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Tunnel Vision

For some reason or another when I used to play basketball quite a bit I was often confronted with a problem: tunnel vision. Now I didn't have an actual medical condition that only exhibited itself when I played my favorite sport, but I did have a problem. As the action progressed and my heart pumped in excitement I noticed that I often had difficulty perceiving anything outside of my immediate gaze. This caused problems as you can imagine. Occasionally open teammates were unnoticed and even more often I was unaware of the opposing players' advancement. This meant my dribbling skills did very little for me when someone came out of nowhere to pop the ball out of my hands.

I used to be frustrated very much by this condition of tunnel vision. Granted it didn't happen all the time and often I was able to keep a watchful eye on my would be assailants. However it certainly happened more than I desired so I began to give it some thought. You see it often happened when I was overly excited and the outcome of my actions were more influential on the result of the game. It often happened when I was not alerting myself to my surroundings and it often happened when I wasn't looking at the big picture.The end result of my dilemma was that when it happened it severely inhibited the success of my team. In fact the old adage of keeping your eye on the ball could easily have been my undoing as I should have been surveying the entire court.

Do we survey the entire court when we play the game of life? Scripture teaches us that a man plans his way but the Lord directs His steps. As we glance around and take in the incoming information of life do we absorb more than just what is immediately in front of us or do we approach life with perspective? It is especially important that we approach life with a bird's eye view or with all the facts. Otherwise we may be taken off guard when the devil approaches us from our blind side. And we all have them don't we?

All scripture is inspired by God. That means that the verse before the one you're reading is also inspired, just as the one after it. The path of heaven may be narrow, but those that find it will not have narrow minds but thoughts that are broad and deep like the God that inspires them.

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