July 2nd, 2008
I’ve always loved to play football. Good old bone-jarring tackle football (and, no, we didn’t wear any protective equipment, even if we could afford it). Because I was fast, I usually played wide receiver. My job was to go deep on every play. Every play, I went for the touchdown.
So it should come as no surprise that I favor the passing game. Why run the football for 2-3 yards at a time when in one exciting pass play you can gain 30-40 yards? The deep pass not only fit my playing style, it fit my personality style which grew impatient with the slow, grind-it-out-on-the-ground style of playing football.
That’s why I became a Dallas Cowboys fan. In the ’70’s, the two leading powerhouse teams in the NFL were the Pittsburg Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys. They had two radically different styles of playing footbll. Pittsburg played smash mouth football, combining an impenetrable defense (the Steel Curtain) and a patient, grind-it-out running offense. Dallas. on the other hand, combined a swarming, blitzing defense (Doomsday Defense) with a dynamic, innovative, pass-oriented offense. It was a classic case of an irresistible force (Dallas’ offense) meeting an immovable object (Pittsburg’s defense).
Which team do you think I became enamored with? Pittsburg’s slow, patient, wait-for-the-other-team-to-make-mistakes style of play or Dallas’ aggresive, innovative, take-a-risk style of play? Dallas was, by far, the more exciting team to watch, and the odds-on-favorite to win the Super Bowl.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the coliseum: Pittsburg beat Dallas in the Super Bowl…again and again! The irresistible force of Dallas’ innovative and flashy offense utterly failed to move the immovable object of Pittsburg’s patient and solid defense. I was crushed.
But I learned a valuable lesson from that decade which I’ve applied to my ministry at MCC. Like Pittsburg, I’ve learned the importance of running the ball for 2-3 yards at a time, slowly and patiently advancing the kingdom of God. And occasionally, I get to throw one deep downfield in the hopes of making a big gain for Christ’s kingdom.
One thing that I’ve discovered, however, is that it takes a lot more faith to pass the ball than to run the ball. Passing the football is more difficult to execute, more dangerous to carry out, and there’s a greater risk of losing ground (sacked) or losing the ball (interception). But when God calls for a pass play, you step out in faith and let it go!
Our new building is a “Hail Mary” pass that went for a touchdown! There were many who tried to intercept the ball, but we managed to pull a David Tyree miracle catch and hold on to the ball. Then recently, we stepped out in faith and threw a deep pass in the hiring of a new youth pastor. Pass complete! Big gain!
And this fall, we’ll be looking to go deep downfield again as we launch another faith-initiative: a new and different kind of service for the 18-30 age group. With all these pass plays, we’re starting to look more and more like Dallas!
But I know that effective ministry always comes down to patiently grinding out yardage 1-2 yards at a time And every once in awhile, you get the opportunity to gain big yards by throwing the deep pass. That was the formula that made Pittsburg the NFL team of the ’70’s.
And that seems like a pretty good formula for leading a church.
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