However, I decided from the minute the Ravens missed that kick that I was going to pull for the Giants and I’m so glad they defeated the evil Patriots. Multiple reasons.

First, the arrogance/cluelessness of Belicheck. To cut a player the night before the Super Bowl just because you can and is just pointless. It’s heartless. That player practiced all week, was ready to play, had probably got his family all situated and then to get called to the coaches room less than 24 hours before the game to get cut? Add it to the long litany of Belicheck stories where he does something just to show everybody that he is still the boss. Remember him fining players for being late to team meetings during the blizzards last year?

Second, Belicheck hasn’t won a Super Bowl and has lost 4 out of 6 playoff games since he got caught cheating by video taping opposing teams pre-game walkthrough. McDaniels brought that act with him to Denver and it got him fired. It didn’t help him win either but that is another post.

Third, The Manning Drama. You think your family has drama? How’d you like to be a Manning? Actually…I’d like it very much but that is not important right now. Eli has always been in the shadow of big brother Peyton and daddy Archie. This was supposed to be his week – 2nd Super Bowl, opportunity to have 2 rings, the confirmation that maybe Peyton was Eli’s brother instead of the other way around.

Instead, we have Peyton-Irsay war of the roses breaking out. Peyton started it with the “we’re walking on eggshells, everything has changed” comments. Irsay firing back with his “protect the Horseshoe” and calling Peyton a politician. To top all of that off, Peyton announces that he has been cleared to play (further proving Irsay’s point) while his team says — ‘uhhhh, that’s news to us.’

The bottom line – it was a lot of incredibly selfish behavior from Irsay and Manning during a week that should have been about their city and his brother. Apparently, neither one got the memo.

I didn’t really like anything either party said all week long – speaking of Irsay and Peyton. All of Irsay’s talk about the “Horseshoe” was just pathetic. There is no “Horseshoe” without Peyton Manning. The Irsay family had gutted and killed the Colts until Manning walks in and gives them double-digit wins every single year. There is no Lucas Field, Super Bowl, full stadium, or anything remotely successful about the Colts without Manning. To paint Manning as just another player to wear the uniform is wrong and petty.

However, Peyton seemed to forget that Irsay made him a very, very, very, rich man even though he didn’t play a down this year. It was Irsay that didn’t move Peyton to injured reserved and thus allowed him to collect his full salary this year. That should have in the least bought some public civility between Peyton and the Irsays. Apparently 28 million doesn’t buy what it used to buy.

(And as a sidenote – the Colts needed to make some drastic changes – despite what Peyton thinks. The team just went 2-14, looked woefully out-coached, and had no depth in any position on the field. That’s an epic fail of epic proportion and Irsay was completely justified in dropping the hammer on the coach and general manager.)

Back to the Giants — maybe now the New York media will believe that Eli Manning is not a bust and Coughlin can keep his job for a year or two. How Marvin Lewis keeps his job and Tom Coughlin seems to have to fight for his every season is beyond my understanding.

And to Eli’s credit – he has not changed at all over these years. Just the same old, calm, nothing phases me guy.

The commercials were not so Super this year either. Hands down the M&M and Dog Burying The Cat Doritos commercials were the best. The rest – mweh.

Halftime show? Great stage – loved the video/production of that. But it wasn’t incredible, wasn’t terrible. Then we got the “We just spent millions of dollars on this 20 minute half-time to sell our albums but we want World Peace ending.” Complete with MIA giving the world the middle finger.

Really? Leave to the music industry to completely miss the point of the Super Bowl halftime once again. IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU!!! You can have wardrobe malfunctions and political statements and whatever else you want at YOUR OWN CONCERT!! Not at the Super Bowl. I wish they would just give up on the music scene and try something else. Cirque De Solia, maybe? Dancing penguins?

The only thing super about the Super Bowl as the last 3 minutes of the game. And maybe that’s how it is supposed to be…but then again, watching the Patriots celebrate New York scoring a touchdown with a minute left in the game while the Giants looked stress was surreal.

And while I’m disappointed with the Super Bowl, the only thing worse is having no football until August. Sigh….. Welcome to the offseason.

Oh.

My.

Gosh.

It has been a long time since I’ve laughed that hard. Growing up around firemen, I’ve learned that every station has a story. Some of the stories are the same – getting in a wreck on the way to a wreck, not quite having the garage door up before you completely pull out of the bay, teaching the rookies some crazy technique that will help them fight fires better that really isn’t a technique.

But they are still funny. And firemen are great story tellers. They know how to ‘spin a yarn.’

They also know how to cook. Am really honored to have the opportunity to serve with these men.

This originally appeared on whillschurch.org as an weekly evo.

My first memory of Joe Paterno was the 1979 Sugar Bowl. Alabama beat Penn State to be the National Champions but I vividly remember those high-water pants, black shoes and thick glasses. I think I made fun of him when my dad told me “Son, Bear Bryant is the greatest football coach to ever walk a sideline but that guy right there is a half-step behind him.” That is high praise from an Alabama fan and Penn State would become a team I loved rooting for – as long as they weren’t playing Alabama.

We have all watched Joe Paterno walk the sidelines over these 46 years. Pants rolled up to avoid getting them dirty and to save money on dry cleaning. Glasses that only he could get away with wearing. That high-pitched raspy voice piercing thru the noise of a stadium full of fanatics. We’ve heard the stories. He goes to the Trustees and demands them to RAISE the entrance requirements for Penn State. He lived in the same modest house for 45 years with a listed phone number. He gives the university 3.5 million dollars to build a new library. Penn State has never even been close to a NCAA violation. Players talk of his generosity and life lessons they learned while eating at his house.

