DEVO May 3-4 - How to Focus

take every thought captive to obey Christ.

2 Corinthians 10:5

 

C.S. Lewis once said, “If you focus on heaven, your get earth thrown in. If you focus on earth, you get neither.”

 

That quote fits with our recent focus on simplicity and our question of, “What’s your one thing?” My contention is that if Jesus is our one thing, then the rest of life falls more easily into place. Indeed, “If you focus on [heaven and] Jesus, everything [gets thrown in and] else makes sense. If you focus on anything and everything else [on earth], nothing makes sense.”

 

Wait … now add one extra line: “… especially when stress comes.”

 

When things are perking along “normally” and without much stress, we can fool ourselves into the thinking that we can do just fine without too much of God, too much faith, and too much single-minded priority. But what happens when trials come and we have “too little.” We haven’t practiced and prepared and all of the superficial things that we have been relying on are cold comfort.

 

So here’s today’s question: How do we focus single-mindedly on Jesus, rather than on all of the other things in life (even if they seem pretty good and harmless)?

 

Look at our verse for today. The Apostle Paul says, “take every thought captive to obey Christ.”

 

It starts in our minds.

 

What do we think about? What do we prioritize? It’s the old saying, “You are what you eat.” That’s why the Apostle Paul goes on to say, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rom 12:2).

 

99.9% of us are too conformed to the world. So be honest: What’s your Achilles heel? And don’t take it lightly. Our verse for today – 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 – is a spiritual warfare passage. To focus single-mindedly on Jesus we must continually crucify “the old man” and redirect our own thoughts. Secondly, we must do battle with internal and external temptations.

 

But … we’re not left alone to struggle against it … “for the weapons of our [struggles and our] warfare are not merely human … They have divine power to destroy strongholds. [Therefore,] with these weapons we break down every proud argument that keeps [us] from knowing God … [But first] we [must] take every thought captive to obey Christ.”

 

How do we make Jesus the main thing?

 

·         By thinking more about him? Kind of. But really, it’s much more than that!

·         Jesus is not one of ten reasonable things to focus on. He’s everything!

·         Instead of worrying and talking to ourselves and solving our own problems in our own heads, we take it all to God in prayer.

·         Instead of focusing on my wife, I focus on Jesus and he gives me the grace to treat my wife like she deserves.

·         Instead of grinding my teeth as the person in the checkout line takes twenty minutes, I start talking to Jesus about her. What’s her situation? What does she need prayed for? Does she even know Jesus?

 

In Christ’s Love,

a guy who thinks

he wants to think of

Jesus more and more