Our lives start today.
Every single day is a new start.
Time does not exist in eternity. At least not our concept of time.
We experience events in a linear chronological order, so we wrongly believe that our lives (and who we are) must be the accumulation of our past events. We can’t see our future, and our present moment seems insignificant when compared to years and decades of aggregated moments. In our minds, our lives are simply our pasts.
This is a limiting belief.
As Christians, we believe in eternal life. The past is like a particle of sand on a large beach called eternity. That little particle of sand could be destroyed, and we would still have the entire beach intact in front of us. When we give one tiny particle of sand (our past) the power to ruin our relationship with God and our relationships with new people who love God; to keep us living in fear and self-doubt; to sabotage ourselves; to push us into limiting choices; and to drive us into self-loath, insecurity, and negative patterns; then we are living a lie where we have become our own worst enemies.
Our past is only a small revelation of our journey, not a revelation of who we are. We are meant to keep moving forward in our journey, as the future unfolds at each present moment. If you travel within a country, you might start your journey in a busy city, then go to a small beach town, and end your experience hiking on the peak of a mountain. It doesn’t matter where you started the journey, but where you end it. And there is no point in stopping and getting stuck in one place, when there is so much more to experience ahead.
Our destination should be the one where we are the closest to the Lord.
So, why do we let the past define our lives? Why do we let the past define us? Why would we let it have power over our present and our future? Why not keep moving forward, and choose to reset and start each day anew?
Perhaps you have only lived 20 years and have another 60 years ahead. Why would the first 20 years be more important and have excessive power over the next 60 years?
Perhaps you have lived 40 years, but there are another 40 years ahead of you! Why should the first half of your life, which was only a preparation, be more important than the second half which could be the half of your life for which God had been preparing you all along?
Even if you have already lived 90 years and only have a minute left to live, why would a mere 90 years of life be more important than the eternity that awaits for us? At the end, even thousands of billions of years only account for a tiny portion of eternity. Remember that Jesus promised a thief who was dying next to him on the cross, that the thief would be with Him in paradise that same day (Luke 23:43). So, no matter how late it seems, you have not wasted your life. Every minute is a new start and a new opportunity to love, to forgive and be forgiven, to grow, to be renewed, and to get closer to God.
And he said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.'”
Matthew 18:3
For many of us, children represent innocence and purity, and childhood represents a time where there was no baggage and we lived each moment to the fullest because there wasn’t a past holding us back. We should strive to always live in this way, with innocence and purity in our hearts and thoughts, and with the enthusiasm and awe of each present moment without being held back by our pasts.
The past and the many moments we’ve collected have been a lesson, a school, a test, or a drill. God only wants our past to be of service to us rather than to enslave us. God wants to be the one directing our steps if we freely allow Him to, freely love Him, and completely give our fears and limiting beliefs to Him, so that He may heal us and guide us.
Today, let go completely of your past and let it only serve you to the extent that it can help you to be wiser, more compassionate, more forgiving, and more Christ-like.
Choose God! Choose love! Choose faith! Choose hope!