Looking Forward

It is that time of year again when the Outer Banks population swells from next to nothing to almost everybody. High heat and humidity, not to mention mosquitoes, are just around the corner. Let’s see, did I leave out anything? Yes, ticks, fleas and an assorted allotment of insects. In case you haven’t figured out yet I am a winter person. I like the cold, the snow (that’s the white stuff that rarely falls in coastal NC) and all that goes with winter. And that’s how I get through summer: I look past summer and know that winter is just around the corner. I look straight through summer, forgetting malaria, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Lyme disease, and heat stroke and see the first frost of fall. Our Christian lives shouldn’t be any different.

All through this world there are tons of things that rub against the grain of our Christian beliefs. Yet, while we are here we can’t separate ourselves totally from the world: I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world (1 Corinthians 5:9-10). They are here, we are here, and we cannot get around them totally. But, we don’t have to become like them. We don’t have to lose site of our goal.

Paul wrote, “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). No matter what the world around him was, Paul never lost site of the goal. He knew where he was going. The mosquitoes, the ticks, the roads clogged with tourist did not take his eye away from the prize. While we many times allow such distractions to take our eyes away from our goal, Paul knew the elements that were there against him and yet he pressed on toward his goal. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air” (1 Corinthians 9:26 NIV). Paul went to the goal. He fought to get to the goal. He had direction.

When the least of distractions stand between us and our goal so often we decide to change goals. We think it easier to become one with the distractions than to continue to our goal. Yet, all those distractions are the smallest of things when compared to the goal. Are you willing to let a mosquito stand between you and your prize?


Around the world of Blogdom tonight:

Trey Morgan tells us ten things he has written in his Bible
Tim Waldrop has the does God exist debate
Greg England has Pentecost 1.0
Bobby Valentine continues looking at Heaven
Richard Mansel says someone is very confused!

Until Next time May The Good Lord Bless And Keep You: All Y'all

Bobby


Bobby Cohoon
North Carolina, USA
cohoon@earthlink.net