Whose Team?

team player

noun   

-       a person who willingly works in cooperation with others.*  

-       a person who plays or works well as a member of a team or group.**

 

I always considered myself a team player, but recently I think I finally learned what being a team player really entails.  By recently I mean over the last twelve years and in particular with my experiences in caring for someone diagnosed with a terminal disease.

When we were back in Oklahoma, and the symptoms of dementia were beginning to take center stage with Piper, it was pretty easy to know whose team we were on.  For at that time we were surrounded by faith-filled Christians at church, school, work and even in the stores we shopped at!

The confusion started to arise once we moved back home to California.  During the first year after our return, I rapidly found myself in a tailspin as we moved into a new home, I started a new job that took me out of town for as many as twelve hours a day and went back to our church that had undergone many changes since we moved away three years previously to attend Bible school.

After about six months of that we knew that somethings had to change.  It was getting obvious that Piper couldn’t stay home alone much longer and I felt like I was getting to the point of a nervous breakdown with the mounting stress, lack of sleep and overwhelming amount of activities and changes going on all around us.  So that’s when we began to pray over, sort out and make decisions concerning whose team we were wanting to end up on!

I won’t rehash all the decisions and subsequent changes we made over the next three and a half years, but suffice to say, when we landed at the Raleigh-Durham Airport in May of 2014, things settled right down and we found ourselves totally focused and in full participation on God’s team. 

What we had learned previous to the move was that there are many competing voices and or teams out there who will do just about anything they can in order to get you to sign on with them and their views, their fears, their expectations, their life experiences and their distractions… The point being… that they want you to be like them and do things the way that are comfortable to them.  And let me tell you… it took a while for me to figure it out… but trying to make everybody happy does not work… especially when you are fighting for the very life of a loved one!

I can clearly remember the day when it finally hit home in my understanding and I realized that I didn’t want to… nor NEED to play other people’s games anymore.  At that point, for us, the decision was made!  We were going to back away from anyone and anything else that differed from the direction we felt led to follow and join what we believed to be the winning team… God’s faith team… and only play under the coaching of His plans, His purposes and His pursuits when it came to Piper’s health.

Philippians 4:6-7 emphatically tells us to, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  Then God's peace, which goes beyond anything we can imagine, will guard your thoughts and emotions through Christ Jesus.” (NASB/Gods Word ©)

We discovered that in order for this verse to work for us, that we needed to focus our attention TOTALLY on God, His Word and His leadings and not be distracted by any other “word” or “advice” or even the false accusations that someone (almost always) seemed to have for us all along the way!  Joshua, the great leader of the Jewish people, told the Israelites shortly before his passing to “choose today whom you will serve.” (Joshua 24:15 God’s Word ©)  And I think that this is the same question that is relevant for each of us today…

Who are you and I going to serve today?  Whose team are we going to play for?  I noticed that in professional sports you very seldom find a player that successfully plays two sports at one time.  It is just too hard to excel at either one with your attention and loyalties split between two teams or two sports.  We had to make some hard decisions along the way, but it was well worth the difficulties we faced in separating ourselves away from pressure and differing game plans of the other teams.

Our scripture in Philippians 4:7 teaches us that when we fully focus on God and His team that He will “GUARD our thoughts and emotions.”  I especially like one of the Greek definitions for the word “GUARD” in Thayer’s Greek Definitions that likens it to the protection “by military guard either to prevent hostile invasion, or to keep the inhabitants of a besieged city from escape.”  When I read that I had another “WOW!” moment as I thought of it as the Lord guarding us from the outside attacks and/or distractions of others who are plying ideas and thoughts contrary to those that we are standing on in faith, while not allowing our faith to escape from the safety of our hearts!

When we commit to play on God’s team and not be moved by other things, then He has always got our backs… just as Piper and I discovered along our final twelve-year journey together and as I am continuing to trust in during these awakening hours of this new chapter of my life today!

So, what do you think?  WHO’S TEAM ARE YOU ON?

Have a good rest of the week and as you do, keep saying with me… “I am wholeheartedly expecting to play and stay fully committed to God’s team today… and forever!”

*Dictionary.com

**Oxford Online Dictionaries