Christmas time and every other time of some celebration, often we are reminded of our friends and close family members who have either departed from this world or are away from us for some reason. However, many people remain immersed in those painful memories and find it difficult to move forward in life. How do we forget our old days while keeping their memories alive, and step into the future with hope and joy?
What effect do the old days have on our future? Abraham’s nephew Lot had separated from him and dwelt in the cities of the plain and ‘pitched his tents even as far as Sodom’, a place whose people were ‘exceedingly wicked and sinful against the LORD (Genesis 13:12-13). Abraham was informed by his heavenly visitors about the coming destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18:20-21). At his intercession God finally agreed to spare the two cities if only ten righteous men were found there. When the two angels entered Sodom in the evening, they found ‘Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom’, a place of honour, where justice was done through hearing of petitions (Genesis 19:1). When did Lot become part of those wicked people and became a judge and dignitary of those people, probably he never realized.
Since Lot was reluctant to leave the city before destruction could commence, the two angels forcibly removed him and his family to outside the city and warned them, ‘Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain’ (Genesis 19:17& 26-29). Lot’s wife ‘looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt’. It is interpreted to mean that she died for disobeying the angels and for her longing for the life of Sodom. But immediately after this Abraham is seen at the place of his intercession and he saw, ‘the smoke of the land which went up like a furnace’. Lot was not saved for being righteous but before destroying the cities, ‘God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow’. Abraham looked at the failure of his intercession and death of the people, for he cared for them, while Lot’s wife looked at the ‘sulfur and fire’ being rained upon the cities, for she cared for her comforts and life style than the people. Abraham’s looking back was with concern for others’ well being and sadness at loss of life due to evil while Lot’s wife’s interest was sorely about personal and excessive interest in evil and sinful ways.
The call to Abraham was to leave his country, his family, his father’s house, ‘to a land that I will show you’ (Genesis 12:1). There has probably never been a call filled with a veil over the future than this. God wanted Abraham to sever all his spiritual links with the belief system and culture of his family to start living a life under His guidance. God revealed His name to Moses as ‘I AM WHO I AM’ for He is not getting transformed and evolving but perfect and complete in Himself (Exodus 3:14). Abraham had to look forward to what God would be doing in His life while erasing the old ways from his life. Moses commanded the Israelites about remembering and teaching their children and all future generations about how the LORD God led then out of Egypt into freedom from the bondage of slavery by showing ‘signs and wonders before our eyes, great and severe against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household (Deuteronomy 6:20-24).
The Jewish people are the only community in the world that has suffered oppression from various quarters that aimed to totally annihilate them and even today the state of Israel faces violence from various neighbours. The reason that they have successfully maintained their identity as a nation is their way of ensuring the continuity of religious education to their children in all generations. It is important to be anchored in the past as a source of strength even while remembering all the tragic sufferings and not as a drag to bind to that. Individuals and families that remain firmly anchored in their past in this manner develop an inner strength to tide over any situation. The Jewish survivors of the torture and deadly circumstances of the concentration camps of the Second World War did not live mourning over the dead and their own unjust suffering but found ways to start afresh and build new lives, while not forgetting the atrocities they had suffered. They resolved to tell others only after starting afresh to teach future generations to learn from it but not to gain sympathy.
Apostle Paul was a known persecutor of the believers and then he himself was the target of the same hatred and persecution from his fellow Jews. He could then teach, ‘one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind (his sufferings, beatings and great opposition from his brethren) and reaching forward to those things which are ahead’ (Philippians 3:13-14). Apostle Peter had denied even knowing the Lord three times and Lord Jesus asked him three times, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me? (John 21:15-17). And each time He entrusted Peter to shoulder greater responsibilities in the Church, starting with feeding the lambs or new believers to nurture them in their walk of faith by forgetting the past and step into the new
What should be our resolutions for the future? God’s promise to His people is about His plan to ‘give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and I will listen to you’ (Jeremiah 29:11-12). God has chosen every believer to be His child and a loving God desires to give the best to His people. The last teachings of Moses to his people, before they entered the Promised Land, were reminders of their past to warn them about their future. God had assured the Israelites of success in battle to defeat the enemy but the caution was about post settlement in the new land, ‘when you have eaten and are full, and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them; and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold are multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied; when your heart is lifted up, and your forget the LORD your God’ (Deuteronomy 8:12-14). We want the fulfillment of every promise of the Lord as written in the Scripture quickly so that we can enjoy the full benefits of that now and not sometime later. God told the Israelites before they went into Canaan, ‘I will not drive them (the present inhabitants of the land) out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land’ (Exodus 23:29-30). God as a loving Father who knows us better than we do and before whom past, present and future are all open as a book, wants to give us the best but in a way that we do not suffer some adverse impact of that.
