I read a story about Dale Brown, the legendary Coach of the LSU basketball team, about a time when he was speaking to a group of soldiers at the military base in California. When he finished, a young man came up to him who stood nearly seven feet tall and weigh 250 pounds.
Coach Brown, the young man said, I want to try out for our basketball team, but I can’t dunk thee basketball. I can barely jump. When I run up and down the court, my legs tire out so quickly that I can only play a few minutes.
How long have you been in the military, son? Coach Brown asked him, gazing up at him, then down at his size seventeen shoes. I’m not in the military, Coach. My father is. I am thirteen years old.”
Coach Brown immediately decided to take this young man under his wing. He said when I get back to Louisiana, I am going to send you my training program. It will help strengthen your legs and increase your endurance.
Three months later he got a letter from the young man saying, Coach Brown, I have done everything you have ask me to do, spent hours in the gym and in the weight room working out. But my basketball coach just cut me from the team. He told me that I’m too big, too slow, too clumsy, and that I will never be able to play basketball.” Nothing but negative labels were stuck to him.
Coach Brown wrote him back and said in effect, son, if you will just keep working out, keep being your best each day, and keep asking God to help you, He will get you where you are supposed to be. At this point the young man had to choose who to believe.
That young man, Shaquille O’Neal, ended up going to LSU and playing college basketball for Coach Brown, where he broke all records and became one of the greatest players who ever played the game.
Today there is a bronze statue of Shaquille the clumsy kid who could barely jump dunking the basketball in front of LSU Tigers basketball practice facility. I wonder where he would be now if he had believed the negative labels, if he had thought, my coach is right I am clumsy, too slow.
We wouldn’t be talking about his nineteen-year NBA career today. Has someone told you that you can’t accomplish your dreams? Along the way there will always be negative voices trying to label you, but God would not given you the dreams or ideas unless he had already equipped you to fulfill it.
You already have what you need. What may seemed like a limitation today too short, too tall, God can use as an asset. God knows what he is doing. He has designed you specifically for the race you are in.
