It’s Faith-refresher Wednesday

 

 

I can never forget this story that Ted once told me about his grandfather on his mother’s side of the family.  Apparently, Grandpa was once a bit naughty as a child when he got into a field of cantaloupe melons. He may have been with a friend or friends but I don’t remember that detail of the story.  But the part I remember is that Grandpa could never ever eat cantaloupe melon because on that day in the field when he was a child, he and his friend(s) at e and ate and ate as much melon as they could consume.  It was rather a kind of stealing –they were eating it for free – hence the naughty part.  Poor grandpa paid the price and all that sweet, hot cantaloupe that he devoured came back up as sour nasty orange puke.  It made him really sick.

Makes me sick thinking about it.

I had a similar experience as Grandpa.  Once, after eating some Taco Bell, I got deathly sick with puking and – yeah – the other end too – and swore I would never eat Taco Bell again.  (It took me a year or so but I DO eat Taco Bell now.)

Let me now talk about our main bathroom in the house and how I have had the same shower curtain and liner hanging there for years.  The liner was getting yucky with all the soap scum build up.  I thought I’d get a new liner and threw the shower curtain in the washing machine.  But then I remembered that I had this other nice shower curtain in the linen closet.  It was the shower curtain that Ted had used in his bathroom in the apartment he had for the year and a half that he lived in Indiana while I lived in Michigan while trying to get our house sold.  We hated that year and a half.  I hated having to visit my husband in another state on weekends.  That year and a half of living separate is a memory that makes Ted and I sick to our stomachs.  We never dreamed we’d live apart that long.  It was awful.  I thought about hanging that shower curtain and at first – I just couldn’t do it.  I was thinking it would upset me to look at it and have memories of that Indiana apartment come flooding back.

Old shower curtain hanging on the towel rack:

 

 

 

 

 

Now let’s take a look at the bible verses I came across this morning and I shall connect the dots for you on this story!

Philippians 3:12-14 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.  Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

In the verse above, Paul writes to the followers in Philippi and tells them to forget their sinful past.  He does not expect them to completely lose the memory but to leave it behind them so they can press forward and towards the bigger goal.  I think, in other words, it’s like saying “take the old bad experience and learn from it”.  It’s done.  It’s over.  Get over it!

Even before reading this verse, I chose to hang the alternative shower curtain.  I like it!  It’s a snappy navy blue cotton with a light blue line running both vertically and horizontally.  It is much more contemporary and almost nautical (we like nautical things!) and I thought – “…the heck with it being from that awful-never-want-to go there again-Indiana-apartment.  I like the shower curtain!

New shower curtain:

 

 

 

 

 

Then I read the verse from Philippians and it all made sense.  The bad things we’ve done in the past can help shape us for the future by being examples.  It does no good to stay stuck in the past with holding onto the same sinful behavior, or reliving and holding on to past bad experiences.  In fact, doing that just stifles us from making progress and moving on to better things.  Poor Grandpa should have given cantaloupe another chance!  I actually LIKE Taco Bell once in a while!  And the shower curtain looks great!  Fresh and snappy new!

So if you want to move forward but are holding onto the things of the past,

Get.

Over.

It.

Forget what is behind and press on toward the goal.

just Laurel