Hi Vickie,
This is truly a touching story.  Thanks for sharing it.
Virgie and Hoshi
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Vicki and The Rors" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, February 06, 2007 3:29 PM
Subject: Coach Dungy


A friend of mine passed this along to me.  No indication of it's source. 
Thought you guys might be interested.

23 January  2007
It was with great pride  and joy to watch the Colts, led by Head Coach
Tony
Dungy, win their trip to  the Super Bowl this past Sunday night.  While
not a
big football follower, there was good reason and insight to support and
 cheer
with enthusiasm for Tony Dungy's Colts team!
Below is a very touching story  about this great man, and the essence
of his
purpose in life. It was most  amusing to hear Coach Dungy's responses
to the
TV  sports interviewer, when  he was asked how great it was to be one
of the
first "African-American" head  coaches to take his team to a Super
Bowl?
Head Coach Tony Dungy responded immediately with, "Yes that's good, but
what is really great and awesome, is how God worked this out for us;
it's just
amazing how He made this all come together!" Thus, as Paul Harvey would
say
after reading the following, "and now, you know the rest of the story."
Dungy Makes Super Bowl Stop to Speak at Athletes in Action Breakfast
DETROIT, Mich. - They were there for breakfast, and  they were there to
cheer
New York Jets running back Curtis Martin. And it was Martin who
received
the Athletes in Action Bart Starr Award Saturday morning, but the
hundreds
who gathered in the fourth-floor ballroom at the Marriott Renaissance
in Detroit,  Mich., on the morning before Super  Bowl XL were clearly
touched by the featured
speaker.
That speaker was Colts Head Coach  Tony Dungy.
Two hours into the breakfast, emcee  Brent Jones introduced Dungy, who
was
welcomed with a lengthy standing ovation.  Dungy thanked the crowd,
shared
an anecdote about Martin, then told the crowd he was going to speak for
about
15 minutes.
"It's great to be here," Dungy told  the crowd, then adding with a
laugh, "I just
wish I wasn't here in this capacity so many times of being just that
close to
being in the game and just being an invited speaker.
"My goal is to have our team here  one day and have a couple of tables
with
all of our guys here. Because we have a  special group of young men, a
great
group of Christian guys. It'd be wonderful  to have them here so you
could see
their hearts and what they're all  about.
"It hasn't quite happened yet, but  we're still hoping one day it
will."
He told them he was going to talk  about lessons he had learned from
his
three sons. The crowd fell silent. Then  Dungy spoke.
And although this was a breakfast -- and although at many such events
speakers speak over the clinking of glasses and  murmurs from
semi-interested
listeners -- for most of the 15 minutes, the room was  silent except
for Dungy's voice.
He spoke of his middle son, Eric,  who he said shares his
competitiveness and who is
focused on sports "to where  it's almost a problem." He spoke of his
youngest son,
Jordan, who has a rare congenital condition that causes him not to feel
pain. "He feels
things, but he doesn't get  the sensation of pain," Dungy said. The
lessons learned
from Jordan, Tony  Dungy said, are many. "That sounds like it's good at
the beginning,
but I promise you it's not," Dungy said. "We've learned a lot about
pain in the last five
years we've had Jordan. We've learned some hurts are really necessary
for kids. Pain is
necessary for kids to find out the difference  between what's good and
what's harmful."
Jordan, Dungy  said, loves cookies.
"Cookies are good," Dungy said, "but  in Jordan's mind, if they're good
out on the plate,
they're even better in the oven. He will go right into the oven when my
wife's not looking,
reach in, take the rack out, take the pan out, burn his hands and eat
the cookies and burn
his tongue and never feel it. He doesn't know that's bad for him."
Jordan, Dungy  said, "has no fear of anything, so we constantly have to
watch him."
The lesson learned, Dungy said, is  simple.
"You get the question all the time,  'Why does the Lord allow pain in
your life? Why do
bad things happen to good people? If God is a God of love, why does he
allow these
hurtful things to  happen?''' Dungy said. "We've learned that a lot of
times because
of that  pain, that little temporary pain, you learn what's harmful.
You learn to fear
the right things. "Pain sometimes lets us know we have  a condition
that needs to
be healed.
Pain inside sometimes lets us know that  spiritually we're not quite
right, and we need
to be healed and that God will send that healing agent right to the
spot. "Sometimes,
pain is the only way that will turn us as kids back to the Father."
Finally, he spoke of  James.
James Dungy, Tony Dungy's oldest  son, died three days before
Christmas. As he did
while delivering James' eulogy in December, Dungy on Saturday spoke of
him eloquently
and steadily, speaking of lessons learned and of the positives taken
from experience.
"It was tough, and it was very, very  painful, but as painful as it
was, there were some
good things that came out of  it," Dungy said.
Dungy spoke at the funeral of  regretting not hugging James the last
time he saw him
on Thanksgiving of last year. "I met a guy the next day after the
funeral," Dungy said.
"He said, 'I was  there. I heard you talking. I took off work today. I
called my son. I told
him I  was taking him to the movies. We're going to spend some time and
go to dinner.'
That was a real, real blessing to me."
Dungy said he has gotten many letters since James' death relaying
similar messages.
"People heard what I said and said,  'Hey, you brought me a little
closer to my son,' or,
'You brought me a little  closer to my daughter,''' Dungy said.
"That is a tremendous  blessing."
Dungy also said some of James'  organs were donated through donors
programs.
"We got a letter back two weeks ago  that two people had received his
corneas,
and now they can see,'' Dungy said.  "That's been a tremendous
blessing."
Dungy also said he received a letter  from a girl from the family's
church in Tampa.
She had known James for many years, Dungy said. She went to the funeral
because
she knew James.
"When I saw what happened at  the  funeral, and your family and the
celebration and
how it was handled, that was the first time I realized there had to be
a God," Dungy
said the girl wrote. "I  accepted Christ into my life and my life's
been different since
that day."
Added Dungy, "That was an awesome  blessing, so all of those things
kind of made
me realize what God's love is all about."
Dungy also said he was asked often  how he was able to return to the
Colts so quickly
after James' death. James died  on December 22, and Dungy returned to
the team
one week later. Dungy said the answer was simple. "People asked me,
'How did you
recover so quickly?"'' Dungy said. "I'm not totally recovered. I don't
know that I ever
will be. It's still very, very painful, but I was able to come back
because of something
one of my good Christian friends said to me after the funeral.
"He said, 'You know James accepted  Christ into his heart, so you know
he's in heaven,
right?' I said, 'Right, I  know that.' He said, 'So, with all you know
about heaven, if you
had the power to bring him back now, would you?' When I thought about
it, I said, 'No,
I  wouldn't. I would not want him back with what I know about heaven.'
"That's what
helped me through the grieving process. Because of Christ's Spirit in
me, I had that
confidence that James is there, at peace with the Lord, and I have the
peace of mind
in the midst of something that's very, very painful.
"That's my prayer today, that  everyone in this room would know the
same thing."