Practice, Teamwork, Game Plan

Sermon delivered October 20, 2019 at First Presbyterian Church, Galesburg

Weeks ago, I told my son, Allen that I was speaking this morning. After he quit laughing, he gave me wise advice, “Remember no ever gets mad at someone for giving a short speech.” I will try to follow his advice.

I did not grow up in Galesburg, but my Grandparent lived in a 2^nd floor apartment two blocks from here on the corner of North and Prairie St. I was named for my grandfather, Bert Evans, who had been a street car driver, going from Lincoln Park to Gale Lake. My grandmother was a stay at home mom. Grandma’s best friend was Nellie Larson. Nellie Larson had a son named Jack, who we all know at this church. It is a small world.  

My grandparents attended the East Main Congregational Church, but for some reason one Sunday when visiting Galesburg, they brought me here for Sunday school. Being 5-6 years old, I was scared. It was huge and I didn’t know anyone.  A lady took a some of us up the stairs into the balcony, and put me in a room next to it. I don’t know if that was a regular classroom, or if it was a room intended for children with suspected discipline issues. I spent the entire morning scared that Grandma would never find me.

My second experience with this church was when I was a Knox student.  I decided to earn money as a ref at the old YMCA down the street. It was a Church League- what could go wrong? In the first game, the Methodists and Lutherans let me know I was a horrible ref, which I already knew. In the second game, it was the Presbyterians turn to yell at me. I quit after the first night.

I am hoping things will go better this morning than they did in my first two experiences with this church.  

As a coach, as we prepare for a game, we try to develop a “game plan” that will allow us to successfully handle the challenges of a basketball game. Today I would like to talk about developing a “game plan” to deal with the challenges and adversities of life.

I could bring up five of you from the audience, and I am confident in 10 minutes you could learn a basic offense. It is easy to run an offense when there is no defense. The problem becomes what do you do if we bring up a defense that doesn’t allow you to run the offense. We need to practice and prepare to handle obstacles the defense may present. In sports, there is no substitute for repetition. We try to repeat skills until the skills become a habit.

No matter how well practice has gone, often an opponent can surprise you with something unexpected. The other team may be faster than we were prepared for or their defense may be different than we were prepared for. What we have practiced may not seem to be working. If we have gone thru enough repetition, we have built habits and built confidence. You might say we stick with it because we have faith in what we have practiced.

For us as Christians, we would hope our playbook is the Bible. We may be tempted to see Sunday morning as our game day. I believe Sunday morning is our practice, AND we would hope we have more “practices” during the week. Practice is our opportunity to read, study, and learn about Christianity. It is our opportunity to build habits and strengthen our faith. We hope to use our “Sunday practices” to then go out into the game of life, prepared to handle challenges. The reading of verses over and over may allow the thought to become a habit for us.

In basketball, the stress of a game may cause some players to panic. They may not have practiced enough, or they may not believe in the game plan. When things get tough, they decide to go it alone. We call that “hero ball,” when one player turns from what we practice, and tries to win the game by themselves. Seldom is hero ball successful, because players are trying things they really have not practiced, and trying to be successful without their team.

The motto for my son’s team at Louisiana Tech is “stronger together,” and it is certainly appropriate in basketball and in life. When we encounter stress, don’t turn from others, turn to others.  

I was very fortunate to have had Hal Devore as my supervising teacher when I student taught. I had Hal as a mentor across the hall for my most of my teaching career, and he was chairman of our social studies department. Hal established our department as a team. There was a culture where people shared their successes but also were willing to share our failures. Sometimes in life we need to remember that we need to seek help. One of many lessons I learned from Hal was not to be afraid to ask for help. The great thing for us as Christians is that when we don’t have someone near and we feel alone, we can always reach out in prayer for help.

Years ago, I had heart by-pass surgery. I had a tremendous team in my family to give support. But I was still scared and filled with self-pity. As I woke up after surgery, there was Rev. Norm Myer standing at my bedside. I remember thinking, “What in the world are you doing here?”  I even remember thinking, if a minister is coming to my bedside is that a bad sign? Norm talked to me and then asked if he could pray with me. Whether it was Norm’s presence, his prayer, or God answering his prayer, that visit changed how I felt. It still is one of the most profound experiences I have had in my life. With prayer, we are never alone.

I have received two lessons about prayer that I would like to share.

When I was a young boy, my heroes were the HS players in my hometown. Dennis Radabaugh was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar before Kareem was Kareem. Louis Rameriz was Michael Jordan before Michael was Michael. At 7-8 years old I noticed several of the really good players would cross themselves before they shot a free throw. Not being Catholic, I had no idea what they were doing, but they made their free throws.

