When I was a kid, I would play volleyball with my neighbor’s grandkids. My neighbor was an elderly woman and every now and then her grandkids would come over and we would play volleyball across the fence. The fence that separated our yards was the kind with the jagged spikes on the top. I’m not sure fences still have those, but they did when I was a kid. One day we were playing volleyball, hitting the ball back-and-forth, and I got so focused on getting that ball that I completely dismissed the obvious threat of those jackets spikes. So as I went to hit the ball as it was coming down to the ground, I ran the bend of my arm right into those spikes. All of a sudden – the world changed. Everything wasn’t fine and dandy. Everything wasn’t fun and games. Everything was bloody and screaming. Everything stopped as I grabbed my arm and went running and screaming at the top of my lungs. I still have a scar today from what happened.
You see, I got so focused on one thing, that I was totally oblivious to a threat that was in front of me the whole time. Even though it was in front of me the whole time, in view of everything I saw, for some reason, I never saw it. I never saw this giant huge spike sticking up as something that could hurt me. The ‘for some reason’ was because I was too focused on one thing and just ignored the other thing. I thought I was smarter than that, to allow my arm to be jabbed into those spikes. I thought it would never happen in a million years. But a millions years must have come and gone, because it happened.
You see, we can get so involved in something that we get oblivious to what is right in front of you. It could be a girl that looks like an angel, but acts like a devil. It could be a cute guy with that perfect smile with one arm around you, but his other hand holding your best friend. It could be this sin or that sin, this preconceived idea or that tradition. It’s great to get focused on things, but only when it’s the right thing. It’s great to get focused on the plan of God for your life, but not the things of this world.
When we get so focused on one thing, we become oblivious to the other things going on around us. That can be good or bad. Sometimes we get so caught up in things that are not God’s will that we become oblivious to the trap Satan has laid for us, and we become deaf to the Holy Spirit trying to warn us. We can become so focused on God and the things of God that we become oblivious to the things of the world calling for our attention, calling for our time, trying to lure us away from God.
Remember the story of Peter and Jesus. Peter walked out on the water because he was so focused on Jesus that the things of this world meant nothing to him. They didn’t effect him, they didn’t cause him to flinch. But there came a time when he took that focus off of Jesus and got focused on the things of the world and he ended up not doing what Jesus had offered him.
Today make a decision to be focused on Jesus, His Word, what He has called you to do and get so focused on Him that this world can’t draw you away because you can’t even see it’s temptations.