Chinese meteorologists have a plan to force rain in Beijing just before the 2008 Olympics so the event will bring only sunshine. Through a process known as cloud-seeding, they plan to clean the air and insure clean skies.

Coloradoans (those of us living in Colorado) have a plan for being ready for snow. When weather people tell us the big blizzards are coming, we run to the grocery store and buy up the bread and milk.

Two examples of trying to predict, control, and stay ahead of the weather. Two examples of getting distracted by the small picture and missing God's panoramic plan. In Matthew 16:3, Jesus said, " 'You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times.' "

Jesus is coming back--in China, Colorado, and in the place where you live. All our lives, we hear about this incredible event when every knee will bow to Jesus, and I fear the truth of it has become trite and we've become distracted with cloud-seeding and running through the grocery story for temporary stuff to keep us fat.

In her book The Things As They Are, missionary-to-India Amy Carmichael wrote about a vision she had one night. She saw blind people walking in droves off the sides of a cliff. But then she saw a group of people under some trees with their backs turned toward the gulf. They were making daisy-chains. When one man stood to go help the blind people, the others pulled him back down and told him not to get so excited about the cries for help. So he sat down and worked, again, on his daisy-chain.

There's nothing wrong with wanting sunshine for the Olympics or food through the blizzard. There is something very wrong with getting so hung up on the small things that we miss or ignore the bigger picture. My husband, Dave, calls the ability to see both near and far away "bi-focal vision." As Christian, we need to live with bi-focal vision--one eye right in front of us on things that need to be done and one eye on eternity.

This year, three Christians working in Turkey for a Bible publishing house were murdered by some young Islamofascist university students. Reports tell us that they were tortured for three hours before their throats were slit.

Apparently, these three had bi-focal vision, they clearly kept in mind what was ahead, yet for the present they chose to give their lives for those lost and going to hell. We read in Hebrews 11:35-38 about such unnamed people: "Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. . . of whom the world was not worthy. . . ."

What daisy chain are you wasting your time on today that is accomplishing nothing for eternity? What voices are you listening to that keep you from being obedient to where your heart aches for the world? How are you trying to control things that belong only to God? What bread and milk are you busy trying to hord for yourself without thought for others' conditions in the coming storm?

Clean off your bi-focals today. Stop the cloud-seeding and daisy-chaining. If in your lifetime you help open the eyes of just one man and keep him from plunging off the cliff into eternal damnation, your life will have been worthwhile. Now, go get busy in the place and to the person God has called you to!