But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you. Therefore, don’t worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:33-34 HCSB
I want to cut right to the chase today. I want to begin by asking you a few questions. What do you focus on most of the time? What gets most of your time and attention? I ask you these things because our focus is very important. Have you ever asked someone to complete a task, but they were unable to do so because their mind was elsewhere. Maybe they were going through a very difficult time. Maybe it was just a task that they weren’t particularly fond of. Whatever the reason, it’s frustrating when we count on someone to do something and they are unable to give the matter any attention or they are distracted.
I can only imagine how frustrated God must be with us at times. Sadly, I have come to realize that the Israelites’ 40 year journey in the Old Testament is much the same as our lives today. I don’t know about you, but I often fall into the same, sad pattern that they cycled around for so many years. It goes like this, focus on God, love Him and give Him all your attention, get distracted and worship other gods, suffer the consequences, beg God for help, repent, God restores me, and for a while I do well and repeat the cycle all over again. Now, I am happy to say that in the last 9 years I am able to see the pattern occurring and stop it before I get too wrapped up in other things or worshiping other gods. Now some of you are shaking your heads in awe and your mouths just dropped open because I said that I worshiped other gods. Yes, the same ones you do my friend. Oh, I don’t have some pole in my yard that I worship or some golden calf or something like that. I’m talking about the things that distract me from focusing on God.
The Ten Commandments (Exodus 20) are very clear on what we are to do. These are some of the things that cause me trouble. The first commandment says that I am to have no other god besides the true living God. The second commandment says that I am not to make an idol of anything, nor am I to worship anything other than God. Then I am told to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Now, I learned that one the hard way. I have learned that working on Sunday brings more trouble than good. I realize that there are jobs that require you to work on Sunday, I’m not talking about that. I am talking about failing to use your day off to honor the Lord. I can go a whole blog on that, so we will just leave that there for now.
The “other gods” in our lives can be many things, but anything that gets in the way of our focusing on God and putting him first qualifies. Anything that distracts us from doing what God has called us to do is an idol in our lives. We can even worship our emotions. We have talked the last few days about bitterness, anger and wrath. If you are holding onto that, that can become an idol in your life. Be very careful. Perhaps you have acquired a lot of really nice things on credit and you have to work 24/7 to pay for all of that. Well, those things can become your idol.
On Sunday morning at 9am, just as we are beginning our Sunday School class I get a notification on my cell phone telling me how many hours a day I spend on my phone. It then breaks it down for me and tells me how much time I spent on the internet, or social media, or whatever else these little handheld computers do. I must admit that I have been shocked at times to learn that I spent that much time on my phone. If we are not careful our phone, or the internet, or social media can become an idol in our lives.
The most important thing for us to remember is this-God is forever. Forever is a long time, my friend. This little life we live here will be gone before you know it and then what? How do you want to spend eternity? Do you want to be in heaven walking streets of gold or in a fiery pit? It seems like a no brainer to me.
The devil has a plan. He wants you to focus on anything and everything but God. He wants to distract you with a number of things that will only cause problems in your life. He wants to destroy your witness. He wants you to fail and end up in misery with him and all his minions. But, you have a choice.
I strongly encourage you to decide today, what will it be? Where will you put your focus? Is that brand new car going to be important when you stand before the Great White Throne of Judgment? Is social media going to help provide the answers when you are being judged for how you spent your time here on earth? Will politicians be able to benefit you? I don’t think so.
When our days here on earth are done, we are either going to spend eternity in glory with God the Father or in hell with the devil. We have to make that choice now. Focus on God, know that he’s got this and He will take care of everything else. Keep your eyes on the prize and don’t allow the devil to distract you with the evil of this world. Follow the advice in Colossians 3:2 and set your mind on things above, not on earthly things. You can’t go wrong with that.
Have a great day!