Tom Brady is one of those football players people either love or love to hate. One thing that no one can deny, he is one of the greatest to ever play in the NFL. Consider the following stats:
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Most NFL Championships: 7
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Most Super Bowl MVP: 5
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Most Valuable Player awards: 3
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Only player to win the Super Bowl with AFC and
NFC teams
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For his career stats, during his last two
seasons:
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Most pass completions
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Most yards thrown
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Highest pass completion percentage
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Year before his retirement, 2nd most
passing TDs
Considering all these achievements, who would have thought a
6th round draft pick (199 overall) would have accomplished all he did in his
career? Even without personally knowing Tom Brady, one thing you can gather
from his career, he used his talents and abilities to get better over his
career, until the very end.
In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul was teaching and encouraging the
churches that we have purpose, talents, and gifts to use. In 1 Corinthians 12:
31, Paul encourages us to “desire the best” and seek to be better using our
talents and abilities. Examples of the gifts are wisdom, knowledge, faith, and spiritual
discernment and were to help with the functioning of the church. Paul wanted
believers to pursue to be better while achieving even more excellence.
1 Corinthians 12: 31: “But earnestly desire the best
gifts. And yet I will show you a more excellent way.” (NKJV).
Similar to what Paul was teaching concerning Spiritual gifts,
as Officials each of us brings something different and unique to the crew. Here
are a few examples: proper communication with coaches, players, and officials;
calmness; rules knowledge; common sense; relationship building; organization;
and comic relief.
As we bring our talents and abilities to the crew, we should
strive for still a more excellent way. 1 Corinthians 12: 31 challenges us to
“desire the best” and seek to be better. In the pursuit to be better, we will
achieve even more excellence. Looking back at the career of Tom Brady, he achieved
excellence by desiring to be the best all the way to the end of his career. Our
challenge is to do the same. Even with the officiating talents and abilities we
have, seek ways to improve communication, to strengthen our crew chemistry, to be
leaders in our position, and to prepare for each assignment.
Let’s
desire a more excellent way.
