Paths to Dwell In

By Cyndi

Forgetting the past. Can it be done? Do you have some skeletons in the closet that you’d just as soon stay there locked up forever? Many of us are not proud of our pasts. We want our past to be just that-the past. The Apostle Paul writes, in Philippians 3:13, that he wants to forget those things which are behind and reach forth towards things ahead. He recommends forgetting the past and looking to the future. Sometimes this is easier said than done.

Our memories cannot be changed; we can’t change the past. What’s done is done and it’s imprinted in our brains. Maybe the memory can’t be erased, but the emotional pain connected to it can be. All the fears, anxieties, and emotional scars from our past can be healed, erased away. God is our healer in every sense of the word. He wants the pain we carry from our past, that heavy emotional weight we have on our back, to be lifted off us so that we are able to focus on the future.

Paul writes in Philippians 3:14, “I run straight toward the goal in order to win the prize, which is God’s call through Christ Jesus to the life above.” Again, he encourages us to look ahead and not back. If you ever watch a race at a track meet, you’ll notice that the runners never look behind them to see what’s going on.  They only look straight ahead toward the goal. I saw a photograph in Runner’s World of Usain Bolt winning the 100 meters in the Olympics with his shoe untied. I doubt he even noticed it. He was totally focused on his goal-to win. And what do we as believers win? We win that place of life above-life above our circumstances, above all the negative news reports. We win that life with Jesus where we can have joy in the midst of sorrow and peace in the midst of fear.

It is only through the Lord that we are able to leave all the pain from our past behind and pursue a better future. The world is full of pain and sorrow, but He is able to heal us and restore us to a place where we don’t spend our time dwelling on what did or didn’t happen to us. We can pull out all the skeletons and throw them away. When we’re healed, they can’t scare us anymore. There’s a higher calling ahead of us, my friends, so don’t look back.

(Good News Translation used in verses above)

By Cyndi              

           Remember Mr. Spock from Star Trek? He would do that Vulcan hand gesture and say, “Live long and prosper.” But what is prosperity anyway? Is it security? Is it having lots of money?
            Well, when we are prospering, we do have a sense of security in that we usually are not worried about paying bills, losing our house, paying for college, or our retirement. We have a type of external security-but it can be a false sense of security, thinking that whatever problem comes up, we can solve it with money. But what if our health fails or we lose a loved one? No amount of money can change that. Yes, wealth can make our life easier and more comfortable-we can fly all over the world getting the best treatments and medications-but we, ourselves, are not in control. We have lost our sense of security.
            I’ve been thinking about prosperity in the internal sense though. (Perhaps this is even what Mr. Spock meant.) I may not be prospering monetarily, but my self-confidence is growing, my knowledge is growing, and I’m becoming more secure in who I am as a person and who God made me to be. For example, I used to be quite fearful about using computers. I was totally insecure that my teenage son knew bookoos more than I did about the computer. After praying about my fears and spending more and more time actually working on the computer, my knowledge has multiplied tremendously over the last year. I am now prospering in this area. I went from a place of fear to a greater self-confidence in my knowledge, and now I’m not as insecure anymore. This is a type of inner prosperity the Lord wants us all to grow in every day.
            Of course, there are many forms prosperity, or security, can take, but my point for this article is to show that it does not have to be just in monetary ways. In Psalm 1, the first few verses tell of the person who seeks the Lord and desires to live in a godly way. This person, the Lord says, shall prosper and live well. Hmm…I wonder. Did Mr. Spock ever read the Bible?   

By Robert

There are 122 references for ashamed in the Bible. I can remember a time when a neighborhood kid chose another boy as a friend over me. Then there was a time some adults applauded one kid riding his dirt bike while waving me off. I felt ashamed. I came to believe something was wrong with me.

            Guilt is the feeling of regret over violating a personal value. Shame is a painful feeling about oneself as a person. Shame is a matter of identity, not a behavioral infraction. It is a feeling of being diminished or insufficient as a person, of being depersonalized-just an object to be used and discarded. Abusive treatment from others can cause this. Being punished rather than disciplined, being told we are stupid or will never amount to anything are all examples of how shame comes into our lives.

            I have recently seen some new ways I had yet to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. In one instance, I realized I had believed I was not worthy of better treatment. It was a lie I had believed about who I was. As I acknowledged my pain, God spoke healing there. He told me I was more precious than silver and gold! This rhema word brought a whole new sense of peace in some areas of struggle in my life, and I know this is something God wants to do for all of us.