The most watched sporting event on the planet will unfold in only three days: Super Bowl LI. Suffice it to say that people are passionate about this annual sporting ritual. Perhaps you have heard this well-travelled story that serves to illustrate my point…
A guy named Bob receives a free ticket to the Super Bowl from his company. Unfortunately, when Bob arrives at the stadium he realizes the seat is in the last row in the corner of the stadium - he's closer to the Goodyear blimp than the field.
About halfway through the first quarter, Bob notices an empty seat 10 rows off the field, right on the 50 yard line. He decides to take a chance and makes his way through the stadium and around the security guards to the empty seat. As he sits down, he asks the gentleman sitting next to him, "Excuse me, is anyone sitting here?" The man says no.
Now, very excited to be in such a great seat for the game, Bob again inquires of the man next to him, "This is incredible! Who in their right mind would have a seat like this at the Super Bowl and not use it?"
The man replies, "Well, actually, the seat belongs to me, I was supposed to come with my wife, but she passed away. This is the first Super Bowl we haven't been together at since we got married in 1967."
"Well, that's really sad," says Bob, "but still, couldn't you find someone to take the seat? A relative or close friend?" "No," the man replies, "they're all at the funeral."
We snicker, but people can indeed get carried away with the Super Bowl. I like the way one anonymous pundit has put it:
Imagine another world looking down at 60,000 people who pay $900,000 to sit in a stadium that cost $45 million to watch 22 men being paid $7 million a year dispute the possession of a ball that costs $16.95.
For my part, I will not be attending the Super Bowl. But, having been brought up in Georgia, I will likely watch the game because, miraculously, the Atlanta Falcons are playing in it! The Falcons entered the National Football League the same year the first Super Bowl was played; and only once in their fifty-one years have they been there before. That was Super Bowl XXXIII in the 1998 season, where they lost to the Denver Broncos 34–19.
I was five years old when they played their first game. I grew up watching them play, both on television and in person. And I have followed them faithfully even after I moved form my home state, in spite of their miserable record of 350–449–6 (only 341–437–6 in the regular season and only 9–12 in the playoffs).
In short, I was a Falcon fan when being a Falcon fan wasn't cool! It was so uncool that, in some years, bumper stickers would crop up on vehicles down home reading: “Go Falcons! And take the Braves with you!”
Alas! Like so many Falcons fans, I have spent decades armchair quarterbacking! Along the way, I have second and third guessed just about every other play ever called, and vented my frustrations year in and year out at the television screen.
But also, like most Falcons fans, I have always failed to give up, doggedly persisting in my hope each fall that “this could be the year”! And now, lo and behold, it is! The Atlanta Falcons are flying about high as they ever have! And they are soaring straight into NRG Stadium, (formerly Reliant Stadium) in Houston, Texas!
For despite their unimpressive first fifty years, they have managed to make it to the Big One in this, their fifty-first year! Of course, they are not the odds on favorite to win. Their opponents, the New England Patriots, appearing in their record-setting ninth Super Bowl appearance, enjoy that expectation.
And yet, none of this appears to be lost on the Falcons, a young team with a young coach and big dreams! The odds-makers not withstanding, the birds believe in themselves and their destiny! And who knows? A whole new champion may just be appearing on the horizon!
After all, it has happened before. The Old Testament Book of 1st Samuel (chapter seventeen) records a time when another underdog rose up to challenge an established champion. That underdog was a young Israelite named David and that daunting champion was Philistine from Gath named Goliath! A little lad versus a giant warrior! A flea versus an elephant!
But the little lad had someone on his team that the Philistine did not. For David had God on his side! And, in the words of the Apostle Paul in his New Testament Letter to the Romans (chapter 8, verse 31): “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
I cannot say for certain if the Falcons will win Super Bowl LI. But I can say for certain that David won his victory! With a single smooth stone and a sling, and with God guiding his hands, he felled the giant and won the day!
And I know that whatever I face in this world, I can be victorious too. Because I serve the same God David did. And the Word of this God (penned via the hand of the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Philippians, chapter 4, verse 13 HCSB) tells me that “I am able to do all things through Him who strengthens me.”
As Paul puts it in his New Testament Letter to the Corinthians (chapter 15, verse 57): “Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
JOKE SOURCE: http://www.jokes4us.com/winnersjokes/superbowljoke.html.
