Adjust Your Focus

‘One of them, when he saw that he was healed, came back to Jesus, shouting, “Praise God!” He fell to the ground at Jesus’ feet, thanking him for what he had done…’ Luke17:15-16

Yesterday, I was telling you about the accident the Holy Spirit’s prompting saved me from. Now that happened to be the very first car that I would have, that I bought with my money. So I was kind of grateful to the Holy Spirit but each time I see the dent the trailer left on my car, I will be sorrowful. And I will say, “God, I pay my tithe”. Then it occurred to me, I could have lost my life. The whole car could have been totally written off and here I am complaining about a dent. That was the story of the lepers, they had a dent – a finger had been chopped off. But this Samaritan leper was better behaved than I was. Even though he saw the dent, he didn’t care about the dent. He ran to Jesus and thanked Him. You are complaining about the dent meanwhile God has just delivered your life and you sit down there complaining about a dent. Don’t let the dent control your joy. It’s only a dent. The car could have been totally damaged; I could have died. Or perhaps ended up with a life long limp but God delivered me from all that.

When I saw the dent, instead of it to remind me of the goodness of Jesus, the devil used that same dent to make me give Jesus attitude. The same dent that could have reminded me of the day that God delivered me. Question to you, what is the dent in your life right now? What is that thing that is taking your eyes off the big picture? What is that thing keeping your eyes from the great thing that God is doing and has done? Gratitude begins from the heart. As long as you are keeping your focus on the dent your heart will not be grateful, and gratitude begins from the heart. As long as the dent is the controller of your focus, your heart will not be grateful. You may be like me at the time; I didn’t have enough money to repair the dent so I had to look at the dent for a long time. But rather than that dent being a source of sorrow, Jesus turned that dent to being a source of gratitude. That dent should be a source of gratitude. So when I look at that dent, I remember the day I could have lost my legs but Jesus delivered me. Maybe, just maybe we need to keep dents just to remind us.

Prayer: Jesus, today I place a guard over my heart so that the enemy will not confuse my praise and thanksgiving, in Jesus Name.