BIBLE STORY: Instances from David’s life. (1 Samuel 17, 1 Samuel 26, 2 Samuel 6:14-23)
BIBLE VERSE: “So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then.” 1 Peter 1:14 (NLT)
As I was learning to drive a car, my parents taught me many techniques and methods to help me. I learned to position my mirrors properly so that I never had to turn my head to look to the side or to the back. I only had to angle my eyes to the mirrors to see where surrounding cars were. I learned to find dash controls, for air conditioning and the radio, by feel. At first, I tried to keep myself in the center of the lane by carefully watching the line at the edge of the road.
But my parents corrected me and taught me how to know where the tires of the vehicle were on the road so that I didn’t have to keep my eyes on the stripe right in front of my bumper. Then I was able to look far down the road, as far as I could see, and still maintain my place in the center of the lane. But more than anything else, I remember one phrase that my parents repeated over and over. “Focus on the road.” All of the techniques I learned had the same purpose. To help me keep my focus on the road. My parents knew that if I didn’t learn to keep my focus on the road, I might never reach my destination without an accident.
In our lives, we are following God, and we need to learn to keep our focus on Him. Just like obeying my parents’ techniques of keeping focus on the road, we need to obey God to keep our focus on Him and keep our lives on course. We need to focus on God, like David did. David knew that nothing else in his life was more important than God, and that guided him through many curves in the road of life.
No giant opponent would make David doubt God’s power. (1 Samuel 17) No unfair situation would make David strike out in anger. (1 Samuel 26) No derision or critique would cause David to stop worshiping God. (2 Samuel 6) David didn’t just think about and worship God once a week. His life was an act of worship. God has a destination in mind for your life. But to get there, you need to keep your focus on God and do what He wants you to do. Unswerving obedience to God is the best way to reach your destination and keep your life out of the ditch.