Let Yesterday Be Yesterday 
By Becky Rule 

I shared last time in "Lift Up Your Eyes" that God had brought about a change in my walk with Him without my realizing it. When I became aware of it, I found it quite unsettling. I thought I had been where He wanted me and wondered what was wrong with where I had been. Sometimes I feel like the curious three-year-old who is full of endless questions: God, why did You have me share my experience with others if You did not intend me to stay here? Was I wrong to share what I did? Why do You take us places only to have us leave them? Did I make a mistake by being where I was?

In His infinite patience, God once again took me back to last year’s New Mexico trip. He reminded me of the miles we covered, all the areas we drove through, the places we stopped, the changes in terrain, plant life, scenery and climate. Then He showed me that our spiritual walks are like a trip across a continent. We encounter all sorts of circumstances and changes on our way. We go to places (like gas stations and rest areas!) only to leave them. The point in stopping was not to stay, but to leave. To be at one place yesterday and another today and yet another tomorrow is not wrong; it’s necessary. It is not a mistake to have been there. In fact, we may stop there again later in the journey. After all, we ARE followers of His leading. The stopping places of our past are what enable us to be where we are today. That does not mean we should not have been at that place. It just means we are not there any longer. The pause was not intended to be permanent. We needed to be there, but we also need to move on.

I find when God takes me somewhere "new" in my walk with Him, I automatically assume my previous experiences were incorrect and needed adjustment. I compare today’s whereabouts to yesterday’s location, then judge the past as a failure. How ridiculous! That is like arriving in New Mexico after driving there from Michigan only to say that all the territory we covered in arriving at our final destination was "wrong." God is content with our yesterdays. They, and we, are reconciled to Him. Let yesterday be yesterday!

Verses for Reflection: 

For if we were reconciled with God through his Son’s death when we were enemies, how much more will we be delivered by his life, now that we are reconciled! And not only will we be delivered in the future, but we are boasting about God right now, because he has acted through our Lord Jesus the Messiah, through whom we have already received that reconciliation. Romans 5:10, 11

Therefore, if anyone is united with the Messiah, he is a new creation—the old has passed; look, what has come is fresh and new! And it is all from God, who through the Messiah has reconciled us to himself and has given us the work of that reconciliation, which is that God in the Messiah was reconciling mankind to himself, not counting their sins against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors of the Messiah; in effect, God is making his appeal through us. What we do is appeal on behalf of the Messiah, "Be reconciled to God! God made this sinless man be a sin offering on our behalf, so that in union with him we might fully share in God’s righteousness." 2 Corinthians 5:17-21