The soccer tournament was made up of teams of boys in Grades 6, 7 and 8.  The problem was that all our Grade 8 students were away on a school trip.  So my Grade 6 son was one of many younger boys who made the team.  As we gathered on the stands to watch them play yesterday, the rain was streaming down in sheets and the players were soaked.  

Playing against teams with older boys, they hustled their hearts out.  But they lost all three games.  However, they never gave up.

Right down to the end, they were playing like it was the first game and there was no score.  They tried again and again and finally, with just a few minutes left in the last half, they scored their one and only goal of the day.

It was like we won the FIFA Cup.  The cheers and excitement lit up the field.

And it taught me something.  That no matter where you are in the game, you can always make progress.  Everything might be stacked against you.  But if you put your head down and do the work, good things will happen.

As American abolitionist Harriet Beecher Stowe once said, “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”

So if the rain is pouring down on your life and you just can’t catch a break, remember that the sun is shining just around the corner.  So keep on trying to make a play and before you know it, you will have scored that game-changing goal.