Adversity

Adversity is something that is in a coaches or athletes vocabulary, basically, from day one.  I know coaches that leave room in practice for "adversity drills".  The dictionary would define adversity as "difficulties, misfortunes".  Pastors would use the word trials or a test.  It all comes down to one thing, how you react.  I'd like to take a look at adversity, with a story from my life and then see what the Bible has to say about it.

Picture it, Carthage Bulldog Stadium, October 9,2015....


In football, we were blowing through opponents and had our eyes on an undefeated season and a district championship.  I always kept that "we are better than them" attitude during practice and during pregame.  Mainly because we had so much talent on our team this year, I literally thought we could beat anybody put in front of us.  It would soon prove to be parallel to our basketball team (which just won district two weeks ago).  So, back to football, we roll in to Carthage on a pretty good high.  It is our first official district game, we had already faced a district opponent in a non-district game (Chapel Hill) and we felt good about our chances against them.  If you don't know, Henderson and Carthage have a storied past.  Being a graduate of Henderson, I routinely remind our kids of just how much angst we have for Carthage.  Of course, it is a friendly rivalry, off the field.  Something happens when the scoreboard turns on and the game starts.  So, another coach and myself had already arrived and were coaching the 7th Grade "B" team when our "A" teams started filing into the stands.  The format of the games is usually, 7th Grade "B", 8th Grade "B", 7th Grade "A", and 8th Grade "A".  usually.  So, here we are, 7th grade "B" finishes and we rush on the 8th grade "B" to get them stretched for the next game.  As I am leading stretches, I turn around and low and behold, Carthage has marched out their 7th grade "A".  I am talking about, our "A" teams had just unloaded the bus.  So we talk to the coaches and we end up rushing our 7th grade "A" quickly onto the field.

I'm the kind of guy that has routines.  I am not OCD by any stretch of the imagination, but on game days and in certain parts of life, I like to have a little structure and sameness.  Call me superstitious.  This totally threw me off my routine.  In my head, I have a little stress but I am one of the coaches and in turn have to stay cool and calm and not let this become my excuse in the event that we lose.  However, sometimes what is going on outside of me isn't what is going on inside.  Inside, I am perplexed and a little ticked off that my routine has been thrown off.  We had played three games to this point and everything was going really well for us.  Now, I am reminded of something Joe Paterno said, "The minute you think you've got it made, disaster is just around the corner."  Well, for the Henderson Cubs 7A team, disaster was about to strike.

We fell behind early, and at halftime, I gave a little speech about not giving up.  Now, I have been in charge of making the bands for the middle school offense for the last two seasons.  I have always included a bible verse on my band.  The first season I did it, I would put one at the bottom of one of the sheets.  This season, we had three-sided bands, so the band was on two of the sides and on the bottom side I would but a picture with a verse.  The Carthage week, this was inside the band...

In case you can't tell, that is Psalm 46:2.  I had the kids repeat it after I read it, it fired them up.  I told them that the game wasn't over and we still had time to take it!

We were only down a TD, so we could do it.  It was not in our cards that night and we ended up losing 32-16 for our only loss of the football season, but the lesson those kids learned was worth it all.

Two weeks later, against Palestine, we were in a back and forth battle, and again went into halftime down, this time by only four points.  We answered in the third with eight points and another eight in the fourth and then managed to hold them on their final drive.  That is an ultimate victory folks, when kids realize when things go wrong they don't have to fold up their tents.  

That same experience translated to basketball, 7A had already lost to Carthage (only their second loss of the season) and we played them again on the final night of the season with the district championship on the line.  We took a eleven-point lead into the fourth quarter, and it slowly disappeared. We were in Carthage, and the crowd was packed.  I think I called three timeouts in the final thirty seconds to get my kids calmed down. We escaped the gym with a two-point win and in my mind, erased their one-point win in our house.  So we took a one-point advantage over them and technically won district outright.  That's how I put it anyway.

All that to say, our walk with Christ should be no different than what happened to those 7th grade athletes.  Now, the triumphs of athletes and sports teams are trivial when compared to what we face in life, but it is useful to utilize lessons learned in these situations.  

The Book of James says, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance." (James 1:2-3)

We are called to be joyous in our trials.  If we open our eyes to see beyond the present suffering we are going through, to see the big picture, we would be so much better off.  For the most part, though, we are detail people and we see the things that are happening to us right now and then we may miss the big blessing God has waiting for us.  We choose to instead sulk in our suffering.  We bend to the pressure that it puts on us.  We scratch, claw, and fight through it, because we can do it.  We rarely lean on the person of Christ.  When all he wants us to do is lean on Him.  Just like those 7th graders had to lean on their coaches and each other, we have to lean on our coach, Jesus.  We can also lean on other Christians, those guys are our teammates and we help each other along.  

Jesus is described as the Lion of Judah.  If we are His children, that makes us lions, too.  Lions live in a pride.  We should stay with our pride and work with each other.  If you're living the Christian life alone, you're setting yourself up for a lot more heartache than you need!

