Memories

[Starise]

 Those little snapshots we all have of our past that often are selective. Sometimes I sit and recollect over long periods of time picking out what were the good times and the not so good times. If we were to dwell on the past all the time we would never live the present or contemplate the future, yet I think it can be a good exercise to go back to those places and times and events we remember. There are also traumatic events for some people that are best not remembered. My recollections often tend to be similar to flipping through a very large novel I've already read and remember in each page as I pull it up.

They say memory is both very selective and very unreliable. There are sometimes things others remind me of that I have solidly forgotten until reminded again, yet I remember things that seem inconsequential. These snap shots of our lives are how we make sense of our past and decipher where we've been and how we arrived at where we are.

The Bible has a few things to say about what it will one day be like in the future when we are in the presence of the Lord.

Isaiah 65:17

17 For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.

Isaiah 43:18

Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old.

Revelation 21:1-5

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

 

I see the explanation to this scripture not as though we will suddenly have our memories wiped clean, but more likely we will have all resigned to the new order of things and so we will no longer look back to a painful past. Our better understanding at that time will allow the Lord to wipe our tears away of the former times.

A door has closed. We will then be moving away from the sinful earth that once existed and the painful memories that were once so real will one day be forgotten. Notice the Bible doesn't use the word 'forget'. When we move past a bad painful event we can then live life to the fullest capacity.

Notice how we often take blocks of time that were once years such as grade school. What seemed a lot of time then is now a block of time we see as a segment on our timeline. The older we get the shorter that segment seemed to be. Pre-school> Grade school>High School>Other education or the Military>Dating> Marriage>A family> so on and so forth. A single person's timeline would look different but be no less important. Everyone's time line looks maybe a slightly different. It is interesting that for the health of the individual memory is often selective. The worst events are intentionally forgotten as a protective mechanism. This is how I am seeing these verses regarding time and how what we are living now will one day be viewed. Notice death and mourning are mentioned in Revelation 21. In my present understanding these seem to be almost insurmountable, yet I know that from bad events in my own life the more time that passes, the easier it is to let go of these things and move on.

Thoughts?

 

 

[missmuffet]

29 minutes ago, Starise said:

 Those little snapshots we all have of our past that often are selective. Sometimes I sit and recollect over long periods of time picking out what were the good times and the not so good times. If we were to dwell on the past all the time we would never live the present or contemplate the future, yet I think it can be a good exercise to go back to those places and times and events we remember. There are also traumatic events for some people that are best not remembered. My recollections often tend to be similar to flipping through a very large novel I've already read and remember in each page as I pull it up.

They say memory is both very selective and very unreliable. There are sometimes things others remind me of that I have solidly forgotten until reminded again, yet I remember things that seem inconsequential. These snap shots of our lives are how we make sense of our past and decipher where we've been and how we arrived at where we are.

The Bible has a few things to say about what it will one day be like in the future when we are in the presence of the Lord.

Isaiah 65:17

17 For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.

Isaiah 43:18

Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old.

Revelation 21:1-5

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

 

I see the explanation to this scripture not as though we will suddenly have our memories wiped clean, but more likely we will have all resigned to the new order of things and so we will no longer look back to a painful past. Our better understanding at that time will allow the Lord to wipe our tears away of the former times.

A door has closed. We will then be moving away from the sinful earth that once existed and the painful memories that were once so real will one day be forgotten. Notice the Bible doesn't use the word 'forget'. When we move past a bad painful event we can then live life to the fullest capacity.

Notice how we often take blocks of time that were once years such as grade school. What seemed a lot of time then is now a block of time we see as a segment on our timeline. The older we get the shorter that segment seemed to be. Pre-school> Grade school>High School>Other education or the Military>Dating> Marriage>A family> so on and so forth. A single person's timeline would look different but be no less important. Everyone's time line looks maybe a slightly different. It is interesting that for the health of the individual memory is often selective. The worst events are intentionally forgotten as a protective mechanism. This is how I am seeing these verses regarding time and how what we are living now will one day be viewed. Notice death and mourning are mentioned in Revelation 21. In my present understanding these seem to be almost insurmountable, yet I know that from bad events in my own life the more time that passes, the easier it is to let go of these things and move on.

Thoughts?

 

 

Some are good memories and some are not so good memories. It is not good to go back and dwell on the bad memories because it can cause all kind of bad emotions. One is my goals is to stay in the day I am living. Not dwell in the past or the future. I do much better that way. 

[Starise]

Just now, missmuffet said:

Some are good memories and some are not so good memories. It is not good to go back and dwell on the bad memories because it can cause all kind of bad emotions. One is my goals is to stay in the day I am living. Not dwell in the past or the future. I do much better that way. 

Yes, day by day. Living in the present is a good idea.

[missmuffet]

1 minute ago, Starise said:

Yes, day by day. Living in the present is a good idea.

It is hard sometimes not to allow your memory to wander to the past. I need God's help with that. 

[Starise]

Just now, missmuffet said:

It is hard sometimes not to allow your memory to wander to the past. I need God's help with that. 

God heals all wounds.

[missmuffet]

8 minutes ago, Starise said:

God heals all wounds.

Yes, He does  and we ask Him to help us forgive but the memories don't go away. 

[Riverwalker]

For the longest time, I was anchored to my past.  I hade a wonderful childhood, but in my teens and twenties my life fell apart. I had to deal with a very emotional health issue, My parents got divorced, and when I finally gto married in my early 20's she was taken away from me (died).  I fell on to God and gave it all end..... but I never stopped looking back at that perfect childhood.

