A couple of weeks ago I struggled through the Duke-Georgia Tech basketball game. We weren’t supposed to lose. However, apparently Georgia Tech didn’t know that, so we lost. They played a great game. We didn’t. At the close of the game, Page looked at me and said: “So, how do you feel?” I simply answered: “It’s a long season.”

One of the things I’ve learned as a basketball fan is that a whole season is never determined by a single game. One of the years when we won the national title, a couple weeks earlier we had lost the ACC Tournament championship by 24 points. One game does not decide a season.

So, why this meandering about basketball – especially when most who read this couldn’t care less whether or not my alma mater is having a good year? I write this simply because it reminds me of a greater lesson about life. Life is, we hope, a long season … and one event, one failure, one tragedy, one broken relationship, one lost job, one illness, one unwise decision does not determine the outcome of the season. In fact, any good coach will tell you his or her athletes often learn more from their losses than from their victories. So it is in life. Sometimes the pains we experience, when intelligently processed, lead to joys or victories we would never have known otherwise.

My pastoral advice is therefore: Do not deny the moment, but don’t get stuck in it, either. Learn the lessons pain has to teach, and then armed with that data, move on. There are new victories yet to be achieved, new joys yet to be experienced. Don’t miss the beauties of tomorrow because of the tears of yesterday. One bad game does not a season make. And, one bad experience or even a series of them does not determine the ultimate quality or character of a life. That’s part of the power of positive thinking which is so fundamental here.

As the St. Paul put it: “This one thing, we do … we press on toward the mark for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:14) In other words, whatever road stops we endured along the way do not have to be the end of the road. When a moment of difficulty comes, just remind yourself: It’s a long season.