And it's somewhat ironic (for me anyway) that Super Bowl XXX was played at Tempe, Ariz., the state in which this year's loser, the Arizona Cardinals reside.

The reason an avid football fan such as myself has gone 13 years without a full dose of the greatest sports spectacle in the world is that I've always been a little tied up on each and every Sunday evening. For you see, as many of you know, I'm a Baptist pastor. Also, as many of you know, the majority of Baptists have evening services on Sunday night as do we at Shiloh Baptist Church in Harrisburg.

In the three churches we've been at between 1997 and the present, I've toyed with the idea of having a special Super Bowl service the night of the game. At each church, however, there has only been a minimal number of people who are football fans at all so I've never really approached the members about it.

In fact, if I had suggested that we have services centered around something as secular as a football game, I would definitely be in store for a church split on the matter. And leading the opposing side would probably be my wife, Janie, a staunch non-sports fan.

Anyway, after nearly one and one-half decades of seeing only the second half or less, I got to see a whole Super Bowl again. Unfortunately, I was able to do this only because of the hardship which thousands of others experienced then and are still experiencing now.

That hardship began last Tuesday in the form of an ice storm, which as all of you know, devastated four states including the northeast corner of Arkansas.

Among the hundreds of thousands of individuals, business, school and churches affected by this disaster was most of Shiloh's members as well as the church itself. And on 'Super Sunday' the church was still without power. The reason is that the church is just a couple of miles from Lake Poinsett, and most of the members live on or near the lake itself. And as anyone who has lived in the country and experienced power outages knows, rural customers virtually always get their power restored toward the end of an outage.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not lambasting the power companies and their employees who are working tirelessly round the clock to get everything back in working order. I know that large population areas and emergency facilities get their power back on first, with good reason----help as many people as possible first.

Plus, I also know that areas like where Shiloh is on Crowley's Ridge has so many trees to deal with that fully restoring power out there may be a monumental task. Lines have to be restrung to poles which have to be reset all in order so that power can be restored. So here and now I applaud the efforts of every lineman, etc. who is working in every state involved.

No, I just once again think it's ironic that a natural disaster allowed me to watch the biggest football game of the year. And not only that, I was able to see what was one of the best games every played in that venue. In fact, I think there could be an argument made that it was, if not the best and most exciting, it was at least in the top five.

Fans didn't get to see just one comeback, but two, as the game came down to the last 35 seconds when Ben Roethilisberger connected with Santonio Holmes in the back right corner of the end zone for the game winning TD.

The early blowout which looked as if it was materializing never occurred. Even after James Harrison intercepted Kurt Warner's pass at the goal line and returned it 100 yards for a score and a 17-7 Steelers lead as the half ended.

A lesser team could have folded, but the Cardinals didn't. Even after Pittsburg tacked on another field goal in the third period to go up 20-7, Warner and Co. refused to die.

And except for the last 2:37 of the fourth quarter, Arizona owned the final period and came back to take a 23-20 lead. But, of course, it wasn't enough and the Steelers prevailed to lay claim to the winningest Super Bowl team in history with a 6-1 record.

As I said, it was great to watch such an exciting game. But as I sat there watching the game in my home in Wynne, which by the way was south of all the devastation, I wished that my joy at finally being able to see a complete Super Bowl again hadn't come at the expense, discomfort and even death of so many people.

So if you have power, pray for those who don't, those who are working on the lines and the many who are clearing areas. None of them were able to see the Super Bowl as millions did because they were involved in a Super Effort for the rest of us.

And to them I just want to say, Thank You.