Focus
Focusing is important. How can you manage hundreds of things at once? You really can’t. We are all humans, and are all subject to human limitations. At very best we can do three or four simple tasks at once; talk on the phone, check Facebook, and pay slight attention to the latest episode of The Office or whatever your favorite show may be. When we focus on only a few things, we get more done, and become more effective.
If this is true, then it may be applicable to another aspect of our life.
In our walk with God reaching others is important. God says in Matthew 18, a book about Jesus’ life, ministry, persecution, and renaissance “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” What in the world does God mean here? It seems simple, but let me simplify it a little more. Webster’s definition of disciple is as follows: one who accepts and assists in spreading the doctrines of another. So that means God wants us to teach others, and equip them to teach and help others in life and their walk with God.
Often we take this thing called numbers, and give them much more power than they deserve. A statistic can be helpful, informational, and insightful, but crippling at times. For example in our area (Northwest WA) there are roughly 8,700 young people that do not love Jesus. WOW! That is a huge number. We have to make sure every single one of them loves Jesus, canvas the cities, preach in the town squares, hand out flyers, and then we ca… Hold on. Breathe for a moment and realize the universe will still be okay even if there are 8,700 people “unsaved.”
Why don’t we reach everyone? It is not our job. It is God’s job! Leave it in His hands because His timing is perfect and His motives are pure. How often is it that we think that we are losing this great battle over souls; the number of unsaved people is going up, but how could we be losing if God is still king, and still God over all? Matthew 6:34 reads: “So don’t worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will have its own worries. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” We need to focus on the now, and not worry about what is ahead. God believes in relationship and community more than works. This means He would rather us love one another and grow in Him than try to “save” or “reach” people. Reaching people doesn’t have to be talking to them about Jesus as an ulterior motive. You can be just as effective, if not more so by just doing life with people and spending time with them. The conversations will come naturally. He will reach them and talk to their hearts. In John 13 God gives a new commandment, the greatest of all commandments, to love one another. He says in doing this, people will know that we belong to Him. This means we don’t need to put up a front, or an act, because we are. We are His, and by our actions and by the way we live our lives not by the way we talk about our lives people will see God in his awesome glory.
Romans 13:8 in the New King James Version reads: “[…] for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.” That means that if we simply do this one thing, love, we do everything God has asked in his commandments. Everything else will fall into place.
Focus. Focus on only a few people to really pour your life into. Only a few people to mentor, teach, and bring up. Why only a few? It is because if we do not focus our attention on only a few we will be less effective. Jesus had twelve disciples who were his closest friends and only 3 he focused on, James, Peter, and John. They were the ones who were closest to Jesus, who did things, saw things, and experienced things with Him that none of the other disciples did. Jesus taught them, brought them up in the faith, and released them. Jesus didn’t try to handle one hundred disciples, fifty disciples, or even thirteen. Only twelve, with focus on three. When we only focus on a few people at once, we become more effective.
