Forget The Past to Move Forward

Sunday morning, New Year's Day, our pastor gave a sermon on moving forward into the new year. As he pointed out, 2011 was a good year for some, a bad year for others, but 2012 is a whole new year unto itself. How can anyone move forward if they're holding onto the past? So his challenge is to forget 2011 and put it behind us. Now, he doesn't literally mean to totally forget what happened, to forget friends and family, but merely not to dwell upon what happened in the past. For how can you move forward if something, or someone, from the past is dragging you backwards?

And he doesn't mean just forgetting the bad things; he means putting the good things behind us as well. Al Bundy from the TV show Married... With Children comes to mind. Al was constantly reliving his high school days when he was a football star, but by doing so, he was depriving himself, and his family, of being a star in his present. He was always bemoaning how horrible his life and family are, but not once did he stop to consider that HE COULD CHANGE THAT by living in the present and trying to make his present life awesome.

While of course there are things we want to remember, and even brag about, from our past, we can't let ourselves become so obsessed with those things that we can't move forward. And constantly remembering when "times were good" means we're not letting Christ make the present good for us. God's plans are not for mortal men to understand, but He definitely has those plans, and when we don't look forward to the future, and don't live in the present, we're basically telling God that whatever He has in store for us isn't nearly as good as how it used to be.

And who among us would be willing to slap God in the face like that? I, for one, have no intention of telling God that His plans for me aren't working out, that I'd rather live in the more fruitful past, and I don't want His designs for my future to come to fruition. Not only would I never slap my Creator in the face that way, I also know, for a fact, that my life is better now than it was in the past. Even if certain periods in the past SEEM better than now (for instance, when I was employed full time, or when I didn't have to worry about how I was going to buy groceries, or pay my bills), I know that I am more of what God wants me to be now than I ever was back then, and I'm certainly happier now than I've ever been!