Do You Need To BURN Your Past?

The title of this article may seem odd, if not objectionable until you read it and understand why I’m writing it. During my lifetime as a Christian leader and pastor, I can’t tell you how many thousands of hours I have invested in trying to help people get freed from their past hurts. To help other pastors counsel well, I would recommend one of my favorite books called “Untwisting Twisted Relationships” by William Backus. He capitalized on helping people recognize the misbeliefs they have acquired over the years that hinder their present lives.

Today, I find people are more messed up than ever because of being bound to their past. This could be because of unforgivness for hurts others have caused them, or because they just can’t seem to let go of regretted choices along their life journey. Part of the problem of our current culture and how it tries to deal with this issue is professional counseling as well as religious counseling. All to often the counselor get trapped in the importance of sympathy and doesn’t give the people who are trapped the hard truth that will set them free. It takes the tough love of showing them what must be done to resolve these past memories. To often, sympathetic people can’t bring themselves to telling the truth to their clients because they don’t want to add more pain to an already painful life. Going to a doctor, you expect to find a solution to your health problem. Why else would you go? You have already made the choice to submit even if it means experiencing surgery to resolve your sickness. More pain can be endured if there is going to be an end your sickness or disease.

Jesus spoke something that seemed like an uncaring and unloving statement that we need to look at.

Luke 14:26 

“If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. 

On the surface, this seems to be contrary to what people expected from Jesus. After all, wasn’t he teaching to love your enemies and now he is talking about hating your parents? Underneath the statement is a basic principle that you must have priorities in your life, and if you don’t trust Jesus more than your parents you not going to follow His instructions on how to have an abundant life that He promised.

Take the following difficult message Jesus gives to those who are following Him:

Luke 9:62 

And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.

Again, Jesus is saying you have to let go of the past in order to enter your future. Let that sink in for a minute.

There is a story in the Old Testament were one prophet is transferring his ministry to another. In this story the first prophet offered him the privilege and anointing to his ministry by putting his robe on the other.

1 Kings 19:19-21 

So he departed from there and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, while he was plowing with twelve pairs of oxen before him, and he with the twelfth. And Elijah passed over to him and threw his mantle on him. [20] He left the oxen and ran after Elijah and said, “Please let me kiss my father and my mother, then I will follow you.” And he said to him, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?”

[21] So he returned from following him, and took the pair of oxen and sacrificed them and boiled their flesh with the implements of the oxen, and gave it to the people and they ate. Then he arose and followed Elijah and ministered to him.

The young prophet wants to go back to his parents. Scripture doesn’t reveal that his request is not just to give his mom and dad a kiss good-by, but to stay longer. Elijah, the older prophet, then thinks he has asked this young man too much and encourages him to forget this new ministry he is offering. If you read the fuller story you find that Elisha, the young guy, goes home, takes his plow and ox and sacrifices them. Why? Because he wanted to burn his past so he could move on to his future. Powerful illustration of a hidden truth that our past often hinders us from making changes to enter a new life.

One of my favorite authors is Erwin McManus who speaks about this in one of his books he says,

“Every day you will have to choose between living in the past, staying in the present, or creating a future. The great danger lies in that the easy path is to hold on to what you know, cling to what you have, and make the future an extension of the past. Though there is no way to stop time, you have to choose the future. Although you are grounded in the past, you must not be grounded by the past. And while tomorrow is coming regardless of what you do, the future comes because of what you do.

It requires courage to face the thing that holds you back and be willing to offer that thing, good or bad, on the altar of sacrifice to Jesus. For some, it might be forgiving a person or persons that hurt you badly, which the enemy has been using in your life for years to keep you stunted in your Christian growth. While others grow hearing the same messages, you stay the same, trapped in your memories of unforgiveness. It may be it’s something that’s good in your life that holds you back. One young man who was in a discipleship ministry I was leading was being being tempted regularly to abandon his faith by his parents who finnally offered “The Family Buisness” which was worth millions, if he would just leave his Christian pursuits and move back home. After great struggle the temptation to make a lot of money and the questions of things in the scripture corrupted his heart and he moved back home. Eventually he even abandoned his faith and became an atheist. The past and his family won the tug of war because he hadn’t walked away from his past.

Each day has challenges of keeping us trapped in yesterday. For those of you who thought that one decision to follow Jesus years ago would be enough, you should have now realized that one decision in life is not enough. When you get married you might think that the wedding is that spectacular event that changes everything, when in reality it was just one decision in a chain of decisions you would have to make to keep married and not end up like so many that got divorced.

Today, ask the Holy Spirit for the revelation that you will need to discover if there is something you’re not willing to sacrifice in order to walk closed with your Heavenly Father. It may be a hurt, it may be a thing that looks good, but in either case it keeps you from embracing your promised abundant life which Jesus promised us all.

Question:

1) Are you finding time during each week to get quiet before the Lord? Without that time you probably won’t hear.

2) Are you being honest with God? God loves an honest heart, so get honest and ask the Holy Spirit for guidence.

Reach for your future today!

Pastor Dale