“Do everything without complaining or arguing.” — Philippians 2:14
Bad Call
“Hey, ref! That was a bad call. Can’t you see?” “That was a foul! Blow your whistle.” “Travel? I didn’t travel. And I didn’t step out of bounds last time either.”
Have you ever heard comments like that while watching or playing a game? Maybe you’ve said or yelled something similar. While playing in a church league basketball game, I heard those exact words — and more. Every single call was argued, and both sides were growing tense. We were not setting a very good example for those watching, and we certainly were not pleasing God with our actions.
In Philippians 4, God didn’t have Paul say, “Do everything without arguing — except while playing sports, because those refs make bad calls.” No, God says do everything without arguing. No exceptions.
The next time you’re watching a game or even playing in one, remember God’s command to do everything without complaining or arguing. You’ll be surprised how much better you feel and how much more fun the game will become.
— Crystal Rhodes
If you would like to submit a reader devotional, please email all submissions to jason@sportsspectrum.com.
Boston Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla, March 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Nell Redmond)
Heading into the season, some NBA pundits and fans saw this as a “gap year” for the Boston Celtics. Star guard Jayson Tatum was coming off a torn Achilles suffered in last year’s playoffs, while key contributors Kristaps Porziņģis and Jrue Holiday were dealt in the offseason. Longtime center Al Horford also departed, signing with the Golden State Warriors in free agency.
But as the NBA enters the postseason, there the Celtics are, back in familiar territory as the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference after posting a 55-26 regular-season record. It’s the fifth straight season in which Boston has finished in the top two in the East. After missing most of the season recovering, Tatum is back playing, and head coach Joe Mazzulla is looking to lead his team to a second NBA championship under his watch.
The way the Celtics closed out the regular season was perhaps a microcosm of the 2025-26 season. Tatum and fellow star guards Jaylen Brown and Derrick White, along with a host of key reserves, were unavailable for Game No. 82, yet the Celtics beat the Orlando Magic — which was battling for playoff positioning — with just eight available players.
“We said it all year, one through [18], whoever steps on the floor, there’s an expectation to put us in position with an opportunity to win,” Mazzulla said Sunday after the game. “Stick to the process of winning. Today is no different than the other 81 games from the standpoint of we had eight guys, and the expectation is to put us in position to win, to execute, to play hard, to play together.”
For his efforts this season, Mazzulla is on the shortlist for Coach of the Year honors. Should he win, he’ll point the spotlight off himself and instead toward God, as he often does when on the biggest stage.
When the Celtics won the title in 2024, Mazzulla donned a black shirt that read — in all white capital letters — “BUT FIRST…LET ME THANK GOD.” As the head coach for one of the most storied franchises in all of professional sports, he sees his platform as an opportunity to regularly give glory to God.
He remained in that shirt for all of the postgame celebration photos and interviews. He was even pictured holding up the Larry O’Brien Trophy, smiling while proudly wearing the shirt. It marked the 18th world championship for the Celtics — the most of any NBA franchise — and the official photo and video documentation of it will forever include his bold and public statement of faith.
The championship celebration continued into the early hours of the morning, at which time Mazzulla walked around the confetti-filled arena with his wife, Camai, and prayed.
“On the walk we were talking a lot about how this can’t change us,” he told the audience at a Nations of Coaches event in Boston in 2024. “A lot of it was praying for the humility and perspective to not allow this to change who we are.”
The Mazzulla home proudly features a “prayer board” where he, his wife, and their children add prayers throughout the year. The board oscillates between prayers for their immediate family, friends and other loved ones. At one point, it included a prayer for Mazzulla to rise through the coaching ranks and become an NBA coach. But as he was making the grind through the Division-II ranks, coaching in the NBA felt like sort of a pipe dream.
“I almost took the ‘NBA head coach’ one down and then she kind of yelled at me and made me keep it up there,” he said at the event.
Before he was married, he started a “vision board,” where he put up pictures of goals he wanted to “speak into existence.” On it were goals like winning the NBA championship and working for the Celtics, and eventually photos of his wife and kids as well as NBA coaches Brad Stevens, Erik Spoelstra and Steve Kerr. There was also a photo of Jesus.
“The vision board kind of tells your story — like I want to work for the Celtics, I want to win a Larry O’Brien Trophy, I want to be able to learn from these three guys … I want to keep Jesus at the center of it, and I want to have a family,” he said. “So it kind of helps you tell the story about where you want to go and how you’re going to get there.”
As he’s grown older as a man and as a coach, so too has his faith and understanding of Jesus — in particular the concept of grace.
“Over the last maybe five to eight years I’ve really made a commitment to study grace and what real love is and understanding [all that],” Mazzulla said on the Sports Spectrum Podcast in October 2023. “How I’m able to accept God’s grace or how I’m able to accept His love is going to be how I’m able to give it to my kids or my wife or people. So it’s something that I’ve really been focused on the last few years: grace, love, understanding, mercy, those gifts.”
He’s also able to see how God has orchestrated his career to where he’s gone from the lower ranks of college to coaching an NBA champion.
“There’s no coincidence that I’ve had the opportunity to coach a team of the area that I’m from,” he said on the podcast. “I grew up 45 minutes from [Boston] and God has given me this. I try to be as thankful as I can every single day, knowing it might not last forever, but this is where God has us. So I can’t hide that, and I’m just forever grateful for what He’s done for me.”
