three states of time.

Time can be such a hindrance, can it not? Rarely do I meet someone who has a proper hold on each of the three--past, present, and future. One thing I have noticed, however, is that no matter which one a person is too focused on, his or her present will always be negatively affected. I'd like to us Paul's take on things from Philippians 3:12-14 which says, "Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."



The past has the potential to be such a snare. Our past experiences, heartbreaks, and successes all contribute to where we are now, but they can easily engulf our purpose for the present and prevent us from making progress. Broken relationships, family abuse, abandonment, devastating news, death, and many other painful things that have marked our pasts not only prove to cripple our present, but determine our future. Patterns are often seen among men who, as boys, were abandoned or abused by their fathers. Sadly, those fearful, wounded boys, many times grow up to abuse or abandon their own families. Their hearts have already been stolen by a fear that determines their future actoins. And those men are just one example. Good things can also have a potentially bad affect. Many parents attempt to relive their high school glory days through the lives of their children. The once captain of the cheerleading squad, now mother, can wrongly push her daughter to embrace the world's love of status and popularity because she doesn't want to see her success fading away.

Paul says that he is forgetting what is behind. So what does that mean? Should we erase our past from our memories? Okay, well obviously no, because that's impossible save the aftermath of brain damage. Perhaps Paul is talking about his individual past, filled with murder, rage, and rebellion from God. But Hebrews 12:1 says, "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us." If Paul held on to the sins that he had committed , they would have entangled him and prevented him for fully living for Christ in the present. When he talks about forgetting the past, I think he's talking more about an unloading process. Not only have we all committed sins, but sins have been committed against us, and those are sometimes the hardest to get by. Christ's sacrifice on the cross 2000 years ago forever released us from our pasts, yet sometimes we still try to drag our burdens to heaven with us. We need to lay our crowns at the foot of the cross. Some crowns may be made of thorns that have left scars on our hearts, and some may be adorned with the jewels of our achievements. Whatever they may be contrusted from, they all belong to Jesus.

Planning for the future is something that we should all be doing, but we must not neglect our present statuses and responsibilities. Being a seventeen-year-old girl, I can say that I think about the future, particularly marriage, quite often. I envision what it will be like, and before I know it, I'm in a virtual Home Depot picking out lighting fixtures for our living room. Now, I don't think it's wrong to envision things for the future, but I believe that it can quickly become something that we stake our lives on. If I was set on marriage, and thoughts of a husband filled my mind all the time, what good would I be as a single high school senior? Right now, God has given me a single friend, student, sister, and daughter. I have four jobs. While I can think ahead, I cannot ignore my present responsibilities. God knows the plans he has for me, and he knows what I need and want even better than I think I do. I must obey his Word in the present while I wait for him to reveal what my future holds.

Paul says he is straining toward what is ahead. He has his sights set on his heavenly home and the glorious fullness that he will experience there. But he is currently living so as to attain all of that. He knows that God is deeply concerned with how he lives in the present, so he strains for the future, yet his focus remains steady.

So many people live in the moment, they don't want to think about their past and they don't want to have to plan for or worry about the future. You can't escape the inevitable: the past will shape you. Denying it will only increase the length of the process you'll have to go through in dealing with it. Sometimes we're just too scared, too hurt to dig up things that we've buried in the deepest places inside of us. We don't want to relive and remember things. Or maybe we've had a pretty good life thus far, but we just want something new. In casting aside the blessings we've received, we fail to recognize the goodness which God has lavished upon us. With no concern for the future, there is no regard for the consequences of present actions. An example that pertains to our nation now is our economy's current state. There are those who disregard the instability of finances and live as though there is nothing wrong. They will wish they had planned and used their money more wisely when a bank, stock market, or employing company takes a turn for the worse.

Paul says, "but I press on." Yes, we have had painful wounds and heartbreaking devastation. But I press on. We want the future to come all too soon. But I press on. We must live in the present, acknowledging our past but free from its chains, looking ahead towards the future but fully completely our duties now. Christ's past sacrifice secured my future. With eyes fixed both on the cross and the glory of heaven, I should live well for Christ in the present.

other than.

One of the first things we need to establish before diving into talking about a relationship with God is that he is other than us. I, along with many other people I know, used to think that God was merely a bigger, smarter, stronger, better version of me. But God is so much more than that. We cannot fathom anything that has no limit; therefore, it is impossible for us to fully understand God in the fullness of who he is. I think that he purposely created our minds to be finite not only for the purpose of him being exponentially greater, but so that there would never be an end to the awe we should have of him. So much of the tension created in the relationships that others have with God is their failure to realize their inability to comprehend everything. Our definitions of things are tainted by the sinful world that we live in, and if we encounter something that fits God's definition and not ours, we immediately assume that God is wrong, unjust, unfaithful, cruel, etc. For example, good is often meant to be something that makes us feel satisfied, happy, wanted, complete. While what God sees as good can very well be something that we see as equally good, it can also be something that does not make us feel so warm and fuzzy. We are like the children who complain about having to receive insulin several times a day, claiming that it's pointless and it hurts; only farther down the road do we begin to have a clearer vision, the bigger picture. Diabetes, like sin, is not something that just goes away--it needs constant maintenance and control. When we have a better understanding of the problem at hand, the steps required to deal with that problem are also better understood, and even valued. The Fall is our massive problem at hand; it has been the main problem since it happened. I believe that seemingly bad things, which we seldom understand, are necessary steps in the process of transforming us into people who are progressively farther and farther from where they started.

Although it is important to know that we can never fully comprehend God, I believe we must long to understand all that he allows. Fortunately for us, God does not just leave us hanging; he has given his children the Holy Spirit, who works in hearts and minds, transforming them to be more able to understand. God reveals himself through his word, creation, and many other things. There is much that exists to be understood, and we are free to desire it. God did not make us to be lazy human beings who just sit around waiting for things to happen. I believe that God wants us to be eager in pursuing him, getting to know his character, his heart, his desires.

I believe that prayer is a crucial part of a relationship with God, though it is one of the elements with which I struggle the most. When I think about it, it's so foolishly ridiculous for me to not take advantage of any moment I have to talk to God. The Creator of this entire universe is free to spend time with me anytime, but it's up to me to take hold of that. Too often, I am convinced that I am created for this world. We are not created for this world, however, but for eternal things. As C.S. Lewis said, "We are souls; we have bodies." When we live with that earthly mindset, our first instinct will always be to run to other people instead of God, to eat a pint of ice cream instead of casting our cares on the Lord, to post unnecessary Facebook statuses about our anger instead of telling God about it. If we believe we have been created for this world, that we are home on this earth, we will do all we can to gather up all that it has to offer; that includes talking to people in place of God.