Fixing our focus

Hebrews 12:1-2

 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

This is a very loaded verse, in which are many subjects to write about, but as I have been journeying through Jeremiah, I have been discovering one theme.  The centrality of God and making him the source of everything in my life.  Casting my mind back to chapter 2 of Jeremiah, therein lies the theme for the whole book.  All that He is, all that He gives brings life.  He is the fountain of life.  All that I do in an attempt to fill my own life in my own way brings death. In my previous blog, I likened my attempt at quenching spiritual thirst my own way to drinking sea water. 

My journey through Jeremiah has taken me to another aspect of making God the centre of my life and, that is, where I put my focus.  The writer of Hebrews covers this really well in chapter 12.  When I read the first two verses, it is clear to me that walking with God on this earth will require endurance, however, when one runs a race, one has a focus.  In sport, the race is run to win and get that prize.  In the Christians walk or race, the prize is Jesus and eternal life with Him. My gaze in this life must be firmly fixed on Jesus. If I loose that focus, suddenly the race becomes pointless and the enemy of my soul will quickly endeavour to completely side track me altogether. 

There is a good example of looking to Jesus found in the book of Matthew.  Jesus had walked on water to get to the disciples on the boat who were battling a storm and rough waters.  They were petrified until they realised it was Him.  Peter wants to walk on the water to Jesus, and so Jesus invited him to do so :

Matthew 14:28-30

And Peter answered him, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” He said, “Come.” So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me.”

Peter did well and I imagine was focused on Jesus as he walked out on the water to Him.  Peters focus shifts from Jesus to the water, winds and waves and sinks. Praise God that he knew to cry out to Jesus to be saved.  So, the focus Peter had, to start with was Jesus, and so long as that was the case Peter continued to walk on the water. This is exactly how it is as the writer to Hebrews puts it, " looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith"

It is so clear that when we commit to walking this life as believers in Jesus that source of spiritual thirst quenching is found in Him, and so long as we focus on Him, we will walk the stormy waters. 

Thirsty anyone?

This week I have been in Jeremiah chapter 18 and 19  Both chapters are visible signs to the prophet Jeremiah about God’s willingness and ability to reshape the nation of Israel.  First, Jeremiah is sent to the potters house to observe the potter at work, and while there witnesses a lump of clay not turning out according to plan, but being reshaped into another vessel.  Secondly, Jeremiah is instructed to buy a clay vessel (I wander if it was the reshaped one from Chapter 18?) and to smash it as a warning of what Israel was in for.  The whole point was that Israel needed to be in God’s hands to be shaped and formed, something they very clearly were not.  Israel was into some very wicked practices, all of which demonstrated to God that, quite simply, He was not good enough.  As the degeneration of Israel continued, and their practices got worse, they served idols and sacrificed their children to the god molech.   This was quite possibly an all-time low Israel had sunk, and they were in huge danger of being smashed like the clay pot and having their enemies destroy them.  If you read Jeremiah 19, you will see the horrid things Israel were about to encounter due to their own refusal to listen to God.

In Jeremiah chapter 2, Gods main lament about Israel is seen in verse 13 for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.

This may all seem completely remote to us in the 21^st Century, but is it?  The church today is FULL of believers who dig their own wells.  How do I dig my own well?  Or rather, do I forsake the fountain of living waters?  Today we have self-dug cisterns a plenty ( in the church), endless television watching, over eating,  secret sins such a pornography viewing, homosexuality, fornication drug taking, alcoholism and the list goes on.  Sadly, many of these are addictions.  Israel seemed to be addicted to foreign gods.  All of this is digging a well, a cistern that can hold no water.  All of this is forsaking God, the fountain of living water. A lot of Christians try to quench their thirst with sea water, it may quench for a small while, but causes damage and makes the thirst worse.  Max Lucado, in his book Come Thirsty writes “Not everything you put to your lips will help your thirst” – and that’s the truth we see in Jeremiah chapter 2.  It is time to drink long draughts of the fountain of living waters.  Jesus said in John 4:14 ..but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

Our default to soul thirst quenching must only be found in the presence of God, and this is where I believe Christians are missing out.  Entering the presence of God and revelling in it, spending time with God in prayer in the word, hearing from Him anywhere, anytime should be our habit.  We need to come to Jesus more than we do, we need to drink long draughts of His presence and know that He is the only one who can satisfy the thirst of our soul.  The minute we reach out to anything other than Jesus to quench our thirst is declaring that God is not good enough.  It is doing what sin desires and that is to rule God right out of the equation.  Let us not follow Israel’s example and reach out to lifeless gods and get into a complete mess.  Let us come to Jesus and drink of the water He gives and experience genuine soul satisfaction.

Revelation 21:6 And he said to me, "It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.