I had an experience from which I will not soon recover. As many of you know, I am associated with the Dallas Cowboys. They graciously invited my wife and me to come to Miami for the Super Bowl. We arrived on Friday, and a guy said, "Hey, Doc. Come on out to the field with us and watch our practice." I always enjoy that, and so I went out to the field. I saw an older man on the side, and I said, "That looks like Woody Hayes." I thought, What in the world is he doing down here? I'd better watch out! I found out it was Woody Hayes. [Editor’s note: Coach Woody Hayes came to the abrupt end of his career in 1978 with a roundhouse blow right to the throat of a player].

On Sunday morning I ministered the Word of God to the men. After their chapel they have a game meal. I usually spend that time eating with them. This time I happened to be sitting next to coach Landry. At the next table was Woody Hayes. I said, "Coach. What's Woody doing here?" He said, "Howie, he's hurting. He needs help. I invited him to come down as my guest. Maybe the Lord will give me an opportunity to minister to him."

I went through the floor. You see, when everybody in America was on this man's case, how many individuals, including born-again believers, were reaching out? We don't reach out. We would prefer that individuals like this got their comeuppance--in terms of what James is talking about: discrimination.

I had a dear brother in the ministry who went down the tubes morally--bad case. By the grace of God he was brought back into fellowship, and by God's grace restored to his ministry. One time when we were fellowshipping together, I said, "Hey, man, I want to pick your brain. I need some help. Where are we failing, in your judgment?"

He said, "Howie, when I fell into sin, it was like going down in the surf for the third time. I was looking over at the shore that was filled with believers that I knew, some of whom were crying, 'Isn't that tragic?' some of whom were cursing, saying, 'You're supposed to know the Word of God; why did you allow that to happen to you?' There were some who were wringing their hands, saying, 'What can we do?' But there was only one who risked the surf to pull me out while I was going down for the third time."

You know what we need in the body of Christ right now? A larger core of nondiscriminating people like that man, like a Tom Landry. As he said to me later, "Howie, he's in football. That's my responsibility." You probably wouldn't reach a Woody Hayes. You might not reach a lot of people in other areas. The question is, are you sensitive about the people that God brings into your sphere of influence, in which he wants the Word to go to work, to deliver you from yourself?