How’s Your God Attention Span?

The link will take you to Amazon.  A couple of times this book was free for Kindle readers, and may be again. It’s a teacher’s view of his class, and I enjoy reading the stories.  I just finished the chapter “Ray’s Math Homework.”

Ray knew he was unable to work through math equations. He was just bad at math, unable to grasp understanding. His mother was hoping for a D this year – it would be an upgrade from before. As the story develops, we discover Ray’s problem isn’t math, it is his attention span.

Since I usually look for biblical applications to every day life, this one was a given – we see ourselves unable to work through problems in our daily lives. Perhaps our own problems are more indicative of attention span than anything else.

Don’t we expect instant response to our own problems? When that doesn’t happen, we blame God for not taking care of us? We expect an immediate response to a problem that took years to create, and we expect it from a God to whom a thousand years is but a day.

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. (2 Peter 3:8 KJV)

Then, when the answer is not what we want, not what will bring us happiness, we blame God for what’s wrong in our lives. The very same God that we believe:

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:9 KJV)

Look at Eve.  She believed God but so easily gave in to what she saw in front of her rather than the words she knew and the Creator she walked with. She took time to consider her choice:

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. (Genesis 3:6 KJV)

Satan didn’t say one word to Adam. Not one single temptation did Satan lay before Adam. All it took was his best friend’s urging to enjoy what was good, pleasant to the eyes and was desirable to make him wise.

How many of us fall for these ideas from our own friends?

How long is our God attention span? Long enough to keep away from temptation?  Long enough to wait through a lesson from Him? Long enough to learn what He has in store for us – even if it takes years?

Or, must we have the desirable thing now?