It's Saturday . . . but Sunday's Coming!

It’s Saturday . . . but Sunday’s Coming!

It’s Saturday, the day before Easter. On the Christian calendar, we often forget this day. Yesterday was Good Friday. Tomorrow is Easter Sunday.

On Friday, Jesus was crucified; died for our sins. His followers mourned.

On Sunday, Jesus resurrected; He arose from the dead! His followers celebrated.

But on Saturday, Jesus lay in the tomb; earth groaned. His followers waited, confused.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . .

Holy Saturday

On the church calendar, Saturday is known as “Holy Saturday.” While there are services on Friday and on Sunday, this day is traditionally a day of waiting.

Holy Saturday is a lot like life this side of heaven. We wait. Our final resurrection is sure. Our victory is certain. But this side of heaven, we face death daily.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . .

The Message of Holy Saturday

The message of Holy Saturday is, “Get ready. Something is about to happen. But it hasn’t happened yet.”

Holy Saturday lasts so long. It feels like Sunday will never arrive. The twenty-four hours feel like seventy-four years.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . .

Death still surrounds us. Sin still tempts us. Sickness still wounds us. Suffering still pervades us. Evil still invade us. Satan still taunts us.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . .

Easter Is Coming Our Direction

In Narnia, under the curse of the White Witch, it was always Winter but never Christmas.

For Christians, we live in the sure hope that Spring is always just around the corner; just around the river bend.

Easter has already arrived, and it’s coming in our direction.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . .

While we forever remember the crucifixion, thank God we’re moving toward Easter. It’s coming in our direction, closer all the time.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . . and it’s not far away.

All we have to do is hold on for a little while and Sunday will soon be here.

Saturday may seem like a long time, but that’s only as we count time.

Hold on. Keep believing. Never give up.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming . . . soon.

Hold on for a little while longer.

The Final Victory

Death will not have the last word.

The tomb will empty.

We will celebrate the resurrection.

It’s Saturday, but Sunday’s coming!

Faith and Football

Faith and Football

Originally From: Faith Still at Core of Warner's Success
Cardinals Quarterback Goes Out of His Way to Credit God
by Paola Boivin - Jan. 9, 2009 12:00 AM

"If you ever really want to do a story about who I am, God's got to be at the center of it. Every time I hear a piece or read a story that doesn't have that, they're missing the whole lesson of who I am." - Kurt Warner

It has become part of the sports landscape. Athletes congregate on the field after a game to pray or offer a sound bite thanking a higher power.

It rarely makes the news.

Cardinals quarterback Kurt Warner understands this. The man who led this organization to its first home playoff game since 1947 knows that discussion about resurrections comes only in the context of career revivals and that tape recorders shut off when faith references start up.

During a visit to The Oprah Winfrey Show, Warner "basically had three sentences to say, so, in the middle one, I made sure I mentioned my faith, because how could they cut it out?" he said. "I went to watch the show on replay . . . and they cut it out!"

Warner, 37, is right. There is dishonesty in telling his story if you ignore what drives him, especially if you accept its role in one of the NFL's great success stories. In five years, he went from a 22-year-old stock boy at a Cedar Rapids, Iowa, grocery store to Super Bowl MVP. He has morphed again, from unemployed veteran to record-setting starting quarterback with the Cardinals, who on Saturday in Charlotte, N.C., will try to advance to the NFC Championship Game by beating the Carolina Panthers.

"I wasn't always this way," he said.

During his final season at the University of Northern Iowa in 1993, Warner went to a country-music dance bar called Wild E. Coyotes. He spotted Brenda Carney Meoni and asked her to dance. Her immediate reaction?

"Get away. Get away," she thought.

"Here's this cute guy in a bar with an entourage of females, and I'm the last person that makes sense for him to go to," Brenda said. "I'm a divorced woman with two kids, one with special needs. And Kurt's 21. Twenty-one."
They danced, and the next day, Warner was knocking on her door with a rose.

"Again, I'm screaming in my head, 'Go away!' but I opened the door and said, 'C'mon in,' " she said. "My 2 1/2-year-old grabs him by the hand and shows him every radio we own.

