Well, I hope you have a copy of the notes for this evening, and I would invite you to open your Bibles with me to Psalm 139. Isn't it funny how often we tend to find an excuse to turn to Psalm 139? I don't know where you keep your Advil PM in your house. Or you I don't know where you keep your Benadryl especially at this time of the year, but no doubt It's it's at a place in your medicine cabinet that is very familiar with you, and you you find yourself going there often That's kind of like Psalm 139 for me. I reach for this psalm on a personal level and while counseling Constantly I love this psalm Let's be reminded of it. I'm just going to read a few passages just by way of introduction from Psalm 139. Look at verse 1. Oh Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up. You understand my thought from afar. You scrutinize, you winnow, my path, and my lying down, and you are intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there was a word on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it all. You know what I'm going to say before I even know what I want to say. Verse 5, you have enclosed me behind and before and laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is too high. I cannot attain it. In other words, you know me so well. You know me better than I know me. And your knowledge of me totally blows me away. Because for some reason, you enjoy my company. Look at verses 14 through 16. I will give thanks to you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works, and my soul knows it very well. Lord, I marvel at your creation as I look around, but part of your creation is me. You've made me exactly like you want me. And your good hand, your loving hand of providence, no doubt, has sustained me thus far on my trip, on my journey. Look at verse 15. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in secret and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth. Your eyes have seen my unformed substance. And in your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them. That last part of verse 16 is really a key to how well God knows you. Read it again. In your book were all written the days that were ordained for me. My days that I have lived up to this point and the ones I will yet live are ordained for me. And he knew all the details before any of them unfolded. Now, at first read, that seems like an encouraging text. And it is. But as we meditate on that concept, that's heavy theology to accept. We like the part that, well, God knows my tomorrows and he's sustaining me today. But what about what I've endured up to this point in my life? What do I do with my past? I mean, those days were ordained for me as well. You were actively engaged and involved in those days as well, Lord? I mean, sure, I want to say that you were there during the good times. And by the way, when we talk about our past, we're saying that there were some good times in our past as well. But what about the dark times in our past? What about the times that we, even at this point in our life, have not felt free to share with other people? What about those times? Do those get an asterisk that this psalm doesn't apply to them? Or was God just as much in them as well? See, when we start talking about the past, when we start talking about what has been lived so far in our wake, there's good and there's bad. I could tell you the different chapters of my life. I could tell you, as I've told you before, different scenes from my own life growing up in a home that our parents provided for us and loved us, but alcohol had a huge presence in our past and that brought some unique challenges in every aspect of family life. I could dwell on that. I could dwell on the good, though. I could say that in spite of all of the success in the business world and all of the alcohol that had left a deep footprint, God saw to it that my parents loved Christian education, and I got to go through Christian education all the way through, and my dad even liked the product of Christian colleges and universities. I could dwell on the good. There's good and there's bad. I could tell you that in a Christian school I had some good experiences in growing as a leader, but I can also tell you that I was suspended twice from school in ninth grade. I'm not going to tell you why, don't ask, and nothing's available online that I know of. I could go into good and bad about the past, just in my story, and you can too. And at some point we have to ask, what do we do with our past? Do we glory and take credit for all the good that's happened? And what about all the bad, dark stuff, A, that we might have participated in, or B, someone in our past acted against us and left deep wounds and scars? What do we do with this? Do we have a plan? Not just for our own hearts as we disciple our own hearts with Christ and his word, but as we try to help other people. I have found that in counseling, in counseling, in any ministry I've been in, that a great deal of counseling does consider from this day forward, but a lot of it pertains to untying big knots from the past. Either the past hasn't been dealt with at all, Or sometimes it's been dealt with in an unbiblical way, thus tying one more knot on top of another one. And it doesn't have to be that way for the child of God. If Scripture is sufficient