Are You Awake To What God Is Doing Around You?

Have you ever been looking for something you know is typically in one place, but the next time you go check it’s not there? As a result, you go ask someone else, only for them to find it in the place you just checked?

Unfortunately, this is a common occurrence in my household. Most times, my wife will proceed to find what it was I was looking for, and then hit me with the never-tiring line of “Are you blind,” which is rich coming from her, whose eyesight is 3x worse than mine.

This strange phenomenon extends to other areas of my life, including the grocery store. One of my new annoyances in life is when my local grocery store changes its layout and reconfigures where items are. Again, I completely miss what I am looking for, simply due to a slight rearrangement of the items. My introverted self then has to muster up the courage to ask an employee of the store where this item is, only for them to tell me, “Look behind you.”

I can’t describe the exact reason why or how, but I always find a way to miss what is right in front of me. I am so fixated on the item being where I want it to be that I don’t see what’s around it. 

Tunnel Vision

Tunnel vision is an actual medical condition where you can lose some of your peripheral vision to the point that you can’t see anything that isn't directly in front of you. Most people today refer to others as having tunnel vision, not literally, but rather as a way to describe their inability to view things outside of what they are concentrating on. 

During our Christian walk, I think we can develop tunnel vision when it comes to our prayers and seeing what God is doing. In most instances, when we pray, we tend to already have an idea/hope of how we want God to answer or how we want him to resolve a situation. Over the course of time, if we are not seeing the answer/situation we were hoping for, prayer becomes more discouraging in our lives than encouraging, and eventually we may ask, “What’s the point of even praying?” We then start to pray less, hope less, and eventually, as in the earlier example of not finding what you’re looking for, we give up. It’s the danger of “tunnel vision prayers.”

I think Paul in Colossians 4:2 can provide us some insight on how we can combat this discouragement or tunnel vision when praying. Paul writes to the Colossians and says, “Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.” 

Paul instructs us to continue steadfastly in prayer, meaning we are not to grow weary of praying or get so busy that prayer becomes a “nice to do” rather than an essential discipline in our day-to-day lives. He then says we are to be “watchful,” alert to the things around us. 

Tunnel-vision prayers keep you focused on one thing, so it becomes hard to see the needs of those around us. We are so fixated on our prayer that we neglect to pray for others or to be aware of the needs of our families, church, or community. Yes, God may not be answering our prayers the way we desire, but what if He’s placing opportunities for us to make an impact, for our prayers to help someone, but we aren’t alert to them because we’ve got tunnel vision. 

Are We Missing What God is Doing? 

Paul, in the same verse, grounds steadfastness and watchfulness in “thanksgiving.” Tunnel-vision prayers not only take away from our ability to be aware of others, but also take away our ability to see the things God may be doing in our lives. It takes the one prayer we have and says that, “If God is not answering this, then that means He’s not doing anything in my life at all.”

Thankfulness (thankfully) allows us to remember the things God is doing in our lives and for those around us. It helps us not ignore God’s hand in our lives, even when it is in the peripheral areas. We can be encouraged that “if God has done this, He can definitely do that.”

My wife and I are currently going through a situation that we have been praying about for years now, to the point where tunnel vision started seeping in, and it seemed like our life was just revolving around this one thing. However, in the last few months, we’ve both been trying to be more intentional about thanking God for the small things that happen, as well as praying for others more than ourselves. 

For example, recently we had an appointment scheduled early in the morning, and I took time to thank God that, out of all the days and times they could have given us, it worked out perfectly so we could both attend without having to miss work. In the grand scheme of it all, it's an insignificant thing, but those things can be the small peripheral moments that make us aware God is there, if we don’t miss it. 

I encourage you today to set your eyes on Christ and not the situation you are in. Let’s not miss what God is doing in our lives, or be too focused on ourselves.  Ask him to take your eyes off what you may be focused on, and to fill your prayer life with awareness of everything he is doing and awareness of those around you.