The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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In His Steps

September 12, 2007 / / 1 Comment

“Now I am a disciple. Let all the dreadful tortures of the devil come upon me; only let me get to Christ.” ~ Ignatius, 117AD

I’m into the last chapter of Childers and Aquino’s Unveiling Glory: Visions of Christ’s Transforming Presence and I’m convicted anew of the paramount importance of seeing our salvation as our new creation. Sanctification. Holiness. Whatever you want to call it. Our baptism into Jesus’ life, death, burial, and resurrection frees us from the bonds of sin to live our lives the way he lived his. Our call as God’s children is to live like Jesus.

I’ve heard my whole life that Jesus died so I don’t have to. Now I realize more and more that that’s not true. Jesus died to show me how to.

He lived to show me how to live. He overcame temptation to show me how to overcome temptation. He selflessly served others to show me how to selflessly serve others. He denied himself and picked up his cross and then commanded me to do the same thing.

From Unveiling Glory: “To confess Jesus as Lord is not merely to claim a relationship with him; it is to surrender to a very specific aim — being shaped according to Jesus’ image. Transformation into the image of Christ is the chief aim of the Christian life, and it is growing maturity in Christlikeness that validates authentic Christian experience.”

What Would Jesus Do?

It’s a question that has become almost trite and uninteresting because of all the bumper stickers and bracelets and T-shirts. But WWJD is not a new innovation. It’s not a marketing phenomenon of the past dozen years. Charles M. Sheldon, the preacher at the Central Congregational Church in Topeka, Kansas in 1896 first coined the phrase in his book In His Steps. WWJD was the theme of the book. The introduction to the book includes this memorable line: “I want volunteers who will pledge themselves earnestly and honestly for an entire year not to do anything without first asking the question, ‘What would Jesus do?'”

The apostles believed and preached the exact same thing, that we “all reflect the Lord’s glory and are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

So if that’s the priority, and I know that it is, how do we gauge it? How do we judge whether our lives and our churches are on track? What measurements are appropriate? Precise accuracy in doctrinal thought and practice? Numerical growth? Stimulating and emotionally powerful worship experiences? All of these are compelling gauges of success. Churches plan entire strategies around aims like these. And they hire and fire preachers and ministers every day based on their ability or lack of ability to deliver those kinds of results. But none of those things provide the correct measurements for the authenticity of a Christian experience. I guess we can judge worship, church involvement, daily life, relationships, devotional practices and disciplines. But that’s not the deal.

The only clear sign that a person is sharing true intimacy with Jesus is the evidence that he or she is genuinely being shaped according to his image. That’s what the apostles repeatedly tell us in our Scriptures. And this is the true standard by which they judge the appropriateness of Christian decisions and behavior.

“Your attitude should be the same as that of the Lord Jesus ~Philippians 2:5

“Imitate me as I imitate Christ ~1 Corinthians 11:1

“Be imitators of God ~Ephesians 5:1

No other indicator, no matter how emotionally rich or intellectually satisfying fits the witness of Scripture.

Again, from Unveiling Glory: “Authentic Christian experience always leaves a person acting, speaking, thinking, looking more like Jesus. It may or may not bring people in — sometimes Jesus attracted people; sometimes he repelled them. It may or may not be pleasant or fulfilling — joy abounds in Christ, and yet sharing fellowship with Jesus’ sufferings is never likely to be pleasant. It may or may not impart a sense of warm intimacy with Jesus — sometimes, walking with Jesus causes the disciple to cry out, ‘My God, why have you forsaken me?'”

As church leaders, we should use the aim of growth in Christlikeness as a standard in our personal lives and in our church ministries. Wherever we find other, counterfeit goals driving the agenda, as they often do, we need to identify them as distractions and re-center our focus on the real work of our God.

Peace,

Allan

Lessons From Chad Johnson

September 11, 2007 / / 2 Comments

Bengals wide receiver Chad Johnson caught a touchdown pass in the first quarter of his team’s win over Baltimore last night and whipped out a replica Pro Football Hall of Fame blazer with the words “Future H.O.F. 20??” on the back. He strutted around the sidelines wearing the coat, much to the delight of photographers and commentators who’d been guessing for weeks how Johnson would celebrate his first TD of the season.ChadJohnson

Johnson is dumb. His agent must be dumber. If he really has designs on the Hall of Fame, this was a dumb move.

This was not a spontaneous celebration. This one took plenty of foresight and planning. His agent was in on it. Several of Johnson’s advisors must have known this was coming. And apparantly they all told him it was a good idea. And even if they advised him otherwise, Johnson obviously overruled them.

