In watching the saga of what has come to be known as 'deflategate' unfold I am perplexed, sometimes amused and perhaps even inspired by what is transpiring. I laugh at the ridiculous: deflation = weight loss, postulate the Patriots. I am perplexed by the ignorance: "I don't know how those footballs got deflated" remarked Tom Brady. And my heart is warmed by the loyalty: "I know my friend Tom Brady would never tell anyone to cheat" Teddy Bruschi said in defense of his former teammate. And I think that is kind of the point but yet misses it all together. I am willing to give Teddy and Tommy the benefit of the doubt and say that in the strictest sense they are, in fact, probably speaking the truth. I don't think Tom Brady ever specifically told anyone to deflate any football "below 12.5 psi". He just wanted something that was illegal, soft footballs, and the people who are responsible for giving it to him were tasked with giving him what he wanted rather than following the rules. That is to say that the team got caught ignoring the rules. And what the Patriots are missing in their struggle to defend themselves and their star quarterback is that their system set them up for significant rule bending. No one set out specifically to bend the rules. It just happened based on personal preference and a disregard for vigilance in what is permissible and what is not. And in the end they set themselves up for rule breaking and eventually got caught.
And I think the lesson for us is equally or even more important. If we are not vigilant and intentional about following God's rules we will naturally start to bend them. It's called sin. We have a natural inclination toward the wrong. And when we go about following our own desire we naturally stray into the illegal. So we must ever be mindful of our own inclinations and what the expectations of us are. We call those expectations the 10 commandments. Romans 3:20 says "...for by the law is the knowledge of sin". So the 10 commandments constitute the principal definition of sin and must be taken very seriously. If we do not make the conscious effort to be completely honest every time, for example, we will naturally start to bend the truth. No one says, "Today I am going to go out and lie to somebody." Yet in our inclination for self-preservation at any cost, the truth is usually the first casualty. So we must not only understand what sin is as defined by the Bible but we must also understand our inclination to it. We must ask God daily to give us the wisdom to know the personal implications of His holy law and the strength to obey it always. "Give me understanding," says Psalm 119:34 "and I shall keep thy law; yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart." And whether Tom Brady does the same with the NFL rule book, well, we will have to wait and see.