Our lives have been given to us as a wonderful gift to enjoy while building positive relationships with others. Our friends and family benefit when we can present our best selves to them. However, sometimes we’re dragging along emotional baggage from our past that interferes with our future. When we discover we have issues, it’s time to jettison them so we can continue our forward progress.
Life was never meant to be unchanging and one-dimensional; just like everything else God created, it has definite seasons to it.
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).
This applies not just to the environment around us, but also to our relationships. What is appropriate in one season of our lives doesn’t necessarily work in another season. Our problem comes when we get stuck in one season and can’t move on.
Sometimes newlyweds who have had different backgrounds and experiences bring those memories with then into the marriage. Past relationships may create issues with their present relationship; when this happens, it’s time to deal with the problem. Letting the past stay in the past allows God to work in our “now,” to prepare a beautiful future. “But forget all that—it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland” (Isaiah 43:18,19, NLT). When our past issues surface, God is able to completely remove them.
Living in the past keeps us from clearly seeing the present blessings we have. Children are a blessing, but parents who have learned heavy-handed ways of parenting from their parents tend to bring those parenting styles with them. That can damage family relationships. “Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged” (Colossians 3:21).
When we discover something about ourselves that hinders our relationships with others, willpower and self-effort alone aren’t enough to change us. We need God’s help in this area. “…Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). The phrase “The life which I now live” is significant; it indicates that we’re not focusing on the things we used to do.
Jesus died so that our past mistakes would no longer have power over us. We can now shift our focus from our past to our future. This future is bright, and beckons for us to reach out for it without looking back.