We can all take three lessons from the Seattle Seahawks. As a Seattle Seahawks fan I admit experiencing a twinge of deja vu during the last minute of the last game of the 2019 regular season. Being denied a score from within arms length of the prize with Beast Mode on the sidelines should have been a no-brainer. After all we had seen that movie before in Super Bowl 49 against New England. But, as it turned out expecting a different result would have been as unwise as betting on an instant replay and hoping for a different outcome. We lost the game by a matter of inches.
I am not a coach and didn’t play football well, so it would be presumptuous for me to criticize the coaches or players. But I know the 12’s have been excited and entertained every time they took the field. And it still isn’t over. We are fortunate to have them in our house. (I just wish we were playing our next two games there.) We’ll have to wait to see how it turns out in the future. In the meantime, I think there are three faith lessons we can take away from the Seahawks.
The first is there are four quarters in a game. No player knows for certain that they will play them all. But they can’t wait until the final fifteen minutes and expect everything to turn out ok. They need to know the playbook, take the field in shape and give it their best effort on every down. In life, too many of us wait until the final quarter to get serious about Jesus. Unlike pro football, it doesn’t matter when we start. We may never be a star player but we are always in the game and will always be on the winning team.
The second is playing to your strength. The guys on the sideline and practically everyone wearing blue and green in the stands anticipated Wilson would feed the Beast. You could just sense redemption in the air. Lynch was brought back for just that scenario. He has a reputation for getting stronger the more carries he has and had averaged more yards per carry than the Hawks needed to win. Instead, they bet on Wilson’s passing. As they did against the Patriots, they relied on him, alone.
Under pressure, he unsuccessfully threw four passes at a crowded end zone. Three missed the mark. The fourth was caught but spotted inches short of the goal line. With no more downs there were no do-overs. It’s the same in life. We can’t make it on our own. If we try, we will fall short of the prize with no second opportunity. Jesus must be both lord and savior in our lives. In exchange he provides us with the power to win, even though we may face setbacks along the way. Trusting anything or anyone else is not playing to our strength. It is playing to lose.
The third is situational awareness. Delay of game cost the team five yards. Stopping short of the goal cost them the game. Where are you? Is your faith in Jesus head faith or heart faith? Do you just know about Jesus or do you know and trust him with every facet of your life? If it is head faith only, you are going to miss the mark by about 18 inches, the distance between your head and heart. How do you measure up? The clock is ticking. Run or pass?
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