Have you ever caught yourself rationalizing and justifying your low spiritual state? “I’m not doing very well spiritually, but I have my reasons. You don’t understand me because you don’t have the same background I have. I’ve experienced things in my past that have shaped my view of life and caused me to be the way I am today.”
Spiritually, can I blame my lack of progress and failure to thrive on the baggage of things that have happened to me in the past?
Without question, there are believers who live with dark memories of horrific events and circumstances in their past. The vast majority of Christians struggle to understand the profound impact such darkness has had on the life of a fellow believer. More often than not, there is a huge disconnect and possibly some impatience with those who must process baggage that has caused great trauma.
Many of us have lived very sheltered and blessed lives with relative stability and surrounded by a caring support structure to cushion the harsh realities of life. Others have not been so fortunate.
The traumatic wounds of egregious personal violations, profound disappointments, and even ingrained habits or lies we’ve believed about ourselves can cause shame, mistrust and self-doubt. If this is your past, be sure of this: God doesn’t minimize what has happened to you—He acknowledges wounds and invites you to bring them to Him.
The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18
There are God-fearing, Christ-honouring believers who struggle, and for them, thankfully, there are a growing number of Christian counsellors with professional credentials who are available.
For those with deep wounds, healing often takes time, prayer, and wise counsel. But for all of us—whether our past is marked by severe trauma or by more ordinary struggles—the call of God is the same: to press forward in faith. We see this clearly in the life of King Josiah in the Old Testament. He could have said:
“I hope nobody has high expectations for me. In my background, my grandfather was as wicked as any king could be. He worshiped false gods. He offered his sons as human sacrifices. He practiced witchcraft and did other dark things. Don’t you think that would have an impact on me? And my dad wasn’t much better! At least grandpa repented late in life, but my father was so evil that his own officials assassinated him. So I’ve got it in my genes. I hope I do better spiritually than they, but I probably won’t because I’ve got a lot of baggage.”
Fortunately, Josiah didn’t think like that. It’s so refreshing to come across his life in Old Testament history. It seems like he went to the throne with all the optimism of youth and a confident hope in his God.
He did right in the sight of the LORD and walked in all the way of his father David, (a ‘grand’ father 400 years earlier!) nor did he turn aside to the right or to the left. 2 Kings 22:2
Sizing a crown to fit the head of the new young king was someone’s task. In his teens, Josiah’s love and devotion to the Lord were evident. He realized he had his own life to live. He was responsible for his choices, and he couldn’t blame his actions on what they had done in the past. It was his turn to choose to chart his course for God. He decided to chart a different path than his fathers. The past was past with Josiah. Now he was responsible for walking closely with the Lord and leading the nation on a spiritual path to God.
Josiah initiated a robust spiritual restoration program. The House of the Lord was his priority. During the process, a long-lost and disregarded Book of the Law was found during the temple renovation project. The tears streamed down young Josiah’s face as they read the Word of God to him. His heart was broken over how far they had all strayed from God. He summoned the entire population to a meeting. Standing beside a temple pillar, he read the Word of God to the people. He publicly pledged to follow the Lord faithfully and to carry out the words written in the Book. What a leader for the Lord Josiah was!
Was dealing with the darkness of his ancestral past a process for King Josiah or just a simple conscious decision to not carry the baggage of his past along with him? How ever it was that he reached his decision, he deliberately left the baggage behind. It was a conscious decision before the Lord to honour and serve HIM —regardless of what had happened in the past.
Assuming I have no complex emotional wounds or critical trauma in my past requiring professional attention, do I have a ‘valid’ excuse for not walking closely with the Lord? Do I have a ‘legitimate’ reason for not obeying His Word? The vast majority of believers have no one to blame but themselves for their spiritual condition, including myself.
Lifting these verses entirely from their context, you may be able to adapt and adopt the spirit of the Lord’s message to your life personally and find some encouragement.
Do not remember the past events, pay no attention to things of old. Look, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it? Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness, rivers in the desert. Isaiah 43:18-19 CSB
No one, no thing, no circumstance or situation can rob me of the joy of my salvation unless I give it or them permission to do so. The choice is mine to either thrive or wither as a believer. As real as our baggage may be and as challenging as our circumstances are, it’s our choice whether we continue to carry it or drop it and walk freely and joyfully with the Lord.
Our baggage does not define us—Christ does. His grace is greater than our past, and His Spirit enables us to press forward when we feel weighed down. Like Paul, we can say:
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
Dear Child of God, even when we stumble, He lifts us up. Even when our steps are small, His strength carries us forward. The joy of the Christian life isn’t found in pretending our past never happened—but that God has saved us for His eternal purposes and His grace is sufficient to take us beyond our past and move us forward in the path of His will. In Christ, we can lay down what burdens us and walk freely into the newness of life He has promised.
The Lord’s message to you today is the same as it was to the Apostle Paul at a very difficult time in his life.
My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness. 2Corinthians 12:9