In the Zone

Isaiah-26-3c

You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You.  Isaiah 26:3

RECOMMENDED READING:  Isaiah 26:1-4  “In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: “We have a strong city; God will appoint salvation for walls and bulwarks.2 Open the gates,That the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in.3 You will keep him in perfect peace,Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.4 Trust in the Lord forever,For in YAH, the Lord, is everlasting strength.”

COMMENTS:  Being and staying focused on tasks or goals or work is necessary for success and accomplishments.  This may be easy when doing short duration or more pleasant tasks but more difficult for long term or difficult or unpleasant tasks.  “Mind over matter” may work for short duration tasks but something more is needed for work with long range goals.   Yesterday we focused on discovering Jesus’ example and focusing on learning to “pray without ceasing” and learning to follow the Holy Spirit’s nudging voice.  Discovering how and who we are unkind and what to do different.

Today let’s focus on mental work or training we also need to do.  Kirk Cousins, as famous respected quarterback, who recently signed a three year $84M contract for the Minnesota Vikings football team, sought help from his coach to sharpen his mental focus abilities.  Knowing he is a “Star War movie buff”, the “brain coach” attached EEG monitor sensor wires to his brain and to a video player so player would stop when he lost mental focus.  He was training to gain and sustain “mental focus” or stay “in the zone” for longer periods of time.  The motivation to enjoy a movie he loved helped motivate him to learn to sustain this “in the zone” time.  Apparently it helped him achieve his goal and improve his game.

So what about us?  We desire to be more effective in obedience and service for Christ but struggle with distractions and fatigue and just life in general, right?  Well, what needs to change in us to make 2019 a more Christ centered and Christ like life lived than 2018 was?  How do we more successfully “pray without ceasing” in 2019 than we did in 2018?

Philippians 3:12-14 says: “I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us.”

But instead of renting a EEG machine and connecting it to us and to a video machine playing our favorite movie, does God offer a better approach to improve our mental focus on listening to and obeying Him?   What are some things to consider?

  1. Planning our day better setting aside prayer and meditation time for brief times but also several times during day. Then migrate to a quiet place away from distraction for that planned time.
  2. Avoid starting new tasks as that time approaches and try to schedule so those times come at completion of tasks to avoid unnecessary conflict or distraction.
  3. Give priority to those times with God but start out simple with an attainable and doable frequency and duration.
  4. Seek an accountability partner who can help in scheduling as well as who you can answer to when start to fail or fall short.  A partner who will help with support and encouragement but also with suggesting to help you succeed.
  5. Paste reminder notes in key areas with a meaningful scripture or word of encouragement.
  6. Tell your wife and pastor what you are planning so they have opportunity to make suggestions or provide agreeable help too.
  7. Set regular times to appraise progress and need for any course corrections.  A good time may be to start daily just before going to bed and then make adjustments as needed.
  8. Set focus on removing unnecessary time consuming tasks like idle TV watching without a good program to watch or accessing phone texts or internet surfing without a specific need or purpose.

These are just a few ideas or suggestion to get you thinking, but the list needs to be your own and maybe should start out at least being a shorter list to not get overwhelmed or bogged down in what to do or not do.  

Remember, He keeps those in perfect peace whose minds are focused on Him.  Failure need not be a permanent destination, but a crossroads to access a different path. 

“We should invest our time, finances, and talents in the coming kingdom and focus on Christ as the center, source, and goal of our lives.”  Charles Swindol

If you wish, you can access my blog at “https://donsdevotions.wordpress.com“. There you will find 364 blog posts I have made plus a link to my devotional journal material archives from 2013 to present.

You may also access my Facebook page and request to be my friend and automatically receive my daily journal publications daily.  My Facebook page is: https://www.facebook.com/Dondevotionals/ Many thanks to a pastor and dear brother in Christ in Nepal who set up the above Facebook page to help and encourage and give opportunity for more to   explore and use my devotional blog materials.

My hope and prayer are, my blog and devotional materials will become a source of encouragement and tools in ministry for you.

 

