Letting Go and Looking Forward

Acclaimed preacher John Claypool once told about a thunderstorm that swept through southern Kentucky where his family lived. At the farm, which had been in his family for six generations, the wind blew over an old pear tree that had been there as long as anybody could remember. Claypool’s grandfather was saddened to lose the tree that he had climbed as a boy and whose fruit he had eaten all his life.

 A neighbor came by and said, “Doc, I’m really sorry to see your pear tree blown down.” “I’m sorry too,” said his grandfather. “It was a real part of my past.” “What are you going to do?” the neighbor asked. His grandfather paused for a moment and then said, “I’m going to pick the fruit and burn what’s left.”

Claypool remarked, ”That is the wise way to deal with many things in our past. We need to learn their lessons, enjoy their pleasures, and then go on with the present and the future.” 

It’s true, isn’t it? We don’t want to get stuck in the past, longing for what was. Because when we do, we may very well miss God’s many blessings here and now. It is also true that when we believe that our best days are behind us, we open ourselves up to despair.  

In the book of Jeremiah we read this promise, “I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans for well-being, and not for calamity, in order to give you a future and a hope.”

May you learn lessons from the past, enjoy its pleasures, and then, trust that God is with you here and now and to eternity.

Our prayer today was written by Roger Kunkel, founder of Dial Hope. Let us pray: Compassionate God, you suffer with us. You care about our anguish, and your love endures all things, bears all things, believes all things, and hopes all things. In this love, we find faith and courage to live and breathe and have our being. Thanks be to you, O God, for your love. In Jesus name. Amen.