How Your Attention Is Your Most Valuable Resource

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One of the first things the Spanish conquistadors did when they took over South America was to collect gold nuggets from the rivers. Strangely, when the locals saw them doing it, they didn’t try to prevent them from looting the local treasures. Later, when asked to explain why, one man said: “We don’t understand what you find so interesting about this yellow stuff.” But the moral is also painful because this story is not only an open window into what happened in South America — it is also a mirror for us, because we are like those indigenous locals in the story of our own lives.

We live in a culture in which there is a disparity between the true value of our attention and its worth in our own eyes. We are far too willing to give it away for free in exchange for another distraction. In fact, there’s an “attention economy” that makes billions because it is easy for them to steal our attention from us. It’s easy for them to take it because we do not attach high enough value to it.

We’ll just watch another short video, just check another news flash, and in return, they sell our attention to advertisers for a huge fortune. In fact, our situation is worse than that of the South Americans because while gold is a treasure on earth, the attention we invest is one of the most important things in our lives worth far more than mere gold. In Hebrew, to pay attention is “le sim lev” or to “put your heart.” Attention is a matter of the heart, and its direction. As it is written in Proverbs:

“Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.” (Proverbs 4:23 Some translations say “Guard your heart” as the Hebrew word means both keep and guard.)

We all locked our doors as we left the house, and probably have a password to protect our phones. But what about putting the strongest guard of all around our hearts? What about securing the information of our minds? Our attention is the most valuable resource we have — it’s an outworking of our free will: what we choose to think about, dwell on, and give our time to.

Where we “put our hearts”, there our lives will flow and move whether we are aware of it or not, and whether or not we really want to move in that direction. As Yeshua taught us:

“The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” (Luke 6:45)

As the Messianic Jewish philosopher, Simon Weil, said: “Attention, when it reaches its highest level, is the same as prayer. It is based on faith and love.”

Worship is paying devoted attention to God. Whatever gets the majority of our attention is the thing we are worshiping. That is why everyone fights to get it. We need to guard it wisely, protect it carefully, and make sure it’s going to the right place.

Here are some questions for prayer and thought:

• Do I set my heart on things that divert me from the right path? Are there security loopholes for my attention, diverting my heart to sin or evil in any way? If so, what can I do to fix this?
• Is there room for silence in my life so that I can enjoy God’s presence – the gifts He sends me every day? To hear the voice of His stillness?

More than needing to clean and reorder our minds, I believe most of us suffer from attention overload (even if we’re paying attention to good things) which will eventually lead to spiritual, mental and even physical injury.

May God give us the wisdom, faith and courage to guard our attention and our hearts with all our might.

David’s heart’s desire was to fix his gaze upon the Lord (Psalm 27:4):

One thing have I asked of the Lord,
    that will I seek after:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord
    and to inquire in his temple.

Yeshua told us that the pure in heart, those who have cleaned away other worldly demands clamoring for attention, will be able to see God.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” (Matthew 5:8).

Based on a devotional by Yonatan. Originally published on OneforIsrael.org; shared with permission. 

Established in 1990, ONE FOR ISRAEL began as a Bible college and has since expanded to a multi-faceted ministry with the express goal of reaching Israelis with the Good News of Yeshua, training and equipping the Body of Messiah in Israel, and blessing our community with Yeshua’s love. www.oneforisrael.org.