THE worried looking man entered the doctor’s clinic and allowed himself to be thoroughly examined. “You’re okay,” smiled the doc, “but something seems to be on your mind?” “Well, to tell you the truth doc,” said the worried man, “I seem to be getting forgetful! No it’s actually worse than that, I can never remember where I park my car, where I’m going or what it is I’m going to do once I get there, I even forget who owes me money or to whom I owe any money! I really need help. What do I do doc?”
“Well for starters,” said the doctor, “Pay me in advance..!” Well, we all remember jokes about such absent minded and forgetful people, professors in college, grandfathers and friends, but if you pause for a moment you’ll realize forgetfulness isn’t all that bad, especially when we decide to forget all the pain from the past that threatens to ruin the present. There’s a song which says, “There’s no future in the past.”
A sick lady with a skin disease who had gone to many doctors approached a doctor who was known for his strange methods of healing. Said the learned doctor after examining her, “madam you suffer from grudgititis!” “What’s that?” asked the woman sharply. “Holding onto grudges,” said the doctor, “you need to forget the hurts of the past and once you do your skin will heal.”
The past is to be remembered; how else will we learn from it and keep from repeating mistakes, but should you remember every time you felt hurt because of your spouse, your children, your friends? A friend of Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, asked her about a particular traumatic incident in her life. Miss Barton seemed perplexed.
“Can’t you remember?” asked the prodding friend. “I distinctly remember forgetting it,” Miss Barton replied. In the book of Isaiah, God says, “Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold I will do a new thing.” You can’t go back and change the past any more than you can put tooth paste back in a tube. So forget it. Get rid of it. You can then say, “Okay God, this is where I am today.
I tie all the old ‘could have,’ ‘should have,’ ‘would have’ bones in a bungle, and I bury them. They are now behind me. Forgive me for carrying bitterness, anguish and resentment, things I have no business to carry. Set me free that I may walk into the Bright future you have planned for me!” So bury your past and walk out of the graveyard of grudges and bitterness..!
