After more than 33 years, I finally watched the NFC Championship Game capping the 1981 season. This was the game which featured “The Catch” - Joe Montana to Dwight Clark in the back of the end zone with less than a minute on the clock to defeat the Dallas Cowboys 28-27. Since it was a late game that Sunday afternoon, and since we had evening worship at 6:30, I ran out to the car after worship to listen to the final drive on the radio. When I turned the radio on the Cowboys were up 27-21. The 49ers had the ball just inside their own 10 yard line with two minutes and change left on the clock. I immediately thought my Cowboys would lose. 6 points wasn’t a big enough lead, and there was too much time on the clock. Montana wasn’t polished yet, but he had “juice” the way Roger Staubach had “juice.” Danny White was polished (he was the top-rated passer in the NFL that year), but he didn’t have any “juice.” Predictably, and methodically Montana moved the ‘Niners into scoring position, and on a third down scramble, while he was back-pedaling out of bounds, Montana hit Clark for the winning touchdown.

            It has been nearly 20 years since I followed the Cowboys, but I haven’t been able to watch that game until a week ago when NFL Network replayed it. What I never knew before was that when the Cowboys got the ball back, with nearly a minute on the clock, Danny White hit Drew Pearson on a deep slant on the first play from scrimmage. It was a play Pearson nearly broke for a touchdown. The San Francisco corner got a handful of jersey, and then brought him down from behind with a wicked horse-collar tackle. The Cowboys were inside the ‘Niners 40 yard line – almost within the range of kicker Rafael Septien. But on the next play Danny White took a sack and fumbled the ball. Game over (I told you he didn’t have any “juice”).

            The game was being called by the great Jim McKay and former Chief’s coach Hank Stram.  They kept commenting on the fact that if the rule against break-away jerseys hadn’t been in effect Pearson would have scored a touchdown. I kept thinking that if the rule against horse collar tackles had been in effect the Cowboys would have gotten the ball inside the 20 after the penalty, and would have made and easy field goal for the win.

            That’s the way it is with sports. A year earlier, a few years later, a step faster and the outcome would have been different. If Everson Walls hadn’t given up on that fateful third down, Dwight Clark wouldn’t have made “The Catch.” If, if, if….always if. As Ecclesiastes tells us:

Again I saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, and the battle is not to the strong, and neither is bread to the wise, nor wealth to the discerning, nor favor to men of ability, for time and chance overtakes them all. Ecclesiastes 9.11

            It is an amazing and astute observation by the writer – that in this sinful word things rarely work out as expected. Happy endings usually surprise us. Things don’t conclude the way they ought. This is true for every human endeavor – sports, war, education, economics, and politics.

            The writer of Ecclesiastes does identify a constant for us humans living here “under the sun” in this sinful world:

The conclusion, when all has been heard is: Fear God and keep His commandments. This applies to every person. Ecclesiastes 12.13

            “What if?” can be a productive question to ask as we seek to do a better job next time, but “If only…” is a destructive reverie to indulge. No matter how much we obsess about things we cannot change the past. The constant in every human life, as we move forward, is God. God is. God is good. He should receive our reverence, and our obedience. A life of reverence and obedience is immune to any doubt about what would have happened “if only….”