Are you playing offense or defense?

The game of football can illustrate the point that as believers we often tend to think we are to be playing defense until the Lord returns. We certainly may be called to defend a position, but we are largely called to play offense. I see that in Matthew 16:18:

In Matthew 16:18 (ESV) Jesus says to Peter, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

I also see it clearly in the well-known Great Commission:

“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20 (ESV)

I hear in these words of scripture a game plan that is in every way an offensive one. The goal and the purpose are clearly laid out for us. The disciples who were listening were not told, “Occupy until I return.” They are asked to go out and reach all the corners of the earth and share the Good News with all people everywhere. But this commission was not simply passed on to the disciples who were in the physical presence of Jesus before His ascension after he had risen. It is one passed down to us.

He is calling us to be light in the darkness and to speak truth and the hope of the very BEST news we could ever hear or know.

If we are to be His offensive line, perhaps we should revisit the football analogy to keep it real as we look at the characteristics needed to play offense. Yes, we can site the spiritual equipment needed, but can the analogy flesh out the image for us a bit more?

I come from a small Midwest town where high school football is the centerpiece of the community. High school football here has a tradition of having been played for 126 years. Many years brought home state championship – from 1935 to 1954 they won 15 of 20 years, a higher percentage of games won than any high school team in any state. They also birthed players that went on to college and pro football. I confess I love it!

As I researched this question, I learned there are five characteristics needed to be successful if you are called to play offense:

1. Intelligence
2. Toughness
3. Work ethic
4. Good character
5. Athletic ability

What do these mean in the football analogy and do they fit for us as believers?

Intelligence as an offensive lineman in football means they are not only smart about football, but they are able to perform well in the classroom as well. They have a balance of both classroom knowledge and football intelligence. In other words they have knowledge of more than football and they can apply that knowledge on the field they are called to play in because they know how to think through a situation. In the game on the field, things are always changing moment by moment in the game. They also play a variety of different teams who play the game a bit differently from team to team.

On the believers’ team I think this applies. To be effective we need to learn skills in the classroom to appropriately handle scripture and scriptural truths when we are out ‘on the field’. We also need to know something about life and lived experiences to apply what we have known and learned in the area and with the people the Lord brings into our lives or that we are called to go to. How you present the Good News to a big city businessman or woman will likely be different than how you would present it to a mom in Middle America or a teen in the inner city.

Toughness as an offensive lineman includes both physical and mental toughness that are developed through drills, weight room programs, mat work, etc. so they can handle the rigors of the game. Often, they are hit hard and must learn to play through and keep going in the midst of pain. In short, lots of practice to the point of exhaustion is needed to develop toughness.

On the believers’ team I think this applies as well. We need to develop strong beliefs and understanding of scripture and the Christian life that can stand the test of rejection, criticism, and perhaps ridicule. The toughness needs to be strong enough so that we do not give up when challenges inevitably come. Paul gives us lots of examples. He was beaten, stoned, thrown into prison, shipwrecked and so on. Nothing deterred him from his call and assignment to share the Good News everywhere with everyone.

Hard work is the basic foundation of any successful offensive lineman in football, so a good work ethic is essential. A good work ethic includes showing up even earlier than asked and never taking for granted the need for practice even if you won the game last time. It means keeping your equipment and body clean and in good shape. It means staying late if necessary, to get it right.

The work ethic of the team of believers means we aren’t sloppy and our discipline about preparedness and making and keeping commitments are central to modeling Christ.These things in combination help to mold and shape a good character and allow the Holy Spirit to have full access to the gifting and calling that has been placed in us as Christ’s team to go out under the command of the Great Commission taking His light into the darkness, speaking the truth in love.

No, most of us are not donning pads and a helmet to take the gridiron this week, but we are commissioned to take the field of the world. We’re playing offense for Christ as we do.

Are we ready?

Excuses. Let’s be honest. We all have them and use them. Sometimes the reasons are valid, but other times not so much. Sometimes we use them without thinking. Many times, we use them because we want to avoid the response we may get if we simply decline to do a particular thing. That can happen because we don’t want to disappoint someone or have someone think less of us. But it can also happen because of what we believe.

