Future Focused

It is easy to get bogged down by the past. Past sorrows. Past trials. Past mistakes. Past sins. It is very difficult to make much progress if you are always looking behind you.

I learned this valuable lesson as a student driver. I was about to enter a major highway for the first from an on ramp. I fixated on the traffic behind me looking over my shoulder to the point I almost ran the car off the road due to not looking ahead. I wish I could say I have always corrected my life as quickly as I corrected that car.

What in your past bogs you down? Where you feel like you are stuck in the mud and cannot move forward. For some it is the death of someone with whom they were very close. They just can't get over it and move forward. For some it is a wrong done to them decades ago. They were so deeply wounded and traumatized they carry the pain to this day. They have never been healed and drag that pain with them wherever they go and whatever they do. Past sins still can haunt the psyche of individuals. God may have forgiven them, but they have never forgiven themselves living in condemnation. In each case the past is their primary focus. Life is viewed from that perspective.

Are you running from something or to somethin?. You can spend a good number of years running from something. Running from the past. It is much more productive to run toward something healthy, wholesome and God ordained. Run toward God. He is with you and ahead of you. You focus on the future. Where does He want you in the future? Go after that.

I have a lifetime of work in the future. This church of my dreams still comes with work for the future. There is no lack of something to do. There are messages to study, messages to deliver, people who need prayer visits to make, books to read, scriptures to memorize, lost souls to evangelize, a flock to shepherd, articles to write, meetings to lead, relationships to cultivate and future events to plan. Future focused.

What happens when you age and feel like you don't have much future to bring into focus. There are people who could always use prayer. There are younger mothers and fathers who need mentoring. There is some sort of service you can still offer Jesus. You could call new visitors or absentees at your local church or from your home. You could write letters of encouragement. You could gather canned foods for a ministry feeding the homeless. You can always pursue God and get closer to Him. All of that can be future focused.

Philippians 3:12-14 (CEB)
¹²  It's not that I have already reached this goal or have already been perfected, but I pursue it, so that I may grab hold of it because Christ grabbed hold of me for just this purpose.
¹³  Brothers and sisters, I myself don't think I've reached it, but I do this one thing: I forget about the things behind me and reach out for the things ahead of me.
¹⁴  The goal I pursue is the prize of God's upward call in Christ Jesus.

Let us put the past behind us and focus on God's future. Let us focus on how we can seek Him and serve Him for effectively. Forgetting what lies behind let us press on to what lies ahead.