Don't settle for anything less than God's best

When I was a baseball player as a kid, I would get magazines with ads for gloves. I would dream about upgrading the glove I played with. When I was about 11 or 12, I received a Rawlings catalogue with page after page of glove after glove. For several years, I kept that catalogue and coveted what was in it. But I never did ask my dad for one of those Rawlings gloves. They were just too pricey. 

My dad pastored little country churches in Tennessee. My mom worked as a clerk at Kroger's Grocery Store to help make ends meet. Money was tight. So, I played with an inexpensive Nokona glove. I didn't feel free to ask for a glove upgrade. I just... well, settled. 

Fast forward 30 years. We had planted Cuyahoga Valley Church. We were looking for property. We wanted 10 acres north of I80, south of I480, close to I77. Our property search team - made up of people I liked a lot and respected greatly - had been looking everywhere. But we couldn't find anything desirable that was affordable until they discovered a little Baptist church building in Richfield just north of 303. 

It was one of those vintage A frame structures with a children's wing for classrooms. It sat on 6-7 acres. The property search team was jazzed about this location. But it just didn't feel right to me. We already had more kids than the children's wing could handle. Plus, it seemed too far south and too far west - not close enough to 77. 

The property search team wanted to make a unanimous recommendation to the congregation to buy that building. Because I respected the people on that search team so very much, it was hard for me to push back. I wondered how I could explain what I was feeling. That's when I remembered the Rawlings glove story. 

I swallowed hard, got ready to use up some of the leadership capital I'd earned, and said, "When I was a kid I always wanted a Rawlings glove, but I never asked for one and I never got one. Well, I think God has a Rawlings glove for us when it comes to the location for our church. That property in Richfield is a Nokona. So, I'm going to ask you NOT to make this recommendation to our church. I want to find God's Rawlings glove for us." 

That was hard for me to say, "Please don't." And it was hard for the members of that property search team to hear. But the members of that team respected me enough to not make the recommendation. However, almost every person on that team resigned from the team. I was happy they didn't leave the church. But we had to create a new team. 

That new team asked a different question. They didn't ask, "Where are 10 available acres?" but "Where would we LIKE to be?" We talked about it and concluded, "I77 and Wallings Road - right between where we started at Lawrence School and where we are currently worshipping, the Brecksville High School." 

One of our new team members, a business leader named Greg Muzzillo, began asking homeowners on the northeast corner of 77 and Wallings, "Would you be willing to sell?" No one was interested. Then he went to the northwest corner. Long story short? 4 different owners of 5 different parcels of land decided to sell to us at pretty much the same time. 

That's God. Only the Lord. He did it. 

Now, we sit at one of the most strategic, visible, accessible sites for a church in all of NE Ohio. 

Don't settle for anything less than God's best.