The numbers are staggering.

2 National Championships

46 years as the head coach at Penn State.

40 winning seasons.

409 victories, most by any Division 1 head coach – yes, even more than Bear Bryant.

He was more than a coach. He was the university’s conscience.

At least, that was the image we were led to believe.

Every story on Paterno now starts with the end of his life – fired from Penn State for his role in the Jerry Sandusky scandal. Is this how he will forever be remembered?

I’m conflicted. I don’t think he should be totally exonerated, excused from all wrongdoing. Nor is he anywhere close to the tyrant that is Sandusky. Figuring out exactly where on that scale Paterno should be was never going to be easy. Now it may be next to impossible because he’s gone.

44 days between his firing and his death.

There will be no retrospective interview five or ten years from now with him. There’ll be no cool 30 for 30 film with a happy ending. Just this – a sharp pain of disappointments and questions.

1 act of cowardice.

Or was it ignorance? Or confusion? Or humiliation? Does it matter? The 1 will be remembered more than the 409.

Legacies are fragile.

The minute you start thinking about your legacy and protecting it is exactly the minute it begins to shatter. The minute a legacy becomes the point, it’s over. Disaster. Compromise. At that point, the legacy is really no longer the point. PROTECTING the IMAGE of the legacy is the point. And that is a different beast altogether.

I wonder if this is what happened with Joe Paterno. I wonder if those around him started thinking this way as well.

The 1 is remembered more than the 409.

Whether it should be this way or not is irrelevant. It IS this way. It always HAS been this way. 1 bite from the fruit. 1 act of murder. 1 strike at the rock keeps Moses out of the promised land. 1 laugh earns Sarah a sharp rebuke. 1 doubt mutes Zacharias for 9 months. 1 kiss betrays a friend and a Savior.

We all have our 1 moment. It’s why I will continue to sing the old song:

My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus’ name.
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.

Rick actually came up with the phrase after going to a worship conference last year. He observed that at the conference before any worship service, there was always a few minutes at the start where they prepared the room. Could have been a video or a practice or silence – but it was a prepared, purposeful pause at the start of the service to remind themselves that they were about to engage with the Holy God in worship.

What does that look like in a local congregation that meets every single Sunday morning?

And no – the Opening Song doesn’t really count as “prepare the room.” See Northpoint’s video below to see what I’m talking about. So last week we started with the video below followed by another video depicting Psalm 31 – My times are in your hands.

The feedback has been pretty positive. Not everyone got the “artsy” rendition of Psalm 31, but everyone loved the reminder to get prepared to worship.

It’s a new tradition, new spiritual discipline of worship for us at Western Hills – prepare the room. And it’s rubbing off in other areas as well. I find myself walking into a meeting or a lunch – pausing in the car to ‘prepare the room.’

Prepare The Room

Psalm 31//My Times video by Jakub Blank

I’m showing the video below.

Overall, I like the video. I don’t interpret this guy as trashing the Church. Some will disagree. Which is part of the problem of the video, the shortcomings of the video. I really have 3 issues with the clip – that I think would be great for a small group discussion.

First, love the “voting Republican doesn’t make you Christian” slap at the very beginning of the video. Very true. But I wouldn’t have stopped there. Jesus had words for the Zealots and the Pharisees. Anything that compromised Jesus as the solution to the problems of the world, Jesus had a quote for. Politics, education, religion.

So my question/issue to him is this – does he feel that way about all political parties? Or is it angst just reserved toward the Republicans? Democrat, Libertarian or anyone else who’s hope for our culture is in the political system is in the same boat (albeit the opposite side) as the Republicans. To limit the sting of his words to one party is doing exactly what he is railing about.

Second, I don’t think Jesus was thinking of me on the cross. That is a very ego/man-centric understanding of what is going on at the cross. The cross is all about God’s character and glory, not the value of us. Yes, we get the benefit of the transaction of sacrifice – no doubt about that. But God was thinking of Himself – his promise and vision of a world without death and sin. And dieing for the consequence was the only way that was going to happen without blowing it all up and starting over.

So I think God was thinking about that. Not me.

Lastly, I can see where he comes across as an anti-church, anti-organized anything guy. But as I read his other comments, I don’t think that is him at all. I think he cares deeply about the church and wants to be a part of a movement that sees church get closer to being a Grace Station instead of Code Enforcement. I think there are glimpses of that in the video but not overtly so. I hear a guy who loves the concept of the church as the Bride of Christ but hating the examples and experiences he’s had with her so far.

And that I think is the real shortcoming of the video. There isn’t a deep, holistic handling of the issues he brings up. They make great soundbites. At times he sounds like a prophet…statements of profound truth and conviction. Then he takes an abrupt left turn leaving that conversation to sound like an angry teenager screaming shallow, pithy cliches at his parents that he himself doesn’t really understand. There are some nuanced, deeper opportunities he missed. Instead of pushing us into deeper conversations about theology or the church and what transformation COULD look like, he’ll take the quick exit to hit another platitude.

But then again, that might have been the point of the whole exercise anyway. Maybe his point was to generate conversations and dissonance with people who otherwise wouldn’t think twice about their own understanding of grace, church, Jesus, or religion.

Like I said earlier – I like the video. I’ll keep my eyes out for the next piece they produce. My hunch is they will get better and better. I think it’s worth a watch and even worth some discussion time in a small group. I think it would spark some deeper conversations of what is the church, what marks Christianity different from all other religions, and what exactly is my role in all of that.

Here’s the video: