I was a little discouraged one night a few months ago. I was discouraged that my wife was very stressed about the move, getting the house set up, getting kids to school. I was feeling unappreciated, feeling like she was ungrateful for everything I\u2019ve done. Bottom line: I was meditating. Mediating on her faults, my \u201cwonderful strengths,\u201d and having a pity party for myself. You see we all meditate. We ruminate. I was feeling unappreciated and was \u201cstuck\u201d meditating on that. So I turned to this verse in Luke 6:35.<\/p>\n
But love your enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High. For He is kind to the unthankful and evil. <\/em><\/p>\n Jesus is saying I should love everyone, including my enemies. Obviously my wife is not my enemy, but if I am supposed to love my enemies, it probably includes my family. \ud83d\ude42 As I read, it says, \u201cHope for nothing in return.\u201d I\u2019ve been thinking, paying attention to that phrase for 2 months now. Rather than, \u201cBeth owes me,\u201d or \u201cI deserve,\u201d I\u2019ve been catching myself in the moments of thinking that way to say to myself, \u201cHope for nothing in return.\u201d But how? How can I do that? The next part of the verse says, \u201cYour Reward Will Be Great!\u201d Meaning, I will be rewarded By God. I can hope for \u201cnothing now\u201d knowing I will be rewarded later. This moves me -not perfectly-, but moves me from loving, helping, serving my wife to \u201cget something out of it,\u201d to REALLY loving her, helping her, and serving her. What about when I feel like she is being ungrateful? What about when she thinks I am being ungrateful? How does this verse teach me to handle an ungrateful person? \u201cGod is kind to the ungrateful.\u201d I\u2019ve been thinking and meditating on that. Even if I could be objective (which I really can\u2019t), and Beth or I were 100% wrong or ungrateful in a situation, how does God respond? \u201cKindness.\u201d Wow! I have been really struck, thinking about this, meditating on this, Paying Attention to this for 2 months. I am making this part of me. That\u2019s what meditation looks like. Often it\u2019s accompanied by prayer, \u201cGod help me see my self pity.\u201d God forgive me my selfishness. God help me to \u201cget this\u201d deep into my mind.<\/p>\n Behind every decision was a thought. If we don\u2019t pay attention to what we think about, some thought will grab your attention. You\u2019ll use alcohol to medicate, allow busyness to take over your life, apathy to disintegrate your marriage… all because you let thought grab your attention instead of paying attention.<\/p>\n 8 Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy\u2014meditate<\/span> on these things<\/em><\/p>\n How different would your life and mine be if someone choose to \u201cpay attention\u201d vs have something \u201cgrab their attention?\u201d If your parents had paid attention to their marriage\u2026 If your pastor had paid attention to his wife\u2026 If you had paid attention to your spending\u2026 If you had paid attention to your savings\u2026 How many years of regret would you have avoided if you had paid attention to your faith, to wisdom, or to good advice? Imagine thinking about what you\u2019re thinking about, and Giving Your Attention to things that are true. Prayer is about Giving Attention to God. Prayer is about talking to God instead of talking to ourselves.<\/p>\n Prayer: Give Attention to Who You’re Talking To<\/strong><\/p>\n Perhaps you are not sure if there is a God, or if there is, you are not sure He or she isn\u2019t some cosmic watch maker who wound up the universe and leaves us alone to figure it out. While that is a possibility, let me ask you this\u2026When you worry or fear or fret, who are you talking to? Aren\u2019t you talking to yourself? When you hold onto bitterness or a grudge, aren\u2019t you \u201ctelling yourself\u201d how bad that thing was that was done to you? It may seem psychologically silly to talk to the \u201cgreat imaginary spaghetti monster in the sky,\u201d but isn\u2019t talking to yourself equally as silly? We all talk to someone. It may be ourself, our psychologist, or a buddy over golf? But if your child has cancer, if you are worried about the future, or if you need direction, doesn\u2019t it make more sense to talk to a being who made everything and has all power and knowledge rather than talking to yourself?