Forget for a moment any opinions you may or may not have about how those kinds of staged celebrations call attention to the individual and disrespect the other 52 members of the team who helped score the touchdown. Forget the way those kinds of things alienate teammates and lead to disharmony on the bench and in the lockerroom. Let’s think for a minute about how the Hall of Fame Selection Committee views this.

The Hall of Fame Selection Committee, a fairly exclusive group of sportswriters and former players, mainly grizzled old-guard veteran types who see themselves as protectors of the dignity of the game, work unashamedly at keeping guys out of the Hall, not putting them in. It’s a brutal process. They disect every aspect of a man’s career, including off-field issues and whether anybody got along with the guy or not. If a man ever brings disgrace to the game or attempts to set himself up above the game and the teams, that man will have a very difficult time getting in. These guys on the committee hold grudges. They vote with bias and partiality. It’s not easy to get in. And if you violate any of their written or unwritten codes of honor, you have to hold a dozen league records and a couple of Super Bowl rings to even sniff a chance of being voted in.

I promise you, when Chad Johnson becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame, five years after his retirement, whenever that is, the stunt he pulled last night will come up. Some will claim he poked fun at the process, that he made light of the committee’s serious work, and that he desecrated the sacred beige blazer. Right or wrong, it will happen.

And as I thought about that while watching the game last night, I was reminded of a sermon I heard Jeff Walling preach at WinterFest and at Tulsa a couple of years ago. Making decisions based on the dot, not the line.

Walling had a bright red posterboard circle, probably two feet in diameter, and told us it represented “right now.” The dot represents the present. Today. And then he had a volunteer run a string of twine from the podium all the way down the center aisle, out the back of the foyer, and into the parking lot where we couldn’t see the end of it. The line. He called that “eternity.” And for 30 minutes that “dot” was up there on the stage and the “line” hung over our heads.

And he talked to us about making decisions based on eternity, not based on the here and now.

Adam and Eve were thinking only about the present when they messed up in the Garden of Eden. They were not thinking long term. Samson continually made decisions based on right now, not based on the big picture. When David was in the middle of breaking over half the ten commandments with Bathsheba, he was making the call based on the moment, not based on the future. The rich young ruler. Judas. Ananias and Saphira. The list of Bible characters who made decisions based on the dot and not the line is long.

And we would do well to learn from those lessons.

The decisions we make regarding how we spend our time. How we spend our money. What we say. What we do. Are we making those daily, hour-by-hour decisions based on the dot or the line? Do we take into consideration the eternal aspect of everything we do or are we driven only by what seems to be good at the moment? Do we reflect on what our actions mean for us and for others in the long run, in the big picture? What are the Kingdom ramifications? How does this impact God’s eternal will for my life? When we’re making our choices, do we consider these things at all?

What will this action do to my wife? How could this choice eventually impact my family? Could my spiritual well-being be compromised by this decision? Is there a chance, down the road, this could harm the Church?

It’s like the end of Moses’ great sermon in Deuteronomy 30, and the end of Jesus’ great sermon on the mount in Matthew 7. It’s like in the Garden of Eden in Genesis 2. And it’s like the prophet’s answer to the king in Jeremiah 21. God always gives us choices. He always lays out the options in front of us. Life and prosperity or death and destruction. We make the call. Every day. Every hour. The choices are there. And they are ours. Choose life. Let us make our decisions based on the line, not the dot.

“We fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”

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CarleyGiftWe’ve always celebrated our children’s birthdays with a family dinner at the restaurant of the birthday girl’s choice. And so far, every kid, every year, we’ve avoided Chuck E. Cheese. Until last night. Carley was adamant. We couldn’t talk her into anything else. And so we went.

SkeeballCarley and Valerie use their tokens on everything. They try it all. They especially enjoy the skeeball (Carley banged in four or five off the top of the game into the little 10,000 point loop) and they took several whirls on the roller coaster simulator.RollerCoaster

Whitney, I think, spent every single one of her tokens shooting hoops.

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Carley&BarbiesCarley was absolutely thrilled with the Hannah Montana Barbie dolls, one for Hannah and one for Miley. You parents of elementary school girls understand. Everyone else, I don’t have the energy to explain. All I know is that Disney could take cauliflower and broccoli, turn it into a TV movie and a 30-minute show with a catchy tune, and sell millions and millions of pounds of it to pre-adolescent girls and their parents all over the world.

