Being the Dad of two boys, I’ve played a lot of “catch” with my sons. Both of them have very strong arms. My younger son excels at throwing a baseball, while my older son excels at throwing a football (though he throws awkwardly, like Phillip Rivers of the Chargers).
Now-a-days it’s a lot of fun playing catch. When they were young, however, it it was always great to be with them…but playing catch was a lot of work!
Why? Because they were enamored with the strength of their arms rather than the accuracy of their throws.
They would rear back and throw the ball as hard as they possibly could and, usually, it would sail 10 or 15 feet above me, or because of the effort would be very inaccurate and fly in a completely different direction. It was uncatchable.
So I would tell them,
The only good throw is one that the person you are throwing to can catch!
If I said it once, I said it a thousand times! Eventually they understood, and now it’s a lot of fun to play catch with my boys.
What I’ve learned, though, is often we do this same thing as adults.
As leaders, we get enamored with our vision. We get enamored with our organizational goals. We get enamored with the latest business or leadership principles we’re reading about.
Or as parents, we get enamored with the way we want things to be. We get enamored with our own comfort levels we feel we “deserve” at home. We get enamored with the eloquent way we’re teaching our kids.
And our staff, our volunteers, our children – can’t catch what we’re throwing them. It’s over their heads. Or it’s completely misdirected. What we’re trying to give them isn’t presented in a way that they can catch on to.
So when you have that great idea for ministry at church, or you have to deal with that issue at work, or you want your kids to change at home – make sure to present your ideas in a way that can be caught by the person(s) you’re throwing them to.
It makes what you’re doing a lot more fun – and effective.
