Return NOT to the FORMER .....

There is a pattern again and again in scripture that warns against returning to past things, situations, traditions, practices and activities.  It warns against living in the past either in glorifying those things nor in regret.

It continually tells us to forget, press on, turn aside, forsake.

There is a danger according to the word of God in living in the past.

I see it.  There are many who ponder things that happened and miss what IS happening.

The same is true for the quality of our relationship to the Father.  It is not ever going to be like it was in 1959, 1967, 1973, 1977, 1981, 1986, 1995, 1999,  2008 or even last week.  He is a new every morning God.  I posted all these dates because all of them have something to do with memories of my own.  You would have a different list.  I can think of great things God did in those years for ME.  You can assemble your own list.

Yet I am a new creation, or more accurately a constantly changing new creation.  One who is in the process of constantly becoming "Made New".

So when I find myself in a place, situation, relationship, fellowship or circumstance that is modeled over one of the ancienct paridigms.. I am uncomfortable, I no longer fit.  I am an outcast, cast out of my former self.

It's as it should be.  At least that's what the word says... forgetting what lies behind... press toward the HIGH CALLING OF GOD

Philippians 3:8  Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ

Romans 12:1-2  I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Isaiah 43:25 “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.

 2 Corinthians 5:17  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

Isaiah 43:18-19  “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

Philippians 3:13-14  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.