I want to give you a pre-game Pep Talk for 2015.

So if you don't mind, I want you to step into the locker room with me

and for the next few moments, I'm going to put on my coaches whistle my coaches hat and get my clipboard out and we're

going to have a little pre-game talk here all right? Are you ready?

Now I want to tell you something my message for today was inspired actually around the

Thanksgiving table. Around the Thanksgiving table we always take time to share what

we're thankful for and this year I ask a second question around the

table I said tell me a life lesson that you've learned this year has been

reinforced with you this year that we can share we were around the table and there was a young man there from

college named Trent and he was sitting there and he looked at me and he said he said

coach everybody calls me coach at church so if you see me just holler coach, I'll turn, I know you're, but.

He said, you know, coach, he said, I went to college and I gotta be honest with you, I found myself

on the defense all the time of my faith and I was kind of knocked off balance

my first year especially.

He said I found myself compromising in little small areas. I found myself yielding to the pressure

of everybody else's value and lifestyle around me and then I found myself compromising my very core principles

of my faith and I realized one morning I woke up and I realized

something you taught this years ago.

The best defense is a great offense. He said from that day on I became intentional about

growing myself in my faith. I could not just maintain status quo. I couldn't just remain on defense because I was losing ground and I realized

I had to start taking ground and when he said that around the table it just stuck with me and I had been chewing on that ever since Thanksgiving.

And I wonder how many of us find ourselves living on the defensive side of life.

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