Then one day I did go back, I went to the school of my perfect childhood and where the trouble first started

I sat on one bench and look across at the other bench and saw my 13 year old self....looking very worried.  I didn't know how this health problem would affect me and I was very scared. And I was wondering what would I say to him (if I could) and would I want to hear it?

And suddenly I remembered I was on the other side of all that trauma, and my life was good again, Married to a wonderful woman and living a full and happy Christian life

And I heard myself say out loud "You Craig, (yeah that's me) you are going to be okay."

And I smiled at myself and I felt a great weight lift off of me, and suddenly the past was no longer a problem, and I didn't miss the goodness of my childhood, because I realized I was on the other side of trouble and I was going to be okay

 

[Marathoner]

1 hour ago, Starise said:

God heals all wounds.

He does indeed. Perhaps what's at stake here is time. We learn by the scripture that there is a time and season for every matter under heaven (Ecclesiastes 3), so we understand while we toil in that which shall pass away (the earth and this flesh and blood), we are subject to time and times, a season and seasons.  

Barring some kind of calamity which robs us of our memories in time, these memories remain with us. There was a time when I agonized over the passing of my adopted mother... did I miss something? Her health started to swiftly decline immediately following the Lord restoring me to health and vigor after my own ordeal, and I did not miss the significance of this salient fact. But as you point out in the OP, there are times when we find ourselves recollecting the past. 

I remembered when we first met and how I stood between her and a gun; I remembered how I devoted myself to protecting her life from the degenerates who had terrorized her for years before the Lord brought us together; I remembered my many failures; and I remembered how the tables were turned when I became ill and started withering away. She in turn became the protector of my life. She didn't cast me aside nor throw me away, abandoning me as a dead man. She treated me like she would her own son. 

There were so many close calls over the years. My experience and skill as a first responder, noticing a health crisis before it arrived to threaten her life, made it possible for emergency services to make it to her side in time (we were isolated on the boundary of a national wilderness). So when I used to wonder, "did I miss something?", I'm not referring to the cancer which she battled and overcame. 

It was sepsis. I never saw it coming, brother. One day she was with us and the next she passed away... and I was devastated by the loss of this precious soul from the earth. I raked myself over the proverbial coals: how could I have missed it? I failed her, Lord! By failing her, I failed You. Ah...but with the passage of time my ruminations of the past changed. I remembered how the Lord delivered me from ruin just in time to devote myself to her once more, only this time as her caretaker and a caregiver. 

In the greater scheme of things the Lord blessed me with the most precious of gifts. He honored me with the opportunity to do unto this woman, who became my mother through hardship and joy, as I would have done to the woman who brought me into this world. I was denied the latter, but God saw fit to bless me with the former. I had already honored and blessed my father of this flesh and blood before he passed on, and so now I was given the chance to honor and bless my mother before she passed on. 

This isn't found in the scriptures, but I deem this saying to be true: the greatest beauty is invariably touched by the deepest of sorrow. Over time the sting of memories changed into a song of thanksgiving and joy. So yes, God heals all wounds.  

[Starise]

19 hours ago, Marathoner said:

This isn't found in the scriptures, but I deem this saying to be true: the greatest beauty is invariably touched by the deepest of sorrow.

I love the way you put this @Marathoner. You should be a poet! Thanks @Riverwalker for sharing that experience.

When I look back on my past with older eyes things indeed do look different the further out I get. Probably the single most emotionally painful event in my life. The event I thought would surely kill me of heart break, eventually passed. God re equipped me to keep going when I couldn't see a way to go. For a time though I was dead inside as if someone had driven a hot spike through my heart. I thought it would never go away. In many ways emotional trauma mirrors physical pain. When we are going through it, it's the only thing we can see or think about. It overwhelms us making all else second in importance. Hold my hand over a fire and it's the only thing I'm thinking about at the time. God in His miraculous providence healed even this for me. I remember feeling dead for the longest time.A walking functional zombie. Praise God. No more.

Then there are the things I did that were all my own foolish doing. The things I would be ashamed to admit to any man much less God Himself. The things I wish I could undo, take back. I know God knows about all of it. Yet His word tells me He still forgave me. I sometimes can't comprehend why and sometimes I get caught in those memory loops that threaten to undo any peace I might have had. For some reason I seldom reflect on the good things I might have done and instead remember the mistakes, especially the largest ones.

There is a lot to be said for moving on and not looking back. Easier said than done sometimes for me.

Maybe this has to do with becoming a believer at a very young age. I see the world often in a very melancholic way because as believers we SEE how it really is. No scales over our eyes....and how can one be optimistic about this mess down here? My only reason for optimism is in going to be with the Lord one day. 

[appy]

On 10/12/2021 at 11:25 AM, missmuffet said:

Some are good memories and some are not so good memories. It is not good to go back and dwell on the bad memories because it can cause all kind of bad emotions. One is my goals is to stay in the day I am living. Not dwell in the past or the future. I do much better that way. 

For some reason, your post made me think of Matthew 6:34

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

But I also recall this really nice poem, written almost 20 years ago.  I thought of it, because it talks about not dwelling on the past or being anxious over the future.

ps, (oops) a link to the video forum is missing...here you go

https://www.worthychristianforums.com/topic/271751-interview-with-god-poem/