Focus and Forget

Copyright (c) 2007 Good News Publications

Almost every morning you can turn on the television and find an exercise show-they have yoga, stretching, lifting weights, just about anything. The profit of exercising your physical body has been promoted for years and there is even a record in God's Word that talks about it.

I Timothy 4:8: For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

The word "little" means "for a little while". This verse says physical exercise profits for a little while, but exercising ourselves unto godliness is much better.

Now with this in mind, have you ever seen a show that had you exercising your mind? I can picture it now: someone is sitting in a chair and they say, "Think-1 -2 -3 -4, now relax-1 -2 -3 -4. Is anyone breaking a sweat?"

Well, as silly as it sounds, I'd like to show you a mental exercise that will profit you for more than just "a little while"-it is called "Focus and Forget". The process is to focus on the promises of God and forget your past failures, past events and past mistakes. It takes effort on your part to do this and to do it correctly. You see most people do a version of this, but they do it backwards-they focus on their mistakes and forget the promises of God!

So let's learn to do it the proper way. Just as it is with physical exercise, you have to do the exercise correctly. So let's start with forgetting.

Sometimes this even means that we must forget our past victories and successes so that we don't get caught up living in the past wishing for the good old days.

The Apostle Paul had to forget the things that he thought were successful before he became a Christian and look to God. He also had to forget his past failures and the things he did to persecute other Christians.

It seems to be human nature to dwell on both our past victories and past failures. So how do we forget?

The first step is to focus on who God says we are and not on our failures. Do you think that after the Apostle Paul became a Christian, he might have said to himself, "What have I done by having Christians beaten and thrown in jail?" I know I would have had a hard time with that one. But Paul stayed focused on God and forgot about the past. When Paul and Silas were thrown in jail at Philippi they stayed focused on God and forgot about being beaten and thrown in jail. Then the earth shook and the jail doors opened and they were set free.

So I encourage you to try this exercise of focusing on the promises of God and forgetting the past and see where it takes you.