The Indians are getting settled in Florida for spring training.  Major league baseball teams are all getting in full swing for the coming season.  While we slowly watch the snow melt away here in Cleveland, what are these mega-million dollar professional ball players doing at spring training with the start of the regular season well over a month away?  Many of them are doing a ground-breaking state of the art training exercise - they are playing catch!  These are men who have been playing baseball maybe since they were 5 years old.  They were stars in high school and college.  Now they are in their 20's and 30's, making millions of dollars a year and some of them will be named All-Stars later this year.  Why are they playing catch? 

Every great player and every great team gets there by mastering the fundamentals of the sport.  They don't get bored with it.  They just do it.  It is when they get careless about the fundamentals that they stop being great players.  As Christians, we are called to give ourselves to mastering the fundamentals.  Prayer.  Bible study.  Church.  Witnessing.  Excel in the fundamentals and your life will be used greatly for the Lord.  Become bored and careless in the fundamentals and you can enjoy an "average" Christian life.  So, have you read the Gospel of John 20 times?  Read it again.  Never grow weary in the fundamentals!