<\/p>\n Phil 4:6 6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer<\/span> and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God;<\/em><\/p>\n Paul puts Prayer and Anxiety in the same sentence. Why? Because when we are anxious or worried, we talk to ourselves. Instead Paul says, Talk to God. Talk to God when you are worried, talk to Him when you need some \u201csupplication.\u201d Let your requests be known to God… You already made them known to yourself…Do you see how simple prayer is? It\u2019s GIVING ATTENTION to WHO you are talking to. So let\u2019s Give Attention to Who We are talking to. Talk to God about your life, instead of talking to yourself.<\/p>\n An Elder’s wife was leading a Bible study a few years ago. In the process of that small group, several women began to realize that their default communication and mediation in life was to worry. When something happened, they worried about it (communicated to themselves \u201cworse case scenarios\u201d and \u201cwhat-if’s\u201d). They also \u201cmeditated,\u201d which means to focus on or mix a thought around and around in your head. A woman in that group shared with us a few years ago that this Bible study helped her to stop \u201cmeditating\u201d or thinking on worry… and instead she learned to \u201cmeditate\u201d or communicate to God in prayer. She first learned to \u201cpay attention to her worrying\u201d and then learned to \u201cpay attention\u201d to what\/who she was meditating\/communicating with.<\/p>\n I was chatting with a business friend a few years ago. I was talking to him about meditation. He said, \u201cI don\u2019t meditate.\u201d I told him that everybody meditates. It\u2019s whatever you think about, whatever your mind focuses on, that\u2019s meditation. He said, \u201cI don\u2019t think about… what I think about.\u201d He was going through a divorce at the time. He and his wife had multimillion dollar homes, cars, etc. But they were constantly allowing the fault of the other to \u201cgrab their attention.\u201d They were constantly meditating on their spouse\u2019s failures. They were meditating, just not on anything good. And that meditation was grabbing them and steering them into a ditch.<\/p>\n STRONG CHALLENGE: This week\u2019s habit is Strong COMMUNICATION. It\u2019s two disciplines that great patriarchs of faith have called, \u201cPRAYER and MEDITATION.\u201d There is a \u201csuit\u201d in your STRONG deck of cards called \u201cPray.\u201d Take a card out each day for 10-15 minutes and do it. It will challenge you to Pay attention to your thinking, and Give attention to your talking.<\/p>\n The Cost of PAYING and GIVING Attention.<\/strong><\/p>\n The discipline of praying and mediating require a cost. The cost of time. The cost of energy. The cost of discipline. And most of us can think of many objections to trying this… We don\u2019t want to Pay<\/span> the cost of our time, energy, habit changes, etc. We don\u2019t think the benefit would be worthy what we pay… It will cost… You will have to \u201cpay\u201d to change your habits and be strong. But, the cost of Paying attention is so much cheaper than the COST OF NOT paying attention. However, right now, instead of the cost of prayer which leads to inner peace. Instead of the cost of getting up earlier and studying\/meditating on the Bible, we have the cost of worry, anxiety, lies steering our thoughts into a ditch throughout the day.<\/p>\n OBJECTION #1: Perhaps, you are saying, \u201cMeditation!?\u201d…\u201con the Bible?\u201d Perhaps you think, \u201cThe Bible was written by men\u2026so I won\u2019t read it\u2026I don\u2019t believe it.\u201d A few thoughts to think about\u2026 First, if you decided that your criteria for reading books is \u201cI don\u2019t read books written by men,” then you\u2019d never read anything. Right? So let\u2019s not use the \u201cmen wrote it\u201d argument\u2026 you read stuff written by humans all the time. Whether you think God wrote it or not, read it. Try it. Dig into it. Give it a try.<\/p>\n OBJECTION #2: The cost of reading the Bible. We are all plenty busy. Taking more time to pay attention to our Bible in the morning or at night is time we don\u2019t have. You may say, Here is the tension. The phrase \u201cPay Attention\u201d tells us that you will \u201chave to PAY\u201d. There will be a cost. It will require a payment. It will require time. But, the lie is this\u2026paying attention costs something, but having something \u201cgrab my attention\u201d is free. No no no\u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t have time to pay attention.\u201d There is a cost of time that we can\u2019t afford. And we\u2019ve heard that it\u2019s hard to understand, so who wants to take the time to figure out the thing anyway?<\/p>\n