Choosing Intentionality Can Save Your Life
During a recent interview with Bill Gaither, I asked him, “What have you done to stay focused on what’s important?” He’s written over 700 gospel songs. He’s been a leader of Christian music since the old days and the mentor of most of the musicians we see today. He helped them get started.
Bill said, “When I was a young man getting out of college, we started to sing in little churches on the weekends, and people liked what we were doing. They would call and say, ‘Would you come here? Would you do this and that?’ Pretty soon we couldn’t do everything we were being asked to do.”
He continued, “Then I got a call from Montana from the radio program in Billings. ‘You got to come’ they said. ‘If you don’t come, you’re going to be responsible. People are going to go to hell if you don’t come.’ That’s a heavy trip. Right?”
He laughed a little bit, but his point was you have to know what the most important things are that you can do.
In the previous blog, Keep Moving Forward, we discussed entropy which means systems tend to move from order to disorder.
- Decide.
First, make a decision. It takes courage to say, “Things aren’t where they’re supposed to be. There’s some disorder in my life.” It’s easier to do nothing and just let things fade. And we can fade to the point of no return. Have you ever watched someone give up? They don’t see any way out.
Satan thrives at the point of no return.
When people go through a divorce or have a personal failure, he’s just waiting to say, “Hey, let that entropy continue … just keep fading.” And some listen to him and choose to walk away instead of putting the right energy back into their marriage, their finances or whatever it is.
Our bodies are fading. And we’re not going to live forever physically. But as followers of Christ, when we die, He takes us to a new place with Him.
Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (ESV).
It’s God’s intention for us is to fight the law of entropy.
- Decide not to go down that path.
- Refuse to allow Satan to push you to give up.
- Keep moving forward.
- Trust God … which moves us to the second point of intentional living and that is to do something.
Whenever you feel like you’re fading, put the right kind of energy back into your life, starting spiritually, with the power of the Holy Spirit.
2. DO
Do something. If you find yourself drifting from God, put some energy back into your relationship with Him. Overcome inertia. Fight the tendency to stay in the state you’re in.
If you’re traveling down a losing path, don’t continue down that path because it’s easy. Get off that path. It takes energy to get into a treatment program if you have a drug problem. It takes energy to fix your marriage if it’s struggling. It requires energy to get some help and find out what is going on with your health if it’s failing.
Continue to take whatever energy God gives you and put it back into your life.
3. Declutter
We can clutter our lives with so many things. It takes a lot more energy to keep everything you collected in your life together. I don’t mean just stuff. I’m talking about your thoughts, your relationships … everything.
We must simplify to know what’s truly important and stay focused on those things.
Bill Gaither is 86 years old. He’s stayed focused on the things that were most important – the things
God gave him to do in his life.
4. Debrief
What does debrief mean? We each need to stop sometimes and ask, “How am I doing?” Maybe it’s the end of the week that works best for you. But sometime every week you should look back and ask:
- How did this week go?
- How am I doing?
- Am I staying focused on doing the right things?
- Is entropy overtaking my life?
- What do I need to put some energy into this next week?
Always start your debrief with gratitude. God has been so good. Every time you pray, say, “Lord, Thank you. I’m amazingly blessed.” Although it’s easy for us to allow Satan to whisper into our ears at those points of no return, that’s not God’s intention for any of us.
2 Timothy 4:7 says, “I fought the good fight. I finished the race, and I kept the faith” (NIV). God’s intention is not for us to fade but to keep fighting to the end.
