As a young coach I had a short fuse, especially when it came to dealing with men in stripes. It was hard keeping my mouth shut, and I often said things that got me in trouble. One game in particular, I thought my team was being treated unfairly, and I was quick to point it out. Late in the game, I stood up and yelled, “What?!” It was only one word, but the officials had heard enough. I got a technical foul that cost my team the game.

Coaches are familiar with famous slogans. We put them on T-shirts and in pictures or paint them on walls to try to motivate our athletes. One famous slogan is, “TEAM, me.” “Team” is capitalized because that’s where everyone’s focus should be. “Me” is in lower case to show that individual goals are secondary to the team goals.

Coach Peacock’s team had just won a state championship. They were celebrating in the locker room, and Coach was hugging his players right and left. As the congratulations continued, the coach noticed one player in particular sitting alone on a bench, watching him. Coach Peacock knew that the young man’s mother and father were divorced, that his dad was also an alcoholic who never attended any of his son’s games. So he walked over to the player and asked if he was okay. The young man responded, “Yes, Coach, but I was just wondering. Could I have another hug?”

One of Coach John Wooden’s favorite Bible figures is Job. That might seem an odd choice for the man known for leading the UCLA Bruins to a record-smashing 10 NCAA men’s basketball championships, producing a slew of All-Americans and developing NBA stars such as Lew Alcindor (now Kareem Abdul Jabbar), Bill Walton, Walt Hazzard, Marques Johnson and Henry Bibby.

But for the people who know Wooden best, the choice isn’t the least bit surprising, as can be extracted from one of the Bible’s most straightforward passages: “There was a man in the country of Uz named Job. He was a man of perfect integrity, who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1).

When I was hired as the new offensive coordinator of the Houston Oilers/Tennessee Titans in 1997, I knew that we had big challenges ahead. The Oilers had never made that exciting trip to the Super Bowl, so when the owners moved the team to Tennessee, it signaled a serious intention to reach new heights. Pursuing a road to the Super Bowl was only possible through the grace of God, which motivated a group of players and coaches to work unselfishly together as a team. While at training camp that season, we discovered several effective principles for building a championship team, and these same principles may be applied to our spiritual lives as well, if we’re willing to think beyond ourselves and dedicate our lives to the bigger purposes of God.