"He fell in love with my kids before he fell in love with me. When we'd have a fight and were going to break up, he'd say, 'Well I get the kids.' I'm like, 'But they're my kids!' "

They stuck together, even when it appeared football wasn't in Warner's future. He signed with the Green Bay Packers as a free agent in 1994 but was cut before the season began. He returned to UNI to work as a graduate assistant football coach and spent nights stocking shelves at the local Hy-Vee grocery store. He moved in with Brenda, who was struggling financially and turned to food stamps for a while. They drove a car that died every time it turned left.

He landed with the Arena Football League's Iowa Barnstormers in 1995 and three years later was signed by the St. Louis Rams, who allocated him to the NFL's developmental league in Europe. His backup with the Amsterdam Admirals was Jake Delhomme, now the Panthers' quarterback.

Around this time, Warner began challenging Brenda about her faith. She had become a devout Christian as a 12-year-old after seeing a fundamentalist Christian film called A Distant Thunder (1978). Warner questioned her, suggesting she was picking and choosing her beliefs from the Bible at her convenience. During this exploration, he closely studied the Bible.

"When I did, it was obvious what the truth was," Warner said.

He committed himself to the Bible's message. That's Warner's way, why he has succeeded in football. He studies, commits, believes.

Before they married, he told Brenda they should follow the Bible faithfully, which meant, among other things, no premarital sex.

"I'm like, 'Dude, we've got so many other things to work on. Why that one?' " Brenda, now 41, said, laughing.

They married in 1997. In 1999, he took over as the Rams' quarterback when starter Trent Green was injured. What followed was two Super Bowls, two MVP titles and a legion of Christian followers.

He was both revered and scorned for his outspokenness about faith. Since Warner's arrival in Arizona in 2005, and the revival of his career, people here treat his religion with more curiosity than debate. Many were amused by Warner giving an invocation one year at Celebrity Fight Night, a popular black-tie fundraiser for Muhammad Ali's Parkinson Research Center. Ali is of the Muslim faith.

"I never feel like, 'Should I say this, or do I not,' but I do try now to strategically figure out (during interviews) how I can get somebody to include it because it's so important to who I am," Warner said.

How does Warner express his faith? He always has the Bible in his hand when he does postgame interviews. He joins players in postgame group-prayer sessions on the field. He loves to engage in spiritual discussions with teammates but says he tries not to be in-your-face about it. He wants the words of the Bible to guide his everyday life.

When he and his family dine on the road, they always buy dinner for another table in the restaurant but keep the purchase anonymous. The children choose the family. Brenda Warner said it's their way of teaching their kids one of the Bible's messages: It's not your circumstances that define you but what you do with those circumstances.

Warner shouldn't be categorized only one way, Delhomme said.

"Football doesn't define Kurt Warner, and I think that's the biggest thing to me. It's not who he is. Kurt Warner is a lot bigger."

Added Cardinals defensive tackle Bertrand Berry: "To limit Kurt as a Super Bowl champion would do a disservice to him. I think his legacy will be that he's just a great human being, and I think that's the highest compliment that you can give anybody."

How's Your Spiritual Love Life? Part Four: Designed for Relationship

How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?
Part Four: Designed for Relationship[i]

Why do we do what we do? What motivates us? Why do we love God or fail to love God? The biblical answers to these questions might surprise you. Join us on a journey of spiritual discovery in our new blog series on How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?

Designed for Relationships

Because God is relational, all reality is relational. God, therefore, designed us for relationship. Henri Nouwen, though separating our relationality from our rationality more than I would, illustrates our core nature.

Somehow during the centuries we have come to believe that what makes us human is our mind. Many people seem to know the definition of a human being as a reasoning animal. But what makes us human is not our mind but our heart, not our ability to think but our ability to love. It is our heart that is made in the image and likeness of God (Robert Durback, Seed of Hope: A Henri Nouwen Reader, p. 197).

Henry Scougal and John Piper more accurately, I think, dissect relational reality. “The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love” (Scougal, The Life of God, p. 62).

How else do we assess the beauty of an invisible heart than by what it loves? Someone might suggest, “By what it thinks.” But clear and accurate thought is beautiful only in the service of right affections. The devil himself is quite an able intellect. But he loves all the wrong things. Therefore his thinking serves evil and his soul is squalid. Or perhaps someone would suggest that we can assess the beauty of a soul by what it wills. Yes, but there is half-hearted willing and whole-hearted willing. You don’t judge the glory of a soul by what it wills to do with lukewarm interest, or with mere teeth-gritting determination. To know a soul’s proportions you need to know its passions. The true dimensions of a soul are seen in its delights. Not what we dutifully will but what we passionately want reveals our excellence or evil (Piper, The Pleasures of God, p. 18, emphasis added).

