The experiment

You become what you behold.  Paul knew it (Col 3:2) The writer of Hebrews knew it (Heb 12:2). And Jesus knew it.

When Peter walked on the water towards Jesus (Matt 14:28), it says he lost focus on Jesus, and instead began to focus on the storm around him.  As soon as he lost this focus, he began to sink.

I ask myself from time to time, what my focus is.  Am I consumed with problems at work, or money, or my own inner turmoil?  Am I like Peter, so full of faith one moment, saying, if it is you, then I will walk out to meet you on the water. but then stepping out in the storm and forgetting the object of my faith?  And so I sink.

I have done an experiment these past few months.  I have stopped watching TV.  Stopped reading the news.  Stopped perusing facebook and just posting a few thoughts or pics from my phone from time to time. I have switched to reading my bible and a Christian book and listening Bethel church sermons.  Always seeking the face of Jesus in my readings.  And I thought at first, that with all of the distractions removed, I would see that I was at peace and closer to Jesus.  But I found something else.  Instead, I found that there were deeper distractions keeping me from full communion with God.  The more distractions I removed, the more was uncovered… deeper ones, more subversive and harder to see from the outside. 

For one, I became acutely aware of my dependence on smoking to get me through the day.  And I began to see how it distracts me from God and from myself, and my wife.  I began to see how my own need for approval from others deflects my experience of God’s love. I began to see a void in myself that longs for things because it longs for God and I satiate it with everything else. I saw the violence in my heart. But when I focused on these things, it only made them bigger, more distracting.  I doubled my smoking.  I was consumed with every day concerns. Distracting myself from the distractions became a distraction itself.  It is only when I turned my attention to Jesus that all of these things took a back seat.  Jesus knew this.  He was constantly inviting people to focus on him, on what he was doing, not because he wanted attention, but because he knew he was the gateway to focusing on God.

And I am finding that this is becoming my mantra:  stop looking at everything else and turn my attention to Jesus.  God willing, I am going to continue this.  And save for Nova and Nature on Wednesday nights (because everything else I have found is mindless crap), I am going to continue to focus on Jesus.  My nights are becoming more restful.  I am finding beauty in the times between moments.  Let me explain that: I am struck with beauty in the midst of the minutes ticking by: a scent here, a sunset there, a flower or a smile on a person’s face.  12 step programs would call it living in the moment.  And it is effortless.  All I have to do is shift my thoughts to Jesus or God or “heavenly matters.” I am definitely going to continue this, I will let you know what I find.