I used to watch the TV show “Friday Night Lights.” Most of it was about the local small town football team and the varsity coach and his family.
There were a lot of examples about relationships — some very good and some not so good.
In high school, I only went to one football game because I didn’t have transportation.
Then I froze at a few games when my youngest daughter was on the flag team. I was secretly relieved when that was over and glad that football was not the choice sport of my grandsons later in my life.
I never watch NFL football on television because I’ve seen examples of severe injuries.
In my personal opinion, football ranks right along side of boxing and bull riding in the easiest way to cause a permanent disability.
I learned some good lessons watching this show, but I also saw some bad things our children learn from watching too much television.
One of the main characters was the captain of the team and his girlfriend was the head cheerleader. He was quite a “hunk” to the other young girls and his girlfriend was very popular.
Their lives seemed so idyllic until one wrong move by several other players paralyzed him from the waist down.
He was so bitter and like so many of us with disabilities, he started out asking God why this happened to him.
Like some real people, he even gave fleeting thoughts to assisted suicide.
One night in a fit of a rage, he took off out the door of his home. I saw on the TV how a rope tied to the door knob enabled him to pull the door shut behind him.
B.I.N.G.O! The perfect answer to prayers I had been having while trying to close the door the past 20 years.
It would have been nice if I could’ve put an automated door there but that would have been costly.
Catching sight of this on the TV has been such a blessing to me.
With the rope tied to the door knob, all I have to do is make sure I have it in my hand as I start out the door and then the door follows me like a puppy dog would.
As I wrote this column, I was reminded of other uses of rope throughout history.
In the old westerns, there were demonstrations of coffins being lowered into the graves with ropes by several strong men.
Cowboys still use rope to lasso their horses and cows.
Some people still tie their dogs with rope, but I’m not in favor of that.
Some little girls still love to learn to “jump rope.”
Criminals paid for their crimes by being hung from a rope which broke their necks. In Matthew 27:5, Judas hung himself for having betrayed our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
In the Bible, I was reminded in 2 Corinthians 11:32-33 when Paul boasted about his suffering and told how some friends lowered him in a basket from a window in the wall to keep him from being arrested. I can only speculate that a rope was used on that basket.
Mark 2:3-5 in the Bible reads as follows: “Some men came, bringing to Him, a paralytic, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening of the roof above Jesus and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on.”
When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
Can’t you visualize a rope tied to each corner of the mat as the four men lowered the disabled man down in front of Jesus?
I couldn’t help thinking about all the times when I have been raised by a rope or seen others rescued by rope either from mine shafts, lakes or other points of danger.
And I will close with a bit of scripture from Ecclesiastes 4:12: “A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”
The rope has been hanging from my door knob at least five years now. As one of my visiting therapists was leaving, I rode out behind her and she commented on my use of the rope. I told her where I got the idea.
She said, “Well, I would have thought you came up with that idea yourself.”
I prefer to give credit to the source, and praise God that I was watching a football show that night.

Linda Beck lives in Woodleaf.