The Saddest Time of Year

This is the saddest time of the year for me. Why, you may ask. Is it because something wrong with your family? Does your job slow down to the point where you feel like you might get laid off? Is it getting close to your birthday and you really are starting feel old? As much as those questions all sound like important reasons to feel sad, they are not the reason for my sadness. For you see when we hit the beginning of April, there isn't any college basketball to watch. I come off the best time of the year, March Madness, and then go straight into the worst time of the year, no more college basketball.

You see I am a UCLA fan. I bleed Bruin blue through and through. This year, like the two previous, we fell short of a national title. That means that until late November I have to be satisfied with the fact that we lost to Memphis and that maybe next year we will come home to Westwood with the title. This is also the saddest time because I have to wait and see which of non-seniors will jump to the NBA. I say to myself, "maybe that feeling of no national title will bring the non-seniors back, maybe......just maybe".

What I described above is not far from the truth about where I used to be with college basketball. I would mope around after team losses, like I was apart of the team or something. I would always use the word "we" when referring to the team, like I was the 13th man at the end of the bench waiting for the coach to say,"okay Pilarski, since my guys don't seem to want to win a title you go in and show them how it's done". I found fulfillment in every win, hope in every season and salvation in every National Title. 

So what's changed you may ask. Well what's changed is my relationship with Christ. You see, instead of finding fulfillment in a win, I now find fulfillment in scripture and living a life that glorifies my God. I find fulfillment in knowing that I have a loving God that desires my best and desires me follow Him. I find hope in Christ now. I find that hope in His death and resurrection. I find hope in the fact that I will reign with Him for eternity. I find hope in the fact that my God loved me so much that He sent His Son down here to die for my sins. I find salvation in Him alone. I know that I am saved from the wrath to come. I know that I am saved from an eternity in hell. I know that because Christ paid the price for my sins that I have salvation from an eternity of pain and suffering to which extent I cannot understand in this lifetime.

Now don't get me wrong I still watch college basketball. I am still a UCLA die hard and still desire another National Title, but it now just pales in comparison to the joy I have in my God and what He did for me.