Student Leadership 201: FocusSample

Focus On The Story You’re Writing 

Have you ever thought about how much time you spend watching people’s stories on Instagram? It’s low-key addicting, right? We love the raw (okay, maybe sometimes filtered) behind-the-scenes footage that stories give us into someone else’s life. 

Stories are great, but the problem is that if we’re not careful we can end up wasting our lives watching other people’s stories instead of writing our own. 

If you’ve been around church for a minute, you’ve probably heard of a guy named Paul. He wrote 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament so he’s kind of a big deal. But before Paul became a sold-out servant of Jesus, he went by the name Saul. Saul was an evil dude. Acts 8:3 says Saul was, “ravaging the church. He would enter house after house, drag off men and women, and put them in prison.” 

But God had a better story in mind for Saul. In Acts 9, Saul had an encounter with God that left him temporarily blind, but forever changed. God (literally) had to mess up Saul’s vision in order to get him focused. 

Paul didn’t just start going by a new name after he experienced God. He started writing a different story and the theme of his story was grace. It’s actually a word he used over 100 times in his books of the New Testament. He talked about grace more than all the other writers of the Bible combined! But think about it — when Saul became Paul he experienced God’s grace to his core, so it naturally became his core message. 

Paul didn’t allow the shame of his past to keep him from writing a better story for his future. He didn’t settle for trying to copy the stories of Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John. He stayed focused on what God was teaching him and the opportunities God gave him. And he tells us to do the same thing in Ephesians 5.

Pay careful attention, then, to how you walk — not as unwise people, but as wise — making the most of the time…

YOU have a story to write. In fact, you have a story that nobody else can write — but if you’re going to write a story worth telling, you’re going to have to pay attention to what you pay attention to. Are you fixated on other people’s lives or focused on the life God has given you?  

What (or who) holds your attention right now? What’s the theme of your story? How are you making the most of the opportunities God has given you?