Our Guest Coach Bill McCartney
Sid: We want everyone everywhere to be red hot for the Messiah. As a matter of fact, I can’t understand why everyone is not red hot for the Messiah. Do you know red hot is normal? Lukewarm, you get vomited out of God’s mouth according to the book of Revelation, and cold I don’t have to define that you know what cold is. So red hot is normal and if you’re not normal then you’ve turned into the right station at the right time because I’ve got a man that’s also like me; he’s red hot. You’ve heard of the organization he started Promise Keepers. His name is Coach Bill McCartney. Many of you know him because of his supernatural, and I do say supernatural coaching career. On yesterday’s broadcast we found out that when he was a Coach at the University of Colorado he did okay but nothing special. His Pastor comes walking up to him and he said “He had a dream about him and that he’d be Coach of the Year and that he’d have a golden year.” Coach just for those that didn’t hear it yesterday or those that need to hear it again tell me again what the Headlines said and what the year was like in Colorado after that prophecy.
Coach: Well Pastor James Rowel told me that we’re going to have a Golden Season and that I would be the National Coach of the Year. Then we played our first game on national television against the University of Texas. And the next day in the Denver Post right across the Front Page it said “Buff’s” short for Buffalos; we were the Colorado Golden Buffalos. It said “Buff’s Debut Golden Season.” That was a shocking headline because you don’t win 1 game and have somebody say you’re having a Golden Season, and you don’t make 1 game and make the front page. But what happened was we won all 11 games; we ranked number 1 at the end of the regular season. I was selected the National Coach of the year and truly we had a Golden Season.
Sid: Coach, tell me about the time someone yelled to you during a football game “Where is your God now?”
Coach: It was years later when I took a team back to Ann Arbor to play the University of Michigan. Prior to the game the Lord had showed me during the summer in July that a passage in scripture Promise Keepers had exploded on the scene we were filling stadiums. And in the second chapter of Haggai the 2nd verse it says “You will shake the nations.” When I mediated on that verse I really understood at that time that God was going to shake the nations with this ministry Promise Keepers this men’s ministry. Then a little further down in the 2nd chapter in the 18th verse it says on the 9th month on the 24th day I will bless you. And I looked on the calendar I did what you would do if you were a football coach; I looked to see if on the 9th month on the 24th day if we had a game. And low and behold we were going to play the University of Michigan where 13 years ago I had come and really I had come in a prophetic sense and when God had kind of moved me to Colorado. So I asked the Lord even though on the Jewish calendar on the 9th month and the 24th day isn’t September the 24th still I asked the Lord “Can I receive that, are you going to bless me?” And the Lord affirmed to me that He was going to bless me on that day. Sure enough we’re playing Michigan and we get there I got to tell you this piece to the story. When we get there it is Friday and in the Ann Arbor news it had my picture on the sports page that wouldn’t be unusual both teams were undefeated this was a nationally televised game. This was a big game by any stretch of the imagination. So below my picture though it says Matthew 7:24 it says “This man built his house on rock.” For those of you that aren’t familiar with the verse it says “Whoever hears these words of mine and does them is like a wise man who builds his house on rock; whoever hears these words of mine and doesn’t do them is like a foolish man that builds his house on sand.” Then it says, “Storms are coming everyone is promised storms but the one who builds his house on rock his house ill endure.” So anyway you know it’s this picture of me and it’s this picture verse and trust me the Ann Arbor News doesn’t quote scripture on the sports page. And so this was highly unusual well, the next day we’re playing; we’re trailing late in the game and we’ve got time for one more play and people are familiar with football may remember this situation and we were on our own 33 yard-line time for one play left and a guy stood up in the stands, there’s 107,000 people at the game, and at this time there was just a little bit of a lull in the action so the stadium had quieted just momentarily waiting for them to move the yard sticks. This guy just bellowed out loud enough for 1000’s of people to hear. He says “McCartney where is your God now?” Well on the next play we completed a pass a deflected pass that went for a touchdown, we won the game it was called the play of the year in college football
Sid: You knew that you were going to win though.
Coach: My God showed up.
Sid: (Laughing) You’d be in big trouble if you God did not show up!
Coach: That’s right your God’s got to show up.
Sid: You and I are talking about other things before this broadcast and you keep saying to me is “All I want is God to show up.”
Coach: Amen.
Sid: You know that’s all I want and that’s all everyone that’s listening that’s all you need you don’t need anything else. And in our peanut brains we try to figure out and we try to calculate and we try to plan, and the truth of the matter is that scripture that you said yesterday “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not in your own understanding and acknowledge Him in all of your ways and He will direct your path.”
Coach: You know I’m wanting to come really close; I mean I want to be fully intimate. I want all that He has for me; I want to be filled with His Spirit. I don’t want to chase my tail; I don’t want to squander my days. I don’t want to just be a guy who knew the Lord; I want to be a guy who serves the Lord.
Sid: Give me some advice; I think any true Christian wants what you said but the flesh, the devil, other things they’re strong forces coach.
Coach: Here’s what I would say; I would say “Take God at His word; go after Him pursue Him.” The Bible says “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.” And so you get up in the morning and you get up early enough to have a time with Him and then you pursue Him. And whether you think He showed up that day or not you just keep pursuing Him. Day after day after day you know what you’re going to discover that He’s going to wrap His arms around you; He’s going to breathe on you; He’s going to fill you with His Holy Spirit. He promises to do that because scriptures says in Matthew 5:6 it says “Blessed is he who hungers and thirst for righteousness for he shall be filled.” In other words if you hunger and thirst to be right with God if you have to have Him at all costs and you pursue Him like that. See Jeremiah 13 says “You shall seek Me and you shall find Me when you seek Me with all your heart.” God’s not looking for a part-time believer as Sid has said that is red hot. Now God may test you; you may go two weeks, God wants to be sure that you’re not going to turn back. Then He’s going to fill you with His Spirit and when He fills you with His Spirit it’s just a whole new way to live and die. It is the abundant life; now you take Him everywhere you go everything you’re involved in. Whether it’s coaching football, whether it’s men’s ministry or whether it’s being a good husband or father; whatever it is you take Him with you.
Sid: You know Coach I just want to PS to something that you’re saying. It doesn’t matter whether you feel like it; it doesn’t matter whether you say “Well, I don’t know if my hearts want You as much as my mind says, but I’m going to go after you with as an act of my will God because I really want to make contact with you. I really need to have intimacy with you.” God can’t resist that can He coach?
Coach: He’s a rewarder of those that who diligently seek Him; but you must believe that He is God. And so you got to go after Him and take Him at His word until He shows up.
Sid: Well, we did it again we’re just about out of time… very few people know about the origins of Christianity, the Jewish roots of Christianity. Very few Christians understand where traditional Judaism went astray; very few Christians understand areas where traditional Christianity went astray. Before Jesus returns, I have it on good authority the Word of God there will be the glorious church; the glorious congregations. Do you know why it will be the glorious church? Because it will be filled with manifest presence of God. Someone will not have to lay hands on you in this glorious church you’ll just have to walk into the cloud; that same cloud that Moses walked in. Did you know that Moses lived 120 years of age? He had a secret of youth; he just spent a lot of time in the glory; that’s what Coach McCartney is talking about. You don’t get old in that glory… I believe the greatest move on planet earth of God’s Spirit where more souls are going to come in. But the truth of the matter is God wants to use you; God wants to use everyone but most people will miss this move because there looking for God in a different way. I don’t know exactly how the move will be but I know some of the ingredients…