The route from Egypt to the Promised Land of Canaan was only 11 days but God took them by a longer route. Also before they were led to Kadesh Barnea to go in and capture the land, God first revealed the way of righteous living in obedience to Him by giving them His Laws and the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai. Apostle Paul was baptized by Ananias, after his meeting with Lord Jesus on the road to Damascus. After that, ‘immediately he preached the Christ in the Synagogues, that He is the Son of God’ (Acts 9:18-20). Apostle Paul was trained by the most famous teacher of that time, Rabbi Gamaliel, but he went into Arabah for three years to be alone with the Lord before he was brought from Tarsus to Antioch by Barnabas. We read about the promises of God in the Scripture and then pray and claim fulfillment of that for us. Any prayer that when answered will affect others lives through us may not be answered immediately for God wants us to prepare us first. However, we want everything today and now rather than wait.
The Prodigal son sought his share of the father’s property, even during his lifetime, and then went and spent all that on sinful living (Luke 15:12-13 & 17-19). But when he came to his senses, he wanted to go seek forgiveness from his father and say, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you’. He then wanted to be like a servant in his house. God chose us to be His children and not to be His servants and does not want us to turn away from Him and suffer in various ways. He desires to prepare us for receiving what we ask and thus enjoy the full benefit of that. We must look back to the last year and attempt to understand the reasons for having received no answer to some of our prayers. This would then lead us to seek guidance of the Holy Spirit to help us identify the areas of our life that need to be changed in line with His will. Apostle Paul has provided us a long list of ‘works of the flesh’ that are, ‘adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissension, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries’ (Galatians 5:19-21). We must carry out a self analysis to identify the evils and their degree or level in our life. God is willing, if we seek His help, to get rid of these and be transformed into the image of the Redeemer.
We are then also informed about the ‘fruit of the Spirit’ that get reflected in our character and daily living. These character traits that we get from and through the indwelling Holy Spirit are, ‘love, joy, peace, longsuffering (Patience), kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control’ (Galatians 5:22-23 & 25). Apostle Paul then urges all believers, ‘if we live in the Spirit, then let us also walk in the Spirit’, to walk in the way of life in God that is visible to all who are our co-workers. Once we have identified the traits that we want to acquire and what we desire to get rid of, we must seek the help of the Holy Spirit to guide and strengthen us to improve. We may also seek prayer support from our spouse and close ones to help in getting changed.
God’s plan for us is revealed to us for ‘He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love’ (Ephesians 1:4). We have all experienced the smothering effects of sin in our lives, how it hangs over our hearts like a wet blanket, suffocating us. We were destined to perish like that and then be in unimaginable agony in the bottomless pit due to our thoughts, words and deeds and the good that we could but did not do. The psalmist having seen and experienced the love of God could say, ‘You answered them, O LORD our God; You were to Israel God-who-forgives’ (Psalm 99:8). The Hebrew word used here for God is ‘El-Nasah’ or ‘God who forgives, lifts up, carry away’, thus implying the lifting up by God from deep despair of sin and evil life, for He chose us not for what we are but for what He can make of us. God, like a loving Father, keeps a watch over His child lest he fall down and get hurt but rushes to pick up the fallen child into His loving embrace. He then lovingly teaches and helps the child to walk in His ways, while encouraging him with love and care, all the while rejoicing over his small achievements also. But He can only do this if the child seeks His help in his walk of life.