for any spiritual need in any person, in any age group, in any generation, without exception, then I fully expect that during our study and this new series of moving forward from the past, we can get help. We can, I'm not saying you can always make sense of the past. I've chosen the title of this series very carefully. We move forward from the past. And so what I want to do for a few minutes with you this evening, it won't take a full hour. and then we'll have a short business meeting after this. I want to just introduce this series that we will return to in just a couple of weeks from tonight. We won't have church next Sunday night because of Memorial Day weekend. But I want to talk to you just by way of introduction on a couple of these topics as we get into this study. First of all, what are some wrong ways of dealing with your past? some wrong ways of dealing with your past. And I just want to, I'm going to throw these out there in a pastoral fashion, in a counseling fashion, and I really want these to serve as five warnings to you. These are not the ways we deal with our past. Number one, we don't ignore it. You don't live your life as if your past never happened. You say, well, I'm just going to bury it and move forward. Aren't we supposed to move forward? Yes, but not at the expense of leaving something undone from your past that still needs to be dealt with. Perhaps there has been a sin that you've been involved in in your past that still needs to be taken care of. Moving forward from the past doesn't mean we cover that up and ignore it. And by the way, another aspect to this one of ignoring it is this. If there are former relationships from your past that are still unreconciled, we don't ignore that. If we're still capable, if it's still possible to be reconciled with someone, where there has been an issue from the past, we need to take care of it. So we don't ignore our past. That's not how you deal with your past. Number two, you can't fully understand your past. Can I relieve you from a little pressure here? You cannot fully understand everything that's happened to you and why. You say, why is that? Well, Jeremiah chapter 17 verses 9 and 10 says, who can know their heart? Only God knows the heart. God is the one who was fully in those moments. God fully understands with his infinite understanding, his infinite wisdom, through the lens of his infinite love, he understands your past and you and I can't fully understand it. We know what happened. We know what we were involved in potentially or possibly. but we don't fully know the depths of our hearts, so we can't fully understand the past. And I'll also say this, in theological circles, when we talk about the fall that happened in Genesis chapter 3, theologians like to talk about what they call the noetic effect of the fall. And by the noetic effect of the fall, that means this, that when sin came into the world, it not only put us on a trajectory towards death, but sin also contaminated our reasoning. It put in place filters, if you will, to keep us from fully being able to understand the past, especially from a moral standpoint. The noetic effect of sin, in a sense, partially blinds us to fully understanding life. And there's one more reason why you can't fully understand the past. First of all, you don't have an infinite mind. Secondly, you're a product of the fall. But finally, God never discloses his whole mind. And all you need to remember for this one is Job. Did Job ever find out, this side of the grave, did he ever find out about the dialogue going on between Satan and God? He was never made aware of that dialogue. Now, I'm sure he knows the rest of the story now. But God doesn't always obligate him to explain himself fully. He's God, he has a right. So while we acknowledge the past and while we need to deal with different aspects of our past, don't fully expect to understand it all the way. Because what will happen with number two if you're not careful, and I see this a lot, some people will set out to understand their past and that will become their consumption, their consuming concern for years. They will focus on studying them, and they will make no forward progress as a disciple, let alone, they will neither be able to be engaged in discipling others. Why? Well, as John MacArthur put it this way, they are consumed with meditating and contemplating their own navel. Just constant inward look. And in the business world, they call that what? The paralysis of analysis. I'm just going to analyze everything constantly, and there's no forward movement. So number two is a pretty significant warning. You understand what the Lord allows you to understand, and you deal with it. Number three, what else is a wrong way to deal with the past? Well, you can't deny it. You can't say the past never happened. What I was involved in never happened. What someone did to me, maybe a trusted figure in my life, that never happened. Scripture never commands you to handle it that way. We're going to see that because you have in your past what's in your past, it's going to create a very unique, awesome opportunity for God's grace to work. Don't deny the past. Number four, Don't relive the past. There was a quote-unquote Christian counseling model that was gaining some traction probably about 15, 20 years ago. It