We have lived in our home almost seven years now and I continue to admire the couple who built this house back in 2002. They were an older couple who had sold their summer lake home as well as a residence here in Carmel – and then combined their resources to build this house. Carl and Sandy were made for each other. She was the social one who wanted a home for entertaining and I was told that Carl was an engineer who worked for Rolls Royce. I believe that he was involved with designing jet engines as opposed to cars, but his attention to detail and his commitment to absolute excellence are legendary.
The home he designed was overbuilt in almost every respect. For example, he had extra strong mortar mixed to hold the bricks together and many wall switches in the house are wired to be activated from several locations. Before we moved in, he actually replaced the sump pump and several other pieces of equipment in the house, just to be on the safe side – not wanting us to be burdened with any repairs when we took possession. And in an unbelievable act of kindness, he had all the exterior locks and handles changed so that we would experience the same thrill that he had the day that they started to live in this house – with all the shiny new hardware!
I had taken several tours of the home with Carl prior to closing so I thought I was familiar with just about everything. But the day that Janet and I moved in, I was perplexed by four yellow dots that had been painted on the garage floor. The next morning I noticed that there were small red dots of light that periodically went on in the garage and lined up with the yellow painted dots. So, I called Carl and found out that he had motion activated lasers installed in the garage so that his wife, Sandy, knew where to stop the car when she entered the garage.
Now I have heard of people suspending tennis balls on strings or doing other things to mark the place in the garage where the car should be parked, but I don’t know anyone who has installed lasers to mark the exact location. But, that’s Carl… always wanting to make sure that things were the best that they could be. When I asked Carl about his decision for lasers, he told me that Sandy had run her car into the front wall of the garage once or twice and he wanted to make sure that he minimized the chance of that happening again…
Anyway, Janet and I were out in the garage today, organizing things and changing the way that we will park our cars. That necessitated changing the aiming of the lasers on the ceiling and we worked together to position everything in the right place. To be sure, it is exacting work and I wanted to make sure that everything was lined up correctly. I was up on the ladder making small adjustments when it occurred to me that there were many similarities to the work that we were doing and how we should focus on our relationship with God.
The Bible is clear that God created everything. And He tends to everything with a laser focus. Just look around – this world isn’t random. It was designed and created by someone wise and focused beyond our wildest imagination. In fact, God is omnipresent (all present), omnipotent (all powerful) and omniscient (all knowing) – in other words, completely in charge and in control of everything. Nothing slips through the cracks with God.
While God stays focused on us, in our verse for tonight the author of Hebrews implores us to keep our gaze squarely on Jesus. We are told, in Hebrews 12:2-3, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
My encouragement this evening is that Jesus is focused on us and wants us to be focused on Him. My prayer is that we will all spend more time studying the ways of Jesus, with a laser focus, and continue to try and become more like Him as we grow in our faith. Have a great day in the Lord, grace and peace…