Mirror Room vs. Window Room

Whittier Christian's football team is going into the fifth week of the season. We have won the 4 games we've played in thus far. a perfect 4 - 0 record, very exciting.

This week we play a team that has good, talented players. Last week we played a team that had fast, discipline players. The week before that we played a team of small, slow players. These teams all run a different offense, defense, and special teams. They have different team demeanors and personality's. Every team we play this season is not the same. Because of this, our game plan will change (not drastically) each week as far as strategy goes. Although, OUR MENTAL APPROACH SHOULD ALWAYS BE THE SAME. let me explain this concept more...

In practice we tell our players to compete with their BEST SELF. Practice as hard as they individually can and improve themselves from yesterday, last week, etc... If we are playing a team that hasn't won a game all year, or even score a point all year we won't tell our kids to practice just hard enough to beat this team. We will keep saying, "compete with your BEST SELF!" If we are playing the USC Trojans (we would obviously lose) I won't tell my players to practice hard enough to beat the USC Trojans, that would be an unrealistic goal. Although, I will tell them to "compete with their BEST SELF!"

When WCHS plays a different team each week they should not look through the window room. In other words look through the window and compare themselves to the other team. They shouldn't even guess if their going to kill the team or if it's going to be a close game. Rather, if WCHS looks in the mirror room and competes with their best self, practices as hard as they can, and reaches their individual potential each day, the players will play their best football on Friday night regardless of the opponent.

We can apply this to our everyday lives as well. Are we looking in the mirror each day and asking ourselves if we are working with great work ethic, great attitude and reaching our potential everyday in whatever we do (work, marriage, friendships, etc...)? Or are we comparing ourselves to other people, worried what other people are doing, even gossiping about them? Take a look at your life and CONTROL WHAT YOU CAN CONTROL.

In this regard, living in the mirror room will always be a better outcome!

Growing in the Lord, with our brothers/sisters

Psalm 133:1 "How good and pleasant it is when brothers can live together!"

I recently asked one of my best friends a simple question, "How is your relationship with God?" It hit me that I had no idea how his walk with God was going and I felt the urge to find out. After asking him this question we engaged in such great conversation, which led to him feeling motivated and energized about his walk with the Lord. After we talked, my friend and I wanted to continue to encourage and lift each other up more often. Since then we have included a few more of our close friends. We send each other text messages throughout the day that say, "Hey bro! I was thinking about you earlier. I hope you had a great day. Make sure you further the Kingdom of God today!"
We also write emails to each other, and have phone calls that include this type of conversation.

Not only are we being great friends to each other but we are creating a BROTHERHOOD. a group of guys that will always know where your at with the Lord, what kind of prayer you need, and someone to help you further the Kingdom of God. If we can teach our students and athletes to become great friends in this way and develop a certain kind of brotherhood & sisterhood at WCHS, it will become a such a powerful place.

Although we don't literally live in the same house like you might expect Psalm 133 to be talking about, we can live in our friends lives and we can continue to further the Kingdom of God by being great friends.

Furthering the Kingdom of Heaven through Athletics

At Whittier Christian High School we hope our athletes our furthering the Kingdom of Heaven while competing. Considering the majority of our student athletes are believers, furthering the Kingdom of Heaven should be there #1 focus.

There are many ways to further the Kingdom of Heaven through athletics but lets concentrate on one area right now.

1 Thessalonians 5:9-11
“For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up as you are already doing.”

In the weight room at WCHS we strongly urge our athletes to ENCOURAGE one another. As we see above this is very biblical. Next time you read the New Testament, check out how encouraging the authors are in the beginning of the book (especially Paul).

I want to share why encouragement will make or break a team. During a tough football conditioning session I tell our athletes to "speak names". This simply means pick one or two teammates out and encourage, motivate, even yell there name in the middle of conditioning. This not only is great for the teammate being called out, but it also takes the focus of how tired the athlete doing the "yelling" is. This act of unselfishness hits the core of our faith. When we are beat, tired and drained we unselfishly ENCOURAGE and MOTIVATE our teammates. When teams become great at this they become more successful. Similiarly, when teams aren't good at encouraging and motivating each other they will not be successful. (I dont care how talented they are!)

The great thing about this is these athletes will face very similar scenarios in life as family members, as friends, and as Christians. When they practice this characteristic of being a great encourager they will be great at it when they are a husband/wife, father/mother, friend, co-worker, etc. All by "speaking someones name" in a conditioning drill on the athletic fields of WCHS we are expanding the Kingdom of God! Very exciting.

Thanks and stay tuned for more posts soon!

Coach Oberlander