Face-to-Face, Faith Beings: We Are Worshipping Beings

Designed by God, we are face-to-face beings. In relationship to God, we are faith beings. Faith is the core of the original human personality. That core involves entrusting ourselves to Someone who transcends us, yet draws near to us. In the innermost chamber of our soul resides a worshipping being; the ability to worship from the heart is what makes us human.

By these descriptions, there are no atheists. Everyone must put their trust in Someone or Something. Even Madelyn Murray O’Hair. Consider these excerpts from her diary, found by the IRS in 1999.

A 1959 entry reveals an almost pathetic despair: “The whole idiotic hopelessness of human relations descends upon me. Tonight I cried and cried, but even then, feeling nothing.”

1973 New Year’s Wish List: A mink coat, Cadillac, cook, housekeeper. “In 1974 I will run for the governor of Texas, and in 1976, the president of the United States.” Ironic that in 1976 we elected one of the most committed Christians ever to be president.

In 1977 she wrote: “I have failed in marriage, motherhood, and as a politician.”

One poignant phrase appears again and again. In half a dozen places, O’Hair writes, “Somebody, somewhere, love me.”

Reflecting on her words, Chuck Colson writes:

How telling that this hostile and abrasive person, who harbored nothing but hatred for God and his people, who believed human beings were merely the product of a cosmic accident, would nevertheless cry out to the great void for someone just to love her. What a powerful example of the fundamental truth that we are made for a relationship of love with our Creator, and that we can never fully escape from our true identity and purpose. No matter how much we may deny it intellectually, our nature still cries out for the love we were made to share. To paraphrase the famous words of St. Augustine, even the most bitter atheist is restless until she finds her rest in God (Colson, Prison Fellowship Ministry, 1999).

God is our primal relationship, whether we face it or not, whether we like Him or not. We always live oriented toward God—either with our faces or our backs oriented to Him.

How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?

So, how’s your spiritual love life? Prayerfully ponder:

*If our ability to love is what makes us human, then how human am I? How loving am I?

*If the worth of the soul is measured by the object of its love, then of how much worth is my soul? Who or what is the object of my love?

*If we can assess the beauty of our heart by what we love, then how beautiful is my heart? Who or what do I love?

*Am I loving all the right things or all the wrong things?

*Who or what does my soul delight in? Who or what is my soul passionate about?

*Who or what do I entrust my soul to?

*We are made for a love relationship with our Creator. Is my face turned toward Him or is my back turned toward Him?

[i]Developed from materials originally published in: Kellemen, Bob. Soul Physicians: A Theology of Soul Care and Spiritual Direction. Winona Lake, IN: BMH Books, 2007

Reasons to Believe

Reasons to Believe

If you’ve visited Amazon.com or a major bookstore lately, then you know that all the rage in publishing is raging atheists raging against God.

Fortunately, Christians are not silent. Nor are the Scriptures.

Consider some of the following books to help you share and defend your faith.

Lay Level Books

1. The Twilight of Atheism, Alister McGrath.

2. The Case for Christ, Lee Strobel.

3. The Case for Faith, Lee Strobel.

4. The Case for a Creator, Lee Strobel.

5. The Case for Easter, Lee Strobel.

6. Reason to Believe, R. C. Sproul.

7. Christ Among Other Gods, Erwin Lutzer.

8. Jesus Among Other Gods, Ravi Zacharias.

9. The Return of the Village Atheist, Joel McDurmon.

10. Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis.

11. The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict, Josh McDowell.

12. More Than a Carpenter, Josh McDowell.

13. Orthodoxy, G. K. Chesterton.

14. Who Made God, Ravi Zacharias.

15. Letter to an Atheist, Michael Leahy.

16. The Real Face of Atheism, Ravi Zacharias.

17. Atheism Versus Christianity, Willow Creek.

18. Twenty Compelling Evidences That God Exists, Kenneth Boa.

19. The Dawkins' Delusion, Alister McGrath.

Going Deeper

1. Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview, J. P. Moreland.

