A Letter Of No Regrets...

I think every person on this planet has at some point or another struggled with regrets. Some struggle more than others. I confess that regret is something I often battle. So, when I read Elisabeth Elliot’s devotional yesterday, I was freshly convicted and encouraged. She features a letter from her grandfather to her grandmother who was struggling with regret over an incident that had occurred several years prior. I was reminded that when we let regret take over our thoughts and emotions we will not be able to be affective in the now. “None of us could be alive to the pressing needs of today if we should carry along with us the dark heaviness of any past, whether real or imagined.” I’m not saying we should never be grieved over our failures and sin, but after we have “briefly” grieved, move on. Regret is a burden God has never asked us to carry. We are to forget what lies behind and strain forward to what lies ahead. The other thing I loved about Elliot’s excerpt was how her grandfather was encouraging and speaking truth to his wife. He then references how he sometimes battles regret and depression and how his wife is always reminding him to “look up”. They are going back and forth in uplifting each other. Ephesians 4:9-10 speaks of the advantages of having someone to be there for you, “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” This provokes me to want to be a greater source of encouragement to others with whatever they may be struggling with. There is nothing sweeter than when someone comes alongside us to gently speak truth to our hearts and lift us up. - Regrets are things of the past and God calls us to live in the present. No matter what we have regrets over, we can be confident that God is sovereignly working it all out for our good and His glory. With God as our Shepherd, nothing ever enters our life that He has not allowed. I am praying to honor God with regret free days and a hope filled heart.

"Regrets" by Elisabeth Elliot
When my father was twelve years old he lost his left eye through disobedience. He had been forbidden to have firecrackers, but he sneaked out early in the morning of July 4, 1910, and, with the help of a neighboring farmer, set off some dynamite caps. A piece of copper penetrated his eye. Four years later my grandfather wrote this letter to my grand-mother:
Dearest:
I am not one bit surprised that after all our experiences of the past four years you should suffer from sad memories, but I really do not believe for a moment that you should feel you have any occasion to let remorse bite into your life on account of Philip's accident. Surely we cannot guard against all the contingencies of this complex life, and no one who has poured out life as you have for each one of your children should let such regrets take hold.
None of us could be alive to the pressing needs of today if we should carry along with us the dark heaviness of any past, whether real or imagined. I know, dearest, that your Lord cannot wish anything of that sort for you, and I believe your steady, shining, and triumphant faith will lead you out through Him, into the richest experiences you have ever had. I believe that firmly.
I have had to turn to Him in helplessness today to overcome depression because of my failures. My Sunday School fiasco at Swarthmore bears down pretty hard. But that is not right. I must look ahead, and up, as you often tell me, and I will. I know how sickening remorse is, if anyone knows; yet I also know, as you do, the lift and relief of turning the whole matter over to Him. We must have more prayers and more study together, dearest. I haven't followed the impulses I have so often had in this.

Lovingly, your own Phil.

“But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 3:13, 14