Blog: Max Dawson
January 19, 2017
While getting ready to leave the house yesterday morning for Vincent Middle School (where I teach a Bible lesson on Wednesday before school) I caught just a couple of minutes of Fox Business Channel. Maria Bartiromo had as her guest, Jim Brown.
For old guys like me, we remember Jim Brown as one of the all time greats in the National Football League. For nine seasons (1957-1965) he played fullback for the Cleveland Browns. In seven of those nine seasons he averaged more than 100 yards rushing per game. He scored 126 touchdowns in his career. Additionally, he even passed for three touchdowns. All that was done in either 12-game or 14-game seasons. (The NFL played only 12 games per season until 1961.)
One of the great running backs of all time. An understatement.
Brown now heads up an effort known as “The AMER-I-CAN Program.” Its goal (as stated on its website is “Building a Better America…One Person at a Time.” The organization teaches a set of nine positive life skills to those who might otherwise fail in life. It teaches such things as proper motivation, goal-setting, problem-solving and decision-making. The program also pushes for strong family relationships.
There is much more that could be said about Brown’s AMER-I-CAN organization, but I want to point to something he expressed on TV yesterday. As he talked about the young men he works with, he said, “Until a young man is ready to be accountable for his actions, we can’t do anything with him. When he accepts responsibility for his choices, then we are ready to help him.”
Personal accountability and responsibility for your choices and actions. That is not a new idea. Brown did not introduce that to the world, but he is using it to change the lives of young men. He teaches them to say “I CAN,” not “I CAN’T.”
Jim Brown is very different from what we find among many celebrities, politicians and media persons. So many want to make excuses for young men who have gone astray. Brown is a blunt-talking, no-nonsense guy who says “You are responsible for what you do.” Instead of teaching young men to see themselves as victims (leading them to failure), he teaches personal accountability (leading to success).
THE FINAL WORD
So, where did the idea come from that we are all accountable for our own actions? That concept has always been there in God’s book.
, “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.”
, “Can a man take fire to his bosom and not be burned?”
, “Be sure your sin will find you out.”
, “I set before you life and death…therefore choose life.”
, “They sow the wind, and reap the whirlwind.”
, “Each of us shall give account of himself to God.”
, “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.”
Blessings to you, my accountable friends,
Max