Turn with me to Romans 12. We're going to read verses four and five.
(4) For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office:
(5) `So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.”
Some years ago, a well-known professional football player was selected to be on the cover of the John Madden football video game. At the announcement, a reporter said, “Every player had a less productive year than the year before after he was put on the cover.” And then he asked him, “Do you believe that being on the Madden cover is a jink?”
The player was a linebacker and the question presumed that he would have fewer tackles in the upcoming year than the previous year. The player responded, “I don’t believe in jinks. What God has for me He has for me.” In essence, he said that being on the cover of the well-known video game would have no impact on what God had planned for him during the upcoming season.
Ladies and gentlemen, this sounds a lot like many Christians today. They believe that God is in control of everything, so whatever happens in their lives is part of His divine will. For example, I have heard Christians who did not get a particular job rationalize their disappointment by saying, “I guess God didn’t want me to have it.” And then there’s the “I don’t understand why God would [fill in the blank])?”
People who say things like this believe everything that happens in life is the will of God. Imagine telling parents who lost a child in an accident, for example, that it was God’s will for it to happen. And then compound their sorrow by saying “We don’t always know and understand why God does these things.”
As I was thinking about this, the idea of God being a “football coach” came to mind. It’s an analogy that can help us understand, to some degree, why many Christians question God and blame Him for the uncomfortable things that happen in their lives.
So, let’s talk a little about God’s team.
Everyone who is born into this world is born with a sinful nature. They are not a child of God, contrary to what most Christians believe. By default, they are assigned to Satan’s team. But, and this is the good part, to join God’s team all they need to do is ask. He doesn’t hold tryouts. He never says no and we see this in John 3:16.
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
Before His first meeting with His players, the Coach (God) and His Assistant Coaches (Jesus and the Holy Spirit) develop the playbook that identifies the team’s one goal – to add as many people as possible to the team – and each player’s role in successfully adding players. Some players will have different assignments; some will have similar assignments, and some will have multiple assignments.
With this analogy in mind, let's read First Corinthians 12:14 and 18.
(14) “For the body (the team) is not one member, but many.”
(18) “But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him.”
In American football, it’s not uncommon for a coach to refer to the playbook as the “Bible” and to insist that the players learn it inside and out for the team to be successful. The same thing applies to “spiritual football.”
Let’s look at what two players, who were on the team earlier, said about the playbook.
The prophet Jeremiah said, “Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts.” (Jeremiah 15:16)
David, the man after God’s own heart, said, “Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.” (Psalm 19:14)
Now let’s look at what the Coach Himself says about His playbook. Turn to Psalm 138. We're going to read the first two verses.
(1) I will praise thee with my whole heart: before the gods will I sing praise unto thee.
(2) I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.
Now turn to Second Timothy 3 and we're going to read verses 16 and 17.
(16) All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
(17) That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
The playbook defines the Coaching staff’s expectations of the players.
In the playbook, the coach and the assistant coaches define their expectations regarding player conduct. For example, one example I found online said, “In every environment an athlete experiences, they have a choice as to how they look at it, how they talk about it, and how they become successful in it. There are only two types of people in this world: positive and poisonous. Which one are you?”
This sounds good from a natural point of view, but there is a huge difference in how our Coach and His Assistant Coaches approach player conduct. They don’t give us a choice if we are going to be contributors to the team’s success. Their “conduct expectations” are clear. For example:
First Peter 1:15-16 says,
(15) But as He which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation;
16 Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy.
Another example is Ephesians 4:25 and 29.
(25) Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another.
(29) Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. (Ephesians 4:25, 29)
Now, let’s get back to the subject that launched this message: the belief that what happens in our lives depends on God’s mercy and grace because He is in control of our lives.
In the natural, the coaches put together a game plan with plays designed specifically to defeat the opponent. Are you following me? Our Coaches have put together a game plan from before the foundations of the world designed specifically to defeat every play in our opponent’s playbook. Every play.
And let me say this before I continue.
Satan and his dark kingdom is not our only opponent. (Depression. Oppression.) Our minds can be opponents too (Unbelief. Rebellion.) and so can our bodies. (Aches. Pains.) Our Coaches’ playbook contains an abundance of plays to address all three of these opponents.
