Winners

 Last week in church, our pastor challenged us to leave the past behind.  Winners always leave the past behind. To those who are New Orleans Saints fans, this Super Bowl is bittersweet or maybe just bitter.  They believe that their team should be there because of a bad call from the referees.  Actually, the referees didn’t make any call, so in reality you cannot call it a bad call, but one that was missed.  The Los Angeles Rams player even admits that he got away with a hit and there should have been a flag.  We cannot live our lives with “Should’ve beens.”  We have to live life with what we know and how we can carry it into the future.

Most of us have incidents in life that if someone had done the right thing, we would be in a different place.  We cannot blame others for our lives.  There are moments that others can affect us.  We need to look to the next moment.  Yes, the Saints got a no call, but instead of crying, the team needed to look at the next moment and block the fifty-three-yard field goal, which in football terms is difficult to make.  When we live life with what should’ve happened, we miss what is happening right in front of us.  That’s when we lose.  Life is full of obstacles.  It’s up to us to move forward in life and create a better future.

For the past few years, I’ve noticed on social media that many people are living in the land of “what would’ve happened if…” Unfortunately, those are lives that have a perception that life is already lived.  Life is good enough.  They are living with requirements.  Their dreams are dead, which means that their souls are beginning to die.  They believe that the people in charge are ruining their lives and they are not participating in the rest of the game of life.

We have to quickly get over what happens to us and continue to live.  As a Christian, I have to remember that I am a new creation in Christ, and that means that the old is gone.  Every day I must throw off the old and live in the new.  The more we live in the one event that we believe has ruined us, we cannot see what is ahead of us.  Our past will begin to haunt us and we will live with our sins, mistakes, and flaws.  We must move forward. 

So, for the Super Bowl, it’s between two teams that move forward.  Then again, I am a Duke basketball fan.  There was a moment that a Duke player stepped or in the eyes of every University of Kentucky fan, stomped on a player on the floor.  Every UK fan believes that Duke player should’ve been tossed out of the game.  He wasn’t.  He played on until the very end.  With 2.5 seconds left and Kentucky in the lead, that player who did the stepping or love tap, hit the shot heard around the world and Duke won and went on to win the NCAA championship.  They should’ve guarded him and blocked that last shot.  They didn’t.  He moved forward into history.  It’s time to move forward.

We can cry about unfairness, or we can live and make our lives and the lives around us much better.  It’s a choice that we have to make every day.  Those who live to make life better live with peace, contentment, and are successful.  Those who live in the world that blame unfair moments and what “should’ve” happened, live in anger and bitterness.  We can see by all the social media posts.  I choose to live for today and create a better future.  Let’s enjoy this Super Bowl Sunday with food, friends, commercials, and create memories that are beautiful.  Let’s move forward.  If someone steps on you or pushes you, guard him against you the next time he comes after you.  If you don’t, you may watch him succeed and you sit back and cry your whole life long.