" 'Tony, I think you're at a crossroads,' Donnie said. 'You know what life is all about. You profess to be a Christian, and you tell everybody that God has first place in your life. Now, when your career looks like it's teetering, we're getting a chance to see what really is in first place for you.' I thought about that all day and then came back to the conversation with Donnie. 'You're probably right,' I told him. 'I feel like I've been learning from you guys and growing, and I'm feeling better about my faith and thinking that I trust the Lord. I'm trying to understand what you guys have. But all of a sudden, I come to a crisis point, and I begin to panic. My thoughts turn to 'What am I going to do?' Donnie paused and measured me squarely. 'All the Lord is trying to do is find out what's in first place in your life, and right now, it looks like football is.' I immediately knew Donnie was right, and I felt convicted. I think that was the point at which I really began to understand what it means to be a Christian, and I began making an effort to start changing and growing as a person. It was the first time I was able to look at football as something that God was allowing me to do, not something that should define me."
--from Quiet Strength by Tony Dungy, chapter 4, pg. 50-51
In Quiet Strength, by Tony Dungy, Dungy gets mononucleosis during the training camp leading into his second football season with the Steelers, and worries that his career with Pittsburgh might be over. He becomes so concerned with this that he asks some of the other players advice on what he should do. He eventually realizes that during this whole crisis, he never once asked God to lead him, and that his own selfishness made him stumble. That was the point in which he truly allowed God to lead his life.
We're all like Dungy in the sense that we don't want to give up what's dear to us, but is it really right for us to strive for the sinful ambitions of this world? Matthew 16:26 says, "And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?" The truth, no matter how much you want it to be otherwise, is that God is in control of everything around us. Sure he gives us the choice of which path to take, but in the end, He is the only righteous way. We can't do anything without his help; for our strength withers like the weeds, but his strength grows only stronger through the seasons.
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