By Ratko Filipovich

In God’s wonderful plan for our life, we are not spectators, but players on the field. We have an incredible number of fans (the entire universe full of angels) and our quarterback is the very SON OF GOD.

Football is very physical, rough, and almost certainly a brutal type of game. The opponent is tough, experienced and merciless --pure evil. He will not hesitate to hurt us, our teammates, or our quarterback, physically or mentally. So his targets are our head and knees.

The opponent knows that if we hurt our head (concussion), we cannot make good decisions in our life. And if our knees are injured, we cannot kneel to pray (an extremely powerful tool to win the game). Also, the more skillful we are, the bigger the target we are.

To play successfully, we have to know very well what to do with the ball in our hand. In this case, the ball represents the very WORD OF GOD. To be better than the average player we have to spend lots of hours daily, with the ball in our hand, practicing.

Let’s just say for a moment our offense is on the field, ready to make a play. As usual, we will huddle to hear instructions from the quarterback (the SON OF GOD) who got direction through his helmet, wirelessly (HOLY SPIRIT), from the coach on the sideline (GOD the FATHER).

The call is made very clearly. It is a simple play: A short pass to the RIGHT and run to the end zone. We all lined up and the time clock was ticking down. Excitement is high, as the stakes are high too. Our first job is to protect the quarterback (His honor and dignity). Then run to the right, stretch our hands WAY HIGH to catch the football (HIS WORD), passed by the quarterback (the LORD HIMSELF).

The football is in the air, we stretch our arms and we get it. YEAH! We are excited because of our first success (accepting God into our heart), and now we have to run to the end zone. That is probably the most difficult part of the play. If we fumble the ball, the play will be over. We have to stay on our feet, because if we fall down the play will be over. In both cases we will disappoint our teammates, fans, coach and our quarterback. Most certainly, we will be hit hard by opponents (the devil). Probably our head and our knees are targets and we have no idea from which side we can expect the hit. Not to mention, we have to run fast.

Also, to open space for us to run, the quarterback sacrificed himself by falling into opponents, and boy, did He hit them hard! (CALVARY)

There are a few tricks we can legally use (after all, if we do something illegally, the referee -THE TRUTH- will see it and give the whole team a penalty… disappointment again from all who are watching us). We can stretch our one arm high (PRAYER) while we are holding the football (WORD OF GOD) tightly in the other. Let’s say we reach the end zone and score. There are a lot of reasons somebody could be happy with success in the end. For me it would be that while everybody is celebrating, the quarterback runs to me to tap my shoulder in the end zone with a few words like, “You did it, and I am proud of you!”