Setting our minds on the right things

1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory

(Colossians 3:1-4 ESV)

This is a reflection that I got probably because of the snowballed experience of doing the opposite of what the verse was saying. It seems like I have set my minds (all the time) on things that are on earth. Reached a point when I somewhat understand what Solomon meant when he repeatedly used the phrase, "meaningless, meaningless, all things are meaningless". 

How often have we thought about about things on earth... About the career paths we choose, about the food we eat, about the partner we marry, about the house we stay, the pay we get, the preschool education for our kids... The list goes on... You know what I mean right? We give a lot of attention to a lot of things, that somehow only exist in this current space time continuum. 

Here is an interesting line I picked up from the movie, The Last Samurai starring Tom Cruise as Nathan Algren. Here is a conversation between him and Nobutada, son of the leader of the Samurais, when he is in the midst of a training duel.  

Nobutada (interrupting the duel speaks to Nathan): Please forgive, too many mind.
Nathan Algren: Too many mind?
Nobutada: Hai. Mind the sword, mind the people watch, mind the enemy, too many mind... [pause] No mind.

Well, here we see that Nathan at this point was having too many things on his mind while he was fighting. He minded on how he held the sword, how the crowd and his opponent think of him. Many thoughts clouded  his mind and he was completely unable to focus on what he should be doing, which was to win the duel! When Nobutada enlightened him, only then he was encouraged to focus on this  critical thing. 

I don't know about you but I sure identify a lot with this scene. I mind too many too many things... I mind about my job, mind about the bank account, mind about what to I should cook for dinner, how to win the pvp duels in marvel avengers (LOL), how to sell my car... Too many mind!!! If I mind so much about all these things, how then can I free up my mind to think of the heavenly things? I mean, as a human, we only have that certain bandwidth, no matter how wide, is still limited. If we spend so much time thinking about the unfruitful things, how can we have time to think of the important things in life? 

So what does it mean by setting our minds on things above? Does it mean that we always dream of heaven? Not trying to sound too morbid here but does it mean that we think all the time about life after death? I don't think so... In fact, I believe that by setting our minds on things above, it means that we need to seriously consider our life here on earth!!! Not simply about the things I mentioned,  but to be able to see Christ in all the things that we do! To make sense of our faith here! Maybe by setting our minds on things above, it means to set our minds on the Person above... To think about the things that our Father thinks about. To worry about the things he worries about, to love the things he love. Well, its always going to be tough to do that but thank God for this sanctifying grace that enables us to be able to that! 

So what should be our next step forward? Hmmm... Lemme think...