Friday, December 11, 2015

CHARGER NATION: STATE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME
 
 


Charger Nation,

            The practices and film sessions are over.  The off-season workouts are over.  The Crucibles at 558 am are over.  The summer workouts are over.  The regular season is over.  The playoff grind is over.  All the hard work, pain and toil is over.  There is only one thing left to do: FINISH IT!   I think it was Rocky 4 where Rocky is fighting the Russian and he had him in the 12th round and needed a knock out.  Rocky’s trainer is in his corner right before the last round screaming “Finish Him”  “Finish Him”  “Finish Him.”  That is how I feel.  I am sure the next 24 hours will slowly creep by.  We are focused and we are ready.  I am excited and I know you are as well. 

            Our opponent, Aquinas, is a great football team and they are similar to us.  They have had great success the past 7-8 years and in been a title contender since 2011.  They have great players just like us.  They are a great football team.  My confidence in tomorrow does not come because I watch film and think we can beat Aquinas.  My confidence is in the boys I coach at ELCA.  I believe in them.

            As we ended our last practice of 2015 last night I ended the night by telling the team thankyou.  It has been an absolute blessing to coach these boys.  Of course there is always drama here and there, but these boys have been very focused all year long and they wanted to work to get better.  Through every challenge, whether a loss or me getting on to them, they responded in the right way.  It has been a fun year to coach.  My wife even told me last week that I had been better at home this year.  I bet that is because life with the boys was good. 

            What I am very proud of is the group so seniors we have.  I don’t want to name seniors specifically but they are the anchor of this football team.   They lead more with their actions than their mouth.   Well some like to talk but they all back it up with hard work.  We have a crazy group of sophomores who I love but they are still crazy.  It’s a group of kids that want to be great but can’t focus very long (but that is how sophomores are).  They are workers though and they will mature from a leadership standpoint as they grow up.  There has been nothing better for those boys than the leadership that has come from the seniors.  I could always see the sophomores challenging and bucking the senior’s leadership, and even mine, but they always got in line.  It was really neat to sit back and watch.  Like I said, this year has been a blessing.

            So as head into the state championship game there are three things running through my mind:

1.)  Our football team represents something so much bigger than itself Saturday.   We are representing a great school and the great people at our school.  We are representing great families at ELCA!  Most importantly, we represent Jesus Christ.  Most kids I coach have not surrendered their life to Christ (I did not say all so if your son is the next Billy Graham please do not take offense).  I’m sure with Uriah in high school we will work through his lostness and preach Christ to him daily.  These boys believe just as I did at that age but they have not surrendered.  So I hate to say that they are representing Christ Saturday.  That is a hard challenge to put on a young mischievous high school boy.  But what they do represent is a group of parents (you!) and a school who are committed to raising their children up in the fear of the Lord.   You parents have sacrificed a great deal that your son may be challenged academically, spiritually and physically everyday and our boys are representing that Saturday.  I know they have been challenged by me everyday in what I believe is the ultimate standard of excellence:  Jesus Christ.  God called me into coaching for that specific purpose.  Our school and our football team exists to raise young boys and girls to men and women for Jesus Christ.  My prayer is that the Lord will go with us and we will represent him in a magnificent way. 

2.)  Griffin Alexander told me the other day that I am not an emotional person.  Maybe it comes across as I am not emotional but I have all kinds of emotions running through me.   Whenever I feel too much emotion one way or the other I just start praying for control.  But the emotions are there.  But I am very emotional and proud of how hard these boys have worked this year.  One thing I hope to teach these boys is how to work hard.  When I went to the Citadel and had to go to class, go to football practice, go study and do all the crazy military stuff they make you do I realized I could do so much more than I ever thought.  My next thought was why didn’t somebody make me learn this when I was 12?  I want your boys to know they can work their tails off through coming in early for film study or weight training, go to school all day, go to practice, go to more film study and then still go home and study and do well in school.  It’s not that you can’t do it—it’s you can do it and you have to figure out how.  NO EXCUSES!  I want them to get into their job one day and think their day is easy compared to a Monday and Tuesday at ELCA during football season.  These boys bought into all of that and excelled.  That makes me emotional.  It makes me so proud of the boys I coached this year.   More than any win we had, I am so proud of the Win the Day attitude these boys came with each day!

3.)  I know I already talked about Jesus Christ but I have to again.  The second thing I care about teaching at ELCA (and its really the first) is Jesus Christ.  I always believed in Jesus but it was not until 23 that I surrendered all to Christ and accepted him as Lord and Savior of my life.  Before that I was the guy who talked about God and Jesus but my actions were far from following Christ.  Soon after I surrendered all to Christ, God called me into coaching.   So God called me to go back to the very age of kids where I was at my dumbest and use the game of football to build men for Jesus Christ.  A great football season will not change your sons life.  A state championship will not change your son life.  You giving your child his biggest desire will not change his life.  Only Jesus Christ will change your son’s life.  I can’t give your son a state championship or a great football season (but we can work real hard for it!).  But what I can offer him is the good news of the One who has died for our sins.  The One who releases us from the bondage of sin.  The One who provides us access to God and is our advocate to God.  Jesus Christ, our Savior, is the greatest gift and He transforms lives.  This I offer to your son daily.  

 
I don’t claim to be a great coach and as an offensive coordinator I don’t claim to the best at that either.  I work real hard at it but who knows.  I am still so mad at myself for that dumb play call I made at Stockbridge and will think about it for the rest of my life.  But what I desire most to be great at is challenging your boys to work hard everyday and be men of Jesus Christ.  It has been a blessing and honor to coach your boys this year.  I love them very much. 

 BEAT Aquinas

 “The horse is made ready for the day of battle, but victory comes from the Lord.”

--Proverbs 21:31

 
Wholly for Christ,

 
Coach Gess

 

1 comment:

  1. Great example.
    Great coach.
    Great post.
    My son does not play football at ELCA, however, you have been a great influence in his life since his 4th grade year. He is now a 10th grader.

    ReplyDelete