Now, the team’s success depends on three things:
(1) Each player’s knowledge and understanding of the playbook,
(2) Each player’s understanding of his role in each play and his commitment to practice, and
(3) Each player’s execution of the plays in the playbook.
Let's begin with Knowledge and Understanding
After putting the game plan together, the Coach and Assistant Coaches meet with the players to go over every play and every player’s assignment within the play. This takes place first in a classroom setting.
For us, our classroom time is the quiet time we spend with the Coaches in prayer and worship.
For the next two or three days, the coaches will spend hour after hour with the players, dissecting the plays in different game situations and asking questions to gauge their knowledge and understanding as to what the plays are designed to accomplish.
For us, our “two or three days” are the times that we spend meditating and assimilating what we read in the Bible, our playbook.
We can think about meditation and assimilation as grasping and understanding one "play" and then adding another "play" and then another and so on. First Peter 1:1-7 is an example.
(1) Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:
(2) Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
(3) According as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
(4) Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
(5) And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;
(6) And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;
(7) And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. (1 Peter 1:1-7)
The players must understand the plays and believe that they will work before the coaches can move to the next step – practicing the plays.
The Practice
The players will practice every play in the game plan again and again and again in various situations. As the plays are practiced, some players will begin to grasp and understand how they complement one another. These players are more committed and determined than others to perform the plays as designed. It’s like what we read in the first seven verses of First Peter 1.
The more we add to our knowledge, the more we put into practice what we’ve added, First Peter 1:8 says, “For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Abound and fruitful in what? For the purpose of this message, abounding and fruitful in producing the results of the playbook – the Bible – in our lives that will help us add players to the team..
For us, our practice includes the times we talk with people about Jesus, when we pray for them and declare their healing, and when our new nature tells us to stop but our emotions are yelling “Go”!
Up to a point, the Coach and Assistant Coaches have been in control of the information and the practice. They designed the game plan. They led the classroom discussions regarding the plays, their intended outcomes, and player assignments. They have spent time with the players practicing the plays to put them in situations where they can be successful. Next comes the execution -- something the Coaches cannot control.
The Execution
Please listen to me carefully: the Coach and Assistant Coaches cannot control the players' faith in the playbook, what they do on the field, or their determination to execute the plays. The control of the Coaches ends when the players hit the field. And this is where many in the church miss it.
We have the playbook and everything we need to be successful. But so many in the Church have not studied it. They have not been like Jeremiah – “Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart.” (Jeremiah 15:16)
So, it’s kind of hard for the Coaching staff to tell us what we need to do in each situation when we have not studied the playbook – when we don’t have it available inside of us.
And since we have not studied the playbook, when we run a play, we don’t get the results the play is designed to produce. Is that the Coach’s fault? Absolutely not. It’s our fault for not thoroughly understanding the playbook and being committed to executing the plays as they are designed.
Our Coaches cannot force us to pull out the playbook, to read the playbook, to digest the playbook, or to understand the playbook. That is up to us.
When we believe everything that happens in our lives happens because God wills it to happen, we make Him totally responsible for executing the playbook in our lives. Coaches don’t execute plays. The players execute plays. When we point our fingers at the Coaches, we are not accepting any of the responsibility for the decisions we made that produced the situation.
You see, just like the coach of an American football team doesn’t design plays that will cause the players to fail, neither does the Coaching staff of all creation! They only design successful plays – when the plays are executed according to their design.
And ladies and gentlemen, it goes back to a point I made earlier – the players must grasp, understand, and believe that the plays will work! Turn to Hebrews 11:1, a very familiar verse.
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1)
I want to close with what the Coach and Assistant Coaches say will happen when we have complete faith in the playbook and execute the plays as they are designed. Turn first to Isaiah 55.
(10) For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:
(11) So shall My Word (the playbook) be that goeth forth out of My mouth: it (the plays it contains) shall not return unto Me void, but it (the plays) shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it (when it is executed with faith). (Isaiah 55:10-11)
Now look at Matthew 4:4.
But He answered and said, It is written (in the playbook), Man (every player) shall not live by bread alone (his own plays), but by every word (every play that has been designed) that proceedeth out of the mouth of God (the Coach.)
I believe that we are players who have or are grasping an understanding of the plays and how they complement each other so that we can execute them in a lost and dying world and, in the process, add players to the team..
I am playing by your side.
