mouthguard at home. I only live a few blocks away from the church, but I hadn’t taken a hard shot to my grill in quite a while so I decided to play without it. You already see where this story is headed…I was playing defense and one of my teammates and I decided to double up on the guy with the ball, and when he jumped up in the air, his elbow came down full force in the area of my mouth. Yep, the one with the missing mouthguard. It hurt, but I had been hurt worse, so I thought I would keep on playing. One of my friends told he didn’t think that would be a good idea and kept asking me if I was okay. I thought he was making a big deal out of not much, so I assured him I was okay and then headed to a mirror to see what was causing him so much alarm. Sure enough, the impact of the elbow to the face had forced two front teeth all the way through skin between my lip and nose. There was quite a bit of blood, but I will spare you the details. The wound closed up cleanly and quickly, and in 72 hours it was looking substantially better. I have a small scar, which hopefully over time will fade.
Yesterday I was thinking about my mouthguard mishap and the scripture came to mind, “Above all else, guard your heart, for it affects everything you do.” (Proverbs 4:23 NLT) Even though I understood the importance of wearing my mouthguard, which had even previously saved me from injury, I choose to ignore the risk. I was actually lucky I didn’t lose a tooth or two, or cut the edge of my lip. Our spiritual heart, which the Bible generally defines as our will, intellect and emotions, needs to be guarded. Our heart is our decision-making center, which is why “it affects everything (we) do.” We have to protect our heart by guarding our thoughts. This is an all-day, everyday activity, because Satan is constantly looking for opportunities to elbow us in the face and to get up in our grill. Satan is looking for those situations where he can employ a sneak attack, because we’re getting lax or too casual in our spiritual walk. Satan will come at us with lies, accusations, false promises, anything he can to get us distracted from guarding our heart. Don’t take the bait!
The scar on my face is a graphic reminder that one split-second decision can cost us more than we want to pay. For awhile, at least, every time I look in a mirror there will be a 3/8” scar looking back at me saying, “Mark, remember your guard.” My mouthguard AND my heart guard.
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