Mischa Elman, one of the greatest violinists of the twentieth century, was walking through the
streets of New York City one afternoon when a tourist approached him. “Excuse me, sir,” the
stranger began, “could you tell me how to get to Carnegie Hall?” Elman sighed deeply and
replied, “Practice, practice, practice.”1
Gary Player, one of the most successful international golfers of all time, lost count of how many
times someone said to him, “I’d give anything if I could hit a golf ball like you.” After one
particularly grueling day on the links, Player couldn’t resist correcting the person, “No, you
wouldn’t. You’d give anything to hit a golf ball like me, if it were easy.” Player then listed the
things one would have to do in order to achieve his level of play: “You’ve got to get up at five
o’clock in the morning, go out and hit a thousand golf balls, walk up to the club house to put a
bandage on your hand where it started bleeding, then go and hit another thousand golf balls.
That’s what it takes to hit a golf ball like me.”2
Another professional golfer, Chi Chi Rodriguez, put it this way. He said, “Preparation through
steady practice is the only honest avenue to achieving your potential.” Octavia Butler, in an
essay for aspiring writers, says, “First forget inspiration. Habit is more dependable. Habit will
sustain you, whether you’re inspired or not…. Habit is persistence in practice.”3
Whether in the concert hall, the playing field or the classroom, the steadiness of practice is
crucial for realized potential. It is an even more critical issue when it comes to living the
spiritual life. We achieve great things by training ourselves. Through proper training, we form
proper habits; we can intentionally choose those habits that are desirable for the formation of
character. Habits and practice seem obvious, ordinary, pedestrian; there aren’t many books that
deal with this positively. But without proper habits, we will never build forward momentum as
we strain toward the goal of the high calling of Christ. This momentum is built through a steady
obedience – as Eugene Peterson calls it, “a long obedience in the same direction.”4
Inspiration and talent will only carry you so far. The habits you form will sustain you. One fall,
in the panhandle of Texas, the local high school football team was enduring a terribly
embarrassing season. Week after week, the hometown would show up and cheer to no avail; it
was abysmal. Finally, a wealthy oil man could take it no longer. The week before the
homecoming game against their arch-rivals, he asked to address the team. “Boys,” he began,
“when I wore the green and gold, we won nearly every single game. Now look at you. You’ve
become a joke! You need some motivation. So here’s my proposition. You win this one game,
and I will personally buy each of you a brand new pickup truck.”
Those student-athletes began to think and dream about how fine they would look driving around
in their new trucks. They obsessed over which girls they would ride in them and whether or not
they would get bumper stickers. They were so excited about the prospect of driving a truck with
2
that “new car” smell. They hung a big poster of a truck in the locker room. And they went out
and lost the game 38-0.
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