Since football season is just around the corner (GO COUGARS!), I think it is the appropriate time for a pep talk. One of my favorites is from the movie “Rudy”.
As you know, or at least as I hope you know because Rudy should be viewed by everyone (and if you haven’t seen it—spoilers ahead—sorry), Rudy’s dream is to play football for Notre Dame. Rudy has to work terrifically hard to even get into Notre Dame and even harder to get on the team. But, he isn’t going to get to run through the tunnel onto the field in uniform to prove to his dad he could do it, so he quits. Fortune, Rudy’s mentor and friend who is the groundkeeper at the stadium, upon learning Rudy has quit gives him this little pep talk:
“Since when are you the quitting kind? . . . So you didn’t make the dress list. There are greater tragedies in the world . . .Oh, you are so full of crap. You’re 5 feet nothin’, a 100 and nothin’, and you got hardly a speck of athletic ability. And you hung in with the best college football team in the land for two years. And you’re also gonna walk outta here with a degree from the University of Notre Dame. In this lifetime, you don’t have to prove nothin’ to nobody – except yourself. And after what you’ve gone through, if you haven’t done that by now, it ain’t gonna never happen. Now go on back . . .
“. . . I’ve seen too many games in this stadium . . . I’ve never seen a game from the stands . . .I rode the bench for two years. Thought I wasn’t bein’ played because of my color. I got filled up with a lotta attitude. So I quit. Still not a week goes by I don’t regret it. And I guarantee a week won’t go by in your life you won’t regret walkin’ out, letting them get the best of ya. You hear me clear enough?”
Rudy just needed someone to tell him how it was and believe in him so he could find enough strength left inside to not give up.
Alma, too, needed a pep talk after trying to preach to the people of Ammonihah. He was cast out of their city and he gave up trying to preach to them. That’s when the same angel that called him to repentance years earlier appeared to him. Maybe this angel was even a mentor and friend to Alma:
“Blessed art thou, Alma; therefore, lift up thy head and rejoice, for thou hast great cause to rejoice; for thou hast been faithful in keeping the commandments of God from the time which thou receivedst thy first message from him. Behold, I am he that delivered it unto you.
“And behold, I am sent to command thee that thou return to the city of Ammonihah, and preach again unto the people of the city; yea, preach unto them. Yea, say unto them, except they repent the Lord God will destroy them” (Alma 8:15-16).
Kind of the same talk: You’ve been blessed and have reason to be happy, now go back and things will work out.
This was enough for Alma to find the internal strength to not give up and he “speedily” went back and preached in Ammonihah.
When things are hard or things aren’t working out as we planned, the easy thing to do is to quit. It is hard to persevere and never give up.
So, don’t give up on yourself or anyone else. Don’t let something get the best of you. Don’t live with regrets. There is always hope. Things will work out. There is always reason to rejoice. You’ve been richly blessed. You have within you what it takes to endure to the end. The Lord needs you. There are others who needs you.
“Now go on back . . . You hear me clear enough?”
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