God’s Word on despair

If I had to choose the three saddest words, it would be a toss-up between “I should have . . .” and “It’s too late.” Failures produce regrets and dwelling on regrets is far too easy.

Just before the crucifixion, Jesus asked the disciples to watch and pray with Him. But they fell asleep. In the moment, and certainly later, they must have experienced incredible despair. They failed Him at the time of His greatest stress.  

Chambers points out that this is a very ordinary human experience; not doing what we had opportunity to do. Sometimes I feel like my whole life is made up of missed opportunities. I should have said this. I should have done that. Certainly I cannot go back and change my responses, no matter how much I would like to. However, what Jesus said to His disciples gives me a strong word of encouragement.

Then he came to the disciples and said to them, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” (Matthew 26:45–46)

In other words, ‘sleep on now . . . that opportunity is lost forever, you cannot alter it, but arise and go to the next thing.’ Let the past go. Share it with Jesus and then go into the future with Him. He did not berate His disciples for their failure. Instead, He took them forward.

Right now I cannot think of one specific example from my life, maybe because there are so many. I feel an ache in my heart from the memories of all of them. Like Chambers says, this is an ache that comes from actual events and I cannot lift myself out of it.

The disciples must have felt that their failure was unforgivable. Going to sleep instead of praying with Him? How terrible, yet He said—‘Arise and do the next thing.’

This reminds me of Elizabeth Elliot. She was asked how she managed her busy schedule. She said, “I always do the next thing and as a Christian, I always know what it is.”

Sometimes God is silent on that next thing. In that case, we wait for direction but even waiting on Him is a ‘next thing’ and such waiting is just as important as doing something.

Jesus wants His people to know that the horrid sense of failure after missing an opportunity is not supposed to ruin our lives. Chambers says not to let the sense of failure corrupt my next action. God’s Word says:

Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:13–14)

This is another reason, among many, why I love Him so much.

Yesterday, today, and tomorrow

On this last day of 2013, I’m thinking of the past year and the coming year, but my usual pattern is to think about the current day. I want to forget the past and would like to predict the future, but reality says I can do neither. Even the challenges of each day are often overwhelming.
 

Yet this is what I love about the Lord; He has the ability to get inside my head and heart and speak to whatever is happening in there. Today’s devotional reading is about those thoughts about the past, the future, and about right now. It uses this passage to speak to my heart . . .  

The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God. Depart, depart, go out from there; touch no unclean thing; go out from the midst of her; purify yourselves, you who bear the vessels of the Lord. For you shall not go out in haste, and you shall not go in flight, for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard. (Isaiah 52:10–12)

God guards the past. As I try to look ahead to new beginnings suggested by a turnover on the calendar, I also think about all my sins and mistakes of the past year. Those memories mar my joy, yet God says they are important memories. He allows them so I do not have a shallow security for today or my future.

God also uses my failures to teach me to pray about everything and to be on the alert regarding temptation and specific weaknesses. Without the stumbling and bumbling, I would still need to learn those lessons, but thankfully, some of them are behind me. Even though some of those hurdles were tipped over by my big feet, I’m glad to be moving forward and glad that I’ve learned to jump higher.

The Lord will go before me. God is my security for the future. He knows my weaknesses and will watch over me. He knows what to allow and what to keep away. He watches so that my life will grow in likeness to Christ and all that happens to me will be toward that end. The past affirms that He will be here for me no matter what, and that all things have purpose for His glory and my good.

I will not go out with haste. The devotional reading suggests that as I go forth into the coming year, it should not be with impulsive thoughtlessness or impetuous delight that remembers nothing, but with the patient and steadfast assurance of knowing that my God will go before me. My yesterdays present irreparable things. I have lost opportunities which will never return, but the Lord still promises to use all things for my good, that I might become more like Jesus. He can transform destructive anxiety about failures into constructive thoughtfulness for the future. He will help me leave the irreparable past in His hands. He invites me, and all who love Him, to trust Him as we step into the future.

I cannot undo past mistakes, or control the future, or even make sense of most of today, but my sovereign God is willing and able to take charge of all that as He goes before me, guarding the past, planning the future, and guiding each step of the way.

To Live is Christ — leaning against the Father’s heart

Wishing I could go back forty years and change the way I did things makes me depressed. The past cannot be changed, but God isn’t into regrets either. I’m to learn from my ignorant mistakes, but must remember a timeless truth about God; He can do things that my wishing and regrets can never do.

Joel 2:25 contains a promise to Israel about the trials they experienced because of their failures to listen to God. He said to them, “I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten. . . . My great army which I sent among you.”

This verse didn’t make sense to me until I looked up the Hebrew word for “restore.” It could be translated “give peace” as it is the same root word from which comes the Hebrew greeting, “Shalom.” Knowing that God can give peace is a giant step toward experiencing it. However, the verses that depress me (if I do not focus on the promises and power of God) are these:

And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. (Deuteronomy 6:6–7)

My children are grown. They are not daily sitting or walking with me and no longer reside in my house. I cannot turn back the clock. However (and this is a big however), God has given me other children, His children, who are eager to learn the things of God. That is amazing, and for me a great joy.

Even so, this is different from teaching my own children. My heart still wishes I could be a new Christian again and know what I know now. Perhaps the Israelites felt like this too, after they realized their wanderings and attitude of heart had been passed on to the next generations. No doubt they felt regret and sorrow. Yet they also were given hope.

Besides peace about their losses, the Old Testament is full of promises for the next generation, for their “children and children’s children.” God says that He will bless them and bring them into the saving knowledge of Himself. He will preserve their offspring.

Although those promises are for Israel, they reveal how God cares, even when His people disobey Him. Because of Christ, He forgives and gives peace. His words to Israel reveal His heart, and knowing His heart gives me peace too. Those words also show me that He can change lives despite the failures of parents. He does not need my help. He says, 

For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and floods on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, and My blessing on your offspring; they will spring up among the grass Like willows by the watercourses. One will say, ‘I am the Lord’s’; Another will call himself by the name of Jacob; Another will write with his hand, ‘The Lord’s,’ And name himself by the name of Israel. (Isaiah 44:3–5)

My part is still prayer and obedience. Should I see evidence of thirst or barrenness in their lives, I’m not to panic or worry. Locusts have to chew up something before God restores it and God looks for that empty longing before He pours out His blessings.