A Fresh Word

I've had trouble forgetting past sins and hurts. I have spent years asking for forgiveness and forgiving others but somehow could not get the forgetting part down. The more I would try to forget the more the devil would bring it to my mind. I would often remember the scripture in Philippians 3:13 where Paul says, "Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead." I would often wonder how he could do that--forget. Especially when the devil is quick to remind you. But then a friend of mine gave me a different word to use--NEGLECT.

Let's compare definitions:

Forgetting (forget) - To lose the remembrance of; to let go from the memory; to cease to have in mind, to treat with inattention or disregard; to slight; to neglect.

Did you see that? To neglect is part of the definition of forgetting! Now let's define neglect.

Neglect - Not to attend to with due care or attention; to forbear one's duty in regard to; to suffer to pass unimproved, unheeded, undone, etc.; to omit to receive or embrace.

That I CAN do!! I can neglect my past until I lose the memory of it. When the devil brings my past up to me, or even if I find myself starting to entertain it I can say, "I am forgiven. I am healed. I choose to neglect it." At that time the second part of the verse comes into action, "straining toward what is ahead."

In my curiosity I looked up straining and this is the definition:

Straining - stretching beyond its proper limit, exerting with violence, making great effort, filtering (to make pure).

In that definition I can see that when I choose to forget [neglect] what is behind it isn't going to be easy to move forward. There is going to be some pain involved. I am going to experience my faith being stretched. I am going to have to move out of my comfort zone. Depending on the situation I could feel like I'm walking through fire or a desert. But through it all God is with me and Jesus has gone before me. Understanding this in this way gives me new insight to the scripture 2 Timothy 1:7 "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline." God has given me, and all of us, the gift of courage to be able to strain "toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:14