I've been bent this way for a long time. I'll never forget the huge fight I picked on the play ground when I was in fifth grade. It never actually happened but it should have. There was a group of about ten or twelve bullies in our fifth grade that made the lives of everyone at school miserable. It dawned on me one day that we outnumbered those rascals so I went to work. I passed notes, I met with guys in the hallway, I whispered across urinal dividers, and I got every able bodied guy I knew stirred up to end this thing once and for all. After I got fifteen or twenty of these oppressed "good kids" united I went to the ring leader of the bullies and set a date to fight this thing out. I told him we were sick of him and his buddies and it was stopping today. The time was tomorrow at recess. I could hardly sleep that night. I was excited in a good kind of way. I hate competition, I never played any sports, but I have always loved a good fight. Tomorrow came. Recess came. I walked out on the field that afternoon looking twelve of the toughest guys I knew in the eye. I looked around me and I had one friend show up. He was a mean fat kid that watched too many action movies. I had to stand down that day. I had the fight in me but I had a group of friends that were a bunch of deserters. I tell you what I wanted to do. I wanted to spend the rest of the week picking fights with all my friends that hung me out to dry that afternoon.
I think in the Christian life that's exactly what a lot of us wind up doing. I've come to terms with the fact that the Christian life is chock full of kids that want a good grade but very few that are interested in the actual fight. The few of us that want to give our lives for what matters wind up getting so mad at all these egocentric babies that we start fighting them instead of that group of devils we are supposed to be waging war with. We have to take our eyes off of those people. We have to do what we can without them. There's that weird kid with no daddy that needs to know he matters. There's that short, chubby girl that needs to know she's pretty, too. Realistically, there is a whole world of people that need hope. The deserters are going to do there thing but if we are going to do ours we are going to have to forget about those guys. What's sad is that we are fighting for those deserters, too. They'll appreciate it one day.... Meanwhile, we gotta get our heads in the game and our swords in the fight.
