Daily Devotional #1,592

There is a story about a group of college students coming into their class and the professor announced that they  were going to have a surprise test. He walked by each desk and placed the test paper face down before the  students. He then told them to turn the paper over and what each student saw was a blank, white sheet of paper  with a small black dot in the middle of it. He said “Your assignment now is to write what you see before you.” When the time was up, the students turned in what they had written and the professor read aloud what each  student had written. They wrote about the size of the dot, the location of the dot, the color of the dot and  anything else they could think of. When he was done, the professor said “I asked you to write about what you  saw before you and everyone of you wrote about the small dot in the middle of the paper. And not one of you  mentioned the overwhelming large white paper that surrounded it. You saw the small thing and forgot about  everything else.” I thought about that, how we so often focus on the black dots of our lives and forget about all  that is out there besides that. That dot might be a disappointment, a hurt, a fear, but it is but a dot in the midst of  all that is out there. We will always have things that will draw our attention and next to the goodness and love  and power of the God of the Bible, they are so comparatively small. Our attention is so often captured by the  dark spot that fills our vision and yet God promises that life is not over and that hope for today and for  tomorrow is still all around us. You and I will hurt, we will be discouraged, we will feel like the good days are  forever gone. But God tells us to not look at that dot, but to look at something bigger. That we have the choice  to keep our eyes on this Jesus of the Bible and in doing so, realize that the dots we deal with don’t define us,  don’t restrict us because we stand before a God for whom nothing is impossible. And he is a God who loves  you more than anyone ever has or ever will. So, when the dot on the paper starts to dominate your attention  turn your eyes upon this Jesus. Keep your eyes on him because he is your champion who is going to bring you  hope and faith and love. And as you keep focused on him, those good and noble and rich things will grow  stronger and the dots on the page will not dominate your heart and mind and soul. Here’s our Bible verse for  today…  
  
Hebrews 12:2 NLT We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith.  Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of  honor beside God’s throne.  
Remember I’m praying for you!  
With love, PJ