Mazzulla and the Celtics will begin their 2026 playoff run Sunday against whichever team emerges as the East’s No. 7 seed from the play-in round.
“Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God’s elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness.” — Titus 1:1 (ESV)
I used to identify everything wrong with me and then work like crazy to fix it. Not disciplined enough? I’d create a harder training schedule. Losing my temper too much? I’d white-knuckle my way through games, trying to control my emotions. Not confident enough? I’d repeat affirmations and try to psych myself up.
And you know what? Sometimes it worked. For a little while. But it was exhausting, because self-improvement is a treadmill that never stops. There’s always something else to fix, another area to improve, another weakness to address. I was trying to transform myself through effort, and it was crushing me.
Look at what Paul says in Titus 1:1 (above). He introduces himself as “a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God’s elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness.”
Notice the order: Knowledge of truth leads to Godliness, not the other way around. Paul isn’t saying, “Work really hard to be Godly and then you’ll know the truth.” He’s saying, “Know the truth, and Godliness will follow.”
Are you trying to change yourself through effort? Or are you abiding in the One who transforms? Are you grinding alone, trying to fix everything that’s wrong with you? Or are you staying close to Jesus, letting His presence shape you?
One way leads to exhaustion. The other leads to life. You don’t have to try so hard. You just have to stay close. Choose His presence over your performance. His pace over your grind.
Manny Machado is a third baseman for the San Diego Padres. He is one of many baseball players who have opted to have Lasik eye surgery to improve vision. He noticed he was struggling to see during night games and hoped for improvement. Many players who have this kind of procedure note better vision and an increased ability to recognize the difference between fastballs and off-speed pitches.
Good eyesight is essential not only for athletes, but nearly everyone. Poor eyesight can be a hinderance to whatever role we find ourselves in.
In our walk of faith, if we didn’t have Jesus, we’d be stumbling along without hope or direction like a blind man. In John 9, we read a story about a man who was well known in the community as being blind from birth and would beg for money. As we read this story, we can put ourselves in his shoes and think about how bad things would have been if Jesus didn’t come to where he was and help him. How wonderful it was for God to come in the flesh and heal this man’s body and soul! Throughout eternity, this man will thank God for showing him mercy.
When Jesus reached out with compassion to give sight to the blind, the Pharisees demonstrated spiritual blindness by focusing on their nitpicking rules about the Sabbath (vv. 13-16) rather than rejoicing with this man about finally being able to see birds, fish, trees and flowers after being blind for a lifetime. Sadly, the Pharisees didn’t care about the wellbeing of this man and tried to shut the door to Heaven in his face. In contrast, Jesus ignored the frowns of the Pharisees and made a way to give hope to a hopeless man, for both the present and future.
Jesus made mud and gave instructions to the blind man to deliver his healing. The desperate man did as Jesus said. “After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. ‘Go,’ he told him, ‘wash in the Pool of Siloam’ (this word means ‘Sent’). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing” (John 9:6-7). Suddenly, everyone noticed the difference and knew Jesus had incredible power. Most people rejoiced with the man, but the Pharisees did not.
After Jesus gave sight to the man’s eyes, He also saved his soul. Though the Pharisees threw the blind man out of the synagogue when he spoke about the infinite power of Christ, Jesus overruled them. “Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ ‘Who is he, sir?’ the man asked. ‘Tell me so that I may believe in him.’ Jesus said, ‘You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.’ Then the man said, ‘Lord, I believe,’ and he worshiped him” (John 9:35-38). This helpless man received grace and forgiveness for his sins and saw the divine nature of Christ better than the religious leaders of his day.
Are your eyes open spiritually to see Jesus move, or are you so focused on how you think things should be that you can’t see Him work right in front of you? Don’t let your poor spiritual eyesight be a hinderance to your calling!
— Bill Kent, Pastor of Memorial Baptist Church, Sylvania, Georgia
“So he got up and went to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.” — Luke 15:20
My oldest son runs both cross country and track in college. We always enjoy getting to watch him race. Some races we get to see, but others we just have to hear about secondhand due to conflicting schedules or meets that are farther away. Most of the stories encompass both the thrills of victory and the agonies of defeat, whether it’s a new personal best, the discouragement of not hitting a goal time, or some challenge faced along the way.
One story he shared inspired this devotional — and I share it with the prayer that it will inspire each of us in the race of faith.
My son was watching his friend and teammate compete in the mile at an indoor track event in North Carolina. His friend led the race from the start. On his final turn of the track, as he headed to a first-place finish, he got passed — his first-place finish taken away by hundredths of a second. As the winner passed, he looked back and made the “shush” symbol.
The race was over, at least from man’s perspective, but that wasn’t the moment when this young man won the real race. He later regretted the gesture he made and made a point of finding my son’s team. He wasn’t able to apologize directly to my son’s teammate, but he did ask that the apology be passed on to him. He said that he didn’t know why he had done that; it wasn’t his usual character.
Did the angels cheer? I hope so. I know I did in my spirit when I heard about this young man making the effort to right a wrong.
I can relate. How often do I say or do something I regret? The enemy would have us live like failures, but the truth is that victory is ours in Christ. It comes when we turn from wrong and look to Christ to do what is pleasing to Him. The best part is that the One we have truly wronged just happens to be the fastest runner of all time. He knows we are a long way from where we need to be, but still He runs with open arms.
