While driving with my sons one afternoon, we passed the building where our church used to meet before any of them were born. I pointed to it and told them of the building’s significance. They asked relevant questions like “how long we were there” and “when did we move.”
My youngest son asked why our sign wasn’t still on the property. I explained that we took our sign down when we sold the building to another group.
Wanting a better answer, he pressed again. “Couldn’t the sign say we used to be there?”
I explained that we had taken down our sign because we were no longer going to be in that space. Our church was moving on to a new location. If the sign remained, people would assume they could find us there and they wouldn’t. The signage needed to be in our new location.
“You wouldn’t want a sign where you used to be. You need the sign where you are actually going to be,” I said.
His questions pulled at me because they came at a time when I was struggling with various signs in my own life that needed to be taken down or replaced.
Signs of disappointment, fear, and frustration were still hanging around my heart. I had allowed temporary situations to impact my disposition on far too many occasions because I hadn’t moved on. I still had some of those signs permanently affixed to my life.
Sure, I had voiced on many occasions that I had taken those signs down but the echoes of those hurts were still ringing in my head.
If I truly wanted freedom from those situations, I had to stop reliving those moments from the past and visiting the pain they caused. I needed to uproot those old signs and toss them in the trash – not the recycling bin.
I needed to move on.
More than that, I had to put up signs in my new territory. I needed signs of forgiveness, peace and hope as permanent fixtures that reflect the prosperity and joy of my life.
There is new territory to occupy and greater things to accomplish in 2017 if we’re willing to make the commitment to leave the past exactly where it belongs.
Happy New Year. Happy New Me.
My youngest son asked why our sign wasn’t still on the property. I explained that we took our sign down when we sold the building to another group.
Wanting a better answer, he pressed again. “Couldn’t the sign say we used to be there?”
I explained that we had taken down our sign because we were no longer going to be in that space. Our church was moving on to a new location. If the sign remained, people would assume they could find us there and they wouldn’t. The signage needed to be in our new location.
“You wouldn’t want a sign where you used to be. You need the sign where you are actually going to be,” I said.
His questions pulled at me because they came at a time when I was struggling with various signs in my own life that needed to be taken down or replaced.
Signs of disappointment, fear, and frustration were still hanging around my heart. I had allowed temporary situations to impact my disposition on far too many occasions because I hadn’t moved on. I still had some of those signs permanently affixed to my life.
Sure, I had voiced on many occasions that I had taken those signs down but the echoes of those hurts were still ringing in my head.
If I truly wanted freedom from those situations, I had to stop reliving those moments from the past and visiting the pain they caused. I needed to uproot those old signs and toss them in the trash – not the recycling bin.
I needed to move on.
More than that, I had to put up signs in my new territory. I needed signs of forgiveness, peace and hope as permanent fixtures that reflect the prosperity and joy of my life.
There is new territory to occupy and greater things to accomplish in 2017 if we’re willing to make the commitment to leave the past exactly where it belongs.
Happy New Year. Happy New Me.
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