Quit Replaying Your Past

Failures seem to have a long shelf life. It’s hard to shake them off. When God killed Uzzah, it really got under David’s skin. He decided to stop right there and name that specific piece of land. He called it Perez-uzzah, which literally means “to burst out against Uzzah” (2 Samuel 6:8 NLT). God burst out in anger with David, and Uzzah was the recipient.

I can just see David letting that failure run through his mind. Every time he traveled through Perez-uzzah, he remembered it. Whenever he met someone from there, a cold chill went down his spine. Anytime someone just mentioned the name Uzzah, he felt a fresh wash of failure. We all have a Perez-uzzah in our lives. One huge mistake that meant monumental failure. We can let it hamper us every time we walk near that place, or we can keep going right on by. It’s up to us.

People may love to remind you of when you failed. They may stay quiet about your successes. Don’t let that affect you. Your failures don’t define you. So don’t let memories of them lead you. Sometimes I think about my most sinful moments and disqualify myself from being used by God. The Enemy can use the memories of the past to remind us of our sinful nature. We forget that God spreads our sin far from us (Psalm 103:12) and that we are the righteousness of God in Christ.

Good memories are the most easily forgotten, while bad ones stick to us like glue. We can’t all stop our brains from working this way. But we can stop ourselves from dwelling on the past. David could have done just that, kept running it over and over again in his head. Maybe he would have cast more blame on God. Or maybe he could have piled more shame on himself. See, there’s a difference between remembering our mistakes and dwelling on them. While David couldn’t forget the mistakes he made, he chose to accept the forgiveness God offers and move forward, using the memory of his poor decisions as a reminder of his reliance on God rather than a roadblock. How do we know? Instead of leaving the ark in Obed-edom’s house for another three months or longer, David decided to act. You can’t act if you’re too busy running the tapes.

To be a true leader of God’s vision for his life, David had to relinquish the past. Don’t dwell on your past failures. Focus on God’s plan for your future instead.