If you we are ever going to get to where God wants you to be you are going to have to let go of our past. Let me start this message by saying that every Christian has a divine destiny; God has a plan, and a purpose for our lives. One dictionary defines destiny as that which is to happen to a person, ones lot, what will become or what has become of a person.
For the purpose of this message, I want to define divine destiny as everything that God wants for you to be and everything that God want you to have right now, in the present, and in the future. May I tell someone in the room that it’s really God’s will for you to be blessed?
God has a plan and God has a purpose designed for you. It does not matter how old you are, how pretty you make be, or how much monet that you may have in the bank, just know that God has a plan and a purpose for you.
However, there is something that you must do if you are going to walk into the purpose that God has for you. Allow me just to share a few things that will help you fulfill your divine destiny, and I’ll be through.
And the first step is if you are going to walk in the purpose and walk in the destiny that God has for you, you are going to have to let go of the past. Why do you say that Pastor? I say that because you will never be able to move forward in life, looking backward or until you leave the past behind.
Look at what Paul says 13 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, 14 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. in other words Paul is saying that I am continuously making efforts to better myself, and reach my goals. Allow me to put it in the young people language, I’m trying to be on my game.
What Paul is telling us is that if we are going to walk in purpose that we are going to have to forget some stuff.
Now understand that forgetting is not the absence of memory. It does not mean that you fail to remember, because unless you are hypnotize, or have a brain tumor, no mature person with a human mind can really forget what has happen in the past. I don’t care how good it was or how bad it was, sooner or later something will trigger you, something will activate, prompt or set it off in your thought and it reappears. No matter how bad you want to forget someone, every now and then somebody that looks like someone that you used to know will show up and bring back all of the memories of the past.
But what the bible means when it says forget those things which are behind you, the bible is tell us to no longer be influenced by or affected by the past. It simply means to break the power of the past by living for the future. We cannot change the past because it’s in the tomb of time, you can’t go back and dig it up and change but we can change the meaning of the past.
[Used Joseph story] When Joseph was talking to his brothers he said that I’m not going to allow my past cause me to hate you, because what you did to me in the past, I’ve gotten over that, and what I’m going to do for you really out weights what you could have ever done for me, you tried to hurt me but I’m going to bless you. You tried to tear me down but I’m going to build you up. You tried to kill me but I’m help you live. Is there anybody here that has a Joseph kind of spirit?
And let me drop a bomb on somebody this morning, and that is God know when people are mistreating you. God sees every time that you have been taken advantage of, he know every time that you’ve tried to mend a broken relationship, he knows when you have been left by yourself, when you have been lied on, cheated on, beaten on God knows, he know when that man has left you with all of those kids, he know when that women has broken you heart. But God can take every evil that come into your life and turn it into something good. What they meant for bad, God means it for your good. And then you can recite that scripture that has stirred our hearts over the years and say “for we know that all things work together for the good of them that love the Lord, to them that are called for Gods purpose.”
But here is the problem; too many of us are shackled by the past. You can’t move forward because you are spending too much time looking backwards. No wonder we are stumbling, no wonder we are falling all over people, because you can’t walk forward for looking backward.
God is trying to get you to your real love and you are still stuck on Lester, God is trying to get into your new position at your new job and you are still talking about how they fired you unjustly at that job that you talked about you hated so much. Tell your neighbor turn around here and stop looking back.
I just need to tell somebody in this room, and I don’t know who I’m talking too but I need to tell somebody that you have been waddling where you are to long and it’s time for you to move forward. That’s what God wanted for the children of Israel. He had brought them out of bondage, through the wilderness and to the foot of Mount Sinai and all he want them to do is worship him for a little while and then move into the Promise Land, but because they were looking back, and God had to come to them 2 years later and say hey you’ve been here long enough get yourselves up and move to where I told you to go.
And that’s what God want me to tell somebody here today, we have been parked in one spot long enough, we have been in neutral long enough, we have been the speculators long enough, it’s time to stop whining, and crying long enough it’s time for you to get up.
Paul says you got to let it go. Tell your neighbor let it go [repeat] because the devil will have you spending all of your time living under condemnation, and he will be telling you that you are not worthy of serving or praising God based on your past.
God told me to tell somebody this morning that he is not looking at where you came from he’s concerned about where you are going.
And then Paul say’s to me by way of the scripture, that I have a resolute, an unwavering, and untiring determination to reach my goal. He says in the realm of the spirit all I want to do is to reach my goal. And that is the goal of the high calling of God.
And I believe that if we are going to make it New G in these times that we are living in that we are going to have to let go of our past and press. Somebody say press.
So what is God saying? He saying that you’ve had to endure some hard times in the past, you have had some ruff roads along your trail, and you have had some dry places in your wilderness. But he dare you to press on. Because if you press on, he will smooth out your ruff roads, I will make your latter days better then your former days, and he will send dew in the morning to your dry places, but there is one condition and that is that you’ve must let go of the past.
You’ve got to let it go
Let go of the lies
Let go of the hurts
Say it like Teddy P said, he said “looking back over my years I’ve guest I’ve shedded some tears, I told myself time and time again this time I’m gonna win, it’s another fight things ain’t right, I’m losing again, I think I better let it go, it looks like another love TKO.
Because as long as I’m holding on to the Past I can’t move forward.
