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The Fellowship of Christian Athletes outlines its “Four Core” as listed above:
Integrity: Athletes should be committed to Christlike wholeness, both privately and publicly. Proverbs 11:3 says integrity should guide you, and you should act the same even when no one is looking.
Serving: In John 13:12-15, Jesus gives the perfect example of serving when He washes the disciples’ feet. To serve, seek out the needs of others and be passionate about pursuing people who are in need.
Teamwork: Teamwork is working together with others and expressing unity in Christ in all of your relationships. In Philippians 2:1-5, Paul encourages each of us to be one, united together in spirit and purpose.
Excellence: To pursue excellence means to honor and glorify God in everything you do. In Colossians 3:23-24, Paul writes, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.”
As a coach, an athlete or leader, it is hard to die to self every day. But that is the only way God’s best can be achieved!
This book contained 12 chapters—each with a different author about a particular aspect of teamwork; and each contained nuggets worth sharing.
Common Enemies (of Teamwork) by Tony Dungy (Super Bowl Winning Head Coach)
Casey Stengel (former Major League Baseball Manager) used to say, “Gettin’ good players is easy. Gettin’ ’em to play together is the hard part.”
Teamwork doesn’t mean you don’t have individual goals. It means you’re willing to put your individual goals behind the goals of the team.
In order to work together, the team must have a coherent understanding of the overall vision. Dungy points out that if we have a common goal—just like Christ and His team had the common goal of spreading the gospel—and if we work together, we can do great things, and no one can stop us. But if we are fragmented and we have different agendas and ideas and we’re not working together, no matter how much talent we have, we are not going to be successful.
Dungy takes his cue from Jesus’ prayer in John 17:21-23, which provides believers a template of how to pray for unity within a team or any group of people: “May they all be one, as you, Father, are in Me and I am in You.”
Dungy explained, “When I came to the Pittsburgh Steelers, I was a rookie, and I came in during the heyday when they were in the process of winning four Super Bowls in six years… Even though you have star players, they understand that it’s not 11 individuals who are going to go out there and have things run smoothly enough to win. It’s going to be how you practice, how you work together, how you encourage each other, how you help each other to become a team and become a unit. You have to constantly talk about team goals and where you want to go as a team and how we can be effective. You have to look out for the warning signs and try to nip those in the bud when you see that individualism creep in.”
Strength in Numbers by Shaun Alexander (NFL Running Back)
In his 2006 autobiography, Touchdown Alexander: My Story of Faith, Football, and Pursuing the Dream, Alexander wrote, “Our family had an ‘all for one, one for all’ attitude. That’s what teamwork is all about. It’s about everybody achieving the goal at hand.”
Alexander encourages mentoring. He explained that when he has issues, he can have five mentors who call up, and they all give different perspectives. It takes many advisers to win the war. To paraphrase Proverbs 24:5-6, King Solomon uses a military analogy to exhort people to seek sound guidance for every part of their lives: “A wise warrior is better than a strong one, and a man of knowledge than one of strength; for you should wage war with sound guidance–victory comes with many counselors.”
Alexander points out that God’s first commandment is to love Him; but His second one is just as important, and that’s to love others—love people. So there’s no way you can do it all by yourself.
The Five C’s by Les Steckel (President and CEO of Fellowship of Christian Athletes)
Steckel used to tell his players, “Let me take you where you can’t take yourself.” True to a coach’s form, Steckel created a game plan that he says will build a championship team or organization. It’s a system he refers to as the five C’s:
- Communication: A solid foundation for any team must begin with effective communication—first from the leader and second within the ranks of the team members. A leader must know him or herself and seek self-improvement. As Steckel explains, a leader can’t really communicate until he knows who he is and how he’s being received. Communication has to be clear and concise, and to some extent it has to be comprehensive.
- Cooperation: Cooperation is team chemistry, and team chemistry is mutual respect for one another.
- Contribution: Contribution is developing a sense of responsibility in your subordinates.