was called Theophastic counseling. And the whole idea with this approach of counseling, which biblical counselors rejected, the whole idea with Theophastic counseling was that your counselor would assist you And going back to the past during your counseling sessions and totally reengaging with the conversations, totally reliving it, and looking around in those scenes while you were reliving it to find solutions and help. And again, I think that that was number four is actually a clinical extension of number two. Someone else is trying to walk you back there to understand it fully, and you can't. And what number four leads to is the same thing as number two, and it's the paralysis of analysis. You're so consumed. Your favorite subject of study is you. And you never really feel that you get to the bottom of you. So I reject the reliving it as well. But one more. And I want to be careful for, I'm talking kind of dogmatically tonight, and I'll throttle it down just a little bit, because I don't mean to be harsh when I say that a wrong way of dealing with your past is to heal it. See, what's wrong with that? I just want to say that healing your past is not biblical terminology. We are going to deal with your past, but we're never told to heal it. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2.13, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. As sensitive as your past is, as sensitive as your past is, however we're going to deal with it, and however we're going to move forward from it, we must insist on this, that we use only biblical terminology. Healing your past, healing damaged emotions, healing this and healing that, though there's good intent with that, those are unbiblical categories. You say, I don't know if I like number five. Stay there with me, okay? Hang in there with me. Because if you follow the Bible's terminology on dealing with the past, you will find lasting, lasting relief and good forward movement. And so, I know number five is especially provocative, but maybe I've stepped on your toes with some of the other ones up there, as we've talked about wrong ways of dealing with your past. So I want you to bring your frustration with my first section down to the second section. where I'm saying at the end of the first section, we need to talk in biblical categories. The second section here of introduction are those categories. All right? I want you to see four major realms of past issues. First of all, well, you say, what do you mean by this? When someone comes into my office here or in another ministry, on one of the campuses where I have the joy of teaching, if someone comes in and says, I need help dealing with my past, I always look for a whiteboard or a chalkboard at that moment. And I don't have this to write up here tonight, but I would draw four squares and I would say, these are four parking spots. I'm glad to talk with you about your past, but I need to know where are you going to park your car? In which of these four categories? Because when it comes to talking about someone's past, there are really only four categories. And these are all biblical categories. Number one, it could be that they want to talk about unconfessed issues in their past. Unconfessed issues. You say, well, what does this mean? Unconfessed issues are dealing with specific sins that you have been involved in. These could be sins that you initiated. These could be sins that someone else initiated and you responded with sin. This is where you have been involved with sin, and it's in the name of this one, it's unconfessed. It's unresolved. You haven't taken care of this sin with the others that were involved with it or against whom you sinned, and you haven't taken care of it with your Heavenly Father. Oh, you're a believer. And you know that leaving this unresolved in your past hasn't severed you from Christ. But there's a tension between you, a redeemed, adopted child of God, and your Heavenly Father. And it needs to be confessed. So the first category of dealing with your past is unconfessed sin. But there's a second category that I'd write on that whiteboard. I'd write unconfessed sin in one parking space, and the next parking space I would write the second one, and these are confessed issues. Confessed issues. This is a fascinating one. This is you, if you have sinned in the past, and you have confessed it to your Heavenly Father. And you have confessed it to the other people that were involved, either as an object of your sin or a participant with your sin. You've taken care of it horizontally with man. You've taken care of it vertically with God. But you're the one that won't let go of it now. You've done everything scripture has asked. God's given you grace to move through some difficult conversations. But here you are months, maybe years, maybe decades after, and you're the one who still has refused to let it go. There's unconfessed issues and confessed issues. Now there's a third box on our whiteboard, and I would draw this in that third parking space. Innocence issues. Innocence issues. You say, what are innocence issues? Well, notice I'm breaking them out separately from confessed and unconfessed issues. Innocence issues, and that's the best wording I can come up with, are when other people's words or attitudes or actions have attacked