1. Do not dwell in the past
In order to propel forward for the better, first and foremost, you must no longer dwell in the past. Whatever the past was, it's gone. There is nothing you can do to change anything that has gone before and so you must turn your attention to the now and future. You might be tempted to dwell in the past because it was awful or because it was wonderful. Either way, you have to leave it behind if you want to be successful.
"Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. (Isaiah 43:18-19 NIV).
You may not be able to forget all the happenings in the past. It can be bad memories or good memories. But you can choose not to dwell there anymore.
Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead. (Philippians 3:13 NIV).
Try to see the past as a room separate from the one you live in now. You can go in there but you DO NOT live there. You live for what lies ahead. Don't waste any drops of precious time by spending too much time in 'that old room'. Don't miss what is happening now because you were busy looking back, or later you'll be busy looking back at this time and wondering why you wasted it.
If your past involved some events or some people that brought you suffering or misery, then you need to do two main things: 1) Forgive & 2) Let it go
"Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. (Luke 6:37 NIV).Be gentle and forbearing with one another and, if one has a difference (a complaint) against another, readily pardoning each other; even as the Lord has [freely] forgiven you, so must you also forgive. (Colossians 3:13 Amp)
Blaming always makes you a victim and makes you powerless. Forgiving your offender/s and forgiving yourself is your choice and it always set you free. Once you’re able to forgive, you will be able to learn something out of it to further shape yourself to be stronger and better. Then you can also be grateful.
For every past situation, you can either give “good” meaning or “bad” meaning to it. If you decide to choose “good”, then it changes your whole focus to the positive and this opens your mind to new opportunities. You’ll start to use your experiences as stepping stones to achieving what God has planned in your life. Otherwise those past experiences will forever hinder you and you will continue to have resistance to certain things in your life (in order to protect yourself) and this prevents you from moving forward.
Letting it go means you no longer hold on to or focus on the action that got you so upset in the beginning. It is about moving on and completely becoming detached from the event. It’s the only way to be truly free and to become the complete and whole beautiful soul you were meant to be.
Forgiveness and letting go won’t happen overnight. It can take a while to develop the willingness to let those painful emotions go and to allow other positive feelings to take their place. You just need to take that first step to allow real healing to take place. Keep forgiving and keep letting go.
YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE who has the power to let the past go and to move on with your life. It is incredibly empowering when you get to the stage where the past does not control your future anymore. Your past is no longer your future! You are relieved of your burden, freeing yourself from self-destructive behaviour.
You may find at this point that you are able to help others who are going through the exact same thing you did. You have gotten your life back. You are liberated from the past and you are free to move ahead and to enjoy many things that the Lord has in store for you. You CAN move out of the past into the new! It is one of the greatest lessons we can learn during our lifetime.
2. Know you are a new creation!
“But Pastor, I STILL cannot forget the past. There are still in my memories.”
Let us see what the Word of God says [Please be assured that you can trust the Word of God to have the final say!]
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2 Corinthians 5:17 NKJV).
Do you feel like a new creation today? Sometimes we don’t. The circumstances of life sometimes can cloud our view so that we won’t recognize the awesomeness of being a new creation. Yet, God’s Word is true! You do not need to wait until you lose your past memories to come out of it. You just need to know what God’s Word says about you NOW. It says that old things have passed away, and now everything is NEW. You are a new creation in Christ.
For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation. (Galatians 6:15 NKJV).
“In Christ Jesus” means we have been placed into the body of Christ. “New” in Greek is kaine means new in nature, new in species (is not being reformed or improved over time). We are now being made anew in Christ. Christians, we must and need to know that in Christ Jesus, it is no longer about what we can or can’t do by our own strength, but it is about us being a new creation in Christ, where we become a brand-new people on the inside.
NOW all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18 NKJV).
The life we live NOW as believers of God is of God, from God, with God. In Romans 6, it is said that we have been buried with Jesus Christ through baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too, are raised from the old and now we can walk in newness of life. Because in Christ Jesus, EVERYTHING IS MADE NEW!
Say this to yourself, "I am a new creation in Christ!"
Say a few times until you know you are!!
Therefore, everything of the past and whatever handicaps/hindrances/weight have lost its power. It no longer has any authority or control in your life UNLESS…you give it authority to control, meaning, you keep thinking about it.
So, do not be like a prisoner who had been set free, but then walk back into the prison again! Do not be like an animal that had been released from a trap, then go back to the trap again! It will sound very funny if we are set free by Christ but we run back to our past again. Know that now you are a new creation. Think about the new you whom have been set free to live for Christ.
3. Be driven by eternity!
Life on earth is only temporary. We are just passing by, and one day we will be with God in heaven for eternity. That is our true home. Therefore we should not be attached with earthly riches and material gains only. Nor should we spend most of the time agonizing over matters that make us sad. We must shift our focus to the eternal and how we should live our life glorifying God now.But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. (1 Timothy 6:6-7 NIV).
Live our life with satisfaction because Jesus had already given us His best, which is His own life in exchange for our new life. All material earthly things can only satisfy us for a limited time, and we can take nothing when we leave earth.
Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:16-18 NKJV).
The troubles and problems we face should not stop our faith. Instead of focusing on the affliction, we concentrate on experiencing the inner strength from Holy Spirit. Our ultimate hope is to realize life is not just there is [dealing with problems, coping with stress, handling relationship turmoil, etc] – there is eternal life after that! This helps us to live above the pain that we face on earth.
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The skies will disappear with a loud noise. Everything in them will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be exposed. In that way everything will be destroyed. So what kind of people should you be? You should live holy lives and serve God, as you wait for and look forward to the coming of the day of God. When that day comes, the skies will be destroyed with fire, and everything in them will melt with heat. But God made a promise to us, and we are waiting for a new heaven and a new earth where goodness lives. (2 Peter 3:10-14 NCV).
From the above verses, we know that the earth will soon disappeared. Knowing that Christ will come again to bring us back to our eternal home, we should live our life with good character & godliness by developing Christ-like character through His Words. We must know that time is short and we have important work to do – to tell the world about Jesus –the way, the truth & the life! Because the whole world need to know the love of Jesus and the new life He can give!
Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. (2 Corinthians 5:9-10 NKJV) (see also Revelation 22:12).
While eternal life is a free gift given on the basis of God’s grace, all believers will still stand before God’s judgement. This is not the punishment kind of judgement, but rather the judgement of rewarding us according to how we have lived – our good character (based on becoming more and more like Christ THROUGH Holy Spirit's empowering); our good work.
For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago. (Ephesians 2:10 NLT).
Being anew IN Christ, we can now do good things with our act of service. We are saved not just to keep the benefit to ourselves, but we also want many more people to be benefited by Him. We are to love & serve Christ, to love one another according to His Words and to preach the gospel of grace to everyone.
In conclusion...
- New creations of Christ no longer dwell in the past!
- Becoming more and more like Christ, put God as our first priority, and serve Him as He desires should be our lifestyle on earth – while awaiting our eternal glory, our eternal Home!
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