“A Moment of Clarity”

Jennie and I served First Christian Church in Wilmington, NC throughout the nineties. Midway through those years, I had a moment of inspiration: I determined to become a better golfer. Duffer today, PGA Tour tomorrow.

A member of our congregation was a teaching professional at River Landing Golf Club forty-five minutes north of Wilmington. I asked Larry if he’d give me a lesson. He gladly assented. When I arrived, he grabbed a bucket of balls, told me to hop in the cart, and off we went to the driving range.

“Hit a few,” he said. “I’ll watch.”

After I hit a dozen balls, he paused me and said, “Let me ask you a question before we do anything else. Tell me honestly. Do you really want to learn to play golf or would you be happy to just play at golf?”

“Say more,” I said.

“Well, if you’re really serious about wanting to play better golf, I can teach you, but you’ll have to practice, practice, practice so you can develop the muscle memory and hand-eye coordination required to consistently swing a golf club and hit a golf ball well. But if you don’t want to make that kind of investment of time, money, and energy, then just enjoy the game. Have fun.”

I had a moment of clarity. I had other priorities in my life.

“Larry,” I said, “I hear what you’re saying. I’m happy to be a recreational golfer.” 

Today I’m the same mediocre golfer I was back then (actually, I’m worse) and I’m fine with that.

As I was driving back to Wilmington from my lesson, I had a second moment of clarity. I was fine with playing at golf, but I didn’t want to play at being a Christian. I was baptized almost twenty-five years to the day before that golf lesson. No one asked me when I waded into the waters of the baptistery the question Larry asked me on the practice tee about the seriousness of my interest in the craft of discipleship. Nobody asked, David, before we do anything else, be honest. Do you want to be a follower of Jesus or do you just want to play at following Jesus?

I didn’t know it at the time, but I would be asked that question at a revival at a church in the middle of a tobacco field in the middle of Lent twenty-some years later.

In the early-nineties, I drove ninety miles north by northwest from Wilmington to Newton Grove, North Carolina (population 585), which isn't anywhere you'd go on a Tuesday night unless you made it a point to go there – which I did only because I heard a friend was going to be preaching a revival there that night.

A woman welcomed me at the door. When I told her who I was, where I was from, and why I was there, she said she was sorry to tell me my friend was ill and wasn’t going to be present, but wouldn’t I come in and stay for the revival anyway? She was quick to add their preacher was going to preach in my friend's stead, and what's more, they were just sitting down to eat – fried chicken, country ham, homemade dumplings, sweet corn, fresh-baked biscuits, pitchers of sweet tea, homemade pecan pie, apple pie, chocolate cake, peach cobbler.

Well, after all that driving, I figured it would be good to at least stretch my legs. And I supposed I could eat a little something. So, I had dinner. Then, to be courteous (who would eat and run?), I stayed for the revival. I sang as members of the congregation called out favorite hymns by number. I listened as a local group harmonized quite nicely on a couple gospel songs. Then I settled in as their preacher explained the publicized preacher's absence and began his sermon, which told of his friendship with a man named Elisha Mobangaba.     

To this day, I remember the sermon at the revival in the tobacco field just as I remember Larry’s homily on the practice tee. Both cut to the chase. Both asked a question that called for a response.      

It was while he was a seminary student at Yale Divinity School twenty years earlier that the preacher met Elisha Mobangaba. Elisha was a Ugandan sent to Yale by the Anglican Church to get a Masters of Divinity degree. He was being groomed by the leadership of the church to become director of Christian Education for the 3 million member Anglican Church in Uganda under the leadership of Archbishop Jenani Luwum.   

Accepting his church's call, Elisha bid farewell to his wife and children in the capitol city of Kampala and flew to the United States for the three years it would take him to get his education.

The preacher at the revival said he got to know Elisha in the seminary cafeteria where they worked in the kitchen washing pots and pans. Side-by-side they worked, arms elbow-deep in hot soapy water, the steam causing beads of sweat to glisten on each others' faces. In that environment of heat, humidity, and perspiration, a friendship was forged.

During those years in Uganda, Idi Amin took power through a bloody coup and declared what amounted to war on the Anglican Church in Uganda. Elisha was hard-pressed to get solid information on what was happening in his homeland, but The New York Times ran occasional pieces that detailed the growing carnage.

Amin undertook a systematic persecution of members of the Ugandan Anglican Church. At one point, the preacher recalled, Elisha received word that "there were so many murdered Anglicans in Lake Victoria that the crocodiles couldn't eat them all." Elisha anxiously stood by as Amin's persecution drew closer to Kampala where the Archbishop resided as well as Elisha’s wife and children.

The preacher recalled the day Elisha received word that Archbishop Luwum had published a letter in the newspaper rebuking Amin for the atrocities committed against the people of Uganda. Amin charged him with treason and arranged a devious plot by which he was murdered. At that point, the suffragan (associate) bishop fled the country. What’s more, Elisha hadn’t heard from his wife and children in three weeks. His hope was they had fled to the jungle. But he didn't know.

According to the preacher, that’s when Elisha's countenance changed, turned ashen. “We knew what that meant,” the preacher said. “Elisha had set his face to return to Uganda.”

Elisha told his fellow seminarians that with the Archbishop dead and the suffragan bishop having fled the country, his people were like sheep without a shepherd. His church had sent him to the United States to receive an education that would fit him for leadership. He had to return and lead.

The preacher said when Elisha shared his decision with his fellow students, they had a send-off for him – a party in the dormitory with cake and punch and such. The preacher remembered the students surrounding Elisha, saying, “We’ll be praying for you, Elisha. You'll be back. We know you will.”

With that, four of the students, the preacher included, drove Elisha to JFK airport for his flight to Uganda. The preacher said he hugged his dishwashing brother long and hard until Elisha was called to the gate.

Said the preacher, “Once Elisha turned toward that jet, he never looked back.” 

That was the last time the preacher saw his friend. After returning, Elisha was killed, his wife and children with him.

Said the preacher, "I worked side-by-side with a martyr. To this day, when I’m washing dishes, it's as if he's standing right next to me. In those moments, I realize I have no excuses for turning away from the challenges that face me as a follower of Jesus Christ.”

Then the preacher stepped down to the base of the chancel steps and said, “God doesn’t call everybody to die for their faith. But God does call everybody to live for it.”

He continued, “Occasionally, the sacrifice Jesus calls forth from his disciples takes place in one moment at one time. But it is usually the case that disciples of Jesus are called to make a series of small sacrifices day in and day out throughout their lives that add up to a lifetime of faithful, sacrificial service.”

Then he extended his hand and asked, “Does anybody want to give their life to Jesus tonight? I invite you to come and stand with me as we rise and sing a hymn of invitation." 

I got up and went forward.

That was almost thirty years ago mid-March mid-Lent.

It all came back to me a few days ago. Two of our adult children, their spouses, and our three grandchildren were frolicking around our rental townhouse. I was washing a few things in the sink, steam and fragrance arising from the hot water and detergent, when the preacher and martyr doing dishes side-by-side came to mind. 

Which made me wonder what it would mean in such a time as this to stand up and go forward to an altar of recommitment and determined devotion.

I’m still happy to play at golf.

I still do not want to play at being a disciple of Jesus Christ.