My husband and I often sit and reminisce about our earlier years. We met when he was 17 and I was 16. We recall the carefree days of being young and naive. Sometimes it’s tempting to relive parts of those days like when we first met, places we went together, the freedom we had with no kids to tote around… Every once in a while we’ll hear a song on the radio that brings us back to our younger years and want to get lost in that age again.
How easy it is to look back at life being so exciting. Yet, neither of us would go back to being teenagers again. That was not a time in our lives where Christ was invited. Seems easy to forget the emptiness I often felt. Though I am not going to get into the specifics of our personal lives here, I will say, much of our days seemed in vain if we weren’t having a good time with our friends. There was a void in both of us that was filled with almost anything except God. We’d fill that void with various things never feeling satisfied. I didn’t want to turn to God because I thought He’d take what good I was feeling away.
When both my husband and I hit a breaking point, we made the decision to have more meaning in our lives. We slowly gave up sinful activities and yes, we even lost some friendships as a result. For everything we lost though, God was gracious to replace. He has provided us with wonderful friends—many of whom love the Lord as we do. He restored our health due to lifestyle changes, and He gave us a hope.
If what we have now is so much better, why is it tempting to relive the past sometimes? It might be Satan’s way to keep us from moving forward. If he can make us believe that life was better living sinfully, we can be tempted to revisit that old life again causing us to backslide in our faith.
My goal is to press forward with the hope that Christ has given me. I know He wants good for our lives and true goodness happens through Him.