A ‘Look’ From Mickey Mantle And The Savior!

TheDiscipleMD

It was an old-timers game at Yankee stadium. As I stood at the entrance of the dugout I looked back to see my boyhood hero, Bobby Richardson, (long time second baseman for the New York Yankees) standing behind me. Behind him was the great Yankee slugger, Mickey Mantle. I ran out of the dugout onto the baseball diamond to cheers of the fans. My hero followed right behind me. We both waited as we heard the announcer of the PA system say, “and now the great Mickey Mantle.” I looked towards the dugout and waited…and waited…and waited. And then I woke up!

That dream brought me back to a real life experience that my brother and I had when we were just kids. We had gone to see the Yankees play the Washington Senators. My Dad had brought us early to the game so we could see batting practice. It was the early 1960’s and we worshipped the Yankees. My brother was an avid Mickey Mantle fan.  I loved the diminutive Yankee second basemen, Bobby Richardson.  As boys we waited patiently on the front row and watched wide-eyed as the players took batting practice. We were in awe of them. They were Gods to us! It was a different time and a different generation. These players were immortalized on baseball cards. TV was in its infancy so you rarely saw one of them up close. They were almost mythical. There we stood watching. Then my brother nudged me. “Hey, there’s Mickey Mantle.” I looked out onto the field to see Mantle walking across the infield towards the dugout. He couldn’t have been more than 100 feet or so from us. We both yelled out, “Mr. Mantle, Mr. Mantle!” Recorded in my brother’s  journal for the day was an account of our visit to the park. It ended with this commentary. “We saw Mickey Mantle. We shouted out to him. He looked at us!”

As I lay in bed the other night I chuckled to myself. “He looked at us!” What a thrill it had been for my brother and I to have the great Mickey Mantle “look” at us! As I lay there, the feelings of that long past moment surfaced and I felt again that wonderful feeling of being “looked” upon. And then to my surprise, as that memory faded, I saw the Savior’s face come to my mind and I felt for a moment, how wonderful it would feel to be “looked” upon by him! And I felt my eyes start to swell with tears and I felt them start to trickle down the side of my face. And for an instant, all of my earthly worries vanished because I was lost in his gaze, but found in His glory!

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