Looking Back

Everyone has a beginning. God said in Jeremiah 1:5, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart.”

That is your beginning. A moment of thought in God’s mind. A fleeting speck of time so small that we can’t even think it or imagine it with our little brains. It was in that 1 billionth of a nanosecond that you began. Because God *thought* you.

And what did He think? He said in Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope – to bring you to an expected end.”

In a piece of time that we can’t even fathom, God thought you. He thought peace for you. He thought about your future. He placed in you hope. And you were still only a thought, an idea, a figment of His imagination and He already had a plan.

So you were born. Some of you into poverty. Some into the middle class. Maybe some rich. Some to a single mom. Some to a two-parent home. Some to an alcoholic. Some to a drug addict. Some to a teacher. Some to a prostitute. Some of you had blond hair. Others had brown hair. Some had naps and some had curls. Some had brown eyes and others had blue or green. Some were early and some were late.

But the one thing each of us has in common is that we were all born with a soul already hardwired with the hope and future that God thought for us. Each of us was born with a mustard seed of faith and a yearning in our heart for God.

And so we grew up. We grew from Mother May I to I wish my mother would get off my back.

From big wheels to texting behind the wheel

From baby dolls to Come on Baby, if you loved me you would

From EZ Bake Oven to a bun in the oven

From Ring Around the Rosie to with this ring I thee wed.

From Duck Duck Goose to duck, there’s goes my husband

From hopscotch to I’ll have another scotch

From kickball to an eight ball

Life happens. Real life on this planet ruled by evil. We steal. We lie. We act up on our jobs. We smoke weed or crack, we drink, we gamble, we have sex, we get abused and we abuse others. We abort babies. We mistreat our loved ones. We cheat on our tests and our spouses too.

We sin.

We lose our faith. We can’t feel our hope and we throw away our future. We forget.

But no matter how down and out we get, no matter how low. No matter how sick and tired of being sick and tired we get, one day something inside of us cries out to the Lord.

Remember me
Remember me
Ohhh, ohh Lord
Remember me

This is how we used to start service at St Paul Baptist Church in Geneva when I was a kid. Someone would moan:

Remember me
Remember me
Ohhh, ohh Lord
Remember me

Father I stretch
My hands to thee
No other, no other help
I know

And God remembered.

He remembered that we thought of Him one lonely night, even while we were drunk or high or laying up in that bed. He remembered that He heard our mamas and our grandmamas praying for us every night and every Sunday morning in church.

He remember all that He had planted inside of us in that moment so long long ago. He remembered that He sent His Son to die on the Cross for our every sin. He remembered that we were His children.

And in that 1 billionth of a nanosecond that it took to remember, our past was erased. God said that as far as the East is from the West is how far He has separated our sins from us. He said He would cast all our sins in the depths of the sea.

And so we begin to travel down a new road. Fresh start. Clean slate. New mercy.

The problem is that God cast our sins away, but not our memories. Not our friends. Not our families. Not our neighborhoods. Not all of the bars, crackhouses or dealers. Not this world.

All of that is still there. Calling to us from the past. Some days it feels like it’s barreling down on us. Breathing right down our necks. Do we dare to look back?

Yes and No

Sometimes you gotta look back just to see how far you’ve come. You gotta peek back and see that’s it’s been a week since you had a drink. It’s been 6 weeks since you cussed anybody out. It’s been 3 months since you smoked a little weed. It’s been 9 months since you chose not to abort that baby. It’s been a year since you stopped using sex as a weapon. It’s been 5 years since you put that crack pipe down. It’s been 17 years since you let a man beat you. It’s been 25 years since you’ve been molested. It’s been 42 years since God had that first thought about me.

Oh yeah, you gotta peek back there every now and again to understand where God has brought you from. You take a glimpse back but you keep it moving forward.

You don’t turn back. You don’t go back. Sometimes the past is so familiar and so normal that some days it may seem easier to just turn back. Sinning is easy. Making the tough choice to do right is hard.

Sodom and Gomorrah is your past. God destroyed it with raining fire. It’s just ashes now. It’s done and over with.

God’s chosen path for your life is ahead of you. It’s through the desert sometimes, but it’s ahead. It’s around a corner you can’t see, but it’s ahead. It’s through struggles, but it’s ahead.

And yes, you might walk through the shadow of valley of death, but don’t fear, God is with you. He orders the steps of a good man and good woman. And though you fall, you will not be cast down because the Lord holds you up with His hand.

God’s purpose for your life is ahead not behind. The lives you will affect are in front of you. The souls you bring to kingdom are ahead. The full use of your gifts and callings are to come.

Your past is behind you and its purpose is to push you forward; to keep you pressing towards the goal. (Phil 3:13-14) But you can’t live back there rehashing all the things you have done or have been done to you.

God said 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)

But be confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6)

Keep moving forward.

In love,

Mona