October 23rd Devotional
Proverbs 30:25
On this day in 1930, J.K. Scott won the first-ever miniature golf tournament. The game of golf was invented around 600 years ago but the game of mini-golf is a relatively new invention. The game of mini-golf was created by an entrepreneur named Garnet Carter. Carter developed a hotel on Lookout Mountain called Fairyland Inn and wanted to create an 18-hole golf course. The construction of the course took much longer than he expected and he wanted to create an attraction for his guests, thus the birth of mini golf, or as he patented it, Tom Thumb Golf. Originally, he thought that the fairyland course with elves and gnomes would only be played by children but much to his surprise the course was overrun by adults. Carter patented the game of mini golf and within three years of its invention, there were over 25,000 ‘putt-putt’ courses in the United States. The game skyrocketed in popularity. The Tom Thumb Open mini-golf tournament took place in Chattanooga in 1930. Qualifications playoff games took place in all 48 states at the time. The total purse available was $10,000, with $2,000 to the winner (which would be valued at $32,000 today). Over 200 players from 30 states participated. The game was intense and the score was close, but in the end, J.K. Scott came out as the winner. The great depression hit miniature golf pretty hard. Most people could not afford luxuries or entertainment during that time and it faded away into memory. It didn’t pick up in popularity again until about the 1970s.
Most of you can remember playing miniature golf. We would grab our favorite color ball (mine was always orange), get a putter that seemed to match our height, take a scoring card with a tiny pencil, and prepare to conquer the green. You know how the game starts. The first hole is typically a straight shot straight down the middle, an easy par 2. But as the course goes on it gets incrementally harder. Soon we are battling sand traps, rocks in the middle of the course, windmills (got me every time), jumps, and shots that only a person with an advanced math degree can figure out. We pretended we had skills but at the end of the day, it was just pure, plain dumb luck. Some of it might have been a bit of cheating as we scooted our ball closer to the hole (you know you're guilty). Truly, mini golf was one of those good things that come in small packages. The Bible talks about miniature or small things. In Proverbs 30:24-28 Solomon writes about four small things that should astonish us, one of which is the ant. He writes “The ants are not a strong people, but they prepare their food in the summer (verse 25).” Biblically the ant serves as a direct rebuke against the sluggard, or the lazy man. The ant is hard-working and prepares. He knows the summer is short and the winter is quickly coming. Likewise, we as a believer must be prepared people. We might not currently be suffering through a winter season, but someone in the future will. What should we as Christians be prepared for? Temptations, trials, and Christ’s return. Sadly, we spend more time preparing for vacations and retirement than we do serving Jesus and looking for His return. Ask yourself, how are you preparing yourself to live for Christ each day? Are you intentionally setting time aside for prayer? Are you putting on the whole armor of God? Are you daily spending time in the Scriptures? Are you daily decreasing yourself and increasing Christ in your life? What, if any preparation do we have to live a Christian life? It’s not always the ‘big’ things, somethings it’s the small things that matter most.
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