Shift Your Focus

Here’s a simple truth: the longer you stare at your problems, the bigger they become. Shift your focus. Move your eyes to the Father, instead, and you’ll start to see a change in your mindset. We stare at our problems hoping that by doing so we’ll somehow magically find an answer. Sometimes, though, the answer is only in the surrender. It’s simple. Take your eyes off your circumstances and place them on God and what He’s saying about you/your life. Too easy, you say? That won’t work in my situation because it’s too big?

How’s this for big?

During the fourth watch of the night Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear. But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”                           

“Come,” he said.                                                                                                                   

Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”

– Matthew 14:25-30

It doesn’t get much bigger than sinking in the very real waters of a very real lake. Peter put his eyes on the water (his circumstance/problem), and took them off of Christ. What happened? He began to sink. Notice, that when his eyes were on Christ, his problems were just as big, just as real. The difference? His focus. Don’t let your circumstances dictate your place in life today. Let your focus stay fixed, and you’ll find you start noticing your surroundings less and less.