Struggling to Focus?

1 Kings 16; Psalm 102; Ezekiel 46; Colossians 3

 My two computer monitors both have sticky notes on them with a †✝ cross and the word “FOCUS” — to combat the bugaboo of my life; a scattered mind. To help me focus, I found and began using a set of recipe cards that I made years ago. Each card has a spiritual discipline or a command or idea from the Bible that I’m putting on my to-do list for each day. Instead of jumping all over the place, this is a discipline of the mind, a retraining of my thought habits. God is using it because He wants me to be a focused person:

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1–4, italics mine)

While my card file is helpful, this NT Scripture passage has more to say about focus than merely telling me to set my mind on things above. It adds further commands that explain how to do it. First, I am to kick out the junk that belongs to this world and to my former sinful self:

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. (Colossians 3:5–10)

It seems obvious that if my mind and focus is on those things listed here, I cannot think about heavenly topics. If I am overcome with lust, impure desires, envy, anger, lying, evil speaking or any other sinful stuff, these things would not only fill my head but affect my actions.

My commentary says: “The Greek tense in this command suggests a decisive action, as if Paul said, ‘Mortify it! Do it now! Do it resolutely!’ Of course, God has already done it, but Christians are to know this, count it to be true, and act accordingly (see Romans 6:5–14). In other words, they are not to go on living as though they are still alive to sin when in actuality they are not.”

God says that those who believe in Jesus Christ are redeemed and reborn. We are a new creation. The old has gone. In the above passage He puts it another way: “You are not that kind of person anymore so stop doing all that old stuff and live according to the child of God that you are now!”

Then the passage goes on to describe what the new person is supposed to act like:

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (Colossians 3:12–17)

With that, no Christian can complain of boredom or having nothing to do! This is a challenging to-do list. It requires focus and determination. The old way of life pokes and prods habitual responses, particularly in those of us who were saved as adults. Giving our lives to Christ makes all things new, but the sinful nature needs constant reminding that it is a corpse!

APPLY: Thinking godly thoughts helps. Reading the Word of God and daily prayer helps keep those thoughts central. Doing what God tells me to do reinforces what He has put in — the antidote to the GIGO principle that warns me also: put in garbage and garbage will come out. Instead, put in what God says and it will show up in my thoughts, words, and actions. This is a simple discipline yet even after fifty years of being a believer, I need to be reminded to focus — because the world, the flesh and the enemy continually pressure me to do otherwise!