The word excuses used as a noun means “a reason or explanation put forward to defend or justify” or “to conceal the real reason for an action.”

That’s pretty obvious and we all know that is what we are doing. But why isn’t it okay to simply say we are tired or don’t have the financial/emotional/relational resources to agree with what is asked? Do we fear being seen as less than, incapable, or inadequate?

If we are honest with ourselves, we generally do have some of those feelings. We want others to think and believe the best about us for many reasons including trying to boost our own uncertainties about whether or not we are. We have a propensity to feel guilty if we decline too.

The issue of feelings of inadequacy are as old as time itself, but it became more popular in recent times as research about the feelings and self-concept formation developed. It is pretty clear the feelings are real, and studies can point to a number of reasons why we experience those feelings. Counselors, psychologists, pastors, and others have tried to help us sort through those feelings and eliminate them with varying degrees of success. (As a retired clinical counselor, I am well acquainted with dealing with the issue and some of the most effective tools to combat it.)

But despite my training and experience of many years, I must confess that I am not sure we are effective at totally eliminating the feelings. We face new challenges and require new skills as we go along and they can stir up that sense of inadequacy pretty quickly for most of us and then we can be tempted to wonder what happened when we thought we had dealt with it and conquered it years ago.

Feelings of inadequacy are not academic for me either. I have experienced them more than a few times in my life. They were once generalized across many things, but over time they most often popped up when I was faced with something new such as starting graduate school in my late 40’s, leaving a solid teaching career to enter the risky business of clinical counseling in private practice, creating a website where I put myself “out there” for many to evaluate and judge, and authoring a book at the age of 75. Trust me, I get it, and these are only a few of the examples in my own life I could offer you.

It’s also true that each time I have risked facing such a new thing for me, I have become a bit stronger and yet without eliminating the feeling completely.

In reading Eugene Peterson’s book, Run with the Horses, I began to see something about this common challenge with greater clarity. You see, if we delve a bit deeper into our excuses and sense of inadequacy, we also might see how often it has delayed our obedience to something God has asked of us. A quick review of the Bible stories we know shows us we are not alone. An easy example is when we look at Moses who says he can’t speak well enough to do what God has asked of him.

I understand that excuse too. Earlier in my life I was asked to consider a leadership position in a women’s ministry organization. I felt totally inadequate. My reasons were many and also valid. I was too young (in my early 30’s) and my spiritual maturity did not match my enthusiasm. I still saw myself as the girl from a small farm who had lived most of her life in the country and this position was a chapter of an international organization that met in a larger city not far from me. (Yes, it was a “Frodo” moment.)

As I prayed about it for one of the only times in my life, I saw a clear picture as the Lord began to nudge me to accept. Some of it is too personal to share, but it involved seeing a stunningly beautiful dress the Lord had designed for me to wear and his disappointment were I not to accept what He was calling me to do.

Obedience can be hard, but failure to do so grieves the Lord. We also miss out on the opportunities that obedience sets in motion, the faith it develops by what we learn about Him as well as ourselves. But guess what? He has a purpose for asking us to do hard things.

“There is an enormous gap between what we think we can do and what God calls us to do. Our ideas of what we can do or want to do are trivial; God’s ideas for us are grand.”

Eugene Peterson in Run with the Horses

What truth there is in that! Who would have guessed he would have chosen a rag tag group of fishermen, a tax collector, and women to be the ones that would spread the gospel around the world? They seemed some of the least likely of the day. They often let him down with their unbelief and even betrayal, but yet He called them and used that call to shape them and now their lives, words, and testimonies help shape us 2,000 years later. That is a grand plan indeed.

I think Paul understood what the source of our adequacy is to be as he wrote to the church at Corinth:

“Not that we are sufficiently qualified in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency and qualifications come from God.”

2 Corinthians 3:5 (AMP)

“In the way of faith we do not escape because it is too much for us; we plunge into it because we are commanded and equipped. It is not our feelings that determine our level of participation in life, nor our experience that qualifies us for what we will do and be; it is what God decides about us.”

Eugene Peterson in Run with the Horses

Let us never offer excuses to God for our lack of obedience as well as learn to know his voice so well, we recognize when it is He that is asking.