A Full-Ride Offer

By Mo Hodge

And shaking the dust off of your sandals

Jared had a full ride offer to a certain law school. He asked me to go with him to the orientation event. At this event he had been asked to make his decision on whether to accept the offer. The orientation consisted of several of the school’s faculty presenting information about their law school. The first faculty member to speak was the woman who led the school’s “gay and lesbian union”. The faculty must have felt it was an important selling point to the students.

At the mid-morning break they offered refreshments. I looked around the room looking for my son. I finally saw him looking out of a window onto the grounds of the campus. He looked like he was deep in thought. A few minutes later he came over and asked me this question: “Is it OK if we leave now, dad?” I paused, trying to take in the decision he was making. “Sure son, ” I agreed. “Let’s go!” Full ride or not, he was not going to attend a law school that promoted something that he knew was evil. We weren’t wearing sandals, but if we were, we would have been shaking the dust of that campus off of them.

I’ll never forget that moment . . . how proud I was of our son . . . and how happy both of us felt as we hurried out the door. That was his only full ride offer. His next choice, the Regent University School of Law in Virginia, would cost him. But at Regent, a distinctly Christian institution, he made life-long friends of students and professors who loved and stood for Jesus. Priceless.

As founding Pastor of The Bridge Community Church and Executive Director of Mo Hodge Ministries, Mo resources Pastors and Leaders in the area of leadership development. He enables Pastors and leaders in the following areas: Developing Teams, Church Growth, Church Planting, Discipleship Multiplication, Nonprofit Organizational Management, Multi-site Church Development, Public Speaking, Capital Campaigns, and Sr. Pastor Succession. … Mo and his wife, Nancy, live in Anderson, IN with their children and grandchildren. Though retired, Mo is still active in ministry, preaching, teaching, and planting new churches wherever the Lord leads. You can follow him on LinkedIn or through his Newsletter.