Carley&CakeInfernoWe couldnt’ find any candles in the house before we left so we actually stuck eight matches in the cake and lit them. You can see from the picture (notice the blackened matchsticks on the right of Carrie-Anne’s hand) that it wasn’t very smooth. Carley was blowing them out as we were lighting them.

And then to cap off the evening, Mr. Cheese actually sang Happy Birthday to the Bear.Carley&MrCheese

We cashed in our nearly 300 tokens for three little toys that we could have purchased at Wal-Mart for 35-cents each. And we listened to Hannah Montana all the way home.

Next up, six little second graders for a sleepover / party Friday night. How do I get out of this to attend the Birdville-Richland football game?

Help.

Allan

Ode To The Bear

September 10, 2007 / / 3 Comments

CarleyBonnetIt was eight years ago today, September 10, 1999, that God blessed our family with Carley Renae. In Wichita Falls. Our only child not born in Austin. The only one we knew was coming the day she came. An alarm clock woke us up at 7:00 that morning to drive to the hospital, not water breaking and painful contractions at 3am like with the other two. But the delivery took just as long. It wasn’t until after dinner that Friday evening, after we ran Granny and Grandpa and Gram and Gran-Gran and Pop-Pop and Aunt Pam out of the room that Carley made her first appearance. She just needed a little privacy. We thought maybe she was shy.

 We were wrong.

There’s not a shy bone in Carley’s body. Never has been. CarleyDP

Carley’s been given plenty of nicknames in her eight years—that’s just part of being in our family, I think. Carl. Carley Sue. Gnarley (which Jimmy Mitchell took to the next level when he started calling her Gnarles Barkley). Little Bit.

But Carley has always been and will always be The Bear.

It began early in her life. She wouldn’t just cry when she needed something. She screamed. When she was wet. When she was hungry. When she wanted something. Anything. She would scream in a way the other two never screamed. Like she was furious. Carrie-Anne was the first one to call her a bear. And it stuck. It was her attitude and her angry screaming as a baby that started it.

But as it turns out, Carley is our most sensitive child. She cries at the drop of a hat, as often in reaction to the pain of others as for her own pain. And she is our most affectionate. She loves to hug and cuddle and play. She’s always grabbing our hands or jumping on our backs. She went from angry bear to cuddle bear in a hurry.

But we just call her Carley Bear.

Carley is a sweet, funny, outgoing, loud, compassionate little girl. She keeps us constantly entertained with her singing and dancing. She says exactly what’s on her mind, which also keeps us very entertained. She is a beautiful gift from our God. And she fills our lives with joy.

Happy Birthday, little girl. We love you.

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CowboyJoeMore questions than answers, I think, from last night’s Cowboys game. Understand, I do tend to see only the negatives with this team. In fact, I’m sure I’m actually looking for them. But aside from Jason Witten’s amazing performance, don’t a lot of things from last night’s win over the Giants concern you?

How long will Romo be able to keep throwing those wobbly side-arm balls in the NFL?

How long until Marion Barber does something in the heat of battle so incredibly dumb that he gets suspended for four games?

Yes, the Cowboys D is good against the run. But with that secondary, who needs to run? The Cowboys DBs made Eli to Plaxico look like Montana to Rice. Anthony Henry and Jacques Reeves are WAY overmatched. And, I’m sorry, Roy Williams is probably one of the top three or four most overrated players in the entire NFL. I would take Everson Walls right now over anybody else the Cowboys have—single kidney and yellow T-shirt and everything.

What is that extra little plastic strap around the back side of Wade Phillips’ headset?

The Giants lost their starting quarterback and their starting running back in a one-score game. We all realize that, right?

How many games can the Cowboys win, giving up 35 points on defense? And don’t say it’s OK if Dallas scores more. Dallas won’t.

And, as much as I hate saying this, Jerry Wayne’s new Pepsi commercial with Romo and Phillips is actually very funny. Jerry is running a very close second to Payton Manning for most completely over-exposed NFL personality. But that new Pepsi spot is pretty good.

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Finally (you Legacy brothers and sisters will appreciate my use of “finally” here), a word on change from C. Eric Lincoln, especially in light of our on-going conversations regarding small groups:

“A society or a community that is religiously alert will invariably react to whatever may be perceived as a religious innovation because whatever is new is perceived as an implied threat or contradiction to what has already been settled by history and confirmed by tradition. The ‘innovators’ seldom see their new doctrine or practice as innovation but are quite likely to find its justification, or indeed its roots or requirements, in precisely the ‘Old-time Religion’ to which all parties appeal as jus canonicum.”