   

My father was a basketball coach. As any responsible basketball coach, he had built a little basketball court in our basement. I loved when my dad would go down and play basketball with me in the evening. One night when he and I went down to play, I lined up to shoot a free throw. I did all the things my father had taught me. I toed the line, took a deep breath, dribbled three times, then I crossed myself. I shot and made it. I was pretty proud of myself! I was waiting for some praise from my dad.

My father had grown up as a Methodist in a small, rural church. At Middlebury Church, the women sat on one side and the men on the other. It was conservative in its beliefs. It quickly became obvious my Dad wasn’t into me crossing myself before a FT. Dad’s line was something to effect, “Prayer to God to help you be a nice person, you take care of your own free throws.”

Many years later, after a hip replacement, when they got me up to walk, at the end of the hall was a sign that read, “Don’t pray for an easy life, pray for yourself to be strong.” It turns out this quote was part of a 19^th century sermon by Rev. Phillip Brooks. “O, do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men. Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks. Then the doing of your work shall be no miracle. But you shall be the miracle. Every day you shall wonder at yourself, at the richness of life which has come to you by the grace of God.”

To this point I have tried to say that we need practice as Christians, and when we encounter tough times, we need to remember to turn to God for help. The last part, we need to make sure we are clear on who we are as Christians and what our “game plan” is as a Christian.  

None of us when we go on vacation, pack our bags, load up the car, and our way down the driveway start talking about where we are going. We have a plan before we go out the door. I would argue that we need a plan in our lives also. We need to clarify to ourselves who we are as Christian.  

Dick Bennett was a very successful HS and college basketball coach in Wisconsin. Bennett was a very intense coach, and he was also very intense about his faith. He reached the following conclusion, “If my faith is real to me and important, then somehow, some way, I’d like it to play out in my vocation.” After reflection, he came up with Five Pillars based on his Christian beliefs, that I would like to share with you.

#1- Humility

Luke 14:11- “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Humility allows us to understand we have room to grow and improve in our lives.

#2- Passion

Revelations 3:15-16- “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot, I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm- neither hot nor cold- I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”

We can impact other people not just by what we do, but how we do it. We can be an energy giver with our love, our energy, and our work ethic.

#3- Unity

Mark 3:25- “If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand.”

Basketball and life are team sports, together we always achieve more. We are tougher together.

#4- Servanthood

Phillippians 2:3-4- “Do nothing of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourself. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

The best teams in life, help each teammate become better versions of themselves.

#5 Thankfulness

Ephesians 4:19-20- “Speak to one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Gratitude must be a constant drumbeat. Don’t forget to express your appreciation. And, appreciate and learn from each circumstance, both success and failure.

Dick’s son, Tony Bennett is the coach at the University of Virginia. He adopted his father’s Five Pillars for both himself and for his team. In 2018 Virginia was unranked at the beginning of the year. As the year went on, they kept winning and winning. At the end of the year, Virginia was ranked as the top #1 seed of the entire NCAA tourney. In the first game of the 2018 NCAA tourney, Virginia became the first #1 seed to lose to a #16 seed. It is considered the worst loss in college basketball history. This certainly would have been a time for self-pity, anger, selfishness, and many other negative emotions.

While Tony Bennett was very disappointed and not happy with the loss, he seemed to choose to focus on three of his Five Pillars-

Humility- “We need to become better.”

Unity- “We did this together, we must own it.”

Thankfulness- “Don’t just be thankful for successes, be

thankful for what you learn through hard times. There is

great wisdom in those experiences.”

From the low of 2018, in 2019 the Virginia team went onto win the NCAA championship. In a press conference, Bennett held up two tickets. One ticket was from their 2018 loss, and the other from their 2019 championship. His message was simple, they could not have experienced their success without having experienced their failure.  He was thankful for both experiences. The Christian foundation Tony Bennett had built had allowed him and his team to successfully overcome adversity, to triumph in the next year. 

Before the 2020 season, Bennett was offered a huge raise by the University. After discussing it with his wife, they turned down the raise.  Tony said, “Virginia was very gracious in what they offered to me as a potential contract, but I already have a very good contract. I have more than enough, if there are ways that this money can help others in the athletic department - that is my desire.”

Tony Bennett has specifically defined who he is as a Christian. His Christianity is not just a Sunday thing. When he encounters life’s challenges, he has a game plan. His game plan is based on five Christian values.

What is our game plan? What are the Christian values that we want to be at the core of our life.