In February 2017, the New England Patriots shocked the world, coming back from a 28-3 deficit against the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl 51 to claim their fifth-ever National Football League championship. As improbable as this result was, another against-all-odds victory way back in 1993 was so unbelievable that the game itself has its own special name: The Comeback.
Rich Stadium, ensconced in the south Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park, was packed with 73,000 rowdy fans on the afternoon of Jan.3, 1993. These die-hards were eager to see their beloved Buffalo Bills get revenge on the Houston Oilers for a loss just a week prior. But this time, the game would have real implications, with the winning team advancing past the American Football Conference Wild Card round of the playoffs to challenge the Pittsburgh Steelers, and the losing team going home in shame, their championship aspirations dashed.
The Oilers (since relocated to Tennessee and renamed the Titans) stole some of the electric excitement of the Buffalo crowd with their first offensive possession, driving 80 yards and gobbling up more than nine minutes of game time before quarterback Warren Moon threw a three-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Haywood Jeffires.
The Bills responded with a field goal, and the score was 7-3. But they wouldn’t score for the rest of the half. Meanwhile, Moon played like the greatest quarterback of all time, tossing three more touchdowns to stake his team to a 28-3 halftime lead (that score seems familiar). The Bills defense played hard and made strong tackles but couldn’t stop the league’s leading passing attack from marching methodically down the field nearly every drive.
In the locker room during the half, the Bills couldn’t escape the wrath of their defensive coordinator, Walt Corey. “I was hollering the same things the fans were hollering at me when we left the field,” he recalled. “[T]he more I talked, the louder I got.
“The thing that bothered me was their approach. To me, they looked timid. … This is an attitude game. Sometimes you start playing, and you’re afraid to make things happen or afraid to make a mistake.”
“You’ve got 30 more minutes. Maybe it’s the last 30 minutes of your season,” legendary Bills head coach Marv Levy told his players. “When your season’s over, you’re going to have to live with yourselves and look yourselves in the eyes. You’d well better have reason to feel good about yourselves, regardless of how this game turns out.”
In the second half, the Bills players showed unshakable resolve. Never was there a hint of panic in their eyes, even as the game was slipping away. They eagerly paced the sidelines until it was their turn to check back in to the game. They encouraged one another constantly.
This is not normal behavior by professional athletes paid handsomely to play a sport. Most of the time, games are comfortably decided well before the final whistle blows. It usually affects the demeanor of the losing team when the game seems out of reach. The players lose their burst of speed. Their shoulders slump. Their heads hang. They make uncharacteristic mistakes. Blank stares cover their faces as they mentally arrange postgame dinner plans. They may experience uncontrollable anger, expressed in childish ways such as screaming at coaches and teammates or even attempting to physically harm the opponent.
Too often, sports devolve into a repulsive display of the downward pull of human nature in action. But not on that frosty January day in Buffalo in 1993.
On the first Bills drive of the second half, their predicament got even worse. Quarterback Frank Reich’s pass was dropped by his intended receiver, landing in the hands of defensive back Bubba McDowell, who sprinted 58 yards for another Oilers touchdown. 35-3. Game over. No nfl team had ever come back to win after trailing by more than 28 points.
By the way, Reich was starting in this game only because Jim Kelly had injured his knee the week before. Earlier in this game, running back Thurman Thomas was sidelined with a hip injury. If Buffalo was to mount a counterattack, it would have to do so without its two most potent offensive weapons—arguably the best quarterback and running back in the league.
But the Bills didn’t quit, and the elements and the Oilers gave them an assist. The wind nearly blew the ball off the tee on the next Oilers kickoff, resulting in a weak kick that gave the Bills outstanding field position at midfield.
Reich, who as a backup quarterback for the Maryland Terrapins in 1984 led his team to the greatest comeback (31-0 deficit) in college football history up to that point, got right to work. Taking advantage of a missed interception by the Oilers, he moved the Bills 50 yards in 10 plays, capped by Kenneth Davis’s one-yard touchdown run. Davis converted a fourth-down attempt on the drive.
Bills kicker Steve Christie somehow recovered his own onside kick, giving the team back-to-back possessions. Reich found Don Beebe for a 38-yard touchdown just over a minute following the previous score. Suddenly, the score was 35-17, with half of the third quarter still to play.
On the Oilers’ next drive, the Bills defense forced them to punt for the first time all game. A woefully short kick gave the Bills great field position once again. Andre Reed caught a long bomb for the touchdown. In 10 minutes, the Bills had outgained the Oilers by 175 yards and outscored them by 21 points. 35-24.
