Intro: My wife, Kristy, is a determined person. Whenever she is involved in a task or a project, she doesn’t give up until it is finished. When she gets her mind on something, she will not let it go until it is resolved. Christmas is our favorite time of year. We enjoy all that the season brings. One part of the Christmas season we love is having the Christmas tree decorated with the lights glowing. Notice I said having the Christmas tree as opposed to putting up the Christmas tree. I enjoy seeing the Christmas tree with the lights and decorations. I don’t enjoy the putting up process. Kristy does enjoy it. Every year without fail, when the appropriate day has arrived, we work at getting our tree as close to perfection as possible. Kristy is extremely focused on getting the tree completely decorated on that day. During one of these decorating marathons, we were checking the lights to see which ones were working. About half the strings of lights worked. It was late, and I was of the opinion we could get the lights the next day and finish the job. In my mind. In Kristy’s mind, however, we had to get the lights and finish the job that night. After a time of communication, I found myself in the Christmas light section of Wal-Mart. We finished the tree that night. Not because I was suddenly moved by the season. But because Kristy was so focused on getting the tree done. She was in the zone.

The phrase "in the zone" is used many times to describe the performance of an athlete. When an athlete is in the zone, they are focused and determined to be at their best. They can block out all distractions and overcome obstacles. They catapult their game to another level that is near perfect. Athletes do not stay in the zone every time they play. Being in the zone for an athlete happens from time to time.

In verses that were read earlier from Mark 12, Jesus is responding to question posed by a religious leader of the day. The question was what is the most important of all the commandments. Jesus begins his answer with the statement: Hear O Israel! Jesus is addressing God’s chosen people. He is talking to people who are supposed to be following God. The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. Jesus was making sure everyone understood that there was only one God. He was setting up His next statement. You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, all your strength. I like the way the Message translates this verse,

Jesus goes on to mention another commandment that He says is just as important, Love your neighbor as yourself. Why would Jesus add another commandment? He was only asked for the most important. When we choose to live in the God zone, we are committing all of our being to loving God and following Him. If we are living for God with that intensity, we cannot look at His creation without love. If we are dedicated to loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength; our eyes will be open to seeing others with the value and importance that God places in people. To be in the zone is to immerse our life in the love God has for each of us. Loving God with all we are is living in the God zone.

Too often, pride is the catalyst to people moving away from living in the God zone. Pride tells you take control of life. You don’t need anyone else. Pride says you know it all, don’t listen to anyone else. Sometimes people can’t admit when they are wrong. And when they are wrong or don’t know the answer, they make something up.

Illustration: The other night, Kristy and I were watching the end of the Coca-Cola 600, a NASCAR race. We are not that into NASCAR, but the end of this race was kind of exciting. There were 10 laps to go and the lead car blows a tire in one of the turns. This causes a little bit of a crash. All the drivers are stopped in a single file row. They get the track cleaned up and the pace car starts off with the other cars following, still in a single file

line. Some of the drivers were veering their cars left and right while the pace car led them. Kristy asked me why they were doing this. I gave her a great answer. I told her they were trying to build speed so when the pace car goes off the track and the race starts again, they can have the speed they need to race. She seemed pretty impressed with this answer. Honestly, I was too. But I had know idea why those guys were driving like that. I was giving her the best answer I could come up with. I then told her that I had no idea why they were driving like that.

Living in the zone means that we defer to God’s leading in our lives. When pride is present, it steers our heart, mind, soul, and strength to what we can do with our lives. This keeps us from being in the God zone.

Illustration: My grandfather used to have recliner that he always sat it. Every time we went to my grandparents house, he was always setting there when we would come through the door. I rarely saw anyone else sitting in his chair. The chair wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. It did have one feature that distinguished it from other chairs. My grandfather would sit in his chair a certain way. Over the years, there was dent left in the chair due to the way he would sit. The funny thing is he wouldn’t get rid of it. He kept it for several years after it’s usefulness had been outlived. He finally had to get a knew chair because the other one had almost fallen apart.

