The Little Letters - Day 20

1 John 5:13-21 13 I have written this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know you have eternal life. 14 And we are confident that he hears us whenever we ask for anything that pleases him. 15 And since we know he hears us when we make our requests, we also know that he will give us what we ask for.
16 If you see a fellow believer sinning in a way that does not lead to death, you should pray, and God will give that person life. But there is a sin that leads to death, and I am not saying you should pray for those who commit it. 17 All wicked actions are sin, but not every sin leads to death.
18 We know that God’s children do not practice sinning, for God’s Son holds them securely, and the evil one cannot touch them. 19 We know that we are children of God and that the world around us is under the control of the evil one.
20 And we know that the Son of God has come, and he has given us understanding so that we can know the true God. And now we live in fellowship with the true God because we live with his Son, Jesus Christ. He is the only true God, and he is eternal life.
21 Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God’s place in your hearts.

Do you have anything that might take God’s place in your heart?
That may seem like a simple question, but it is probably something that most of us wrestle with time and time again. We want to keep Jesus first and foremost in our lives, but we sometimes get distracted, confused, or simply forget.

Money, love, and family can supplant God’s place in our lives. Not that loving family is a bad thing; of course, it is not. However, there are times when we put great things in front of the place that Jesus should have in our lives. It is easy to let things slip without the desire to keep God as primary.
 
Have you ever made a new years resolution? The power and focus that it takes to keep those things going strong is pretty impressive. Most people drop the ball by the beginning of February. If you have made it past that, then you are in about 3% of people who make those resolutions! Amazing!

But this focus we have on keeping God primary in our lives is something that is even more difficult, yet more important. So how do we keep God first? How do we seek first the kingdom of God and make that into our habit?
 
First, I think we start to do it by rearranging our lives to make the God choice the easy choice. This takes a little bit of organization, a little bit of focus, and a little bit of time. But when we do make these choices a priority, we will then begin to find ourselves falling into much more disciplined patterns that keep us moving toward toward the focus that we want to have in our lives.

1. What can you rearrange in your life to help keep the focus on God? 
2. How many distractions do you live with each day? 
3. Are you a very disciplined person in general? Do you need help with maintaining a structure in your spiritual life?