The Pitch He Never Expected

On June 17, 2015, Chris Singleton was a freshman baseball player at Charleston Southern University with dreams of the major leagues. That evening, a gunman walked into Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and murdered nine people during a Bible study — including Chris's mother, Sharonda Coleman-Singleton.

The next morning, while the world raged with grief and anger, this nineteen-year-old athlete stood before cameras and said, "Love is always stronger than hate." In the days that followed, Chris publicly forgave the man who took his mother from him. Not because the act deserved forgiveness. Not because the pain wasn't real. But because he knew that hatred would destroy him far more thoroughly than any loss ever could.

Chris went on to be drafted by the Chicago Cubs in 2017. But he will tell you that the hardest thing he ever did wasn't fielding a ground ball under pressure or standing in against a ninety-mile-per-hour fastball. It was choosing, day after day, to release the bitterness that had every right to consume him.

The Apostle Paul wrote, "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you" (Ephesians 4:32). Paul didn't say forgiveness would be easy. He said it would look like Christ.

Chris Singleton learned what every believer eventually faces: forgiveness is not a feeling you wait for. It is a decision you make — sometimes daily, sometimes hourly — to set down the weight that was never yours to carry. The God who forgave you will give you the strength to do the same.