What Is Your Focus Today?

It is said that Cyrus, the founder of the Persian Empire, once had captured a prince and his family. When they came before him, the monarch asked the prisoner, "What will you give me if I release you?" "The half of my wealth," was his reply. "And if I release your children?" "Everything I possess." "And if I release your wife?" "Your Majesty, I will give myself." Cyrus was so moved by his devotion that he freed them all. As they returned home, the prince said to his wife, "Wasn't Cyrus a handsome man!" With a look of deep love for her husband, she said to him, "I didn't notice. I could only keep my eyes on you- -the one who was willing to give himself for me." (Unknown.) I read this today and it hit me. My eyes are focused on the wrong things. My heart is longing for the wrong things. Does that make me unfit for the love of God? Not at all. Does it show me that I am still very much a "work in progress"? Absolutely. In my line of work I am privileged to meet many different people in a day's time. Constantly exposed to various circumstances, places and things. I remember one time I visited a friend in her new home and when I walked inside I was stunned by the beauty in her decorating. Everything was very neat, very stylish and seemingly very expensive. When I got home I went on this cleaning rampage. I was a mad woman. Garbage bag by garbage bag I loaded up everything I deemed to be "shabby" or "tacky". I remember once I was finished I looked around and realized there really wasn' much left in my home! I sat in the middle of my kitchen floor and cried. I felt so sorry for myself because I knew I was going to have to dig all that stuff back out and put it back in it's place because I certainly didn't have the "means" to buy all new and redecroate our entire house to look like my friend's. As I was drying my tears and sniffling on my cold linoleum floor, I happened to look up at my refridgerator and hanging on it was a wrinkled piece of white paper. It had scribbles all over it in a virtual rainbow of magic marker colors. In the corner it said: To My Nana...I love you! It was a picture my grandson had made for me and had proudly hung up there with his own two little hands. After putting everything back in it's place, I sat down once again, this time in my living room chair. Again I began to peruse my home. I saw pictures in mismatched frames of my children and grandchildren hanging on the walls where I was going to hang new, more fashionable artwork. My tatered Bible sat on the corner of the coffee table where I earlier thought I would place a lovely centerpiece. Scattered across the top of the television set were VeggieTale DVDs. On the end tables, where beauiful vases would have gone, were nothing but tiny fingerprints and a baby quilt I had been working on for years. Suddenly my eyes were focused on different things in my home. Not the worn furntiure or the out of date, early attic, hand me down knick-knacks, but the things that told a story about who I was. Someone could walk into my home and instantly tell that a family lived there. A wife, a mom, a nana. A family that believed in God. Hopefully, if someone walked into my home they would be comfortable and feel as if they were welcome there, they would sense a feeling of a "work in progress" but definitely not "perfect", and they would like that feeling. Everyday I find myself longing for things I cannot have. Desiring and dreaming about things I will never be allowed to do. Sometimes I even find myself arguing with God about it, telling Him that life isn't fair. But just like that day I noticed so many beautiful things around me in my home that I had overlooked in my haste to get what I thought I wanted, I am trying each day to "focus" more on Jesus and what He has already given me. Now don't start telling me that the Lord knows the desires of my heart and one day my every wish will come true...because the only way that will happen is if my "wishes" are "in-line" with God's will for my life, and trust me, I'm certain some of them are not. Some are simply my "flesh" wanting what it cannot have. That is where the word "sacrifice" comes in. Not one of our favorite words these days. Cyrus was willing to sacrifice everything for the one he loved and his wife was so appreciative of his sacrifice that her eyes never left him for a moment. God was so willing to sacrifice His son out of love for me that my eyes should never leave Him, not even for a moment. But occassionally, they do, and for that I am sorry and I am so grateful for His mercy and grace, allowing me to try again tomorrow to be better "focused". I have certainly come a long way...but I have a long way to go and I look forward to the day I meet my heavenly bridegroom face to face and I am able to gaze into His eyes and actually see His love for me come pouring forth from His face! !

Jesus was not only "willing" to give his life for me (and you!), he did!

With a look of deep love for my Lord, I say to Him,.. "I didn't notice the world. I could only keep my eyes on you- -the one who was willing to give Himself for me."

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

   JOHN 3:16