Looking Back

The Music Minister asked me to provide the Executive Assistant to the Pastor with some words I had written for a song we llove to sing. Of course I couldn’t find them off-hand in the jumble of papers I call my “files.” As I searched through the stuffed drawers of a filing cabinet, I was constantly delayed by some idea or thought I had written down over past years. There’s enough stuff in those files to keep one busy for a while, but looking back has its disadvantages. One gets tempted to think about the “good old days” or the time when everything was “just right.” Of course, no such thing exists; it is only our selective memory riding the crest of an unrealistic nostalgia.

These days are the ones we must focus on. For the most part I don’t want to spend time thinking about what was, or agonizing over what is no more. Rather, I want to focus on today and its opportunities to share a word of faith, support a brother, get a shoulder under some-body’s burden, and llove the folks who are a part of this day, this particular journey.

Again, I am not opposed to a little nostalgia. I will never forget a host of people with whom my path has crossed and marvelous memories of other times are locked forever in the recesses of my heart, but living with a mindset in the past is a killer in being successful today. “This is the day that the Lord has made. Rejoice, and be glad in it.”