The only thing missing was a night of triumph in the poker room. Could it happen....?
BLINDS: 1,500/3,000 (as best we remember)
IN THE POCKET: K-K
It's the third hour of play, and we've had another night of drama. After early losses, A-10 brought a 10 on the flop which won a big pot. We reached the first break at 13,775 chips (starting from 12,000). Big bets with pocket Aces and A-8 in Hour 2 led us to 20,400. But misses then set us back to 11,700 - enough to reach the final table at Break 2.
Now six players remain. Since 20 entered, only two will win money. The blinds are steep. We have a big pocket pair, early in the betting order. So we go for broke - going all-in with 18,400 chips left. Who will dare to take us on?
We watch players to our right fold. Then we notice a woman to our left. She called.... and she has pocket Aces! This classic clash happens only 2.4 percent of the time.
"I probably won't win this," she says. Oh really? She's an 81-percent favorite to knock us out.
ON THE FLOP: 2-3-5
No third King, and even more trouble. Now Ms. Aces has a straight draw.
ON THE TURN: 4
Oh well. "There's the straight," we say. "and that's the ball...."
ON THE RIVER: 6
"Wait!" other players say. Amazingly, there's a straight on the table! We stay alive, and gain about 1,000 chips on the split because of the blinds.
We offer our opponent a long-distance fist bump. "I'm not sure her fist would have been friendly," a player to our right jokes.
"More like a Five-Finger Death Punch," we joke in agreement.
We had other big moments like that, including A-Q which matched another player and resulted in a chop. The field dwindled to five players, then four. We reached Break 3 with 15,000 chips. Then a miscalculation by a player left us in the top three!
We hinted at the "C-word" (chop) and "BB-words" (bubble boy), but our opponents ignored it. Finally with the Big Blind at 6,000, we were forced to push with a lowly 4-10. This time the board didn't bail us out, and a woman to our right hit it big with her own pocket Kings. A long night with some close calls ended with no money, but a thrilling third place.
MINISTRY MOMENT: A man who started the tournament to our immediate left said he was feeling good.
"I try to be good," we told him - and he seemed to understand. Then we paraphrased a Bible passage about that effort....
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do.... no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing. - Romans 7:15, 19The apostle Paul explains in this complex-sounding section that he's not inherently good (verse 18). In fact, we all have a sinful nature - so deep down, none of us are good. We continued the paraphrase:
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord! - Romans 7:24-25
A distraction then happened, which prevented us from asking the man what he thought of this. So we'll ask you. Have you come to realize you do a lot of evil things - sometimes because you have no choice? Those evil things leave you doomed to death. But like that poker hand, there's an escape hatch here as well:
For the wages of sin is death., but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. - Romans 6:23
Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice - taking the penalty for sin that we're supposed to face, so that we might gain eternal life in God's Kingdom. Be thankful for that sacrifice, and ask God in prayer to have it applied to you.
UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 224 final tables in 582 games (38.5%) - 48 cashes. Oh, about those boxes.... we'll explain why we collected them very soon.
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