Back in the earlier days of baseball, big leaguers rarely made enough money to live on for the whole year. Roger Maris, one of the biggest names in the sport in the early 1960s (he broke Babe Ruth’s single season home run record), had to drive a beer truck in Kansas City during the off season to make ends meet. Some of the biggest stars, like Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio and Micky Mantle and a few others made enough to live on, but mostly the players played for the love of the game. They farmed or worked in factories or sold insurance or cars, whatever they could do to provide for their families. In the 1910s and 20s and 30s a lot of the players would form teams with other players as soon as the season ended and they would barnstorm the country, particularly the south. What that meant was they would crisscross the south and play local town and country ball teams. Admission would be charged and the pros would take some of that and the local teams would take some. The big league clubs would usually pick up the travel costs because it was great public relations for the sport. Since there were no big league teams in the south, it was the only opportunity for Southerners to see the stars. For five years or so a special team was organized during the 1930s that traveled to Japan to play their teams because the Japanese were baseball crazy.

          In the 1920s the big stars, like Ruth and Gehrig, also went barnstorming. They really didn’t need the money and their shares of the gate mostly went to the other players, but having the super stars was a good advertisement for big league baseball. Because the biggest stars were with the New York Yankees and because those big stars were barnstorming and playing up to the fans, people all over the south fell in love with the Yankees. Very good public relations.

          In 1927 the Yankees had an incredible year, winning the American League pennant by 19 games (This was decades before the division set up that exists now. You played the season and the best record went to the World Series.) In the World Series they swept the Pittsburgh Pirates. Even today, they are considered the best team to ever take the field. On that team there was the famous Murderers Row, a group of hitters no pitcher anywhere could get through without serious damage being done. Earle Combs, Mark Koenig, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Bob Meusel, and Tony Lazzeri. Just an awesome line-up. When barnstorming season came along, Ruth and Gehrig and Meusel went out together on the tour.

          They played their way across the south, ending up just before Christmas. The regular season ended in September and, because there was no playoff format, the World Series was usually over by the first week in October. That made the barnstorming season a good two months long and the various teams of big leaguers managed to play in just about every ball field in the south. In late November of 1927, the bus carrying the team with Ruth, Gehrig and Meusel pulled into a small town in Alabama. It was cold with a light snow and some wind, but the small stands were filled to overflowing with fans wanting to see the heart of the fabled Murderers Row bat against their boys.

          By 1971 our family farm had failed. For the first time in my life I was working away from the fields. My sister got me a summer job at the nursing home she worked at. The floors were not carpeted and so needed swept and mopped daily. I happened to be pretty good at that chore. On the second day of work I entered a room with my dust pan and broom. The occupant was a tall man with a full head of red hair, almost as red as mine. The day before he had been asleep when I was there, but on this day he was laying in bed reading a book. I said good morning and began to sweep.

          “Hey, Red.” A reference to my bright red hair. I didn’t like being called Red. It had only happened a couple of times in school and my reaction to it made certain it would never happen again. But he was as red haired as I, so I turned to him and said, “Yeah, Big Red?” He got a chuckle out of that and then he said, “You like baseball?” His southern accent made it sound like ‘basebawl’, so I grinned back and said, “Love it.” “Yeah? Ever hear of Murderers Row?” Big Red was talking to a baseball nut. It might have been 44 years since that group had come together, but I knew all about them. “Sure. Combs, Koenig, Ruth, Gehrig, Meusel and Lazzeri.” Big Red’s eyes lit up. “Red, if you got a few minutes I got me a story to tell you!” So I took a few minutes and pulled up a chair.

          The bus pulled up to the ball field in that small town in Alabama and the big league players piled out. They were already wearing their uniforms and most of the men were hungover from a night of drinking on the bus. Meusel and Ruth and Gehrig were the last ones off because they were the ones everyone really wanted to see. Gehrig wasn’t a drinker and was stone cold sober, but Meusel and Ruth had seen better days. Gehrig said a few words to the gathered crowd and then he followed the team to the field, leaving Meusel and Ruth to fend for their selves. On the field waiting for the pros was the local American League baseball team. A pretty sharp group of young guys, but obviously no match for the pros. Still, most of the pros were hungover. It might be a pretty good game. They had their ace on the mound, a tall, red headed kid of 20 who just the day before had bagged two deer. He felt like he could do anything. Young, strong, pitching against the pros. Maybe he could get into the minors based on this game. He had not thought at all that in four decades he would be bed bound in a nursing home in Madison, Ohio, dying of cancer. No, on that cold November day in Alabama, he aimed to be a hero.

