Devotionals by Dr. M. Craig Barnes
Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus. --
On the journey of life we hear two voices calling to us from different directions. Not only do the voices want our attention, they want us to move toward them.
One of these voices comes from the painful past. It calls you to turn your head around and keep focused on your failures or sins. "How could you have done that?" the past keeps asking. Or it may preoccupy you with the failures and sins of others who hurt you. Either way, the voice from the past makes it impossible to move ahead because it doesn't let you even face the future. It doesn't matter how carefully you analyze your shame, or how long you nurture the hurts you've collected, you'll never have a better past.
The other voice calls out to you from heaven. It invites you to keep moving into the future because you are not yet home, the place where you can settle down. You'll know when you get there, because heaven is the place where you are no longer haunted by the voice from the past. In heaven, finally, there is no regret.
In the meantime, as the Apostle Paul says, we strain forward to what lies ahead the heavenly call. That means we have to forgive, forget, and turn away from our past failures because that is exactly what God has done. Only when you believe that are you free to move ahead.
-- Craig Barnes