This week I am sharing the story about a song called ‘Enter In’. I wrote it on July 19, 1996 but it’s message still rings true today. How do we move on from our past? We can’t live there. We can’t thrive there. It’s time to go on. Time to move on…groveling in our past failures and hurts does not produce life. We always have a choice as to how we respond to our failures and our hurts, even if we don't have a choice as to every circumstance of our life.
We can choose to be a victim or we can choose to be a victor over those things. In John 8:32 Jesus tells us that, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set set you free.” The problem comes if we never get honest about our failures and honest about our woundings. The first step towards freedom is always our own honesty. If we never get honest, we never get to the place of freedom. If we never get free it's like we don't really ever move on.
Living in the past is like trying to drive down the road by focusing solely on the rearview mirror. If we did that in our physical life, we would find ourselves in constant mishaps or constantly trying to dig our way out of the ditch we drove into. Is that any way to live? How do we move on from our past?
Again, we must get honest about it. If we sin, we repent and receive God's forgiveness and move on down the road. If we have been wounded in the past, we allow the Lord into those wounded places and allow him to show us his point of view. Regarding those past hurts and the people who have hurt us, we must be people who are forgiving. I had to forgive the people who hurt me, but that does not mean I forget what happened. I just choose to see it from God's point of you.
Having un-forgiveness - bitterness - in our hearts and minds - effectively chains us to our past and keeps us focusing, again, on the rearview mirror. Holding bitterness or un-forgiveness toward others does nothing to help you or even hurt those who have hurt you. It's like dragging around the wreckage of one's life. That would be a wearisome and unbearable burden to carry.That is no way to live.
And while you're forgiving those who hurt you, there is another very important person to forgive. Forgive yourself. Forgive those who have wounded you and forgive yourself for whatever, and receive God’s gracious forgiveness and then move on down the road.
And remember this while you're at it: As long as we have breath, we have hope. Every believer has one thing they should always give up hope on, though. We should give up on the hope of ever changing our past. It's not possible, so why focus on it? Acknowledge it. Put off the lies. Put on the truth and then move on down the road towards Jesus…and enter into the sweet rest and peace of His presence.
Even as I was writing this week’s blog, a question came up in my mind that I know occurs in the minds of most people at one point or another in their lifetime. Why did God allow that bad thing to happen in my life that has caused me so much heartache and torment through the year? I thought he was a good God. He is good and He is loving, but He is God and we are not. While reading the Wild at Heart Daily Reading by John Eldredge on December 26, 2023, I was shocked - in a good way - by the title of the devotional reading: Forgive Jesus. In that reading, which I am now quoting directly from, John writes:
Forgive God? This idea is going to cause some readers to freak out. Just listen for a moment. If you are holding something in your heart against Jesus — the loss of someone you love, a painful memory from your past, simply the way your life has turned out — if you are holding that against Jesus, well, then, it is between you and Jesus. And no amount of ignoring it or being faithful in other areas of your life is going to make it go away. In order to move forward, you are going to need to forgive Jesus for whatever these things are.
“But Jesus doesn’t need our forgiveness!” you protest. I didn’t say he did. I said that you need to forgive Jesus — you need it.
Let me be clear: To forgive a person, we pardon a wrong done to us; "Forgiving" Jesus means to release the hurt and resentment we hold against him.
This comes before understanding. We don’t often know why things have happened the way they have in our lives. What we do know is that we were hurt, and part of that hurt is toward Jesus, because in our hearts we believe He let it happen.
Again, this is not the time for sifting theological nuances, but this is why it is so important for you to look at the world the way Jesus did — as a vicious battle with evil. When you understand you have an enemy that has hated your guts ever since you were a child, it will help you not to blame this stuff on God. Anyhow, the facts are it happened, we are hurt that it happened, and part of us believes Jesus could have done something about it and didn’t. That is why we need to forgive Him. We do so in order that this part of us can draw near Him again, and receive His love.
That was a timely word from John Eldredge that I felt I needed to share with you in regard to this week’s song. To receive the daily readings by John Eldredge and his team, go to dailyreadings@wildatheart.org.
So, what do we do with past failures and hurts? I had the privilege of growing up on a farm and working with animals of all types and shapes and sizes, and one thing they all had in common? They left tons of manure…but even that did not go to waste because we used it to turn around and fertilize the very ground where we grew the feed and hay that became their nourishment.
We can do the same thing with our past failures and past hurts. We can use them as holy ‘fertilizer’ to spread on the fields of our mind allowing us to grow grace and forgiveness and peace of mind, to grow out of being a victim and to grow into being a victor…to help us grow out of those failures and hurts. I believe this is part of God’s design…and He wants nothing but what is best for us. It really is time to move on from our past and learn to live in the present with Jesus.
Dennis Jernigan
To hear The Dennis Jernigan Podcast version of this teaching and to hear the song, ‘Enter In’, go to https://www.patreon.com/posts/enter-in-101037294
Photo courtesy of https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2021/01/21/18/46/ghost-5938210_1280.jpg