Mixed images and emotions pervade my memories from Junior High. Awkward is an understatement as I remember those emerging pimpling days. My burgeoning interest in girls (failed attempts to “go steady” really) exposed my debonair deficit. The “old college try” had to begin sometime and somewhere.
What was a young man to do? I did what manhood demanded. Since I didn’t like being hit (hence my golf career), I became the manager of the football team. I reasoned even the least association with uniforms, heroism and brute force would win me points with Judy Newcomb.
My plans, mostly a figment concocted on the false assumption success possesses a favorable conclusion when one’s motives are pure, yielded mixed results. Judy and I did go steady, briefly, which means a movie or two in group outings. It’s hard to be a man without a car. But let me get back to the point.
Prevalent in memory is one singular football practice. Standing on the sideline, bored, I decided to retreat to the locker room to wash towels. Clean towels are a major responsibility for any manager, and even in Junior High, I knew it. The problem arose when the coach, needing a lackey, could not find me.
His inevitable wrath ensued. Not yet a salesman, and never a quick thinker, I failed to convince him washing towels was a responsibility best pursued during practice. Apparently, doing the right thing, at the wrong time, is not a virtue. I conformed. I just hoped my misstep would not reach Judy’s ears.
The Bible says Jesus got lectured by his parents when he was twelve. There he was, in the temple, going about his Father’s business, but forgetting to let Joseph and Mary know where he would be. He was doing the right thing at the wrong time.
Jesus scolded the Pharisees for doing the wrong thing in the right places, tithing mint and dill and cumin, but forgetting the weightier matters of justice and mercy and faithfulness. They were like “whitewashed tombs, beautiful on the outside, but full of dead men’s bones” (Matthew 23:27-28).
Faith is only belief when it is easy. Hard faith begins in the negative, the right thing at the wrong time. Society, culture, tribe possesses their own set of rules. Compulsion and conformity are powerful forces mitigated by a desire for safety. Who really wants to go against the crowd? But when the shadows come, and we are inclined toward fear, God demands an unnatural response.
If we claim God and are to be claimed by him, Jesus says, “move to the shadows.” “Follow me,” he says, toward fear, the misunderstood, the lost, the different, the ones unlike us… and move away from the natural and easy and safe.
It’s easy to do the wrong thing when the crowd makes it seem right.
Live in the negative. God’s light follows.
“Those who have ears to hear, let them hear” (Matthew 11:15).
Excellent words, my friend! I always look forward to seeing your name pop up in my in box!