The Girl Who Sobbed

[This is an edited version. I forgot when I originally posted this to credit Alexander Wolff's article in the Dec. 12, 2011 issue of SPORTS ILLUSTRATED for the Pat Summitt story. My bad.]

            In 2008, the University of Tennessee Lady Vols’ basketball team prepared for takeoff on a chartered jet. They were traveling on an SEC road trip.

            Pat Summitt, Tennessee's head coach, took her seat on the first row, as she always did. The flight attendant took the jump seat across from Summit. She began to sob.

            Summit inch forward and asked, “What is it? Tell me, what's the matter?”

            Pat Summitt is the winningest college basketball coach of all time. She has won more college basketball games than John Wooden, Adolph Rupp, Dean Smith, and Mike Krzyzewski, her fellow award winner for this year’s Sports Illustrated Sports [Person] of the Year award.

            If you are a woman playing high school or college sports, you owe a great deal to Pat Summit. If you have a daughter who has played sports, you owe a great deal to Pat Summitt. Pat Summitt, as much as anyone else, has made women's athletics popular.

            But Pat Summitt also has a compassionate heart. Not everyone sees this.

            A few years ago, the Lady Vols were playing a game at Louisiana Tech. After the game, when Summitt was leaving the floor, she saw a girl in a wheelchair at the mouth of the coliseum tunnel. Kneeling down beside her, Summitt said, “… You can overcome anything if you work at it.”

            That girl took Summit’s words to heart. She, one day, left that wheelchair. She decided to become an airline attendant. I suppose, among other motives, was the motive to travel, which would make sense for someone wheelchair-bound for so long.

            She did so well as an airline attendant that, when the University Tennessee athletic department requested an attendant for their charter flight, the company they contracted with chose their best–the once wheelchair-bound girl.

            And now, she found herself sitting across from Pat Summitt. She was so overwhelmed; she could not help but begin to sob.

            I think something else Summitt told her that long ago day in the flight attendant’s childhood made an impact upon her. She told her, “Don't let the way you are now define who you will be.”

            In John 21, Jesus invited Peter and the other disciples of Galilee to leave behind, once and for all, their fishing business. They were called to truly follow Jesus and become fishers of men. You cannot encounter the risen Christ and return to business as usual.

The disciples accepted Jesus’ challenge and left behind their old lives. I'm sure these poorly educated men of Galilee had no idea they would change the world forever. I am equally sure Jesus did.

The risen Christ calls each one of us to leave our old lives behind. It is for our best, and He believes in our future.

            I believe that Pat Summitt mouthed the words that Jesus would love to whisper to each one of us, “Don't let the way you are now define who you will be.”

Five Things I Think I Think

(with a nod to Peter King for this idea)

1. Okay, the Cowboys won on Saturday night. I still think if Jerry Jones would fire himself as general manager and hire a good one, I predict that Cowboy fans would one day build a huge statue in his honor—the Cowboys would win enough Super Bowls to inspire that gesture.

2. My first Christmas with a college daughter home for the holidays. So far, I really like it. And it makes me feel mature.

3. Wow. If Newt Gingrich receives the Republican nomination for president, it will sure bring an interesting challenge to conservative Christian voters who believe their president should live a life that reflects family values.

Who to vote for? A man who loves his one and only wife, is faithful to her, and is a good father to his two daughters?

Or a thrice-married man who twice left wives for women with whom he was having affairs—not to mention a man whom his own party forced to resign during the Monica Lewinsky scandal because he was maintaining an affair himself.

            Don’t get me wrong. It’s probably no secret I am a conservative Christian and believe in family values. However, I am wondering if I should offer more grace to those who disagree with me politically.

            It appears to me it is hard to vote for anyone in the political process who is not flawed in some way.

4. I like Christmas falling on Sunday. It is a great evangelistic opportunity in the nation with the fourth largest unchurched population on the planet.

5. Rest in peace Hazel Cross. You were a godly, Proverbs 31 woman.