Every basketball fan knows the name Larry Bird. An All-Star player for the Boston Celtics for many years, Larry Bird won nearly every award a basketball player can win. And yet he still remembers what it was like to be overlooked and unappreciated. In his senior year in high school, Bird was chosen for the Kentucky/Indiana All-Star Games. Now those games are a big deal in basketball crazy Kentucky and Indiana. However, the only reason Bird was chosen was that usually there was a representative from southern Indiana and they needed someone to fill that slot. They made that clear to him when he was selected. So from the very beginning, he was placed on the second team.

In the practices, however, the second team outplayed the first. And in the first game of the All-Star series, the Indiana team was up by eight points when the second team with Bird on it was sent in. They blew the game wide open. The same thing happened in the second game. This time the Indiana team was trailing in the first half when Larry's unit went in and again they went crazy and took complete control of the game. However, as the second half started, the coach put the first team back in.

Later, when it was time for the second team to go back in, the coach put everybody in except Larry Bird. He was left there, alone at the end of the bench wondering what was going on. Finally with about two minutes to play, the coach came over to Larry and said, "Hey, I forgot all about you. Why don't you go in now?" And Bird refused. "Too late, coach," he said. Years later he reflected on the event and said, "I know I overreacted because I was young. However, if I had it to do over again, I'd do the same thing because I remember how embarrassed I was. Even though my values have changed and my outlook is different, I still remember how I felt -- completely forgotten and totally unappreciated."

Friends: if one of the greatest basketball players of all time can feel forgotten, how about the rest of us who are not blessed with the talent and skill that he has? We know how it is to feel forgotten and unappreciated. We've been down that road.

But the good news this morning is that God will not forget us. God tells us that we are somebody -- and in baptism God calls us by name. God puts God's mark upon us and makes us God's own. God sends us the Holy Spirit, to comfort and counsel us in life.