Coming to a place of comfort in our Christian lives is a sign that danger is ahead. The status quo becomes our mode of living. We start to sleepwalk through life. Our relationship with God gets stuck in a rut. Things that used to excite us don’t. We become complacent to the things God desires for our lives. When we become comfortable Christians, we rob God . We take away a heart that beats for His kingdom and replace with a barely beating heart.

We quit taking spiritual risks. We don’t want to step out in faith for fear of what it might cost us. We take our place in our lazyboy without realizing that it is falling apart. As our comfort level rises, we slowly move away from living in the zone.

A few weeks ago, I celebrated my 34th birthday. As I was thinking about that day, I thought back to the time a became a Christian. I was 6 years old. I have been a Believer for 28 years. That is quit awhile. Many of you have enjoyed more years than that in your walk with Christ. In that span of time, it can be challenging to keep the same intensity of relationship with God. Sometimes, we have let that desire, that burning passion to change the world for God to wane until it becomes a simple chore. Our desire has turned to duty. Attending church used to be a chance to learn something new about God. You used to find a challenge from Sunday School. There was something tangible that you could take into the world during the week to help you in your journey with God. Somewhere along the way, church become something you have to do instead of a place you can’t wait to go. Worship was something that happened in your life throughout the week. It wasn’t confined to one hour on Sunday. Somehow, a life lived in worship to God became a one shot, fill me for the week so I can make until next Sunday mindset. Prayer was a time to communicate with your Creator. It was a time to share from your heart, openly and honestly to the God whose love knows no bound. Over time, prayers started sounding the same. The words you offer to God have become empty. Ministry was something you were excited about. You were more than ready to serve wherever God wanted you. Time goes by, and serving others is more difficult than you realized. And now you still are involved in service, but you are merely going through the motions. Somewhere the desire to love God with everything you have and all you are turned into that’s what I am supposed to do. Passion becomes obligation.

Desire that has turned to duty made it’s way there due to certain attitudes. One of those is the time clock mentality. When we walk in the church doors, when we take time for prayer, when we are involved in a ministry, we punch our card in the time clock and tell God I am giving you this amount of time and no more. If I somehow give more time, I need to be paid for overtime. We take the position that God gets this amount of time in our lives, no more. Somehow, we think this is how it should be.

Another attitude we have is driven by feelings. Feelings. I don’t feel like going to church. I don’t feel like teaching Sunday School. I don’t feel like singing songs or listening to a sermon. I don’t feel like serving anyone. I don’t feel...If we lived according to our feelings, we might be the president one day and in jail the next. Feelings are not a way to gauge your life. I will be honest with you. Sometimes I don’t feel like coming to church. And I am a minister.

Illustration: Sunday morning can be a pretty stressful time for everyone who is trying to get themselves and family to church on time and in one piece. It is no different at the Stokes house. Kristy sings with the praise team on Sunday mornings and has to be at church before me. Sunday morning comes and we start our routine of getting ready and getting the girls up and ready. It doesn’t always go as smooth as you would expect. No matter how much you plan, sometimes things happen. It doesn’t matter if

you get clothes ready the night before, get the kids their baths, get all the bows and bags and stuff together, something will happen. One Sunday morning we had our routine going. Kristy had already left. The girls were dressed, hair up and looking good, everyone had eaten, we were ready to go to church. Zoe was already on her way to the car. I was trying to locate Ellie. I was fairly certain she was in the house, so I went looking. I saw her coming from the dinning room into the kitchen. I was still confident we would make it to church with time to spare. As Ellie made her way to the kitchen, I noticed her pink dress had a very dark spot on it. The closer she got, the more I noticed. The spots seemed to multiply. Not only was there dark spots on her dress, there was green all around her mouth and on her face. She had gotten into some of Zoe’s paint and smeared it all over. I had to get a new dress, iron it, get Ellie cleaned up without giving her a complete bath, and get us all to church before the music started. If you would ask me if I felt like going to church that day, I would have said no way.