How to Win BIG

I spend the majority of my football season in practice and at the high school helping with film and other things.  We spend the majority of basketball season in the gym.  We spend track season trying to strategize and place the right runners in the right events to get the most points to win the meet, then we spend most of our time on the track.  What is all that for?  We do it because we want to win.

If we chose not to practice and to just show up on game day, how successful would we be?  If you look at it, the teams that are most successful have the players and the coaches that put the most into what they are doing.  Do you have to have some talent? Yes, I believe talent helps, but I can tell you from experience, talent will only get you so far.  There's a point in a game and in a season, where the will to win and the heart beating inside your chest takes over.  Sometimes, do we fall short?  Yeah.  That's life, you don't win every game you play.

Our walk with Christ should be the same thing.  How can we face the pitfalls of life and temptation if we don't practice.  I've been a huge "fan" (I love the entire Bible, but always seem to come back to this) of Paul's passage on self-discipline in his letter to the church in Corinth.

"Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only on gets the prize?  Run in  such a way as to get the prize.  Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict   training.  They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.  Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I  have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."
                          1 Corinthians 9:24-27

Paul uses the metaphor of athletics to get his point across that our Christian life is supposed to be nearly the same.  Athletes do not go into competition without being prepared.  Soldiers do not enter a war zone without intelligence.  Police do not bust down a door without some sort of idea of what waits behind.  Firemen don't run into a fire without knowing something about the building.  All these people have some sort of strategy before they go into the situation.

Our daily lives as a Christ-follower should emulate those people.  Where should we get our strategies and tactics?  The Bible.  How will I know when to use them?  Oh, you're going to know trust me.  Our enemy uses plenty of things to side track us.  Our main defense is to stand behind the power of Jesus Christ and his Word.  If you have God's Word in your heart and mind you will have the recall and the ability to overcome a situation.  That is why God gave us His Word.  Not only is it His love letter to us, but it is our game plan or our battle strategy.  USE IT!

Another way of battling the traps and evils that come up in our lives is to completely avoid the things we know will trap us.  "Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul."  1 Peter 2:11.  Peter gives us a great strategy here, just stay away from it.  If you know that going to a bar is going to cause you to get sloppy drunk and do things you wouldn't want to do, don't go to a bar.  If you cannot trust yourself in the middle of the night with your cell phone in your bed or beside your bed, put the phone on the dresser across the room.

  
Our most important strategy in life is to put trust where it should be.  If you are facing a temptation or trial, lean on Jesus, because He's already won!  "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.  In this world, you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world." John 16:33.

In the end, Jesus has done it all!  All we have to do is trust Him and His strategy and plan for our lives!  

Life Under The Lights

What does it mean to live a "life under the lights"?

Well, quite obviously, if you don't know already, I am a coach.  I label myself more of a football coach, but I actually coach football, basketball, and track.  Football is my first love, so it is more of a default for me.  In the athletic setting, players perform on a field, court, or track, mostly at night. Hence, "under the lights".   As a coach, I am also on display under those lights.  For coaches, the moniker of "under a microscope" might be better.  I know you find this hard to believe, but even middle school coaches live life under that microscope.  Coaches' decisions are often called into question a few times during a game, even at my level.  Therefore, every action I take is under scrutiny.  During a game setting, all my work during the week and all the calls I make to the team are on display for the entire crowd.  They are wide open to the criticism of the people in the stands.  Make sense?  Even my life away from the classroom and the field or court is under scrutiny in the public eye.  Yes, even as a middle school coach the way I conduct myself, in public and even on social media, is seen by the people that I have some sort of impact on. 

Where else does this theme apply to my life?  Well, I like to think it applies to my walk with Christ.  In 1 John, the Bible says that "God is light," so therefore if I am claiming to be a Christian and living my life in God then I am "under THE light."  The Bible goes on to say that if I say that I have fellowship with God, but spend my life in the darkness, then I am lying.  It goes on to say that "if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from sin."  So therefore, as a Christian, if I am to be in total fellowship with God, then I must be "under the lights."  Does that mean if I am walking under the light of God that I will not fail, or that when I'm on the literal playing field that I don't screw up? NO! The Bible goes even as far to say that those who claim to have no sin are lying to themselves.  The greatest promise of all, occurs at the end of the passage in 1 John: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." The best thing about all this is that, I don't have to be the perfect Christian or the perfect coach!  Does that mean I can go out and live like hell all week and treat my student-athletes like crap all the time? Of course not! However, it does mean that I do not have to fear death for the mistakes I make.  I serve a God who loves me and wants to forgive me where I fail.  The beauty is, that's how most people are, at least in my opinion.  

God wants you to be real, and in my short life I've noticed that most people just look for you to be genuine.  We have enough fake people and we definitely have enough fake Christians.  

It is time that we started to live all of our lives under, or in, the light.  Take it as a blessings that God is watching, and that even others are too!