Have you had the opportunity to check in with how you feed your mind lately? What goes into your heart and soul by what you listen to, read, watch, and think about? What about the people you are spending your time with?
“Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, And revive me in Your way.” Psalms 119:37 NKJV
It really is an interesting phenomenon that happens to us when we condition ourselves by the things we consume and with who we consume things with. Hopefully this is making sense to you.
If you are with a group of guys, and they spend all their time talking about how the world is messed up and pulling out proof points, there is a good chance you will embrace this thought. You get emails from them, blog posts, news articles, and podcasts. Soon, your happy thoughts are now sour thoughts.
How about when you are in a crisis? Maybe you have an ill child or spouse. Suddenly, your focus is on what is happening and your world is filled with that. You don’t notice the things around you and your thoughts are mostly around the crisis. You wonder will we ever get out of this? How is the person doing in the crisis? What comes next?
It is very hard to remain centered on God with what surrounds us. We can be purposeful about it or we can just let the world guide our thoughts. If you are being guided by the world I highly encourage you to stop that and get centered. Anchor your life around time with God in a very authentic way. What does this look like you ask?
Authentic centered living is different for each of us. However, at the core is making time to be with God. Not just reading something like this or the replay of the awesome pastors message. Not just going to Catholic Mass and receiving the Holy Eucharist. It is really all of it. It is using all the tools but the most important one is that alone and quite time where it is you and God.
Now when you are there in that quite it isn’t a bad idea to have pen and paper with you. Some suggest you write down the letter “Q” with a period “Q.” and ask your question followed by the letter “A” with a period “A.” You are to sit there in silence until something is provoked. If you get nothing just leave the A open. You’ll be surprised that that Q will get an A in time.
So now the question is how long? Well that is truly between you and God. I like to say God keeps me in class often a bit later than I thought. I call it class because God is always instructing me. It is an incredibly fruitful time and a time I do not like to miss. For me it is mostly during a morning coffee. It starts usually with a Bible verse from either the verse of the day or perhaps once of the devotional I am reading. More often than not, a simple verse, like the one above that came from a “tickler system” provokes a writing (this one).
Now, I fall out of alignment often. It’s human nature to. Those strongholds the devil has that we try to eliminate grab our attention and we might start to fade in that direction. That’s when the call to the Holy Spirit happens. A “Help me center Holy Spirit” or something to that affect. In the beginning alignments took longer because it takes time to root your life in God. Now, as long as I call on the Holy Spirit it is amazing how quickly that alignment can happen.
I’d bet that someone who study’s the brain would say what this really is a cognitive trick of some kind. It’s a refocus of the brain which causes the entire thing to work. Well if that is the case my desire is to center on God or the idea of God as the place I land. How about you?
The thing I like most about this verse is the very in your face comment about worthless things. It is so true. Back to what we feed our mind with or what we do with our time. It is as simple as if you are doing A you are not doing B. So when you are with a bunch of gossipers, or men who only want to talk about themselves, or it’s all about sports, investments, politics or even religion you run the risk of spending too much time on worthless things. You have to discover with is worth your time and for me those precious minutes done daily with God is worth every second.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, thank you for the time with you. Thank you for the Holy Spirit who helps me during that time and brings me back into alignment when I fallout. Thank you for your Word and what it provokes in me. Thank you for my family and friends who I enjoy time with as well. Keep me away from worthless things I do not want to waste this precious life you have given me. Help me live a worthy life one that does what you need me to do and not be driven by earthly motivations. Allow me to enjoy your creation and live more in harmony with you so I have balance. Teach me what that is and please answer those questions I ask in away that I can fully understand your will. Please keep my family and friends safe. I pray all of this in the name of Jesus who is my Savior and Lord. Amen.
Great message and reminder