Dear God, I"m having a great day. I haven't gotten upset at anyone, the kids haven't made me lose my temper. I've not had any bad thoughts, haven't thought of any ways to hurt my boss without anyone knowing, haven't yelled at my spouse for perceived wrongdoings. It's been a great day so far. But God, I'm about to get out of bed, and at that point, I"m really going to need your help.
I'm a firm disbeliever in "magic bullets" in the Christian life. So often you see a blog or article telling you that if you'll just do this one thing, your walk with the Lord will be amazing. I wish it were so. Salvation is a one time deal; discipleship is a moment by moment deal.
Lately at the juvenile detention center we've had a few lessons using the outline of "Five Things to Know..." We talked about salvation, things you need to know before you die. We talked about walking in the Spirit, things you need to know while you're still alive. So naturally, as I was reading Colossians 3 this week, 5 things just kind of jumped out that we need to do before getting out of bed.
1. Set Your Focus
If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. 2 Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.3 For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.4 When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
Colossians 3:1-4
How often have you heard an athlete or coach at a postgame press conference say "We just wanted to come out and set the tone early on defense". In sports, it's important to set the right tone from the get-go if you want to be successful. It's the same way in the Christian walk. Setting the tone, getting our perspective into focus even before our bleary eyes get into focus can be the 'make-or-break' moment of our day.
Colossians 2 tells us that Christ took the "handwriting of ordinances that was against us...", our bill of indictment if you will, and nailed it to His own cross. All the things we are guilty of - He bore the punishment. Remember how you felt back in school when finals were over, and you knew the monkey was finally off of your back? Remember how good it felt the next morning, waking up and realizing you didn't have to worry about them anymore? Now multiply that by a billion. When you and I wake up in the morning, we should be overwhelmed by the fact that Christ paid our sin debt - a debt we could never pay. That very thought should get our minds into the right gear.
So if we're risen with Christ, our focus should be on Him, on eternity, not on this old earth. We will spend eternity with Him. Our affection should be on Heaven, not this fallen sinful globe. Matthew 6:20 tells us that where our treasure is, our heart will be also. If we are living for eternity, that's where our heart, our affection will be.
Paul reminds us in Romans 6 that our attitude should not be "Hey, God's grace abounds where I sin, so let's go sin so we'll get more grace." Quite the opposite - he says "How can we who are dead to sin live any longer in it?" As the old saying goes, "Sin will keep you from God's Word, or God's Word will keep you from sin."
These days it shouldn't be hard to get out of bed with the right focus - we have these super little handheld computers that have God's Word right on them. Before we check Facebook or Twitter, let's make it a priority to get into the Word and ask God to help get our focus right for the battles that lie ahead.
Tomorrow: Part 2 - Kill All The Bad Things!!!!
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