you. You're not the perpetrator. You may have even attempted to resist or you didn't even have a chance to resist. But someone out there has invaded you and sinned against you grossly. Those are acts of innocence and the best way I can think of it is to use those terms. You are a victim. And there is someone who's a perpetrator acting on you. And that's why I choose innocence. You didn't move towards them. You either saw it coming or you didn't saw it coming, and it happened. And it might have gone on for a season of time in your life. Number three, oh really, numbers one and two can be very dark, understand. Number three can get especially dark, especially dark. But there's one more category that I think is a biblical category, I know is a biblical category, when we're dealing with the past. We have unconfessed issues, confessed issues, innocence issues, and the fourth one is what I'll call fall issues. And that's not just what happens in September, October, and November. Okay? Because the Lions, the Detroit Lions, have trials every September, October, and November. Right? They just roll with it. Now, when I talk about the fall issues, I'm definitely referring to Genesis chapter 3. In case you haven't noticed, the fall happened. This perfect creation of God, because of the disobedience of Adam, was thrust into a fall that remains today. It's escalating. It's picking up momentum. And in Romans 8, it's so bad that Paul says not only humans and Christians groan under the fall, but creation itself groans under the fall. I mean, we're talking the far corners of the cosmos. The entirety of creation is subject to the problems that came with the fall. And creation itself, in Romans 8, is looking forward to the redemption of God's children, when there's a new heaven and a new earth. But until then, the fall happened. And the heavens and the earth have been ruined. Tsunamis happen. Death happens. Accidents happen, and they might not be the result of sin on your part, but you are nonetheless impacted by tragedy. And it's just a reminder that you live in a fallen world. You didn't ask for the problems that were in your past. You don't ask for this physical ailment. You have to figure out, how do I live with this? But you have it. and the tragedies that happen even from nature, the accidents that happen, quote-unquote, and death and illness that are constantly at work in our bodies, and we feel their pull every day, keenly. All of these have footprints in our past as well that come with us into the present. So what I would do, if you were in my office and you said, hey, I want to talk about my past, I would say, okay, I would write these four parking spaces on the whiteboard. I would say, unconfessed sin, confessed sin, innocence issues, and fall issues. And then I would ask you, after explaining all four, now where, tell me, where are you parking your car right now? I need to know how I'm going to approach you. And I find it very helpful to explain these four parking spots, and then the person that I want to try to help, they tell me what they're coming for. These are all four biblical categories, as we will see. And when you, listen, when you know what you're dealing with, you know how to deal with it. I'm going to make this argument in all four of our studies. And by the way, I think you can figure out what our next four studies are. Next time we come to this series, guess what we're going to look at? Unconfessed issues. How do we deal with those? The next study we're going to look at confessed issues. How do we handle it if we won't let go of something that others in God have totally moved past, but we can't? Our third study is going to be a heavy evening, and we probably should think through young children. The issues of innocence we're going to talk through, and I want to talk adult to adult that night. And I'm going to use a very common, dark experience for many people, and it's that of abuse. But I don't fear taking that topic of abuse, even sexual abuse, to Scripture. Because we're going to see that night that Scripture is sufficient for that. And watch this. If Scripture sufficiently answers something as dark as that type of abuse, Well surely, it'll be sufficient for anything less, right? That third session's gonna be pretty heavy, heads up on that. And then our fourth study will be on fall issues. How do we deal with living in a broken, fallen world that brings things into our narrative that we didn't want in there? How do we deal with that? And I'm gonna argue in all four parking spots, I'm gonna argue this. For you as a child of God, The gospel is the right answer. Coming back to the basics of who you are in Christ will give you traction like my son didn't have in his first softball game this season. Those of you who were watching the softball game, the first game, Jared's like on the way out. He says, Dad, I need a new hat. So we got him a new hat. He needed a Detroit Tigers hat. And he says, I got my mitt, I got everything. I said, do you have baseball cleats? No, I don't have any, but these basketball shoes will be fine on the infield. That was after he did three somersaults after first base, right? The first time he got on base. No traction. If God's people never stop treasuring the gospel, but see it afresh, especially as they look at the past through