It's the Only Thing

It’s the only thing by Daniel Gardner, Special to the Gazette

Legendary NFL Coach Vince Lombardi famously quipped, “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.” In the long run, how do people measure winning and losing over a lifetime?

Super Bowl LIX features two popular teams with an assortment of popular players and coaches. On top of the athletic competition, President Donald Trump will raise considerable interest as the first sitting president of the United States to attend the premier annual sporting event. President Trump has become a cultural icon on his own with his come-frombehind landslide victory.

Nevertheless, many of the players on both teams in recent years have stepped up into that nebulous world of faith in Jesus Christ.

Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes answered who Jesus is to him, saying, “Jesus is my Lord and Savior. It’s someone that I look up to every single day to decide what I want to do with my life and how I want to live my life. And so, Jesus is everyting to me at the end of the day.”

Likewise, Mahomes’ counterpart on the Philadephia Eagles, Jalen Hurts answered who Jesus is to him sayng, “I’ve always wanted to root myself in that and keep Him in the center of my life in everything I do.” He continued, “Through the highs and the lows, He’s greater than all of them.”

Both Hurts and Mahomes have attracted admiration from younger and older fans alike not only for their exploits on the field, but possibly more-so for their testimonies about their relationships with their personal Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Those who have sought meaningful relationships as their most important values have counted on the Way, the Truth, and the Life for the ultimate meaning of “the only thing.” The “cool” American culture swung more and more toward the woke irreverent left over the past few decades. Glorifying sexual perversions of all kinds seemed to triumph over common sense of decoram as well as respect for circumspection. Many feared the next generation was doomed to follow outrageous conduct and rhetoric of fowl mouthed politicians who revel in their one-ups-manship barbs at quaint leaders who stick with tried and true common sense.

On another of one of the biggest stages in American athletics, Ohio State and Notre Dame players showed their own depth of common sense in their young lives. After the big game, Ohio State quarterback Will Howard paused before answering reporters’ questions, asking “Before I say anything, I just gotta give my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ all the glory and all the praise.”

Likewise, Notre Dame’s quarterback Riley Leonard began answering questions by saying, “Before I answer your question, I want to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for giving me the opportunity to play in this game.” He continued, “I wrote on my hand Proverbs 27:17, ‘As iron sharpens iron, so should one man sharpen another.’”

Commenting on these testimonies at the national championship, media personality Benny Johnson wrote on X, “Wow. Quarterbacks from both Ohio State and Notre Dame praised Jesus Christ after last night’s National Championship game. In sports, there’s a winner and a loser — but in a life devoted to Christ, there are only winners. God Bless these players.”

In the end, praising God for Jesus Christ is “the only thing.”