We find our unity, our common ground, in whatever discussion we’re having, in the blood of Jesus Christ and his claim of Lordship over every segment of our lives. Our commonality is found in the Holy Word of God and in his mission for his Church. We can all agree on that.

Peace,

Allan

FWC 13, DC 7

September 8, 2007 / / 1 Comment

What does crow taste like? Humble pie, anyone?

 Fort Worth Christian definitely showed up to play football and gutted out a pretty impressive home win over my Chargers. Despite what the final score might indicate, there were a lot of big plays. It’s just that all of DC’s big plays were overturned or brought back by penalties.

Dallas Christian did have a chance to make the Cards pay for a missed extra point and win the game at the end. They got the ball at their own 20 yard line with just under seven minutes to play and drove it all the way down to the FWC seven yard line at the 1:50 mark. First and goal at the seven. An incomplete pass on first down stopped the clock. But then, as a fitting capper to what had plagued the Chargers all night, a holding penalty pushed them back to the 17 yard line and they just couldn’t pull it off from there. With 45 seconds left they faced a fourth and goal from the five. But an incomplete pass in the end zone ended the DC drive and sealed the deal for the Cardinals.

We were walking across the field to get to our car after the game when Coach Thannum, the FWC Athletics Director, stopped me to take issue with my Dallas Christian T-shirt. I asked him if I could take at least partial credit for their win since my chapel talk obviously inspired the entire school community. And he told me I could take lots and lots of credit. He said my inspirational talk about being fully committed to our goals, about putting behind all the things that distract us from achieving our goals, set the perfect tone for the day. They apparantly talked about it all day long getting ready for the game.

D’oh!

We had a fantastic night. The Brownlows, our common-law members at Legacy, were the perfect hosts. It was so good seeing old DC classmates and teammates such as Jeff M., Mike M., Brian C., Todd S., and their families. We also got to catch up with some old friends from Mesquite like the Montanas, the Powers, and the Tollesons. And then, there are so many new friends on the Fort Worth side of things now. An almost perfect evening.

Congratulations to the Marble Falls Mustangs after their big win over Crockett last night! I’m sure Kyle and Stan and Cord are smiling this morning.

Peace,

Allan

Be Holy Because I Am Holy

September 7, 2007 / / 3 Comments

JerryWayneDoorOur Children’s Minister at Legacy, Kipi Ward, is the one who mischievously taped the Jerry Wayne JerryWayneCloseupPapa John’s pizza ad to my office door. It didn’t take me long to figure it out. She and I share a common disgust for the way he acts in public. Look at the expression on his face. Click on the closeup shot on the right and look at how his leg is hiked up in the Heisman pose. Are you kidding me? The owner of the Dallas Cowboys is in his suit and tie, in all seriousness, striking the Heisman pose, to sell pizza.

Forget the pizza. Deliver me!

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I just returned to the office from speaking at chapel at Fort Worth Christian High School. A very pleasant fellow, Mark Weathers, invited me a few weeks ago. And I didn’t realize until just a few days ago that I was scheduled to speak the very morning of the Fort Worth Christian – Dallas Christian football game.

Very weird.

As we were chit-chatting in the foyer the bell rang and here they all came, a couple of hundred high school students in an overwhelming sea of Cardinal Red. All the football players wearing their jerseys, all the cheerleaders in their uniforms, all the pep squad in thier red shirts, and everybody else with some kind of red shirt proclaiming their spirit and allegiance to FWC. I turned to Mark and I said, “There’s no way they can know I graduated from DC.”

I captured their attention, I’m fairly sure, with a little joke about the football coach and lots of sports analogies during a brief message on commitment taken from King Asa’s life in 1 Kings 15. And it’s not like I was wearing my letter jacket or my high school ring. But it was very surreal. I felt like they all knew I was not one of them.

For most of my 40 years on this earth, Fort Worth Christian has been the enemy. Now, I find myself in a church family that meets less than two miles from the campus. Some of my best friends now, I’m finding out, were playing football and basketball at FWC the same time I was at DC. And now their kids are Cardinals. I’m playing hoops at the Cardinal gym once a week. I’m so disoriented. Paradigm shift. Worlds are colliding!

We’re having dinner tonight with Andrew and Stephanie Brownlow and their two wonderful little boys who spent most of Wednesday night trying to put a FWC ballcap on my head. And then we’re going to the ballgame together. At Fort Worth Christian. The last DC football game I attended, I was suited up. That was well over 20 years ago. But I’m starting to get butterflies again.

