Focus

Day 8 - and today's theme seems to be Focus, Focus, Focus.  Our staff team is currently reading Celebration of Discipline by Richard J. Foster and, at staff meeting, I am to talk about the first two inward disciplines - meditation and prayer.  As I read through the pages, my mind seemed to wander constantly - thinking about the myriad of things that need to be accomplished.  Laundry, dishes, Sunday reports, the list goes on and on.  But God was trying to teach me something - Focus!

Meditation requires focus - prayer requires focus - life requires focus.  But how?  My mind is racing like a million electrical circuits, all firing at the same time giving energy to all of the life around me - if I focus on only one circuit, how will everything around me have electricity? The laundry, dishes, reports, meetings - how will it all get done?

Focus.

Focus..

Focus...

Focus on Him who gives me strength.  On Him who gives me life.  On Him who is my provider.  On Him who is my sustainer.  On Him who is my very creator.

Fasting is about denying myself something, relying on God to give me what I need, and then allowing Him to reveal Himself to me in a real way.  Fasting requries focus.  Actually, fasting perpetuates focus.  As I hunger and yearn for the cheesy goodness of an omelette, as I salivate over the pizza commercials, I can't help but turn my thoughts over to Him.

Today, I am asking Him to turn off all of the unnecessary electric circuits - the distractions - in my brain so that I may focus on the things that please Him.  I am simply asking Him to allow me to Focus.

And to remove all pizza commercials from television for the next two weeks...is that too much to ask?