Fear: Focus on What Ultimately Matters

Focus. It's not all it's cracked up to be. 

What we focus on is more important than whether we focus in the first place. If we only focus on what we can see, we'll be short sighted.

We focus on what matters to us. If we like gaming, we focus on gaming. If we like gardening, DIY or sports; you guessed it: we focus on those things.

There's not necessarily anything wrong with hobbies and leisure activities, but I would argue that they shouldn't be our focus. Neither, in my opinion, should weighter things like money, sex and power. None of what I've mentioned is intrinsically wrong, but they shouldn't be our primary focus.

There was a very wise man, the second wisest ever after God incarnate, who dabbled in lots of foci to try and find meaning. He even tried wine as a focus for his life, and of course ended up with a regretful hangover as he overindulged.

Solomon, as he was named, was famed for focusing on women. Nothing wrong with a wife, but Solomon overdid it and came to realise that human relationships aren't what we should primarily focus upon.

He also focused on work and wealth creation, and despite building great things and accumulating great riches, he knew he wouldn't take any of it with him when he left this world.

Even wisdom isn't to be our primary focus. We would be wise to realise that wisdom doesn't come naturally and we need God's supernatural wisdom to help us focus on what really matters eternally.

So what should our primary focus be? Solomon realised our raison d'etre is to worship God. He went as far as to say that we should fear the Lord.

We can read more about the meaninglessness of our worldly foci in the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible.

If we're tempted to see focus as a virtue regardless of what we're focusing on; we might also be tempted to see fear as an exclusively negative thing.

Yet Solomon insisted that the 'fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom' (Proverbs 1:7). He didn't mean the kind of fear that cringes away in terror. Instead, he was referencing a similar kind of fear to that of a child who is afraid to displease their father.

That relational fear, a focus on pleasing God, helps us to discover the heart of wisdom. If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, the love of God is the heart of wisdom, and what should be our primary focus.

God loved us so much that He sent His only Son to die for distracted sinners like us, to reconcile us to Himself. Just as God loved us, so we ought to love Him, and one another. That should be our focus, to live lives defined by love.

So often, we focus on ourselves. God calls us out of our inversion to be outward looking: to Himself and to others. Instead of being selfishly focused, we are to be Other focused, whether that be God or other people (or ideally both!).

What are we focused on? Writing for writing's sake? I'm preaching to myself! If work is our focus, what happens when we retire? If worldly hedonism is our focus, what happens when we die? If manmade religion is our focus, what happens when God judges us?

Only by focusing on Christ crucified on our behalf can we avoid the condemnation we deserve for our distractedness from Deity. We can't focus on justifying ourselves. We just need to focus on trusting God to justify us in Christ.

I admit that I often lose focus. I focus on writing, blogging and podcasting for their own sake instead of serving my wife and family in love. Yet for distracted people like us, there is hope.

Jesus calls us to come to Him, all who are weary and heavy laden. With so many demands for our focus, we can certainly feel that way. Yet Jesus promises that His yoke is easy and His burden is light.

If we focus on Christ, we don't have to worry about our needs, that He'll provide. Instead, we can focus on His Kingdom and His glory, that we can be part of for eternity.

How do we focus on Jesus? Reading His word, the Bible, is a good start, whilst prayerfully asking Him to reveal Himself to us. God isn't, contrary to popular opinion, a cosmic killjoy who's waiting for us to lose focus and then smite us. He invites us to focus in on Him, and find in Him our all in all, both now, and for eternity.