- Commitment: Once each team member understands and accepts their role, the next step is for each member to make the commitment to excellence and to give it their best. Psalm 37:6 says, “Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him and He will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.”
- Christ: Proverbs 15:33 says, “The fear of the Lord is wisdom’s instruction, and humility comes before honor.” We as individuals are fighting an incredible, built-in self-centeredness. We have to intentionally deny ourselves.
The cause of Christianity is to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s not about you. It’s about Him. So when you’re on a team, it’s not about you.
Know (and Accept) Your Role by Cat Whitehill (U.S. women’s Soccer Gold Medalist)
Mia Hamm (Whitehill’s Olympic Teammate) said, “I am a member of a team, and I rely on the team, I defer to it and sacrifice for it, because the team, not the individual, is the ultimate champion.”
One of the many lessons Whitehill learned from her father was that “you can always help your teammate be better.”
Teamwork is putting your personal preferences aside and looking at the person on your right and your left first. It’s putting aside everything in your personal life and your athletic career and doing whatever it takes to make someone else better.
Of the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team, Whitehill explained, “We’re all a bunch of type-A females, but when we compromise and we come together as a team, then we can use our abilities to make the team so great. It’s having the ability but also figuring out that we’re a team, and we’re not just a bunch of individuals.”
Trust or Consequences by Andy Pettitte (MLB Pitcher)
Andy Pettitte says his opennesss to the Holy Spirit was a key factor in those earliest inclinations of a lifestyle of godly righteousness. “I was convicted not to drink. I was convicted not to use the Lord’s name in vain. He took all the bad language away from me. I was just extremely convicted of these things at a very young age. I thank the Lord that He’s kept His hands around me and protected me.”
Jesus taught in Matthew 5:37: “Let your word ‘yes’ be ‘yes,’ and your ‘no’ be ‘no.’ Anything more than this is from the evil one.” Whenever you say you’re going to do something, do it. There are a lot of people in the world today whose word doesn’t mean a whole lot.
Eyes on the Prize by Luke Ridnour (NBA Guard)
Philippians 3:13-14 says, “One thing I do: forgetting what is behind and reaching forward to what is ahead, I pursue as my goal the prize promised by God’s heavenly call in Christ Jesus.”
Ridnour says that once he hit college, God really spoke to his heart. God started drawing him closer. He started to find peace and got excited about the fact that he wasn’t just a basketball player, but he was friends with Jesus. That’s what really changed his life.
Ridnour explains, “[Teamwork is] very much biblical with principles such as putting others before you. I think that’s what teamwork is. A good teammate puts others before him. No one person thinks they’re bigger than they really are. The Bible just reinforced the belief that I can’t put myself above anybody else… No matter what level you’re at, the most important thing is still the team. My first responsibility is to make sure all of my decisions are going to help the team win the game. The second thing is making everybody else better… Everyone likes to play with someone who shares the ball… A lot of it goes back to the ‘I’ stuff. They always say there’s no I in team, and that’s really true. That’s a huge thing that hinders teams from having a common vision. You look at all of the teams that win, and everyone’s involved. Everyone’s touching the ball.”
Checks and Balances by Curtis Brown (NHL Defender)
Charles Colson says, “I urge all Christians not only to attend church services regularly but also to establish small groups of other Christians to whom they are accountable. I would never have developed real Christian maturity by staying home, reading religious books and attending church once a week—no more than an athlete can develop by shooting baskets alone in the driveway.”
Curtis Brown points out how everything we talk about, everything we experience—whether you admit it or not—the Bible is the handbook for life, and it’s in there. You can find it in there on any topic. As far as teamwork is concerned, it starts right in the beginning of the Bible with God and the Holy Spirit and Jesus in the creation story. There’s teamwork there. They were creating things together.
When you know that you’re accountable to someone and they’re accountable to you, it’s amazing how much more time and focus and energy you’re going to put into the job that you have to do. You don’t want to let that other person down.
