“—forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before. I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”-Philippians 3:13-14 Some people can’t get ahead because they are always looking back. They live in the past. Their mind is constantly occupied with things that have already happened. This can be a number of things: failures, sins, trials, injustices, accomplishments, etc. It doesn’t really matter what it is, the effect is the same. You can’t be a safe driver if you are always looking in the rear-view mirror. Nor can you live successfully unless you get past the past. The following story tells of a man who figured it out. A man’s sight left him. He sought the counsel of a trusted medical friend who prescribed a medicine for him. The man took the medicine regularly for four days, and his sight returned to him, but he could no longer remember anything. His friend suggested a remedy for that, too. After a few days his memory came back to him, but he went blind again. This continued for sometime. Eventually his friend said, “It looks like you have to decide which you want-your sight or your memory.” The man thought for a moment and then said, “I believe I would prefer my sight. I would rather see where I am going than remember where I have been!” So, how about you? Are you trapped in the past? Are you content with what you’ve done, or are you committed to God’s plan for your future? Do you see where you’re going?

“And we know that all things work together for good—“ Romans 8:28

We all claim to believe Romans 8:28, but there are times when it does not seem to be true. We often do not see the good that is produced and we wonder if our situation is an exception to the rule. The following story I read several years ago serves to illustrate what sometimes happens:

A young woman, a great lover of flowers, had set out a rare vine at the base of a stone wall. It grew vigorously, but it did not seem to bloom. Day after day she cultivated it and tried every possible way to coax it to bloom.

One morning, as she examined the vine disappointedly, her invalid neighbor called to her and said. “You cannot imagine how much I have been enjoying the blooms of that vine you planted.” The owner followed her neighbor’s gaze and on the other side of the wall was a mass of blooms. The vine had crept through the crevices and produced flowers on the other side.

How often we think our efforts are thrown away because we do not see fruit! We need to learn that in God’s service our prayers, our toil, our crosses are never in vain. They will bear fruit and hearts will receive blessings and joy, sometime, somewhere.

“Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.”–Psalms 37:4 You never know what a day may hold. Life has a way of changing, and not everything is pleasant. All of us tend resent these intrusions into our life–we prefer comfort and ease. In this ever changing world it would do us good to remember these words by Jonathan Edwards:   The enjoyment of God is the only happiness
with which our souls can be satisfied.

To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better
than the most pleasant accommodations here on earth.

Earthly fathers and mothers, husbands, wives,
children and earthly friends, are all ‘shadows’.
But God is the ‘substance’.

All earthly delights are but ‘scattered beams’.
But God is the sun.

All earthly delights are but ‘streams’.
But God is the ocean.

“O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.”–Psalm 95:6

Have you ever watched how a bird sleeps on its perch and never falls off? How does it manage to do this?

The secret is the tendons of the bird’s legs. They are so constructed that when the leg is bent at the knee, the claws contract and grip like a steel trap. The claws refuse to let go until the knees are unbent again. The bended knee gives the bird the ability to hold on to his perch so tightly.

Is this not also the secret of the holding power of the Christian? Daniel found this to be true. Surrounded by a pagan environment, tempted to compromise with evil, urged to weaken his grip on God, he refused to let go. He held firm when others faltered because he was a man of prayer. He knew the power of the bended knee.

From sleeping birds we can learn the secret of holding things which are most precious to us-honesty, purity, thoughtfulness, honor, character. That secret is the knee bent in prayer, seeking to get a firmer grip on those values which make life worth living. When we hold firmly to God in prayer, we can rest assured He will hold tightly to us.(From A Treasury of Bible Illustrations)

“If your knees are knocking kneel on them.”

” O death, where is thy sting?–“–1 Cor. 15:55

Donald Barnhouse was the pastor of Philadelphia’s Tenth Presbyterian Church when his wife died and left him with young daughters to raise alone. He conducted his own wife’s funeral. While driving to that funeral, he realized that he had to say something to his girls to somehow put in perspective for them something with which he himself was already struggling.

They stopped at a traffic light. It was a bright day, and the sun was streaming into the car. A truck pulled up next to them and its shadow darkened the inside of the car. Barnhouse turned to his daughters and asked, “Would you rather be hit by the shadow or by the truck?”

One of them responded, “Oh, Daddy, that’s a silly question! The shadow can’t hurt you. I’d rather be hit by a shadow than by a truck.”

Then he explained that their mother had died and that it was as if she’d been hit by a shadow. It was as if Jesus had stepped in the way in her place, and it was He who’d been hit by the truck.

“Amazing love! How can it be, That Thou my God, shouldst die for me.”