By Brad Locke
March 24, 2006

(AgapePress) - Doc Gooden is heading to jail. He violated probation when he snorted a few lines of crack. When I think of Gooden, I think of the baseball card I own of him, a picture of a 19-year-old rookie phenom for the New York Mets -- a picture of seemingly limitless potential.

Now, over two decades later, Gooden is a pitiful shell of a man as far removed from those days of promising youth as the east is from the west. We (me included) often rant and rave about spoiled athletes, then laugh at and mock them when their arrogant, selfish actions bring them ruin. But I find it harder and harder these days to say, "I told you so." I guess I've learned to identify with these people to a certain degree; maybe I've just become more aware of my own numerous shortcomings.

When I read of Gooden's probation violation, I was deeply saddened. Saddened at the sight of another victim that the world had devoured, digested and expelled like so much manure. Yes, Doc is a victim, but that doesn't make him guiltless or absolved of responsibility. He is a victim of lies that have been told for centuries, and despite the consistently tragic results experienced by those who believe these lies, more and more people continue to embrace them.

What Doc believed, at least in general (I cannot know the man's mind), was that he was invincible. Most of us feel that way when we're young (and many of us never wise up). He also believed the world could provide him lasting joy, or at least an eternal string of pleasures that would keep his heart suspended above that canyon of despair so indigenous to the human psyche. He believed he was an end unto himself, and he used whatever means necessary to satisfy his heart's desires. When you add drugs to that equation, disaster is always the end product.

Even without drugs, disaster is inevitable. The tragedy isn't always so visible. Maybe that is what keeps the lies alive; men see other men who appear happy in their palaces and their giant cars, etc., and so that lifestyle becomes irresistible. Few of us have the ability to reach the financial status Doc Gooden once attained, but the feeling of emptiness upon discovering the world's inadequacy is just as potent for the guy on Elm Street as it is for the king on Trump Boulevard.

One huge lie undergirds all these other lies, and it is currently manifested in a phrase heard, sadly, even on children's television: follow your heart. Follow your heart, and it will lead you to your dreams. It will lead you to happiness. It will lead you to purpose, we are told.

I have shocking news: the heart cannot be trusted. I don't know why people think the heart is infallible, especially when you consider how quickly it can grow cold. People who follow their heart, and nothing else, wind up heartbroken. When our feelings change about our spouse, we get divorced. What we thought was love turns out to be nothing more than a slowly fading infatuation -- sometimes with the other person, sometimes with the concept of love itself.

The Lord spoke well when he said, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?" (Jeremiah 17:9) That is why we should heed Psalm 119:11: "I have stored up your word in my heart, that I may not sin against you." We must take care not to let the heart alone guide us, because the heart is naturally reckless.

Doc Gooden knows this now, in some sense at least. He actually turned himself in, confessing his drug use without prompting. I hope that means that he recognizes his sin and that he sincerely wants help. I hope he gets that help, and I hope in his despair that he fully and finally turns his life over to God.

Because God will comfort, heal and guide Doc with the Truth, and Doc's sins will be removed from him as far as the east is from the west.