It Was Good Advice

Many years ago, while serving as a pastor, I like many preachers had my share of church problems. The most trying being when a segment of influential members left. After their departure, I continued opening the sore, so to speak, in my messages. One of my best parishioners met with me and revealed that he and his family would be leaving our assembly. When asked why, referring to our past troubles, he said, “Preacher, it’s over, but you won’t let go of it.”

I had allowed the painful past to be a part of what should have, and could have, been a pleasant present. I kept my shovel handy so I could visit the graveyard daily to dig up the putrefying corpse of yesterday. I refused to heed Paul’s words, “Forgetting those things which are behind.” Like the maniac of Gadara I dwelt among the tombs. And can you believe, I wondered why I didn’t feel alive. But thank God, I finally woke up, cast aside my grave-clothes, and began again living among the living.

Maybe some of my reader’s need also to heed my friend’s advice, and leave the cemetery behind them.