the grid of redemption, they will have traction. I don't know how dark it is for you as you look back. The gospel will give you light and allow you to move forward. We'll see the gospel answer all four of those. Well, while we're here doing an introduction for a few moments, and you think, and here's what we think as believers. even as non-believers. My past, we might say, is unique. I mean, I know other people have difficult pasts, but mine's extra special. Why? Well, it's me, right? I'm the standout. No one's had a past like me. That's what we try to talk ourselves into. So let's look at some biblical standouts when it comes to dealing with the past. You know who is in Exhibit 1? How about Adam? You say, wait a minute, Adam had no past. He was like suddenly here as an adult, a young adult, real young adult, maybe around 50. I mean, he was just suddenly here, right? He had no past. But even Adam, who had no bad experience in his past prior to the fall, and only good experiences in his past prior to the fall, yet he still made the wrong decision, the worst decision. We refer to the first Adam with dread in Romans chapter 5, but the first Adam is actually a picture of the second Adam who would come, that's Christ. But they make no mistakes about it. He had no past, he had no bad in his past, yet he still made wrong choices. So he's an interesting study about the past. How about Exhibit 2? Well, you know this guy, don't you, Moses? Moses had a past. You say, what's in Moses' past? Well, how about immense privilege? He had immense privilege. He was brought up in the courts of Pharaoh. He had any resource he could dream of. He had the best clothes. He had the best food. He had access to Pharaoh. He had access to the royal family. He was royalty. He had immense privilege. Yet even coming from immense privilege and ease, he was guilty of murder. And on top of that, he continued to make wrong choices and at some points even argued with God early on. He had a great past, but he had some struggles going forward. How about a third exhibit? How about Joseph? He's quite a study, isn't he? Joseph can relate to abuse from siblings to the point of all but one or two wanted to murder him. You say, well, he hasn't experienced the abuse I have from loved ones. True, but you're still alive. He had siblings that wanted to murder him. Joseph is one who was constantly submitted early on to false accusations, not only by his own family, but by Potiphar's wife. And it was Joseph who showed great kindness in jail there in Egypt, and the two men that, or the one man, he fulfilled, or he interpreted two dreams, one that a fellow cellmate was going to be killed and he was, another one that the fellow cellmate was going to return to his duties to the king and he was, and then that man went for a long time not remembering the kindnesses of Joseph to him. And Joseph continued on in prison. I think it's safe to say that from a human perspective, Joseph's past stunk. Did he ever, did he ever have bright moments? Well, I'm sure they were here and there. I think you can argue that they were, but they were only eclipsed by the consistency of bad moments. Yet what do we find with Joseph? With a past that messed up, he shines. He's elevated in Egypt. He's a man of character and wisdom. The Lord allows him to be reconciled with his brothers, to return to fellowship with his father. And we find out what Joseph was thinking the whole time because he tells us at two different parts towards the end of Genesis. Twice he tells his brothers, let's talk about my past for a minute. Everything you did, from the threats of murder to selling me into slavery, yeah, you meant that as worse as you meant it. But God meant it for good. And as dark as it was, whenever I look at the past, I can only see God's good hand of providence sustaining me. and bringing me to a place where here now in the future I can turn around and be a blessing and servant to you. In spite of a past like that. How about another case study? Remember David in Exhibit 4? David, you're here in Psalm 139. Look over at Psalm 16. Psalm 16. I wonder if David knew anything about being an outcast and being rejected. Psalm 16. He's a man whom we see several times even in his childhood. The king, King Saul, hurling spears at him. We see whole armies pursuing him. He was an outcast. He would hide in caves. You say, what kind of caves would he hide in? Well, he hid in dark holes and caves that kings would eventually use as a restroom. That was his home while he was on the run. Even after he was king for a while, his own son rose up against him and drove him out again. And he was an outcast. He understood being an outcast. He understood rejection. Yet he could write words like these that would reflect on his whole life. Psalm 16.6, the lines have fallen to me in pleasant places. Indeed, my heritage is beautiful to me. It's like, wait, David. I thought you were on the run. I thought you knew what it meant to be an outcast. He looks back and he says, my heritage is beautiful to me. Wow. Look at Psalm 21. Look over at Psalm 21. David could write these words, O Lord, in your strength the king will be glad, and in your salvation how greatly he will rejoice. You have given him his heart's desire, and you have not withheld the request of his lips. For you