2. Scaling the Secular City, J. P. Moreland.

3. Reasonable Faith, W. L. Craig.

4. There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind About God, Antony Flew.

5. What's So Great About God, Dinesh D'Souza.

6. The Dawkins Letter: Challenging Atheist Myths, David Robertson.

7. Faith of the Fatherless, Paul Vitz.

8. Letter from a Christian Citizen, Douglas Wilson.

9. Atheism Is False, David Stone.

10. God the Evidence, Patrick Glynn.

11. The Creator and the Cosmos, Hugh Ross.

12. The Fingerprint of God, Hugh Ross.

13. I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist, Norman Geisler.

14. Darwin on Trial, P. E. Johnson.

15. Hard Questions, Real Answers, W. L. Craig.

16. The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, F. S. Collins.

17. The Hidden Face of God, G. L. Schroeder.

18. Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense, N. T. Wright.

19. Intelligent Design, William Dembski.

Super Bowl, Super Faith

Super Bowl, Super Faith

There he was, the whole world watching. Tony Dungy did not disappoint.

Asked during the trophy presentation about the cultural significance of being the first African American head coach to win a Super Bowl, Dungy told over 100 million viewers, “I’m proud to be the first African American coach to win this. But again, more than anything, Lovie Smith and I are not only African-American but also Christian coaches, showing you can do it the Lord’s way. We’re more proud of that.”

When Dungy said “again,” he meant it. For he and Bears head coach, Lovie Smith, were the page-one story throughout Super Bowl week, discussing daily the Christian faith they share, the personal relationship they maintain, their groundbreaking success, and their motivational coaching style.

Facing the Storm with Faith

Dungy’s faith impacted how he coached his team Sunday. Speaking of their early deficit due to a Bear kick-off return for a touchdown, Dungy stated, “We took the hit early with Devin Hester. We talked about it. It’s going to be a storm. Sometimes you have to work for it. The Lord doesn’t always take you in a straight line. He tests you sometimes.”

In fact, Dungy and Smith’s faith impacts everything about their coaching. Coaching great, Bill Walsh, head coach of three Super Bowl championship teams and mentor to Dungy, noted, “Tony and Lovie are professionals, and I think that’s what players want. There are some coaches who are screamers in the NFL, but not as many as there used to be. The players just can’t see the real value of the coach if he’s continually harping at them and harping at the media and harping at everybody else. The coaches who continue to be so animated that they distract everybody are usually coaches without a lot of confidence. The confident coach can plot out what he needs, how his staff should function and people respect that.”

Walsh continued, “Tony and Lovie take a more civilized approach to it and they can reach more players that way. But I think in both of their cases they’re pretty darn firm when necessary, but they don’t go public with those things. Both are very knowledgeable about the game of football and how to deal with people. I hope this style is what survives rather than the coaches who run amok whenever they’re tested on the sideline, and the players see that they may have a madman on their hands and they may have to overcome it.”

Leonard Moore runs the African-American studies program at Louisiana State University, and he considers sport part of the curriculum. He has spent time studying coaches, including Dungy and Smith. “By them being African American men, I think Tony Dungy and Lovie Smith understand the culture of the hip hop generation,” Moore said. “They know that Bobby Knight stuff isn’t going to work in 2007, that yelling and trying to be that strict dictator. I think you’re dealing with a different generation of ballplayers that aren’t going to tolerate that stuff. “I don’t think they are trying to be players’ coaches at all. I think it’s, ‘I’m going to treat you like a man and in return I expect you to treat me like a man.’ I think Dungy and Smith see their role not only as coach but as mentor, father figure and friend. Kids of this generation don’t want to be yelled at. I think you lead by example. In the black community, we’re big on this thing: ‘I don’t care what you say. I’m going to model what you do.’ So I think by Tony Dungy and Lovie Smith being very calm, cool and collected, players realize, ‘Maybe I don’t have to be loud and go off the handle. Maybe I can have some control over my anger and my emotions.’ That's what I see from Dungy and Smith.”

Bill Cole had a strong rooting interest in this year’s Super Bowl. Regardless of the outcome, he was guaranteed to win. He’s a fan of calm coaches. Cole, a sports psychology consultant in California who works with coaches and athletes, pointed out that Dungy and Smith are both devout Christians who stress that faith and families take priority over football. “Here’s the real paradox. They’re in the Super Bowl and football is not the biggest thing in their world. They have publicly stated that. Sure, it’s important, but it’s not the end-all and they have perspective. I think when you get life perspective as an athlete or as a coach, it calms you down more.”

Calm in the storm. That’s what Lovie Smith and Tony Dungy bring to football and to life.

