“It’s time to pick teams,” shouts the PE teacher as he designates the captains.

Of course each captain wants the athletic, tall, strong students.  One by one the students are chosen by their designated captain and then we get to the bottom of the barrel, so to speak, and it becomes about choosing between the bad and the worst.

Not being athletic, I was usually one of the bottom-of-the-barrel kids left for the athletic captains to settle for.  Secretly I would always hope to be chosen by the one who had the best team that was already formed because if I had so and so on my team, how could I lose?

In the game of life, there’s two teams:  God’s team and the devil’s team.

Only in this game, God gets to do the choosing and His team is stacked.  He chooses us all.  But He realizes that slowly people decide to leave His team and wander over to the losing team.  Why would anyone ever do that?  Why would someone want to be on the losing team?

Is it because what they are doing and saying and watching and drinking looks like more fun than team God?  Of course it is.  But when you know that you win in the end, why would you choose to follow the team of destruction?  Life gets rough and valleys are low but that’s life no matter what team you are on.  Why would you not want to be with the Captain who can lead you through the ugly days and usher you into the good days?

“It’s just a little fictional analogy of a PE class and real life,” you say.  And maybe so.  But every decision we make to go our own way or the world’s way is just as if we say to God, “I don’t want to be on your team anymore.”

We are lucky that when we sincerely apologize, (and we have to do it every single day), God says, “come on back over, my child.  I still want you on my team.”

Thankfully, God loves us no matter how many times we head over to the devil’s side.  And He is waiting across the field with arms open wide begging us to come back.  We have to be careful not to go back and forth too many times because one day, we may decide the immediate fun of team devil outweighs eternal life in heaven.

If God is for us, who can be against us.  Romans 8:31

It may get tough but as our Leader, He stays with us through it all, holding our hand, picking us up and carrying us, waiting patiently while we rest.  Wow!  Why would anyone not want to be on God’s team?  Your choice.  I beg you….choose the winning team.