meet him with the blessings of good things. You set a crown of fine gold on his head. He asked life of you. You gave it to him. Length of days forever and ever." Wow. We could go on. You say, David, were you writing that before all the bad stuff happened to you? He's like, no, that's all in my past. It's all in my past. But whenever I look at my past, I see God's kindnesses and goodnesses to me. Let me give you two more examples, biblical standouts as we talk about the past. You ever hear of Paul, the Apostle Paul? The Apostle Paul had the highest pedigree possible as a Jewish young man. The highest pedigree. If he had a resume, he would have the perfect resume to advance in Judaism, to advance into leadership of his own people. He'd studied under the right people. He had the right background, even biologically, from the right tribe. He had absolutely everything going for him. He was missing nothing on his resume, nothing. But you know how he counted his resume? He rejected it all. Philippians chapter 3, verse 7. What things were gained to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish that I may gain Christ. Paul, let me make sure I'm understanding you here. You had everything that anyone would want to have on their resume. You were missing nothing, and he would say, correct. But when Christ rescued you, you said that was all nothing, right? That's correct. Well, Paul, I have another question. The things that the rest of us recoil from, rejection, persecution, suffering, the things we don't want in our life, you count as strengths. And he would say, you're correct. How can that be, Paul? Well, he'll tell us in 2 Corinthians chapter 12 when I'm weak because of God's strength. That's when I'm strong. So Paul takes a perfect past and turns it on its head and says the things that we would normally want are loss and the things we don't want are gain. There's a guy that has a grip on how to deal with the past, right? But I have one more biblical standout to put in front of you, and this is the ultimate and you've guessed it, about Jesus. How do we talk about Jesus' past? Because we immediately have to ask another question. Well, which past are we talking about? If we're talking about his earthly 32 to 33 year pilgrimage, let's talk about that past. And Peter writes all about it in 1 Peter. Writes about how Christ suffered in his past and how he persevered and let us follow in his steps. Of course Christ had another past prior to the earth past. Is this confusing? We read of this past in John 17 when he's praying to his father, and he says, Father, I want my disciples to see the glory that you gave me before the foundations of the world. You see, with Christ, there's an eternity past full of perfection. He's deity. He's God. And we read this this morning in Philippians chapter 2, that he emptied himself of all that to come rescue us. He has quite a past. Quite a past. Well, we've talked about how not to deal with the past. We've talked about the four categories of the past. And we've looked at just a sampling of individuals in the scripture who had different experiences in the past and different progression towards the future. But I want you to note, before we tie things off here, some blessings of your past. And I'm not necessarily talking about the good times and the trophies from high school. What are some blessings that can come out of your darkest moments in your past? And I'd like to suggest three before we close out. First of all, number one, I'll call it this, your past is a counselor creation. Now I need to explain what I mean by that. Your past, even your darkest of moments, and I want your mind to go to those moments right now. From those moments, your God is so big and so present in your life and even in your past that he can take the darkest moments of your past and use them to make you a counselor to help others in the future. For this one, write down a very familiar text, 2 Corinthians chapter 1. We find ourselves going to this text often. 2 Corinthians chapter 1, verses 3 and following. Paul writes, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction. And by the way, Paul's gonna list those out later. What do you want? Do you want to be left for dead? Do you want to be several days in the open sea until someone rescues you? Do you want to be whipped? Which one you want? Paul's going to list them all out here. The most grievous of physical assaults Paul was so familiar with. He says, yep, verse 4, he comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, look at this, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. And in case you didn't get that point, look at verse 5. For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, that's past, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ. If you circle words in your Bible, I hope you're circling the word comfort all the way down, you're going to see it again three times in verse 6, one time in verse 7. I'm just trying to make a point. Whatever is your story in your past, whether it's confessed sin, unconfessed sin, issues of innocence, whatever's back there, those darkest moments, God is there. He was there. And he's going to, with his mercy and comfort, bring you through as a child and not let you go. But he's going to bring you through this and he's going to turn you