Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Concentration (07/24/08)
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TITLE: Christ's Passion | Previous Challenge Entry
By Rita Horten
07/25/08 -
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I looked up the word “Concentrate” to see what Webster’s definition is: 1. To bring or direct toward a common center. 2. To collect or focus (one’s thoughts, efforts, etc.) 3. To increase the strength, density, or intensity of; to fix one’s attention on. 4. To mass (troops) in a place.
Because of Christ’s love for his Father and His love for us, He was able to concentrate on His mission from beginning to end, in every way.
At the age of 12, Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem to sit at the feet of the teachers in the temple, instead of returning home with his family. When they found Him and expressed their anxiety, He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” (Luke 2:49) Even then, His focus was directed toward a common center, His Father’s business.
When Christ was ready to begin His public ministry and He went to John the Baptist to be baptized, John tried to prevent Him, saying “I need to be baptized by You, and You are coming to me?” (Matthew 3:14) Christ could have been filled with pride and He may have desired to baptize His own cousin, but He was able to concentrate beyond the circumstance and stay focused on His mission. Christ answered John by saying, “Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” (Matthew 3:15) Christ knew His purpose.
When Satan took Christ into the wilderness to tempt Him, Christ summed the whole 40 days up with these words of wisdom. “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.” (Matthew 4:10) To be starved and thirsting for 40 days, having all the desires of this world brought before Him, Christ never wavered. His concentration was on His heavenly Father and worshipping only Him. He was able to concentrate His thoughts and efforts on the one thing that He came to accomplish. He would not be deterred.
Throughout His three-year ministry, He taught His disciples and the masses who thronged to hear Him and be healed by Him, of His purpose, which was to bring salvation through His death and resurrection, first to the Jews and then to the Gentiles. His love for the Father and His love for us gave Him the ability to concentrate and increase the strength and intensity of His purpose. That would be proven in the Garden of Gethsemane, when sweating drops of blood, He asked God to take this cup from Him, yet He was able to concentrate on the fulfillment of His purpose, in the midst of the agonizing sorrow of His soul, and prayed “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.” (Matthew 26:42)
Through a mock trial, through the most brutalizing and agonizing beating and scourging anyone ever endured, and at His crucifixion, Christ assembled the masses, the troops, His followers and His mockers in one place. It was to witness the height of His concentration, His focused purpose. In shame and humiliation, He hung between God and man to pay the ultimate price for our sins. He reminded the disciple He loved to care for Mary, Christ’s mother. Even in His darkest hour, when all the sins of the world were placed upon Him and His beloved Father could not look upon Him, He cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” Even then, Christ remained focused until the transaction was completed and He cried out “Tetelestai” which means, the debt is paid. It is finished.
Christ was able to concentrate on my lost state and fulfill my need for a Savior no matter what the cost. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. (John 15:13)
Oh, that I might concentrate all that I am, all that I have and all that I ever hope to be or do, on the One Christ, who concentrated wholly upon my salvation.
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