My first high school football practice, as a freshman, was to begin at 7:00 a.m. on Monday morning. The head football coach had a meeting with his team the Friday before to give us our football equipment and tell us what to expect. He told us to be there at 6:30 a.m. to get dressed and be ready to run out the door of the field house at 7:00 a.m. sharp. There was no compromise in the coach. We had to do things his way not our way.

I was nervous when I got up Monday morning and did not get much sleep. Since I would be walking to the football field that morning, I would need to leave before the sun was up. Being freshmen, we had heard the coach was a tough taskmaster, he yelled a lot and that he would demand great effort on everything we would be doing at practice and if we didn’t pay attention like he wanted, he would make us do up downs forever.

That nervous feeling I got that first morning of football practice. I have felt that same nervousness numerous times through out my life, like when I left home to go to college. I felt it when I went to my first job after college. I felt it when I called my wife for our first date. I felt it when my wife said it was time to leave for the hospital to have our first child. I bet you have experienced the same thing over and over in your life also.

When is the last time you felt nervous about something? In most situations where I felt nervous, I was not in control of any of them. When you join a team you are no longer in control. How you respond to the situation is under your control.

We love to be in control of our situations. When you joined the football team did you try to change what the coach wanted you to do? (Sure some of the guys tried to get the coach to stop making us do so many up downs, but that didn’t help us any.) You must conform to the football coach’s way of doing things to be transformed from a bunch of individuals into a football team.

When we join God’s team we need to treat it just like joining a team. Yes, you will be nervous the first time you walk in to a church worship service. But we need to accept God for who He is and that we are the ones that will need to adjust our lives accordingly. God does not change and our transformation may at times be painful. (Just like football practice.)

Let me encourage you to rejoin God’s team today. If God knew Jeremiah before he was born, God knew you before you were born also and He has been seeking to find you your whole life.

Jeremiah 1:5 Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.