What about distractions?

Exodus 31; Proverbs 7; John 10; Galatians 6

Last night I was reading a book on prayer that focused mostly on the difficulty of focus. This has been a major problem in my life, not just focus in prayer but in anything. I’m easily distracted, particularly in my studio because it is full of  color, quilt and other creative projects, a desk with computer and books, exercise equipment, photographs, music CDs and Google Home, sewing machines, filing cabinet, cabinets full of supplies and project boxes, and wheeled storage drawers also full of ideas and project material. Just walking through to get a pencil without stopping to check out something else is a challenge.

The book convicted me. How can focus be improved — for prayer and for life? God answered me in today’s reading in Proverbs with a warning to a young man to avoid seductive women who lead the naïve into sin. It begins with:

My (child), keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you; keep my commandments and live; keep my teaching as the apple of your eye; bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart. (Proverbs 7:1–3)

This chapter could be skipped for I’m not a man, but as I read it, I thought what if it was talking about the distractions that keep me from focusing on the Lord and on the activities that He wants me to do? What if those seductive distractions are as dangerous to my life as a prostitute is to the life of a young man?

That thought was immediately tested. I glanced over at the quilt on my design wall and thought about my plan to improve it. My mind leaped away from the Scripture I was reading to the color choices I needed to make. There is nothing wrong with working on a project or making such decisions, but that was not where God wanted me to be at that time. I was supposed to be sitting down with Him, thinking about His principles and listening for His voice. The idea of this distraction being like the temptation to the young man in Proverbs 7 was fresh and immediately put my heart back to where it was supposed to be. A vivid example. Will it stick?

John 10 talks about Jesus being my shepherd. It describes His care for me and as I think about sheep, no animal could be more easily distracted. I had a flock of sheep once. They were curious, flighty and almost brainless in their ability to go wherever a distraction would lead them. Jesus’ audience knew this. They also knew that a good shepherd would never allow them to be led into danger.

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly . . . . He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.” (John 10:10; 12–15)

As His listeners heard this, they asked if He was their Messiah. Jesus answered them,

“I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.” (John 10:24–29)

APPLY: In context of allowing distractions, I need to remember that His sheep do not  follow the voice of another but stay focused on His leading. I also need to remember His words from Galatians: “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.” (Galatians 6:7) Thinking of them as seducing me is a strong and helpful image. The distractions may seem innocent yet they will keep me from hearing what Jesus says and for that, I will suffer the consequences.

God is not mocked

We joke in our family that “normal” is only a setting on the dryer. “Perfect” has to fall into the same category. As my mother would quip, “There ain’t no such thing.”

Even so, these verses describing the church sound really good: “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.” (Ephesians 2:19–21)

They give me an image of a solid structure that is unified and set apart to serve God. But if anyone is looking for a perfect church, they will be disappointed. Even in the beginning, the church was not the ideal. 

One of the first problems was a prideful couple who wanted to impress others with their generosity. They sold some property and gave some of the profit to the church. A partial donation was not a problem. What was a problem is that they told everyone that they had given ALL of the money.

Peter confronted the husband first. This man was so shocked that he died on the spot. Then his wife came in and Peter said to her, “How is it that you have agreed together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out.”

She also immediately fell and died. The result was that “great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things.” (Acts 5:9–11)

This story is horrifying. At first I thought Peter was much too harsh, but that reveals how my understanding of holiness is not even close to how Peter and the early church understood it. For them, lying to God and each other was dire sin. It was a lie to God and also broke the bond of unity that He had given them in Christ. This couple thought more about themselves than they did about that unity and holiness, and about the close fellowship of this body of believers.

This story also shows what God thinks about hypocrisy in His people, and even about any who claim to be His children but try to impress others by being loose with the truth. He had warned them for years about the importance of truth and the relationship of truth to knowing Him as their God: “Everyone deceives his neighbor, and no one speaks the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies; they weary themselves committing iniquity. Heaping oppression upon oppression, and deceit upon deceit, they refuse to know me, declares the Lord.” (Jeremiah 9:5–6)

God knows the root of such sin. It comes from a heart that is bent on doing its own thing, a heart that may be able to fool others, but He is not fooled or mocked. He says, “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord . . . The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:5–9)

This couple paid a high price for their deception. If they were genuine in their faith, this sin was covered by the blood of Christ, but it still had consequences; they both died because of it. Their story may have been on Paul’s mind when he wrote, “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).

Purity in the church and in individual Christian lives is far more important than most Christians realize. As I read this, I’m thinking that I can never allow the abundance of God’s grace to be an excuse to let my pride and sinful old self be deceitful and mock God or His family, particularly in a silly effort to look better than I am.