Bills safety Henry Jones intercepted the first pass of the next Oilers possession. Reich connected with Reed for another touchdown, and the Oilers were reeling. 35-31.
In the fourth quarter, a botched hold thwarted an Oilers field goal attempt. Davis took a third-down handoff and romped 35 yards before Reich threw yet another touchdown pass to Reed. With 3:08 left, the Bills finally had a lead, 38-35.
Pulling off the biggest comeback in history wouldn’t be that easy. How could making history ever be easy?
Showing flashes of his invincible first-half performance, Moon led the Oilers down the field for a game-tying field goal, sending the game to overtime.
In overtime, however, Moon threw an interception to Nate Odomes that would prove fatal. Three plays later, Christie kicked a 32-yard field goal to give Buffalo the win, 41-38. Rich Stadium erupted. The Bills rejoiced. Never before had anyone witnessed or executed a comeback of this magnitude.
To fans of the Buffalo Bills, this first-round playoff victory is equivalent to a Super Bowl championship. I should know. No other team has ever advanced to, and lost, four consecutive Super Bowls. In fact, the Bills would go on to lose the Super Bowl that very year. In the doldrums of Bills history, one Wild Card game, against a team that no longer exists, is a rare bright spot.
The lesson from The Comeback is obvious: Persevere. Strive. Fight. Even when buried by an avalanche of touchdowns, keep picking yourself back up. Move forward. Push onward.
The Bible tells us that if we faint in the day of adversity, our strength is small (Proverbs 24:10). God expects the exact opposite from all of us. In a Key of David television program on May 26, 2017 titled “Psalm 37:4—All the Desires of Your Heart,” presenter Gerald Flurry said, “What if Jesus Christ had been a quitter? Then none of us would be having the opportunity to be in the Kingdom of God! You can’t be a quitter!”
“For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again …” (Proverbs 24:16). Can you think of even one great figure in history who quit when times got tough? If he had, the history books would have omitted him—and his lofty status would have vanished.
Back to Christ’s example. He had plenty of opportunities to quit: during His 40-day fast, while facing temptation from Satan in the titanic battle of the ages (Matthew 4); whenever a Pharisee attempted to lure Him into a verbal trap; or just before being arrested, illegally tried, scourged and crucified. Every moment of every day, He had to make a choice: Inch closer to the completion of three decades-plus of total sinlessness in thought, word and deed, or take the easy way out. As Satan reminded Him, He could have obtained power over many people right away and elected to gratify the physical senses rather than endure daily discomfort. All He had to do was bow down, give in, surrender and quit.
The sixth law of success, as outlined by the late theologian and educator Herbert W. Armstrong in his life-changing booklet The Seven Laws of Success, is perseverance. He related his own hard experience from a lifetime of applying this law: “I had been making an income, still in my 20s, equivalent to $350,000 or more per year on today’s dollar value. But some 90 percent of it came from five or six big Midwestern corporations. Most of these great corporations ‘went under’—that is, they went into receivers’ hands.
“Later, in 1926, an advertising business I had started on the West Coast was wiped out from under me by an association decision made in the east. A million-dollar project was dashed to oblivion by the stock-market crash and depression of 1929. But I did not quit or give up living. That was when my life goal was changed!
“Even the first two years of the operation of Ambassador College stared constant defeat in the face. Nearly everybody thought we were through—we had failed! Why, they wondered, didn’t I realize it and quit? In those days I had to listen to associates around me talking constantly about ‘when this college folds up.’
“But it didn’t fold up! By the year 1949 we got over our first financial hump. Later, the second. Today, I think I may be justified in saying that the college went on to glorious success! And our operations today are worldwide on a major scale.”
As Mr. Flurry asked, Where would you be today if Christ had been a quitter? What if Mr. Armstrong had been a quitter? The entire history of God’s Work in the 20th century would not exist! You probably wouldn’t be in the Philadelphia Church of God today!
In a playoff game that ultimately didn’t mean much, the Buffalo Bills refused to quit. In a life-or-death, 33½-year-long struggle against Satan, society and human nature, upon which the eternal fate of all mankind depended, Jesus Christ refused to quit. Through heartbreaking business collapses and then financial peril at the outset of God’s Work, Mr. Armstrong refused to quit.
Keep these examples in mind when you encounter intimidating obstacles and confront failure—in sports, relationships, your spiritual life, health or whatever else. The battlefield lies before you. The fighting will be hard, but the victory will be glorious. Refuse to quit.