Keep eyes focused on God
Rev. Chad Poland
Friday, December 1, 2006
If you’re working your way through the wilderness, it sometimes helps to find a distant item in the direction you want to travel, perhaps a tree or a rock or a hill top, and then to stay fixed on that item. That distant focal point then guides and informs your every step, calling you on, calling you forward. Such an object doesn’t make the terrain any different; it may still be a difficult journey.
There may be twists and turns along the way, but you have brought to that journey purpose and consistency. There is no question about where you are headed; no need for constant reevaluation. As long as you press on toward that focal point, you won’t be wasting your time and energy traveling in the wrong direction. Sooner or later you will arrive.
Life often seems like a wilderness. I think we have all felt that way at some point and the same advice applies. Even in life, we ought to look off into the distance. In our minds eye, we ought to look to the future. Where is it that we desire to be? What is it that we hope to accomplish? And the further we can look the better.
We do ourselves a great disservice when we fail to look beyond the immediate. When we get fixated on the moment, our life becomes a series of disjointed and jerky movements. We end up retracing our steps over and over again only to one day realize that despite all our efforts we really haven’t gotten anywhere.
As a culture I think this problem plagues us. If I can coin a term, we live in an era afflicted with, “spiritual myopia” (which for those of you who don’t know is nearsightedness). We often make decisions based on what feels good… right now. It has been said that we are a generation that thinks with its feelings.
Our ever-increasing credit card debt is another fine testimony to our desire for instant gratification; something that is bound to grow even larger in the next few weeks. Some people go to great lengths to have it now. People wait for days in line for a game console, even committing acts of violence against others doing the same. People trample each other to get to the early bird special at the department store. All of this in pursuit of things that won’t last.
These are somewhat extreme examples, but I think we are all guilty of forgetting the larger journey that we are on, a journey that doesn’t end at the checkout aisle or anywhere else in this world. Growing up I was given the advice to always have a five-year plan and to evaluate everything I do according to that plan. It was good advice, but I have come to believe that even five years is short-sighted.
I have come to believe that 25, 50 or even 75 years is still short-sighted. I have come to believe that we ought to have our mind’s eye fixed on a destination, a purpose and that is far more enduring; one that will draw our focus even beyond the horizon of life itself. I have come to believe that above all we must keep fixed on our relationship with our Creator.
It is into God’s presence that our journey will eventually take us and our goal should be serving Him. All we do should be weighed against this goal. We should ask, “Will this action take me closer or further from God? Will it strengthen or hinder my relationship with Him?” And when worldly desire and this enduring purpose collide, it is that latter which must be put first.
We ought to put our relationship with God first, because in the end that relationship will be the only thing that will last.
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