I was counseling a woman the other day and she was tormented by her past. I can relate because I’ve had a hard time refraining from reliving my past as well. Hers was a sad story of sexual abuse and rape conducted by her own father over a period of years followed by a series of unspeakable things that various evil men perpetuated upon her again and again.
As she blurted out her story to me and a female counselor, her hand was shaking and I wondered if she had a nerve disorder. It turns out that she was just emotionally distraught from thinking about it.
She told me she had been using drugs and alcohol to numb her mind. I told her that many people are caught in that trap and the sad thing about it is that the mind doesn’t get numb from those things; ironically it just makes them worse – much worse.
I told her that she needed to quit dwelling in the past. I used the analogy of looking out of the front windshield of a car as one speeds along leaving a crummy section of town and heading into the beautiful countryside. One can see a whole new world being revealed by looking ahead. However if we look in the tiny rear view mirror all we will see is the decay of a rotten city, (and if we look too long in the rear view instead of through the front windshield we will likely crash.
When I look at my past I don’t like what I see. If I did too much of that, I’m sure I would crash and burn. When I look ahead, I see new opportunities galore and leaving the past far behind sets me free from its chains.
I view the past merely as a teacher. I told someone the other day that there is nothing wrong with making an honest mistake, but to make that same mistake again and again turns it into a dumb mistake. I don’t sit around thinking about teachers, but when faced with a situation for which I have received a hard lesson somewhere down the line, I immediately utilize that information to help make my decision on how to decide upon the best way to proceed. Aside from that I don’t want to think about the past, teachers, or hard lessons learned.
Bottom line forget about your past and look towards Jesus Christ and all of the exciting things that He has in store for you. Allow Him into your heart and follow Him into your new calling.
The Apostle Paul (who had much in his past to lament) sums up this concept far more eloquently than I can.
Phil. 3:13
Brothers and sisters, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet;
but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to
what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward
call of God in Christ Jesus . . .
March 3, 2016 – Click here to listen