ENan and I did a “Friday Night Football” date last week.
One of the teams playing was the Wallace-Rose Hill High School. We have lived in Wallace for twenty years and are well acquainted with the football legacy of the “Bulldogs.” When I accepted the call to serve as pastor of First Baptist Church – Wallace, I was told, “Don’t plan any church activities on Friday nights. At least not in the fall. Football is our Friday night religion in Wallace.”
The other team playing was John T. Hoggard High School in Wilmington. ENan and I met at Hoggard, started dating while at Hoggard and graduated from Hoggard a “few” years ago. We are friends with the Hoggard football coach and know a number of students who attend there.
You see our dilemma. As we prepared to go to the game, we had to decide, “Do we wear the orange and black of Wallace-Rose Hill or the blue and white of Hoggard?” We feel some loyalty toward both schools and both football programs. We have friends sitting on both sides of the field. We were torn. We actually considered wearing orange t-shirts under blue sweatshirts. That way we could display our loyalty depending on who we sat with or which team was winning.
People in the time of the prophet Joshua tried playing that game. They would profess devotion to God when life was hard and they needed divine assistance and assurance. However, as long as life was going easy, they followed the path of least resistance and worshipped the gods of their neighbors or the gods of their ancestors. It was culturally and socially prudent to go along with the majority of their peers. God was their back-up plan in case their fortune took a turn for the worse.
Joshua calls them for being two-faced. “But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve…” (Joshua 24:15) Joshua’s admonition was clear. You have to make a choice. You cannot live in both worlds. Joshua ended his plea with this declaration, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
I’m with Joshua.
-Dr. Jim Baldwin
Comments