How To Win the Super Bowl

This week the Arizona Cardinals will make their first appearance in the Super Bowl. The Metro-Phoenix area where the team is located is buzzing with excitement. Now, let me share with you a biblical principle that, if applied, will win the Super Bowl for the Cardinals as well as win the Super Bowl of life for you. Read on and see if you agree with me.

There are three stages in every athlete’s life playing in a team sport that one must go through to win the championship. Assuming reasonably equal talent, the team that wins the Super Bowl will be the team that gets to the final stage. It’s hard, it doesn’t make sense, but the rewards are amazing.

The first stage a football player goes through is trying to make the team or the ‘tryouts.’ That’s where he must stand out from the rest of the players. He has to show case his talents. He has to be the man among men. He has to be the greatest. The tryout stage is where ‘it’s all about me.’ The player is independent and he gets the accolades and credit if he makes the team. It’s wonderful for his ego too! 

The second stage is after you make the team and the season begins. This is the ‘regular season’ stage. The player has made the team. However, in reality, it’s still about him first and the team second. He still wants to be the lone ranger! He is like those seagulls in the movie, Finding Nemo, who only can say, “Mine, Mine, Mine!” His team is a means to his own end. He plays but he is the first to take his helmet off for the television audience and be the star. You see heaps of athletes, politicians, business persons, and ‘wannabe’s’ stuck in this stage. It’s a group of individuals playing in a sport or vocation that requires teamwork. Teams like these may have a decent win-loss record but they lose in the playoffs.

The third stage is where the team who wins the Super Bowl is. This stage is called ‘the playoff stage.’ In this stage, the players understand that it’s all about the team first. Personal agendas fade into the background. The team has ceased to be the means to someone’s selfish end, but the end in itself. The players realize that all of them together can do what none of them individually can do, win the Super Bowl. The team gets the win, not the individual. 

Henry Ford once said, “Coming together is the beginning; keeping together is progress; and working together is success.” In other words, teamwork makes the dream work. Teamwork divides the effort and multiplies the effect. Tom Landry, a former coach of the Dallas Cowboys, was asked how to build a winning football team. He said, “My job is to get men to do what they don’t want to do in order to achieve something they always wanted to achieve.” What don’t they want to do? Many times it is learning how to be a team player. Winning the Super Bowl requires it. Remember, if you see a turtle on a fence, it’s for sure he had help to get there.

Where did this wise principle originate? The Bible, of course! Psalm 133 says, “Where brothers dwell together in unity…..there the Lord commands the blessing.” You see, God made life a team sport! If you don’t get stuck in either one of those first two stages, you just may win the Super Bowl God has assigned for you!

Ed Delph, The Church-Community Connection, January 26, 2008.