Joe Gibbs is back on the sidelines. Actually, Coach Gibbs has spent most of his adult life stalking the white line of the football field—or pacing at the back of the pits for the cars and trucks of Joe Gibbs Racing. A three-time Super Bowl champ with the Washington Redskins (1982, 1987, and 1991), Gibbs can also count two championship trophies for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series among his accolades. Joe Gibbs knows how to win.

    The 'Skins are counting on that winning tradition for their upcoming season. After dismal showings and five coaches, the management for the Washington team has called Gibbs out of retirement to lead the team back to its former glory. "First of all, you win with good people," he told reporters at the January 8 press conference announcing his hiring. "If we can get the right players who have the right character—it starts with that—and the right smarts and the right ability like we had before, then we have a good chance to win."

    In two sentences, Gibbs delivers much of his philosophy on life: good character leads to success. He believes so strongly in the idea that he wrote an autobiographical book encouraging people to consider how their behavior, attitudes, and choices affect daily life. "I'm convinced that true success is impossible without a strong spiritual commitment," he says. "My faith in God became the foundation for every major decision . . . in my life. Faith became the formation out of which I ran every play, the engine that gave me inner power for every race I won or lost."

Career

    "All work done for the Lord is sacred," Gibbs writes. "In God's economy, how you do whatever job you have is what matters most. Do your work as unto the Lord, regardless of what field you serve in."

    In 1978 an eager Joe Gibbs accepted the offensive coordinator position with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. This was the move that could push his career toward a coveted head coaching job. Halfway through that season, rookie quarterback Doug Williams went down with a broken jaw, and the team fell apart. As Gibbs recalls: "We devised whole new ways of losing games!"

    Gibbs desperately begged God for help. "It's bad enough to be floundering in your career," he says. "But when you believe that God is directing your path, it's even more frustrating when you can't understand what He's doing with you." The season slipped from bad to worse, and he went from being a consistently winning assistant coach to a regularly losing offensive coordinator.

    It would be three years before Gibbs fully grasped the wisdom God had extended to him in Tampa. As the newly hired coach of the Washington Redskins, he lost the first five games of the 1981 season. "Interest-ingly, what I drew from most during those awful times of failure was not my past victories. Instead, I drew strength from the tough times I endured in Tampa . . . and the spiritual lessons I learned as a result."

Relationships

    "Each person in your life means completion, not competition," Gibbs tells readers. "Each of us has specific strengths and weaknesses, but God knowingly places people in our lives with complementary strengths. We are meant to live in interdependent relationships, strengths complementing weaknesses and weaknesses complementing strengths. This principle is especially important in marriage and in the family of God."

    Gibbs cannot seem to resist the urge to praise his wife of 38 years, Pat. "She knows how to encourage me with just the right word, and she's been known to humble me, as well." He repeatedly credits Pat—whom he calls "super-frugal"— as the savvy financial mind in their family. Surprisingly, for a man with a successful and profitable race team, a thriving not-for-profit youth home, and significant financial security, Joe Gibbs does not possess the knack for identifying a good business venture.

    He clearly relishes telling the story about a friend who pitched him a big money-making idea. Gibbs thought the plan unstable, but suggested his pal discuss the idea with Pat, who rejects most of the ventures the couple consider. To his surprise, Pat immediately pounced on the idea. They invested and saw a huge return in just two months.

    Yes, Joe Gibbs is accustomed to winning, both on and off the field or track. But for him, success has little to do with how high the corporate ladder can be climbed, how much money can be made, or even the number of trophies that can be collected. Instead, he is intent upon being satisfied. To achieve that, he has learned that every part of life has to be surrendered to the One who knows all the right plays.

—Tracy Hillwig

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