My junior year we snapped a four game losing streak to Fort Worth Christian 14-7 at our place. We commemorated that victory with a special patch on our jackets. My senior year we beat the Cards on their field 63-14. The first team only played the first series of the third quarter and then we had the rest of the night off. I predict a similar outcome tonight. In fact, I predict the same score: DC 63-14.

ChargersFans

I further predict that I will not be sporting any body paint tonight.

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For those of you who care (mom and the other two), the swelling has gone down a little but my nose is still very sore and very crooked. And I’m a little worried about the discrepancy in nostril size. Suddenly, I’m not concerned about popcorn lung anymore.

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“You are to be holy to me because I, the Lord, am holy and I have set you apart from the nations to be my own.”  ~Leviticus 20:26

 The greek word Paul uses in 1 Thessalonians 4:4 and 4:7 is “hagiosmos.” It means a process leading to a state of holiness or holiness as the end result of a process. Either way, Paul is communicating a process. Continual conformity to God’s character. Becoming exactly like God.

And sometimes we distort this a little bit. We think of holiness strictly as separation from the world or separation from our culture. Paul’s idea of holiness is fundamentally a different concept. His is all positive. Holiness is a process of becoming more and more like our God who’s chosen us and who saves us.

Now, modeling ourselves after God does require some separation from things that don’t please him or things that conflict with his holy character. But to overemphasize or only emphasize the idea of separation hides or ignores the primary aspect of sanctification.

It is multi-faceted. You can view holiness as the gift God gives us at baptism. You can see it as a future goal to be realized on that last day when Jesus comes back to take us to Heaven. You can view it as an on-going journey. It’s past, present, and future. It’s all of that. It’s a one word summary of God’s will for his children.

And as God’s children, it’s our calling.

“For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life.”                            ~1 Thessalonians 4:7

Peace,

Allan

On Distractions, A Bloody Nose, and Thursday Night Football

September 6, 2007 / / 2 Comments

This will forever be known as the day I became a perimeter player. But first…

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One of my dear friends in Austin — let’s call her Brooke — included in her comments yesterday regarding congregational singing this provocative nugget:

I’m not sure where the idea arose that worship should be “free from distractions.” I haven’t really thought it all the way through, but I think the incarnation implies distractions, even in worship.

I also have not worked all of this out in my own head and heart. But it is something I struggle with mightily. Big time.

As a deacon over worship for two different congregations and a song leader and worship leader for 25 years, I always thought I had a grasp on how worship should be structured and on what’s important and what’s not. And then, a little over two years ago, Thomas G. Long blew the doors off my worship theology at the end of the introduction to his excellent book The Witness of Preaching.

He writes of his childhood church experiences in rural Georgia, particularly of the stray dog that would wander into the sanctuary during hot summer days when the doors and windows to the building had been left open to catch whatever little breeze they could. The dog wasn’t there every Sunday, but almost. Long jokes that the “stray hound of indecipherable lineage” had a better attendance record than some of the church officers.

“The ushers knew better than to try to run him off, the one and only attempt at that having driven him bounding toward the pulpit. So, while we sang hymns, the cur would sniff curiously at the ankles of the worshipers. Deacons would step around him on their way to take up the offering, and during the pastoral prayer the dog would wander aimlessly around the room. He was an endless source of mirth for us children, and he occasionally served as a handy and spontaneous sermon illustration in such references as ‘no more sense of right and wrong than that dog there.’

Looking back on it now, I realize what a trial it must have been for our ministers to attempt to lead worship and to preach on those Sundays when this mongrel was scampering around the building and nuzzling the feet of the congregation. I readily confess that I do not covet similar circumstances for myself, but there was something wonderful about those times as well. Whatever else it may mean, a dog loose in worship unmasks all pretense and undermines false dignity. It was clear to us all that the grace and the joy and the power present in our communion, and these were present in abundance, were not of our own making. We were, after all, people of little worldly standing who could not keep even our most solemn moments free of stray dogs. I want to believe that even our dark-suited, serious-faced ministers were aware of the poetic connection between a congregation of simple farmers and teachers in their Sunday best with a hound absurdly loose in their midst and a gathering of frail human beings astonishingly saved by the grace of God, grace they did not control but could only receive as a gift. If so, then in some deep and silent place within them they were surely taken with rich and cleansing laughter — and if they were, they were better preachers of the Gospel for it.”

