Sacrifice

There are very few contemporary tv shows that I will watch today, much less anxiously await the new episode as they come out. Also, I was born in such a year that I became an after school tv watcher at a time when some excellent shows went into syndication such as The Brady Bunch, Gilligan’s Island, Beverly Hillbillies and, in my opinion, the best of them all, The Andy Griffin Show.

I read somewhere a few years ago that Andy Griffin had a few rules for the writers. He required that every episode end on a positive note and that there be a positive moral lesson. What I find is that those moral lessons are more important today than they were back then.

This morning, I saw the episode where Opie (Andy’s son played by Ron Howard), busted his bike and felt compelled to get a job so he could pay for his repairs himself. Now to be fair, Andy was reading him the riot act about having to pay to repair his busted bike and Opie decided himself to get a job - a subtle moral lesson in and of itself. 

Anyway, the local grocery store needed a delivery boy and had an opening. Opie and Billy (another townie) both arrived to apply for the job at the same time.  The owner decided to hire both of them for a week and retain the better of two.  This set off a week of competition between two highly motivated boys.

As the week wore on, Andy would hear reports from other town residents of how good a job Opie was doing.  Andy expressed more and more pride in the effort that Opie was demonstrating.  As the week ended, the grocer offered Opie the job.  The losing Billy left while Opie was walking out to make a delivery.  The next scene showed Opie telling his boss that he needed the rest of the day off to play baseball (something the grocer told them from the onset that they’d have to give up). The grocer sacked Opie and hired Billy. Hope you caught the pun there.

Of course, being a small town, Andy heard that Opie got fired before Opie had a chance to tell him. When Andy got home, he tried to play it cool and give Opie a chance to confess his firing himself but, in my opinion, doesn’t give Opie much of a chance before confronting him.

Andy, from his perspective, had been bragging how proud he was of Opie and his getting the job and getting fired embarrassed him in front of the (small) townies. Opie eventually confessed that he made up telling his boss that he wanted to play baseball.  He found out, after he was selected, that Billy’s father had gotten sick and Billy needed the job to help his family with the bills. That is when he decided to get himself fired so that Billy would get rehired.

Andy, in his character, realizes that his displeasure was driven by his selfish focus on being embarrassed in front of the town people and not his father role to his son. He also realizes that Opie made a very compassionate decision to sacrifice what he wanted for another person’s welfare.  So many positive lessons.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.” - John 3:16-21 ESV

“Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.” - Hebrews 13:16-17

I’ve written before that as our son was growing up, we didn’t give him everything he wanted.  However, if there was something he really wanted, we would contrive a job that he could do to earn the money for the item.  To be fair, the job was never pleasant but the pay was better than average for the skill level required.  One of the things he told us, as an adult, was that he appreciated that we made him work for things and not give him whatever he wanted.  At the time, he was never happy to do the work but as an adult he acknowledged the work effort that this instilled in him. 

Ironically, our son had a friend whose name was Billie that did get almost everything he wanted (his parents had divorced and there was a contest to buy his love). So at the young age when he wanted something and had to expend effort, it made him unhappy but he also witnessed the spoiling result to Billie.