In the Bigger Picture of Life: Super Bowl, Race, and Faith

In the Bigger Picture of Life: Super Bowl, Race, and Faith

All the buzz in Chicago is about “Da Bears!” The Chicago Bears are headed to the Super Bowl headed by Coach Lovie Smith. There are so many intriguing story lines in this match-up of the Bears and the Colts.

One of the most intriguing is the solid relationship that Smith shares with the Indianapolis Colts head coach Tony Dungy. Best friends, they are now pitted against each other: the Windy City versus the Indy City.

Making History in Black History Month: “It Means a Lot”

As many have noted, with both men being African American, history will be made in Black History month in February. And historic it is. In the bigger picture of life, Smith and Dungy form a social triumph of major proportion.

''It means quite a bit for me being the coach of the Chicago Bears and being able to lead our team to another Super Bowl,'' Smith said. ''But being the first black coach to lead his team to the Super Bowl, of course our players knew about it and they wanted to help us make history today. So I feel blessed to be in that position.”

''It means a lot,'' Dungy said after the Colts' 38-34 victory. ''I'm very proud to represent African American coaches, but more than that, it's about the Indianapolis Colts.''

The Bigger Picture of Life: Christian Faith

What has been conspicuously missing in the national media attention is the main element in each man’s life. In fact, in their own words, it is ultimately what makes them who they are—their Christian faith.

At a Chicago news conference on Monday, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama noted that Smith and Dungy present "a good lesson for all of us. To see two African-American coaches go to the Super Bowl when it has been historically difficult for black coaches to break into the NFL is terrific," Obama said. "But what makes it even better is that they are both men of humility, they are both men of God. They never trash talk. They are not yellers and screamers on the sidelines. They are a couple of class individuals."

Indeed, they are both men of God, men of Christ.

Dungy recalls one of his first interviews for a head coaching position. "One guy did ask me, 'If you get this job, is this going to be the most important thing in your life? Are you going to treat my team as the most important thing?' "No, I'm not," Dungy said. "I didn't think I was going to get that job and I didn't. But for faith to be more important than your job, for family to be more important, we all know that's the way it should be, but we're all afraid to say that sometimes. Lovie isn't afraid to say it, and I'm not afraid to say it."

"I know the type of person Lovie is," Dungy said. "He has the same Christian convictions I have. He runs his team the same way. I know how those guys are treated in Chicago and how they play—tough, disciplined football without a lot of profanity from coaches or a win-at-all-costs atmosphere."

Dungy told an audience of more than 1,200 at the Convention Center last year that his Christian walk is even more important than sports. "That is really the main element in my life. Athletics is important, but without the Christian part it is kind of empty," the famed coach said.

Lovie Smith is a Christian and has made no attempt to hide his beliefs. Smith says that he relies on his Christian faith, which was cultivated in him during his childhood. "Everything that I am is based on my faith. It has been a big part of me," he says. "At a young age, I called on God to help me, and He was there as a comfort for me. That is something that I have leaned on ever since."

Faith Active in Life: "Staying with It Through the Storms"

In an era when many often ridicule men of faith as weak and incapable of making it successfully in the “real world,” it is empowering to understand how Smith and Dungy have been energized and guided by their faith. Their Christianity impacts everything they do as coaches and has enabled them to treat their players with a respect that has produced loyalty and productivity.

For years Dungy couldn't get a coaching job, not only because there were so few blacks in the NFL but also because conventional football wisdom considered him too nice, too polite, too "laid-back" to be successful in a cutthroat, demanding business.

Dungy said he shares more similarities than differences with Smith, adding, "Lovie's probably a little smarter than I am."

Said Smith: "I would not use 'laid-back.' I think our styles are similar. We try to treat our players as men and we expect them to behave that way. We have certain standards."

"As you look at young coaches coming through the ranks, a lot of them have a mental picture of how a coach is supposed to act, and I think what Tony Dungy showed me was that you didn't have to act that way. Be yourself and just believe in what you know and stay with that through the storms and you can get the job accomplished."

Super Bowl Champions: Winners in the Game of Life

As a “Chicago kid,” I have to root for the Bears in this one. But as a “Christian man,” I’m rooting for both Lovie Smith and Tony Dungy. They have what it takes to be winners in the game of life. They have Christ, and He has them.

One will come away a Super Bowl Champion. However, both will come away winners in the game of life.