Bob's Bits

Are you dragging a ball and chain? Are you bent over from carrying a heavy load? This is just where Satan wants you to be. He wants to see us miserable, wretched, and blind. So many people are dragging their past along with them and it is like dragging a ball and chain. When we live in the past and think about the past continually with the mistakes we have made in our life, and something that we enjoyed in the past but no longer have; it is dragging us down. It may be a relationship that we no longer have, it may be a loved one that has gone on, it may be prosperity that has left us but whatever it is we cannot live in the past we must live in the present and future. For others they are carrying a heavy load of pain and guilt for the mistakes that they have made or a self image that is just about zero. This also can be like carrying a heavy load. Only through the grace of Jesus Christ can we overcome the guilt, the poor self image and the freedom from the heavy load. Heb. 8:12 God said: "For I will be merciful to their iniquities, And I will remember their sins no more." If we have come to Jesus Christ with faith, repentance, confession, baptism and faithfulness God has forgotten our sins and put them in the past. If we are Christians let us do the same. We can learn from our mistakes, vow to never make them again, but to let them hinder us from living a joyous life in Christ may it never be. We must realize that we are sinful and possess a sinful nature but to live in the Spirit is to overcome that sinful nature through the faith and obedience in Christ. Let us not make the mistake of hurting and destroying ourselves from walking while looking back. Let us look to the future which only comes in Christ Jesus. Any other way is a dead end. Mt. 11:28-30 Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.