I remember years ago while visiting my uncle on his farm, he asked if I wanted to learn how to drive his riding lawn mower-- a subtle Tom Sawyer type way to get his lawn mowed I believe. Of course, I jumped at the idea having never before operated a riding lawn mower. He had already made the first couple of rows so all I had to do was stay in line with his rows and everything would come out just fine. So, after a brief lesson how the clutch worked, off I went bouncing along the bumpy farm yard. As I rolled along I found myself weaving back and forth, over adjusting the steering wheel trying to stay with the line of the row to my side. When I got to the end of the yard my first row looked like a saw tooth instead of a straight line. So my uncle came out and gave me some additional advice. He pointed to a tree way in the distance and said, "Just keep your eyes on that tree as you mow and your rows will come out straight." Well, it worked. Instead of constantly glancing back and forth trying to stay within the lines, I kept my eyes on the tree and my rows suddenly became straight as a string.
The writer of Hebrews gives us similar advice when he states, "...let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith."
So many times in this life I find myself trying to stay within the lines of all the things the world is throwing at me. I react to people who want to make things difficult or situations out of my control, and then when I look back, I see where my path didn't go in a straight line. In fact, often times see where I made things worse. As we've been teaching through the Sermon on the Mount series, we have seen that the religious leaders in Jesus day tried to put God in a box by making up all sorts of rules and then requiring the people stay inside of that box. But when Jesus came along, he taught that instead of trying to live within a set of rules that we simply keep our eyes on him, the "author and perfecter of our faith." when we live this way, Jesus then becomes our standard; Jesus becomes our focus and our hope.
We all need Jesus. There is no other way to make it through this life, but to keep our eyes on Jesus. As our sins weigh us down and create chaos in our life, Jesus is there as the only way to bring us back to God and keep our paths straight. Just like the tree in the distance helped keep my rows straight on the mower, Jesus is there to keep our paths straight on our way to drawing closer to God.
Robert Morrison,
member and former pastor of Maple Grove Community Church, Kokomo, IN and past Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Church of God General Conference