After a season of high school football and a season of coaching my oldest son’s YMCA basketball team, I now find myself coaching my two sons’ 10-13 year-old PAL football team. Our first game was Saturday, and we were winning 13-7, but we were looking at third and 18 from midfield. I looked at my 10-year-old quarterback, David, and told him “Bunch Left, Bootleg.”

The NFL Draft is coming up in April. This year, the experts say that the number one pick will be either Arkansas' Darren McFadden or LSU’s Glenn Dorsey. Could you imagine being the number one pick? Well, surprise… You are!

You are a top recruit! God is recruiting you for His team, but the enemy is trying his best to keep you from joining "TEAM JESUS." Psalm 51:5 says that we were born in sin and shaped in iniquity (or evil). That means that we have to make a decision to join God's team. If we leave this world without accepting Christ, we cannot enter His Kingdom.

We are all familiar with the story of Jonah being swallowed by the giant fish. But, what is intriguing to me is that in the four chapters in the book of Jonah, he goes through four different phases with God. In chapter 1, Jonah is running away from God. In chapter 2, he is running to God. In chapter 3, he is running with God. And, in chapter 4, he is running ahead of God. I believe that in our Christian lives we all go through these phases as coaches and athletes.

Ok, so you’re an athlete. You’ve probably read or heard this verse before. But when was the last time you stopped and thought about it? What was Paul trying to say? Is the athlete the metaphor, or how the athlete trains? My take on this passage is that every Christian is an athlete; so, that leaves the training in this verse to be the focus. 

Often times, a victory might be determined by the game within the game. Can our left tackle keep their defensive end off of our quarterback? Can our closer strike out their best hitter? Can our off-guard shut down their "go-to" guy?

We spend a lot of time in practice doing individual drills and one-on-one drills. In our one-on-ones we want to go "best-versus-best"; we don't want one of our starters going against a second-string player because he is not challenged as much. He does not improve from the situation.

When we go best-versus-best, we quickly find a player’s weaknesses--the flaws in his technique--so that we can correct them. We also see who is going to rise to the top, whom we can depend upon when the game is on the line.

Across from the headquarters of FCA, atop a hill, is a tall communications tower. In the almost three years that I’ve worked here, I’ve glanced at this tower hundreds of times and never given it a second look. But yesterday morning I caught myself daydreaming. It was in this daydream that God taught me a beautiful lesson--one He’s been teaching me over and over again for the last several weeks.

At the top of this tower is a flashing light. It guides air traffic and prevents aircrafts from flying into it. No matter the time, day or season, this light continues to flash, and communication continues to be broadcast.

It’s been a while since I was in high school, but I still vividly recall one day during my junior year. It was the day my coach called me into his office and told me he was moving me from fullback to tackle. As a sophomore, I had weighed 200 pounds and was pretty fast. I gained 35 pounds over the summer and was a little slower at that weight. The coach told me I was too good of a player to sit on the bench, but that I was now too slow to be a running back. He asked me to make a personal sacrifice and move to a new position on the line so that I could help the team have a chance at the conference title.

As Christians, our ultimate purpose on earth is twofold: to bring honor and glory to our Lord and Savior, and to share His goodness and love with others. So often we forget that people are watching us and that God has commanded that we be a light to a lost and dying world. When I think of “letting my light shine,” I think of three ways that, as a coach and Christian man, I try to do that every day.