Top Dollar

Three years after signing a record-setting $252 million, 10-year contract with the Texas Rangers, Alex Rodriguez was traded to, of all teams, the New York Yankees. Exactly. A team with an already-outrageous payroll of $170.3 million per year is ready to bump $190 million to acquire Rodriguez, arguably the best player in the game. The Yankees will have not one, not two, not three, but FOUR players with 100+ million dollar contracts.

I caught myself daydreaming about how fantastic it'd be to play this childhood game for 16-mil a year. Sadly, I didn't get too far in this daydream before I was quickly jerked back to reality … the reality that, oh yeah, I've never been paid a penny to play baseball. One time I think my parents might have paid 4 bucks apiece to watch me play in some tournament, but that's about as big-time as I've gotten. I'm just not as sought after as A-Rod. Or am I?

On second thought, my acquisition price was a heckuva lot more than A-Rod's millions. And what's crazy is that I'm a nobody! But so are a lot of the others on my team. Most of us are quite overlooked and underpaid from the world's perspective. But the same God who chose a shepherd boy to slay the giant, a group of fishermen to be His Son's closest followers, and a Christian-killer to take the Good News to the Gentiles, has paid in full and upfront the highest price to get us on His team. Indeed, the grace of God and the blood of Christ allows "nobodies" like you and I to sit in the same dugout as the greats — Abraham, Moses, David, Esther, Peter, Paul, even Jesus himself. I say go ahead and play like you're "all that." After all, you've been paid top dollar to do so.