Published by donsdevotions

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Don McDaniel - Who am I? Hello everyone and welcome to my devotional journal blog. In order to get acquainted and help you get to know me a bit better before considering following my blog, let me give you some background. I am a 74-year-old male and a retired engineer. I worked for a major supplier of underground mining equipment for nearly 40 years before retiring in 2012. Arlene and I have been happily married since April 1978 and have two grown – married children, one granddaughter and 2 step grandsons. I joined the local United Methodist church at age 12 after accepting Christ as my Savior at age 10 during revival services in that same church in 1961, so I have been a “Born Again” Christian all my teen years and adult life. Christ has helped and guided me all that time. He guided me in choosing my wife and life’s career. My life journey has included regrets and failures, but God has picked me up and protected and spared me from life threatening consequences and dangers more times than I can recall or count. But many I do recall and encourage and motivate me to trust and follow Christ with more passion than ever. Christmas 2011 our daughter gave Arlene and I each a devotional journal. Journals were books with devotion for each day and space to give personal impressions and thoughts related to each devotion. Her desire was to have a lasting legacy she could refer back to and share with her children and grandchildren especially after we are gone. I was touched by that gesture. My parents and Arlene’s were devout Christians, so we would have greatly treasured having that from them, so we felt a sense of urgency to honor her request. I finished my journal first and returned it to our daughter the following Christmas. I’m glad I did it then because Parkinson’s has caused my hand writing to deteriorate since then. The exercise was such a blessing for me. Discipline of keeping journal helped me gain a deeper walk with Christ and greater discipline in honoring my time of prayer and devotion with Him each day. So, I decided to continue the practice but since I could not find a paper journal I liked, I decided to create my own. I had already been receiving electronic devotions by email every day from several sources, my favorite being “Turning Point” from Dr. David Jeremiah. What I decided to do was to include devotional scripture but add my own thoughts and comments only so there would be no issue of copyright infringement. Creating and maintaining journal by computer also addressed my deteriorating handwriting ability. I started an electronic devotion journal January 1, 2013 and have been faithful to that practice every day since. I prayed about method and level of distribution. My initial intent was to only share it with my two children by email, but quickly discovered others in my family, my church, and friends from work (both retired and still working) who knew me and wanted to be included in distribution when they learned what I was doing. I now distribute by email my daily journal at the beginning of each month to over 150 friends and relatives. God has richly blessed and encouraged me. I am concerned with the state of our church and nation, and world for that matter, believing we are living in the end times the prophets of old and Christ have talked about in scripture, so time is short. I desire to be true to my Savior and a witness to help others come to a saving knowledge of Him and equipped to share His Good News too. If my journal can encourage and help others, I believe God wants me to share it. I struggled, for a time at first, because I know many others keep similar journals but only for their own edification and do not want to share them because they are private. However, Christ has stirred my heart to share it as a witness tool. Our son and daughter have a long-time friend who grew up with them who we also befriended nearly 25 years ago. He had a lot of family problems, so would gravitate to our family as a refuge and eventually thought of us as his adopted parents and he as our adopted son. We lost contact with him for some time when he grew up and left home. He traveled around the U.S. and eventually ended up in Ukraine where he resided for next 10 years. He had to return to the US to renew his visa and took opportunity to recommend I begin a blog of my devotions and helped me set it up. He is also an active blogger and has been an email subscriber to my journal for several months, so he has been suggesting I expand my distribution by starting a blog to get broader exposure. After reflection and prayer, I concluded God was in this, so he is helping me set up my blog site. This brief autobiography is my first entry. He returned to Ukraine, then resided there until circumstanced made him decide to move back to US with his young son. This biography was my first post February 29, 2016 . I have published 600 posts from 2016-2023 automatically sent to all my Facebook friends, published on WordPress to be accessible to anyone curious or seeking a deeper walk with God. I decided to take a sebatical to prepare for a new chapter. In 2014 I was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease which affects patient ability to walk, drive, do physical work, and eventually talk. By mid 2023 it became evident our home for last 42 years (previously owned by my parents for previous 44 years and by my mother's grandparents for 39 years before that) would eventually not meet my needs so we decided to sell it and move into 1st floor of a duplex we also owned that was the town school from 1855-1913. Likewise, the property was requiring more maintenance that I was no longer able to keep up with. 2023 involved selling our home and moving into apartment next door and then in early 2025 an opportunity to move closer to our daughter and granddaughter in Kentucky which was completed in May 2025. For a number of months I have been seeking direction seeking God's direction and timing to return to blogging as my journey with Parkinson's continues to unfold with God's guiding hand in mine. I hope and pray my devotions will continue to be a blessing for you. God certainly has become closer and more real to me since started this blog in 2016. I have spent time with Him studying scripture and praying and listening and writing this journal. I will continue seeking God’s help and will welcome your input to make this site as meaningful as I can and true to God, who is motivating me to create and maintain it. I will also welcome input in order to make format more meaningful going forward. Don & Arlene McDaniel In His Service, Email: mcdanieldonald769@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Don1951 If you wish, you can access my blog at “https://donsdevotions.wordpress.com“. There you will find 600+ blog posts I have made plus a link to my devotional journal material archives from 2013 to present (https://donsdevotions.wordpress.com/2016/03/02/link-to-dons-devotional-journal-entries-2013/ ) You may also access my Facebook page and request to be my friend and automatically receive my daily journal publications daily. My Facebook page is: https://www.facebook.com/Dondevotionals/ Many thanks to a pastor and dear brother in Christ in Nepal who set up the above Facebook page to help and encourage and give opportunity for more to explore and use my devotional blog materials.

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