          The first time through the line-up the tall red haired kid got roughed up a little. Even hungover, they were big leaguers. The pros had scored a couple of runs by the third inning and the American Legion boys had punched over a run. Now, for the second time in the game, Big Red was going to face Meusel and Ruth and Gehrig, in that order. Runners on first and second, no outs. Looked like a big inning for the pros.

          Meusel fouled off two pitches and then watched strike three smoke by. He argued with the umpire and got thrown out of the game. Babe Ruth strode to the plate. He pulled two mammoth foul balls to right and then struck out swinging. Both Meusel and Ruth had been trying to drive the ball out of the park, but Gehrig was a contact hitter with great power. He rarely tried to kill the ball, but he still got his share of home runs. All he needed here was a single and a run would score. Three pitches later he walked back to the dugout, having swung and missed on all three. The crowd went crazy! Their American Legion red head had struck out Murderers Row! What a moment in that small Alabama town! It didn’t even matter that the pros eventually won the game. All anyone could talk about was the third inning strike outs.

          He told me the story with great detail. It was all burned into his mind. He grew tired with the telling and fell asleep when he was done. I sat and looked at the older man. I didn’t know the rest of his story. What was it that brought him to Northeast Ohio, if he had ever made the minors, did he marry and have children? At that point I didn’t know he would die in a week from cancer. But I just sat there and watched him sleep. The barnstorming days had always fascinated me and I had read a lot about that time. There were lots and lots of stories of local teams pulling off victories and even a few of a local pitcher who had struck out the three mightiest hitters on the pro teams, always in the third or fourth inning. Although never stated, it almost seemed that such things were planned to excite the local folks. Perhaps this gentleman had just done that, struck out the side because they let him do it. I don’t know, but I do know it was a happy memory.

          A few years later, in college, I was sharing the story with my roommate. Instead of the inspiring tale I was shooting for, my roommate seemed adversely affected by the story. “What, you don’t think it’s a great story?” My roomie looked at me and shrugged. “Yeah, its pretty cool. But just think about it, Larry. You don’t know anything about him except that story. That is what he wanted to tell you. Probably the greatest moment of his life. And he was twenty years old. To find something great in his life, he had to look back a long way. Don’t you think that is sad?”

          I had never thought about it like that. Doing something great at an early age then never anything to top it. Living on a memory. I was at the nursing home a week later when he died. He had no family there. He died alone. Was that really his one shining moment?

          That bugged me. As my roommate said, it was sad. I thought about it and thought about it and I decided that regardless what happened in my life, I would keep looking for bigger challenges and higher mountains regardless of what happened. No greatest moments for me, just greater things to come.

          All this came to mind this week. Sitting in a chair at home (not my recliner because I didn’t want to fall asleep) one evening with the lights out, I was letting my mind run through events of my life. Recent events have been sad, but mostly this life has been very fulfilling. As of Saturday, October 5 I will have been in the ministry for 44 years. It occurred to me that Big Red told me the story of that shining moment 44 years after it had happened. I sat there in the dark and thought, ‘Do I have a shining moment?’

          As I thought about it, there have been many, many shining moments. Moments in time that stand out, faces that become clear in the memory, babies that smile when they see you. Sometimes seeing someone come to the Lord against all odds. Watching a dear saint pass from this life to glory. The unbridled joy of a child at VBS and the gentle pleasure of an older person upon hearing a favorite song. My great moments might not sound so great to some, but at the moment of their happening they were great. For 44 years it has been awesome. Which is not to say there have been no down times, but sitting there thinking about it, the shining moments blow the bad moments away.

          Please don’t live your life in the past. Your personal life, your family life, your church life should all be focused on the next shining moment. If you keep seeking great things, when that time comes to sit in the dark and ponder on your very best moments it will be like a parade of joys and laughter and smiles. Even the heartbreaks will pale.

          Big Red gripped the ball, then fired that third strike past the great Lou Gehrig and the crowd went wild. But then…….nothing else of note. A wonderful memory, yes. It seems so sad, though.

          A year ago, I was ready to stop and end my ministry. The Lord would not let me and, almost as important to me, neither would you folks. So, thank you and keep looking forward. Blessings!