Two-Way Street by Sam Hornish, Jr. (NASCAR Driver and Former IRL Champion)
In most cases, people don’t think about racing as a teamwork sport. That’s probably because the driver gets about 99% of the credit. But racing is probably one of the most teamwork-oriented sports. Everybody’s got to do their job. The driver’s got to do his job. The crew chief has to do things right. The pit crew has to make the right decisions. All the way back to when the car is being built, those things have to be put together right. There are so many things that can take you out of a race. It’s very much a team sport.
One thing Hornish learned in Sunday School was how Jesus’ disciples worked together as a team. As described in Matthew 4:18-22 and John 1:35-51, each of the 12 men had different roles and diverse personalities—a lot like what Hornish has experienced working with various race teams over the years.
All for One by Tamika Catchings (WNBA Forward and Olympic Gold Medalist)
1 Corinthians 12:14 says, “The body is not one part but many.”
Teamwork is a group of people who come together to work for a common goal. Whether it’s winning a championship or whether it’s getting a project done, they have a common goal and everybody’s on the same page.
Catchings lists pride, ego, and a general inability to accept one’s role as some of the primary enemies of teamwork. She says, “You look at Michael Jordan. When he started playing, he was doing everything. But once he figured out how to let his teammates help him, he won six championships.”
Coach Pat Summit taught her players that becoming a great player is one thing, but just becoming a better person is the most important thing. It’s not just about who you are on the basketball court. It’s about becoming a well-rounded person—having respect for yourself, having respect for others, and living life to the fullest. She also taught that you ride or die as a team.
The Ties That Bind by Mark Knowles (Former Men’s Tennis Doubles Champion)
One of teamwork’s most fundamental elements is respect. Knowles wholeheartedly believes that this irreplaceable product of genuine love and concern can be the difference between success and failure.
For Knowles, respect means that you’re allowed to mention little imperfections or give constructive criticisms without the other person feeling like it’s a personal onslaught and vice versa. Unlike modern society’s definition of respect, which is so often only performance based, Knowles says respect is more about the commonalities that all humans share—we are all God’s creation and deserve to be treated with dignity, compassion, and empathy.
Soaring with Eagles by Steve Fitzhugh (Former NFL Safety and National Spokesperson for One Way 2 Play–Drug Free)
British Playright and Author W. Somerset Maugham said, “When you choose your friends, don’t be short-changed by choosing personality over character.”
Fitzhugh says his relationship with Jesus made him a better teammate. He understood that biblical teamwork required Christ-centered confidence and humility. When he speaks to teenagers and young adults, one of the key points he focuses on is the importance of friends and surrounding yourself with people of character who will become your teammates for life.
There’s an old Japanese proverb that says, “When the character of a man is not clear to you, look to his friends.”
Fitzhugh equates two types of friends with eagles and chickens. The eagles are those friends who will support one another and build each other up. The chickens are those friends who lack moral integrity and the discipline to consistently make godly decisions. While eagles soar, the chickens stay on the ground, because, quite simply, they don’t know how to fly. There are too many eagles who don’t have the courage to cut off those one or two chickens who are hanging around.
He goes on to say that the best advice he ever received was from Oscar Roan, a retired tight end with the Cleveland Browns. Ron said, “Son, the first thing you do when you get to college is find the people who know how to pray, and build relationships with them.”
Firm Foundations by John Wooden (Former UCLA Men’s Basketball Coach)
Sometimes we fail to recognize how important others are to us. Wooden says, “I think that teamwork really starts out in the home. Children have to help in various ways, and that must be taught when they’re young. I think parenting is the most important profession in the world. If children are taught to be considerate of others and think of others and help others in every way they can, they’re going to have a much better life, and they’re going to be content with themselves.”
Friendship breeds the next key element of teamwork—loyalty. Wooden describes loyalty as a “foundational quality that gets us through hard times.” While loyalty is an emotional characteristic of teamwork, reliability puts that dependable attitude into action.
In a way, Wooden believes that plain courtesy is teamwork. When his team went on trips, Wooden was insistent with players that they treat waiters, hostesses, and janitors just as if they were the presidents of a university. Wooden thought consideration for others can make someone a better team player, and he thinks it makes them better at everything.