This is not a joke - will give you cold chills!

This will give you cold chills, but puts life into perspective!
At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves learning-disabled
children, the father of one of the school's students delivered a speech
that would never be forgotten by all who attended.

After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he offered a question.

"Everything God does is done with perfection. Yet, my son, Shay, cannot
learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other
children do. Where is God's plan reflected in my son?"

The audience was stilled by the query.

The father continued. "I believe," the father answered, "that when God
brings a child like Shay into the world, an opportunity to realize the
Divine Plan presents itself. And it comes in the way people treat that
child."

Then, he told the following story:

Shay and his father had walked past a park where some boys Shay knew that
were
playing baseball. Shay asked, "Do you think they will let me play?"

Shay's father knew that most boys would not want him on their team. But
the
father understood that if his son were allowed to play it would give him a
much-needed sense of belonging.

Shay's father approached one of the boys on the field and asked if Shay
could
play. The boy looked around for guidance from his teammates. Getting
none, he
took matters into his own hands and said, "We are losing by six runs, and
the
game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we'll try
to
put him up to bat in the ninth inning."

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shay's team scored a few runs but was
still
behind by three. At the top of the ninth inning, Shay put on a glove and
played
in the outfield. Although no hits came his way, he was obviously ecstatic
just
to be on the field, grinning from ear to ear as his father waved to him
from
the stands.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shay's team scored again. Now, with two
outs
and bases loaded, the potential winning run was on base. Shay was
scheduled to
be the next at-bat. Would the team actually let Shay bat at this juncture
and give
away their chance to win the game?

Surprisingly, Shay was given the bat. Everyone knew that a hit was all but
impossible because Shay didn't even know how to hold the bat properly,
much less
connect with the ball. However, as Shay stepped up to the plate, the
pitcher moved
a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shay could at least be able to
make
contact.

The first pitch came and Shay swung clumsily and missed. The pitcher again
took
a few steps forward to toss the ball softly toward Shay.

As the pitch came in, Shay swung at the ball and hit a slow ground ball to
the
pitcher. The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could easily have
thrown the
ball to the first baseman. Shay would have been out and that would have
ended the
game.

Instead, the pitcher took the ball and threw it on a high arc to right
field, far
beyond reach of the first baseman. Everyone started yelling, "Shay, run to
first.
Run to first." Never in his life had Shay ever made it to first base. He
scampered
down the baseline, wide-eyed and startled.

Everyone yelled "Run to second, run to second!" By the time Shay was
rounding first
base, the right fielder had the ball. He could have thrown the ball to the
second
baseman for a tag. But the right fielder understood what the pitcher's
intentions
had been, so he threw the ball high and far over the third baseman's head.

Shay ran towards second base as the runners ahead of him deliriously
circled the
bases towards home. As Shay reached second base, the opposing shortstop
ran to him,
turned him in the direction of third base, and shouted, "Run to third!"

As Shay rounded third, the boys from both teams were screaming, "Shay! Run
home!"
Shay ran home, stepped on home plate and was cheered as the hero, for
hitting a
"grand slam" and winning the game for his team.

"That day," said the father softly with tears now rolling down his face,
"the boys
from both teams helped bring a piece of the Divine Plan into this world."

And now, a footnote to the story. We all send thousands of jokes through
e-mail
without a second thought, but when it comes to sending messages regarding
life
choices, people think twice about sharing. The crude, vulgar, and
sometimes the
obscene pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of decency
is too
often suppressed in school and the workplace.

If you are thinking about forwarding this message, you are probably
thinking about
which people on your address list aren't the "appropriate" ones to receive
this
type of message.

The person who sent this to you believes that we can all make a
difference. We all
have thousands of opportunities a day to help realize God's plan. So Many
seemingly
trivial interactions between two people present us with a choice: Do we
pass along
a spark of the Divine? Or do we pass up that opportunity, and leave the
world a bit
colder in the process?