SCRIPTURE SOURCE: http://biblehub.com.
A guy named Bob receives a free ticket to the Super Bowl from his company. Unfortunately, when Bob arrives at the stadium he realizes the seat is in the last row in the corner of the stadium - he's closer to the Goodyear blimp than the field.
About halfway through the first quarter, Bob notices an empty seat 10 rows off the field, right on the 50 yard line. He decides to take a chance and makes his way through the stadium and around the security guards to the empty seat. As he sits down, he asks the gentleman sitting next to him, "Excuse me, is anyone sitting here?" The man says no.
Now, very excited to be in such a great seat for the game, Bob again inquires of the man next to him, "This is incredible! Who in their right mind would have a seat like this at the Super Bowl and not use it?"
The man replies, "Well, actually, the seat belongs to me, I was supposed to come with my wife, but she passed away. This is the first Super Bowl we haven't been together at since we got married in 1967."
"Well, that's really sad," says Bob, "but still, couldn't you find someone to take the seat? A relative or close friend?" "No," the man replies, "they're all at the funeral."
We snicker, but people can indeed get carried away with the Super Bowl. I like the way one anonymous pundit has put it:
Imagine another world looking down at 60,000 people who pay $900,000 to sit in a stadium that cost $45 million to watch 22 men being paid $7 million a year dispute the possession of a ball that costs $16.95.
For my part, I will not be attending the Super Bowl. But, having been brought up in Georgia, I will likely watch the game because, miraculously, the Atlanta Falcons are playing in it! The Falcons entered the National Football League the same year the first Super Bowl was played; and only once in their fifty-one years have they been there before. That was Super Bowl XXXIII in the 1998 season, where they lost to the Denver Broncos 34–19.
I was five years old when they played their first game. I grew up watching them play, both on television and in person. And I have followed them faithfully even after I moved form my home state, in spite of their miserable record of 350–449–6 (only 341–437–6 in the regular season and only 9–12 in the playoffs).
In short, I was a Falcon fan when being a Falcon fan wasn't cool! It was so uncool that, in some years, bumper stickers would crop up on vehicles down home reading: “Go Falcons! And take the Braves with you!”
Alas! Like so many Falcons fans, I have spent decades armchair quarterbacking! Along the way, I have second and third guessed just about every other play ever called, and vented my frustrations year in and year out at the television screen.
But also, like most Falcons fans, I have always failed to give up, doggedly persisting in my hope each fall that “this could be the year”! And now, lo and behold, it is! The Atlanta Falcons are flying about high as they ever have! And they are soaring straight into NRG Stadium, (formerly Reliant Stadium) in Houston, Texas!
For despite their unimpressive first fifty years, they have managed to make it to the Big One in this, their fifty-first year! Of course, they are not the odds on favorite to win. Their opponents, the New England Patriots, appearing in their record-setting ninth Super Bowl appearance, enjoy that expectation.
And yet, none of this appears to be lost on the Falcons, a young team with a young coach and big dreams! The odds-makers not withstanding, the birds believe in themselves and their destiny! And who knows? A whole new champion may just be appearing on the horizon!
After all, it has happened before. The Old Testament Book of 1st Samuel (chapter seventeen) records a time when another underdog rose up to challenge an established champion. That underdog was a young Israelite named David and that daunting champion was Philistine from Gath named Goliath! A little lad versus a giant warrior! A flea versus an elephant!
But the little lad had someone on his team that the Philistine did not. For David had God on his side! And, in the words of the Apostle Paul in his New Testament Letter to the Romans (chapter 8, verse 31): “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
I cannot say for certain if the Falcons will win Super Bowl LI. But I can say for certain that David won his victory! With a single smooth stone and a sling, and with God guiding his hands, he felled the giant and won the day!
And I know that whatever I face in this world, I can be victorious too. Because I serve the same God David did. And the Word of this God (penned via the hand of the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Philippians, chapter 4, verse 13 HCSB) tells me that “I am able to do all things through Him who strengthens me.”
As Paul puts it in his New Testament Letter to the Corinthians (chapter 15, verse 57): “Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
JOKE SOURCE: http://www.jokes4us.com/winnersjokes/superbowljoke.html.
SCRIPTURE SOURCE: http://biblehub.com.