Very few truly important things in life
are without their complexities.
Work, of course, is no exception. The same is true of Christian focus. If focusing was easy and simple, either in the natural or the spiritual, we'd concentrate better at work, every athlete would spend more time "in the zone," every student would get the maximum from his brain, and we would probably be further along in our spiritual journey than we are.
As with all great endeavors, there is a need for practice when it comes to maintaining focus on God. My son is in his first year of playing football. We who grew up playing and watching sports forget all the small but critical things about a sport that we picked up along the way, things we don't even remember learning. Football's level of complexity, even when you weigh about 88 pounds, is amazing. So guess what. Our team practices... a lot! We do drills that teach skills. We run plays, the same ones over and over. The point is to practice.
We would not be good at our work without learning about it and making an effort to apply what we learn. A good work environment also depends on good relationships, so they also require effort. In a similar vein, we practice maintaining our focus as we practice the complex life and death endeavor of living life with God. One of the ways we practice maintaining a God-focus all the time is by spending some time focusing on God. If you don't have a regular time in which you give God all your attention (praying, reading the Bible, listening to God, journaling your thoughts), you need to start one. This is THE KEY to being able to maintain a God focus. We can learn to maintain God focus all the time, but we must start by having God focus some of the time.
The Apostle Paul told the Thessalonian church to "rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances" (I Thessalonians 5: 16-18) which is a way of saying that it's possible to keep focused on God all the time, keeping aware of his presence just as he is aware of us. Paul was a practical fellow who didn't give unrealistic advice. To understand what he was getting at, we need to start with having a God focus some of the time -- very much including some of our work time.
Now unlike football practice, or some work, it doesn't have to be drudgery. In fact, if you stay at it, this will become the time that is the highlight of your day. But like football practice or learning our work skills, our time of focus is preparing us for something else. It's the prep for living the rest of the day with God. It's prepping us for Game-time, when the working hours and the other hours are equally and all part of our God time.
