Rejoice:

Read:

Colossians 3:1 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. ² Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. ³ For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. ⁴ When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Have you ever bit your lip or cheek while chewing gum… and then you foolishly kept chewing that gum. The struggle is real. Or you spit it out but later in the day you were eating and then ended up biting it again?! Cool. That’s all I had today. Talk to you tomorrow!

Obviously I am joking because you could tell there were more words here. I tricked you though! The rest of these words are just these words over and over again. The rest of these… just kidding. Anyways, the reality is because you bit your lip it is swollen. Therefore, when you keep chewing that gum or when you eat something else you end up biting your lip or cheek again because it is sticking out or in a different place than what your mouth is used to.

This is true about pretty much everything in life, when something is sticking out, in an odd place, or ultimately not where it should be we fixate on it, it gets more attention, or it ends up being ran into more often. A moment of silence for everyone who has stubbed their pinky toe… *Silence*

In the same way our thought life, our day to day experience of reality, when things are wrong or things are difficult they stick out. Consequently we focus on those things, essentially biting our lip over and over again. Just like that swollen lip, biting it over and over again will just cause it to be worse. We are SUPPOSED to leave it alone.

God knows that if we focus on things that we don’t see as a swollen lip (lustful thoughts, desires for money, pleasing other people, etc.) we are simply going to increase their size in our life and ultimately they will be the only thing we notice. They build up, swell more and more. They begin to cause us immense pain and we keep complaining about them while simultaneously stimulating them causing them to continue to grow and impede our ability to get away from them.

SOOO God calls us to put off these things. Don’t stimulate them, ice them down, reduce their involvement in our life. Focus on something else so that we will not cause those injuries to swell and take over. We are called to focus on the fact that our lives are nestled within Christ. We have been changed, and it is time for us to fixate on that. Shift your thoughts, take them captive. Fixate on the Lord and let that reality become inflamed and overtake your life!

^{Philippians 4:8} 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.

Respond:

Spend 1 minute thanking God that you have lips… I mean, otherwise your teeth and mouth would dry out. lol Spend 1 minute thanking the Lord for giving us His Word to fixate on. Then spend 2-3 minutes asking Him to help you take your thoughts captive and focus on the things that are good!

Relate:

Don’t gossip with people. When someone is complaining and fixating on the negative things, help remind them that we are called to focus on the good things, encourage them to look up!