I remember reading a story in which some of the characters had summer jobs at a golf course. One was a young man who had a real talent for finding golf balls. He could go out and walk around the golf course in an afternoon and come back with pockets full of golf balls that he would sell for spare change. When asked what his secret was he’d say focus. He would train his eyes and his mind to focus on the size and shape and texture, or appearance of a golf ball. If there were just a few dimples of a ball sticking out of the grass, his eyes could see it. He wouldn’t pay any attention to the flowers or the squirrels or anything else. If it wasn’t a golf ball, he wouldn’t see it. He would just look for what he wanted to see.
This can be a real useful and enviable skill. The fact is that a lot of us have it. We can listen to a pastor’s 30-minute message and pick out each of the five grammatical errors. We can list the personality traits that we find annoying in our acquaintances or relatives. We can be quick to be offended by something that someone might say or do, because that is what we expect. Again, it’s just a matter of looking for what we want to see and seeing what we are looking for.
This all came to mind as we were studying Philippians 4:8. Here, Paul points out what we should be focused on, what we should be looking for and seeing, not what is little or annoying, not what we think should be different or fixed, or the speck in someone else’s eye (Matthew7:3). “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”
That’s a big refocusing that I need to do. It will take work and a lot of reminders, followed by refocusing. It is amazing what you can see and enjoy in God’s world when you change your focus.