A Good Defense is a Good Offense

Lacrosse is a awesome sport it is actually my favorite sport of all time. I played lacrosse from 7th grade till I was graduated from high school I have lots of memories from it.  A lot of you may have heard of it but you probably do not know how that game is played or maybe you have not heard it at all. So let me explain some things about it , so you can be up to speed.

You have a 100% rubber, and the point of the game is to get the rubber ball into the goal using your lacrosse stick.

 In lacrosse there are four positions-



 The Goalie-
He is the guy in the goal hence goalie, he has the hardest job in the sport I think. He has to with stand 70-100+ mph shots and block them, and most of the time he blocks it with his body

  The Middies - They are the guys that are always moving they play offense and defense and they also do what is called a face off in the picture on the left they are doing a face off

  The Long-Poles-   There job is defense they usually stay on the side that the goalie is on.  And they usually guard a attack-men and they try to prevent the opposing players away from the goal.  there lacrosse stick is a little different from every one else. it is about 6 feet long so they can get a better reach on the other players.

   The Attack - They are the people whose main job is to get it in the goal.  they are high skilled in shooting and offensive moves and plays.

So that is Lacrosse in a nut shell.  But I was thinking how important the defense is in lacrosse. You can have a really good offense but if you have a bad defense every time the ball comes onto your side of the field you will pay,  and most likely the ball is going to go into the goal. So even tho your offense is one of the best you can end up losing a lot of games.  If it where me I would rather have one of the best defensive teams than a offensive team.

But as I was thinking about that and how important a good defence is, I realized that we also must have a good defence in life, from something that is always tempting us, a enemy that will take advantage of are mistakes .  Can any of you guess who I'm talking about. You are correct Satan. We have to have a good defense against Satan and all of his tactics. Because he is always trying to have us give into temptation, and sin. So that he can get through and score a goal on us and make us lose. 

I like to think that Are life can relate to a lacrosse game, we can either strengthen ourselves to get back to our Heavenly Fathers presence,  or we can give in to sin and never making it back to him. we can either win or lose. But even tho we are not perfect we may make mistakes and Satan my score a point but that doesn't mean that the game is over.  We can learn from that mistake and never do that again, and are defense strengthens. 

But how do you strengthen your defense, well a good defense doesn't come over night.  You got to be conditioned, you got to be trained in defensive tactics, and you got to know the rules,  and the list goes on and on. A lot of this learning comes before the game in something called practice. But it has to be a good practice with your team or you wont be prepared.  Just like this quote says-

Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.
    -Vince Lombardi

   That is one of my favorite quotes, thanks Vince. 

By Greg Olsen

So in practice we have someone that leads us to win the game and he is also with us in the game, and that is the coach.  He knows how to lead us to success.  We also got to put are trust in a perfect coach and if we listen to him and follow him we will win the game and return home with honor. And his name is Jesus Christ if we follow him and put trust and faith in him we can not fail.  He has also appointed a leader on the field of are life. A living prophet,  he is the head of the defense I like to think of him as the goalie.  The goalie always has his eyes on the ball and sees what happens.  He then tells us how we could avoid mistakes and also warns us of danger. He also tells us how we can strengthen our defense.  and there are may things we can do and we must do to see success in are defense.  Some are reading the scriptures, praying to are Heavenly Father, going to church, and the list goes on and on.    

But I also don't want to discredit the offensive side because we can't win the game if we don't score any goals.  Some things i like to think that may weaken Satan's defense to score, is sharing the gospel with others because once we have learned how the strengthen are defense we can't just keep it to are self's we got to share it.  I also think if we share the gospel and help others around us with what ever they may need we weaken Satan's defense and score a point for the team. 

 I know that at times we may fall short and Satan may score a goal or two but we can always learn and turn back to the Savior, and when we look back and see that we had some bad and good times during the game but if we listen and do what are Savior asks of us we will not fall. And we will win the game, and return home with honor.

I hope you enjoyed reading this if you want to talk more about the gospel come and add me on facebook my name is Elder Joshua D. Abercrombie.