Trouble in the Christian life comes from various sources. Not least the spectre of past failures haunts us and brings depression and discouragement with it. What do we do if we're in these circumstances? Maybe George can help us.

"I'm sorry to put you to all this trouble," said George, as he let me into his flat. "I really felt low this morning and I just couldn't..." He stopped, a worried look on his face. "I just couldn't face going to church yesterday. I'm sorry to bother you..."

"It's no bother at all," I assured him. "I'm glad you phoned me. You said you had one or two things play­ing on your mind. Maybe we could talk about these together."

"Well," he said, "I just cannot seem to get away from these thoughts about my past. All my failures seem to flood my mind first thing every morning. All day I keep thinking about silly things I once did and said."

Physical Health⤒🔗

"Is this something new, George?" I asked.

"No, I've often had these thoughts before, but since my wife died, and my arthritis got worse, I just cannot seem to shrug them off like I used to. It really is weighing me down now."

"Have you seen your doctor about your arthritis at all?"

George hesitated and said that he had not. I suggested that something to relieve his pain would at least take one thing off his mind. "At least you'll be able to concentrate a bit more," I said.

He agreed, and said he would make an appointment in the morning.

"But it's really these thoughts that worry me" he said. "I'm praying about it but it doesn't seem to make much difference."

"You know, George," I replied, "Sometimes it is possible that we can be pray­ing about something, instead of doing something about it. Regrets like you have cannot make any difference to the past. That's not going to change the past. So you should not feel depressed about what you cannot possibly change, should you? It's the present that really counts, and what we're making of it."

"But I just keep thinking of how much I hurt others in the past," he said. "It hurts me to think of this and I just cannot get it out of my mind. If only I had not... "

"George, that's the problem with you," I inter­rupted. "Your time and energy is being spent in thinking "if only". That's a sure way of letting the past paralyse you now in the present."

He listened quite intently. Sometimes a "common sense" course of action is obscured by such a condition as he was in. A case of "cannot see the wood for the trees" type of thing.

Redeeming the Time←⤒🔗

George was noticeably less tense as I tried to show him how such regrets as he had about the past must also be "made up for" in the present. "The best way to deal with your past," I said, "is to stop being worried about it, and make sure that you are doing all you can, now, to make up for it."

"How do you mean?" he asked.

"Well, by being busy with all that you know is your duty in the present. You cannot relive the past, so why be depressed about it? Put that energy into doing what God wants you to do now. It's not what you once were that counts, but what you are now. It's not what you once did, or said or failed to do, that's impor­tant, but what you are doing and saying now. Do you think the apostle Paul had any regrets in his life?" I asked.

"Of course not," George, "there's no way someone like him could have regrets like I have."

Forgetting the Past←⤒🔗

"I think he had, George. He spoke of the time before he had come to know Christ with much regret. He re­gretted what he had done to people, how he had per­secuted the church of God, how he had been a blasphemer, how he had hated the very name of Jesus. He truly regretted all that. But he did not let his regrets dominate his think­ing. Remember what he told the Philippians. "Forgetting what is behind, and straining towards what is ahead, I press on towards the goal of the prize of God's high call­ing in Christ Jesus." He had regrets just like you and I. But he knew that the past must be seen as the past. He could not change it. But did all he could, to live for Christ in the present."

"But why should I actu­ally feel bad about these sins of the past?" George asked. "As a Christian, should I feel this, when all my sins have been forgiven by God? I just can't understand why I have these thoughts as I have."

"Is it not true though, George, that your under­standing of sin as sin is much greater now, having been a Christian for all these years? You can see the failures of the past as sin, in a way that you could not a few years ago even. That's part of the growth of a Christian. That's why you feel bad about them now."

"That, in itself, is alright. But you are going further than that. You're letting such bad feelings get on top of you, as if you could undo the past and change it, and as if God did not know about these failures when he covered your sins in for­giveness."

Self-Discipline←⤒🔗

George thought for a moment, and asked, "Do I just lack some self-discipline then?"

"I think you have hit a very important point there," I replied. "With the kind of thinking you've been doing George, a person usually needs to shake himself very firmly out of it. The Bible tells us that we need to be ruthless with ourselves when we become preoccupied with self. I think you need to do that in your case. That's why I said that praying about it and waiting for something to happen to you is not enough."

"So what will I do then tomorrow morning, when these thoughts come to me again?"

"Well, the Bible has a very simple principle for us to follow every day, God knows that we are likely to let our thoughts ... to let self take a tight grip on us, and that our mind is likely to become depressed by this. He knows that this in turn leads to a paralysis. We stop doing what God wants us to do. We just don't get on with living our Christian lives. That's why God's prin­ciple is "study Jesus". Look at what Hebrews 12:1 says, "Let us run with patience the race marked out for us, fixing our gaze on Jesus... Consider him who endured such opposition against him from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart."

"We have to learn to stop looking too intently at our­selves, George, and get on with studying Jesus and enjoying him. Every Chris­tian has so much treasure to enjoy in him! Nothing from the past can ever rob us of that."

"Well, I hadn't thought of that passage to apply to me in such a way before, but I can see what you mean," George replied.

As I left him, I wondered, as with all cases of counsel­ling, whether I had helped George or not. "Maybe I only complicated things for him," I thought. "Maybe if I...." But then, having to check myself for the same kind of thinking as I had just seen in George, I decided to proceed to my next duty and, having said what I thought was needed, leave George to the care of the Lord.