Focus!

“Let your eyes look directly forward, and your gaze be straight before you.”
-Proverbs 4:25

I was a very athletic kid, and I played a lot of sports. (Those who know me now may be surprised to hear this.) There was a certain skill that you tried to learn in many of these sports, and that’s the fake. You pretend to go one way when you’re planning to go another. The defense falls for the fake, and all of a sudden you’re in the clear.

Except when you’re a kid, you’re not very good at it. You fake one way, but your eyes are glued to the spot you’re really going after. I had some good coaches who taught me to look at someone’s body and eyes rather than his hands and legs, and doing that, I became pretty good on defense.

The reason kids at that age are looking at where they are going is because they’re not coordinated enough to do the play without watching themselves do the play. If they look one way and dribble another, they’ll end up kicking the ball out of bounds.

There’s a lesson in that, and one I still have trouble learning. I used to try to do my homework or write while watching television. Guess what? I watched a lot of television and didn’t get much work done. More recently, I’ve tried to start praying on my way to work. It was a fine idea, but the road would distract me from my prayers, and I would end up being hopelessly lost in what I was saying. Then I tried to start praying in the shower, and I would get lost there too. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older, but I find that I have to park myself to really pray.

Some people have the ability to do otherwise. Personally, I don’t think it matters all that much where you pray. If you have a good conversation with God from the shower, I’m all for it.

My point is merely this – it is so easy to get off on a rabbit trail when you aren’t looking at where you’re going. We, as humans, have this amazing ability to be distracted by any shiny object. This is true in our spiritual life as well. We can be distracted from God by a lewd advertisement, a party, an argument, a project at work, a trip, or anything.

We can even get distracted by religion. It’s true. Some churches do this by becoming legalist. They focus on following the Law perfectly without even mentioning the work of Jesus. Others go the other way, focusing on our social efforts and how we love one another. Actually, this is still legalism, because you’re trusting your spirituality and your works.

There’s only one way to walk this trail, and that is by the Blood of Jesus. Whether you have been pulled off by sex and greed, or simply pulled off by a busy day, it is the righteousness of Jesus that can put you back where you need to be. If you’re pulled off by reliance on moral works or following the rules, it is still His work that can provide your way.

Christianity is not a religion where you earn your way anywhere. You can’t. We have already fallen short of the glory of God. Whether we have fallen by moral failures or by trying to be as moral as possible and losing sight of God in the process, we are unworthy of Him. But Jesus has succeeded where we have failed, and in His death He has taken the punishment for our sins. Though we have not deserved eternal life, He has given us a way to Heaven.

That path is not laid by our works, but by His. It is not walked by focusing on ourselves, but on Him. The moment this walk becomes about something other than Jesus, we have stepped off the trail.

But by His Blood, we will survive even that.