Fix Your Focus: Set Your Minds on Things Above
Recently, I had the opportunity to travel to Italy with my wife Dare in celebration of our 41st wedding anniversary. As I encountered all the incredible history and drank in the beautiful architecture for which Rome is known, I couldn’t help but marvel at the engineering. As an engineer myself, I was in awe of the fact that these famous monuments, such as the Coliseum and the Pantheon, were constructed thousands of years ago; yet they remain prominent in this century. And they were built without fancy equipment or modern technology! During that time, workers from distant lands excavated huge stone columns and transported them by ship and barge to be moved into position. Back then, this system was groundbreaking, and it obviously still deserves merit today.
After admiring all this beauty, I became confused. How could the Romans fail to see God in the work they were creating? Despite their stunning architecture which many would say reflects God’s own handiwork in forming the earth, the Romans rejected God. But how could they do this when His beauty is inscribed plainly in the vast columns and intricate detail work?
Fixated solely on themselves and their capacity for greatness, the Roman culture strived for personal fulfillment and glorification. With their engineering processes, they must have thought they were the greatest in the world! And why, after all, would a people so great need God?
Honestly, this way of thinking reminds me a lot of our culture today.
Look around: We are just as lost as the Romans. Our society thinks it is so smart. As we seek to figure out life’s problems and determine what is right and what is wrong, we end up looking to ourselves for the answers rather than fixing our attention on the One who is the answer to everything. In our attempt to be high-functioning intellectuals, we somehow picked up the idea that we can operate on our own. This belief has grown so out-of-hand that we even believe we can save the planet from its eventual prophesied destruction. All we need is one more law, one more regulation, one more brilliant elected leader.
Our hope is in all the wrong places.
Like the Romans, we have become so consumed with gaining power, status, and wealth that we have sometimes lost focus on the things that truly matter. Only one thing lasts forever, and it is written in Scriptures numerous times:
1 Peter 1:25: “‘But the word of the Lord endures forever.’ And this is the word that was preached to you.”
Matthew 24:35: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.”
Isaiah 40:8: “The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.”
I love the United States, but we are headed on the same path as the Romans. Mental health issues are raging, alcohol and drug use is climbing, people’s pursuit of their own lustful passions and self-gratification is the main focus, we can’t seem to trust our leaders, we see the truth being distorted everywhere from our government, to our media, and even in our schools, people are divided to a level of hate toward others over political and social issues, lawlessness and chaos is becoming the norm, and there are now more distractions in our culture than ever before. The United States is anything but united, and we may now be headed down a path that every great nation before us gone before that history tells us will be ultimate destruction. Despite these things, Jesus’ message is to trust Him and depend on Him for everything. To do that, however, we need to turn our gaze away from ourselves to look toward Him. Colossians 3:2 urges, “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” Similarly, 2 Corinthians 4:18 writes, “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”
Where is the logic in looking to our human limitedness for the seemingly unlimited number of questions we have? Where is the intelligence in trusting objects and ideas that will eventually crumble and decay? If we are truly as smart as we think, then we should heed the words of the Lord since they alone will endure forever.
One passage in Matthew speaks to this wisdom when Jesus commands, “‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,’” (Matthew 6:19-21).
In touring Italy, one thing became clear to me. Though the relics of the era remain, the Roman civilization is no more. All they placed their faith in is nothing more than beautiful tourist sites trampled over by dusty feet each day. They are a case study in these versus, and a warning to us to avoid their fateful trajectory.
Take a mental inventory right now. Where is your treasure? Is your trust placed in your own accomplishments and the things of this world? Or is your faith grounded in the Bible and the hope of eternal life found within its pages? While you may be tempted to turn to manmade resources for help, position your heart toward God and look up to Him for provision. I promise you it will be immeasurably more than you can ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20-21).
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