I had always held strongly to the belief that worship should come off without a hitch. We should have our very best songleaders leading the songs, our very best readers reading the Scriptures, and the very best speakers and orators praying the prayers. I had always cringed when I had planned a Scripture reading or a song to be read or sung at just exactly the right moment only to have the person responsible for executing my plan mess it up. What will the visitors think? How does this reflect on me? It’s not our best we’re giving to God or each other.

Even though I still struggle and wrestle with this, I see now that kind of thinking is wrong at best and idolatrous at worst.

Long describes the “poetic connection” between simple, frail humans and the astonishing grace of our Lord. Grace that is completely out of our control. It’s a gift that God delights in giving and we gladly and humbly accept.

God views, and we must, too, not the misread passage or the ill-timed song or the confusion that new members sometimes bring to the Lord’s Table, but the people. We should see the people, the church, as an amazing collection of God’s children in all of our weakness and humanness. That speaks more to God’s love and mercy on a Sunday morning than anything we can plan. Instead of looking down when Brother Sam mispronounces “reconciliation,” I should look at the courage God gives him to read the Scriptures in front of the assembly. Instead of rolling my eyes when Brother Neil starts the song on the wrong note, I should roll my attention to the joy of the Lord evident in Neil’s service. And instead of shaking my head when Brother Joe goes down the wrong aisle during communion, I should praise God that Brother Joe is a brother!

It’s not the well-orchestrated, perfectly executed worship service we should strive for. It’s recognizing that God meets us, his Church, his children, in our imperfect songs and in our imperfect prayers and in our imperfect sermons.

There is no perfect sermon or perfect worship service. There is only a perfect God who loves his Church.

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Thursday is my basketball day at Fort Worth Christian with a bunch of other area ministers and coaches. An hour and a half of wide-open full-court hoops that gives me the exercise and the recreation I need to finish out the week strong. Today I was having an unusually good outing. In fact, I ended the first game by driving through the lane, around and through a couple of defenders, and scoring the winning bucket. As the second game was beginning to start, Eric, one of my teammates, and I were talking about driving to the lane and playing inside. Like Darrell Royal’s mantra that three things happen when you pass and two of them are bad, we both acknowledged to each other that good things happen when you drive the lane, and we vowed to do more of that during the second contest.

I was playing help defense early in that second game when one of the few young flat-bellies who plays with us began to drive to the hole. He had the ball down low. I stepped into the lane to take a swipe and he brought the ball up, nailing me right in the face with an 18-pound sledgehammer! I later found out it was just his elbow. But it felt like a Mack truck. I’m sure it wasn’t delivered with the same force as Kermit Washington’s punch to Rudy T. But it’s one of the first things that went through my mind.

That happened at about 12:30 this afternoon. The bleeding didn’t stop until about 1:30.

You know how a tornado can hit the rough part of town and people jokingly say the storm did about 17-million dollars worth of improvements? I’m hoping that, once the swelling goes down in my lip and my nose, I won’t be horribly disfigured but actually better looking. Right now my nose is crooked as a dog’s hind leg and one nostril is considerably bigger than the other one. My lip is busted. And I’m hoping like crazy that I’m not going to get two black eyes. I’d post a picture. But it would be so graphic that the filter on your computer wouldn’t even allow you to get to this site.

Playing down low is overrated.

I’ll be back. But today I have become a perimeter player.

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NFL KickoffThe Colts and the Saints kick off the NFL season at 7:30 Texas time tonight and I can’t wait. Just a few more hours. I know they’ve been opening the season on Thursdays now for a while. And I know for a couple of years now they’ve been playing on Thursday nights during the end of the season. And I guess this is the second season for Monday night doubleheaders. I always thought one of the main reasons NFL football became the national sport is because all the games were played at the same time on the same day. You gear up for it all week. You talk about it. You read about it. You get ready for it. And then BOOM Sunday comes and it’s crazy! And you spend all the next week analyzing the outcome and reviewing it play by play and then starting the process all over again for the next Sunday set of games.

 Is there any chance in the world, as popular and as unstoppable as the NFL appears to be, that the league could ever start to suffer from over exposure? Could NFL games on TV four days a week ever hurt professional football? I realize there are some who will move heaven and earth to be in front of the tube for every NFL game. But most of us (right?) can’t do that. We don’t have time for that every other night. And so we’ll miss a bunch of games and highlights. Will that ever cause us to care less? Will that ever plant in our minds the idea that we can live without it?

Probably not.

Go Saints. Love Drew Brees.

Peace,

Allan

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