One last attitude people can have is the Dixie Plate mentality. I am referring to the Dixie paper plates that people use for picnics. These plates have compartments to keep your food from touching. We all know someone who doesn’t like their food to touch. My brother-in-law is like that. He eats one food item at a time so there is no intermingling of the food. I have always been of the opinion that it is all going to the same place, what does it matter. Some people treat their lives the same way. They have their Christian life in one space, work life in one space, friends in one space, children in one space. Everything has a place and they don’t effect the other. God had a different idea in mind. Our lives as Believers should have a place in all areas of our lives. If we are compartmentalizing life, we are keeping God away from places he needs to be. People at the workplace should know we are Christians. Friends should be able to ask us spiritual questions because they know that is who we are. Our children need to see God in our parenting. Our spiritual life should spread to every area of our life.

These attitudes contribute to turning our passion for a God centered life into an obligation. When this happens, we discount living in the God zone.

The things that were important when we began our spiritual walk are no longer at the top of our list. We have allowed other things to take the place of loving God with all our mind, strength, soul, and heart. The world sends us messages that confuse and distort the things that God meant to be important to our lives. The busyness that life brings effects the time we are able to give to what we value in life. Andy Stanley in his book, Choosing to Cheat, says this "When we cheat, we choose to give up on thing in hopes of gaining something else of greater value…Daily you make decisions to give up one thing in order to gain something else. This is especially true in the arena of your schedule. You face a variety of responsiblilites and opportunities: work, family, hobbies, clubs, leagues, the list is endless. Each competes for your attention. Each competes for you most valuable resource, your time. You allocate your time the best that you can, knowing all the while that somebody id going to feel cheated. Unfortunately, that somebody is usually someone we care a great deal about."

A great tug of war happens between us and what is important to us. Time. Family. Friends. Work. Church. God. In the end, we have to decide what will get the greatest portion of our attention. Unfortunately, God takes a back seat to other priorities in our life.

Many people start out serving God. Along the journey, they lose sight of loving God with all their being. We choose to serve other things before God, and this takes us from living in the zone.

These obstacles can pull at us and drag us away from living in the zone of living for God. To avoid these pitfalls, we have to make a conscious effort to love God with all our heart, mind, strength and spirit; to live in the zone.

That is your base from which to begin a zone lifestyle.

Illustration: Before I become a parent, I really didn’t understand all that was involved in parenting. I had read books about parenting to find out from other people what parenting was like. I talked to other parents who would tell me their experiences as a parent. I could even talk about parenting. It wasn’t until Zoe came along that all those things I read and heard about made sense.

Until you enter a personal relationship with Christ, you will not experience life in the zone with God.

The next part of the verse says:

I am not talking about quitting. Loving God with your entire life requires giving up the selfishness that we currently possess. You have to make a trade in, an upgrade for the only model that will give you life satisfaction. Living in the zone means following God with all of your life.

When we come to the point where we think we have learned all we can from God, we stop living in the zone. Growing in our relationship with God should be like giving our body nourishment. When we get hungry we eat. We don’t ignore that feeling. When our relationship with God becomes empty, it will be filled with something. We must consistently cultivate our life with God. This will ignite our passion to live in the zone on regular basis.

Expressing our thankfulness to God not only lets God know we are committed to him. It can be a picture for others to see the importance of God in our lives. Overflow points our minds to spilling out. People notice overflow.

Illustration: Zoe likes to play with bowls in the bathtub. One night, she was making a meal for me. She was filling the bowls with water for the food. At one point, my attention was somewhere else. When I focused back on Zoe and her meal, water was spilling all over the floor. I got up to clean the floor up and fell in the water.

When our lives overflow with giving praise and thanksgiving to God, people will see that we are living in the zone.

In the NASCAR race I talked about earlier, the interviewers were talking to one of the drivers while the wreck was being cleaned up. They asked him a number of questions. His answers were short without much elaboration. The interviewer finally stopped his questions. His comment about the driver was he was in the zone, he was focused on the goal that was set before him, to win the race.

God is clear about his desire for us: to love Him with all our heart, mind, spirit, and strength. If this doesn’t describe you, today you can change that. You can choose right now to give your whole life to God, to live in the zone.