Having been made in God’s image, which has been restored by our Redeemer, Apostle Paul has defined our resolutions for daily living and not only for the onset of a new year. Starting with our behavior towards others, we are to, ‘comfort the fainthearted, uphold the weak, be patient with all’ for God has been patient with us, not judging us but in His mercy forgiving us in His Son, our Redeemer (1 Thessalonians 5:14-19). Then he defined our task for our own self, ‘Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you’. Continuous prayer is to be in regular dialogue with God as a child reveals all to His loving Father, especially one who in His love is friendly towards us. Finally we are commanded, ‘do not quench the Spirit’. It is then that His promise of (John 14:20) oneness in and with Him is fully realized by us – Then we start understanding ways of God, in as much as He reveals to us, and start being thankful for what we have rather than resenting what we don’t.
Our attitude of complaining and bitterness forces the Holy Spirit to step aside and let us find our own way in the darkness of this world. The most important gift and its fullness that I need is patience, for in my eagerness to achieve good results, I am likely to start letting anger manifest itself. Patience will then allow me to wait expectantly with thankfulness, for God will, in His time, answer my prayers.
Forgetting the old and moving forward – Once a year the High Priest was required to first offer sacrifice and enter the Most Holy Place in the Tabernacle to ‘make atonement for himself, for his household, and for all the assembly of Israel’ (Leviticus 16:17 & 23). After completion of the sacred ceremony he was to go back into the Tabernacle of meeting to ‘take off the linen garments which he put on when he went into the Holy Place, and shall leave them there’ to be stored away. Though the priestly garments that he wore daily could be used repeatedly till they needed to be replaced due to normal wear and tear, but not the garments that he wore on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. High Priest’s garments were expensive but the day was for renewal and getting rid of our old ways, comfort zones and limitations. The way forward in life is to get rid of our resentments, grudges, hate, insecurity, envy, bad habits, guilt, shame and feeling of our own worthlessness. The vital message is that God can help me start afresh and fill my soul with capacity to be what I desire to be to fit into His Divine plans for me. In my newness I neither enter with my old clothes nor allow my past to become my future. Like the old clothes that are not the core of my being, I can discard the anxiety and traumas of the past to move forward. My failure can never be identified by the number of times I fall down but only when I refuse to get up and give up. The High Priest had to first believe that He was forgiven and then He could be an intercessor for the people.
Lord Jesus identified the two great commandments where the first is about loving God with the whole being and the second is to ‘love your neighbor as yourself’ (Matthew 22:37-39). The great Jewish sage Hillel termed this as fulfillment of entire Torah. People usually focus on the first part of loving the neighbor, but ignore the second. You can only love others if you love yourself, for having a healthy sense of self is the pillar of all good relationships. Having low self esteem will keep you bound in self rather than reaching out to others to be a blessing for them. Such people become a problem for others rather than being a problem solver for them as an instrument of God’s mercy.
First point in loving yourself is to compliment yourself daily by finding something in you that you love; your smile, your patience or your generous attitude towards others. Do not just think but speak to yourself and believe it. The second, is to practice gratitude and this must start as you wake up in the morning by expressing thanks to God for giving another day to live. Once we start identifying things to be grateful to God we can be grateful to others for what they have done and speak out about that. The third is preach to yourself like a friend. If a friend turns to you for help in trouble, you do not turn him away but console. When you feel down, speak to yourself about God’s love for you as His beloved child as also about others help that you received or can depend upon. Remember that many people love you despite all your shortcomings and tell this to yourself. The fourth, is to use positive confirmations. The best way to change your view of yourself is to identify the good that you do and write it down. This will help you overcome the negative feelings that come up about yourself about being less hard working or any other thing. Write down the good points and speak to yourself every morning and before going to sleep. The fifth and final is, take care of yourself. Self love and self care are synonyms, for a person who loves himself will take care of himself also. This is not about getting beauty treatments but about healthy eating, exercise, reading a good book or spending time with your family.
People who love themselves make others also feel loved and spread joy all around. Rather than making great resolutions, decide to love yourself this year so that you can love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and love others also. Then like the High Priest on Yom Kippur day, you can also discard your old habits like clothes and step forward to be the channel of God’s love for others.
Our loving Father in heaven desires that we live in faith, with our focus being on the wonderful blessings that He has prepared for our future. His love for us is an established fact and then we, being filled with that totally undeserved love of the Father, must love ourselves to be in a position to love others also. It is only then that we can really love God and be called His children!
