Fixed Gaze
Worry and fear, which are generally lies about our future, assault our minds on a daily basis. It is easy to imagine the worst outcome of a situation, and then train our eyes on that outcome. Hoping to avoid our worst fear, we actually focus our gaze on that exact fear.
There is a principle in life that is easily tested: you go where you are looking. When I was in college, I worked my way through most of it mowing lawns for a commercial lawn company. One thing you had to learn right away was how to mow in a straight line. One day, the owner of the company stopped by a job I was working on, and was obviously disappointed by the straightness of my lines. I was watching the front wheels of the mower, and trying to run alongside my last line. In my own limited experience, I was trying to pattern each new line off the first.
Barney, my employer, taught me something that day that I will never forget. It is true in nearly every aspect of life, whether it is driving, working, playing golf, marriage, raising kids...it is so simple: you go where you are looking! He said "pick a spot on the other end of the yard and stare at it, then start moving. If you don't take your eyes off the spot until you get there, your line will be perfectly straight.". He was right! I tried it and it proved itself right. Since that day I have mowed straight lines! This same principle is why you "keep your eye on the ball" in baseball, and why you "keep your head down" in golf. You go where you are looking.
So when worry, anxiety, fear, or trouble come, where am I first tempted to look? To the worry!
This is how the enemy uses fear to steer us away from God and His perfect plan for us: We will imagine the worst and make decisions to avoid the worst thing we can imagine, all the while walking right toward it. How do we set our gaze on where we want to go? We pray and we resist worry!
We take the lies about our future and lay them before God (we tell Him about them). We command the liars, the spirits of fear, or anxiety, or worry, to "leave in the name of Jesus," and we set our gaze, by faith, in God's promise of protection, His goodness, and His perfect provision and plans for our life.
As we keep a locked gaze on God, we walk nearer and nearer to His plan for our lives!
Isaiah 37 tells the most amazing story about this. Here are the highlights (it is so worth reading if you are battling worry):
Isaiah 37:...Before leaving to meet the attack, he sent messengers back to Hezekiah in Jerusalem with this message:
10"This message is for King Hezekiah of Judah. Don't let your God, in whom you trust, deceive you with promises that Jerusalem will not be captured by the king of Assyria. 11 You know perfectly well what the kings of Assyria have done wherever they have gone. They have completely destroyed everyone who stood in their way! Why should you be any different? 12 Have the gods of other nations rescued them—such nations as Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Tel-assar? My predecessors destroyed them all! 13 What happened to the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad? What happened to the kings of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?"
14 After Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it, he went up to the LORD 's Temple and spread it out before the LORD . 15 And Hezekiah prayed this prayer before the LORD : 16 "O LORD of Heaven's Armies, God of Israel, you are enthroned between the mighty cherubim! You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You alone created the heavens and the earth. 17 Bend down, O LORD , and listen! Open your eyes, O LORD , and see! Listen to Sennacherib's words of defiance against the living God.
21 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent this message to Hezekiah: "This is what the LORD , the God of Israel, says: Because you prayed about King Sennacherib of Assyria, 22 the LORD has spoken this word against him:
"The virgin daughter of Zion
despises you and laughs at you.
The daughter of Jerusalem
shakes her head in derision as you flee.
23 "Whom have you been defying and ridiculing? Against whom did you raise your voice? At whom did you look with such haughty eyes? It was the Holy One of Israel!
36 That night the angel of the LORD went out to the Assyrian camp and killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers. When the surviving Assyrians woke up the next morning, they found corpses everywhere. 37 Then King Sennacherib of Assyria broke camp and returned to his own land. He went home to his capital of Nineveh and stayed there.
Don't let the enemy's threats into your heart. Lay them out before the Lord, and then lock your gaze on God's promises, then you will walk straight into His goodness, and no "weapon formed against you will prosper!"
There is a principle in life that is easily tested: you go where you are looking. When I was in college, I worked my way through most of it mowing lawns for a commercial lawn company. One thing you had to learn right away was how to mow in a straight line. One day, the owner of the company stopped by a job I was working on, and was obviously disappointed by the straightness of my lines. I was watching the front wheels of the mower, and trying to run alongside my last line. In my own limited experience, I was trying to pattern each new line off the first.
Barney, my employer, taught me something that day that I will never forget. It is true in nearly every aspect of life, whether it is driving, working, playing golf, marriage, raising kids...it is so simple: you go where you are looking! He said "pick a spot on the other end of the yard and stare at it, then start moving. If you don't take your eyes off the spot until you get there, your line will be perfectly straight.". He was right! I tried it and it proved itself right. Since that day I have mowed straight lines! This same principle is why you "keep your eye on the ball" in baseball, and why you "keep your head down" in golf. You go where you are looking.
So when worry, anxiety, fear, or trouble come, where am I first tempted to look? To the worry!
This is how the enemy uses fear to steer us away from God and His perfect plan for us: We will imagine the worst and make decisions to avoid the worst thing we can imagine, all the while walking right toward it. How do we set our gaze on where we want to go? We pray and we resist worry!
We take the lies about our future and lay them before God (we tell Him about them). We command the liars, the spirits of fear, or anxiety, or worry, to "leave in the name of Jesus," and we set our gaze, by faith, in God's promise of protection, His goodness, and His perfect provision and plans for our life.
As we keep a locked gaze on God, we walk nearer and nearer to His plan for our lives!
Isaiah 37 tells the most amazing story about this. Here are the highlights (it is so worth reading if you are battling worry):
Isaiah 37:...Before leaving to meet the attack, he sent messengers back to Hezekiah in Jerusalem with this message:
10"This message is for King Hezekiah of Judah. Don't let your God, in whom you trust, deceive you with promises that Jerusalem will not be captured by the king of Assyria. 11 You know perfectly well what the kings of Assyria have done wherever they have gone. They have completely destroyed everyone who stood in their way! Why should you be any different? 12 Have the gods of other nations rescued them—such nations as Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Tel-assar? My predecessors destroyed them all! 13 What happened to the king of Hamath and the king of Arpad? What happened to the kings of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivvah?"
14 After Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it, he went up to the LORD 's Temple and spread it out before the LORD . 15 And Hezekiah prayed this prayer before the LORD : 16 "O LORD of Heaven's Armies, God of Israel, you are enthroned between the mighty cherubim! You alone are God of all the kingdoms of the earth. You alone created the heavens and the earth. 17 Bend down, O LORD , and listen! Open your eyes, O LORD , and see! Listen to Sennacherib's words of defiance against the living God.
21 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent this message to Hezekiah: "This is what the LORD , the God of Israel, says: Because you prayed about King Sennacherib of Assyria, 22 the LORD has spoken this word against him:
"The virgin daughter of Zion
despises you and laughs at you.
The daughter of Jerusalem
shakes her head in derision as you flee.
23 "Whom have you been defying and ridiculing? Against whom did you raise your voice? At whom did you look with such haughty eyes? It was the Holy One of Israel!
36 That night the angel of the LORD went out to the Assyrian camp and killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers. When the surviving Assyrians woke up the next morning, they found corpses everywhere. 37 Then King Sennacherib of Assyria broke camp and returned to his own land. He went home to his capital of Nineveh and stayed there.
Don't let the enemy's threats into your heart. Lay them out before the Lord, and then lock your gaze on God's promises, then you will walk straight into His goodness, and no "weapon formed against you will prosper!"
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