But the Lord said to her, “My dear Martha, you are worried and upset over all these details! There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her.” Luke 10:41-42 (New Living Translation)
I was highly focused on my preparations to begin a job that I was looking forward to when the phone rang. Thinking that it was my hubby, I answered. It’s been quite some time since I’ve answered a phone call with a stranger at the other end that took me away from completing my task. Sure enough, yesterday was one of those times.
It was a survey and I immediately hung up. As soon as that button was pushed, my eyes got huge as I realized there was a small chance that was an actual person on the other end of the line and not a machine. I thought it was a machine, but I was incredibly rude if it wasn’t! I automatically prayed, “If that was a real person, I am so sorry!”
I got a pretty quick stirring in my spirit! I felt like I heard, “Boy, you did that in record time. Didn’t even have to think about it did you?” I didn’t feel like I was being scolded though. It was more a fact being stated.
The next thing I heard was, “Too bad you aren’t as quick to do that with all the other distractions that take away your time from the assignments I’ve given you.”
Wow. Alrighty then, I guess there’s an area that God isn’t too pleased with me that I apparently need to work on.
Later in the day, the hubby and I had eye appointments. This time they had a little questionnaire to fill out that focuses on dry eyes. It’s still pretty crazy around here with allergies, so I checked a few boxes that had to do with typical environmental irritations. I’ve also experienced some blurry issues over the past year. So I checked that.
The next thing I knew, my hubby was looking over at my sheet. Trying to see my answers I tell ya, which led to him bragging about how he only checked one box. Seriously! Apparently that was a competition too. Men!
Anyhow…getting back on track…I found out I was having problems with the tear layer in my eyes. When I first look at something, it can be a bit blurry before it comes into focus. The mornings tend to be the time I really notice it. I learned that it was probably from the Lyme disease, and as it keeps getting better, so will that problem.
There are times that it’s definitely to our advantage to take a second in order to let things become clearer (to get into better focus) before responding. Yet, I’m starting to believe that there are also times when God wants us to immediately cut off those things that take our focus off his plans for us. He wants us to be as quick to respond as I was with that phone call yesterday.
I challenge you to pay attention to what you’re focusing on today. Does it get you to where God wants you to be? Remember that most people’s attention is like my eyes. Once they move them onto something else, it takes a while to refocus and have a clear picture of what you were doing to follow God’s orders.