and face you towards other people who are going through similar struggles. And he's going to say, now take the comfort you tasted from me and share that with them. So this is actually a blessing that can come out of our dark pasts. If I can use the wording this way, as some do, your God is so big and so awesome that he can redeem the darkest moments of your past and use them for his glory in the future. Now that just fuses in my mind, but our God is that great that he'll take your past and make a counselor out of you. Number two, another blessing from the past. Your past, even the darkest moments, can be a worship prompter. A worship prompter. And I'd like for you to turn to Ephesians chapter 2 with me. Ephesians chapter 2. Paul's actually going to tell these believers at Ephesus to remember the past. Including the dark parts. And before I parachute down into verse 11, let's go back to verse 1 of chapter 2. He says, remember your past. Remember how bad it was. Verse 1, you were dead. You were dead. It was that dark. The things you were doing, the things you were involved in, they only revealed that you were dead. Verse two, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them, we too all formerly lived in the lust of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. He's saying, remember that. If you go over to chapter four, chapter four, Verse 17, in a sense he's asking them to remember this as well. So this I say and affirm together with the Lord that you walk no longer as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart. And they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity and greediness. he says never forget how the Gentiles walk because that was you that's your story too but he comes right out here in chapter 2 of Ephesians verse 11 through 13 saying don't forget rather remember Verse 11, therefore, remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by the so-called circumcision, which is performed in the flesh by human hands, remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, you who were formerly far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ." Or back in chapter 2, verse 4, he says, but God gave you life. You see, every time you and I wander back into our past, even to those darkest moments, whether they happen prior to our regeneration or after, we serve a God, ours is a Heavenly Father, who rescues us. If we are outside of Christ, He rescued us from everything I just described here in chapter 2 and chapter 4. He rescued us and brought us to Himself. And Paul says, He brought us out of the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of His dear Son. He's the God of rescue. And once we are in Christ, it doesn't mean He stops rescuing us. He can rescue us from our darkest moments, even as His children. He's the ultimate rescuer. And you know what that does? Every time you and I contemplate rescue, our rescue, whether from sin as an unbeliever to being a Christian, or even as a Christian getting into sin and God rescuing us, Matthew 18, 12 to 14, Him coming after us as a lost sheep and He finds us and brings us back and is rejoicing. Whenever we ponder our rescue as we think of our past, it always leads us to worship. And we want to declare his praises with fresh fervor, with all of the affections of our hearts. So your past, as dark as it can be, does not have to paralyze you. Actually, it can do the exact opposite. It can produce a wellspring of worship in your heart. But there's one more blessing that can come out of the past, as we will see in this study. And that is this, your past. can be a grace trophy, a grace trophy. And let me take you to one more, one more passage. Boy, I didn't think this was going to go an hour. I usually preach a little shorter than this. First Timothy chapter one, right? First Timothy one verse 12. I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord, who has strengthened me, Paul writes, because while he considered me faithful, putting me into service, Even though, here's where Paul kept an eye on where he'd been, where he'd come from, even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor, yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was more than abundant with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus. It's a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. Not was, I am. Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate his perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in him for eternal life. And look where he ends up with worship. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Paul says, yep, my past, I have scars and I walk with a limp just like everyone else, but every one of those is a reminder of God's grace at work in my life. What an amazing Savior we have, Paul says. So I don't know all the details of your narrative. I don't know what's in your past. But I do know this, your God is so big that he can redeem your past and make a counselor out of you, give you fresh reason to worship every time you have opportunity. And your life suddenly becomes a trophy to his grace for others to behold and say, well, there's no other way to explain where you are in your life. except that God has done this. Because what you've experienced, no one should be able to recover from. But here you are, not only past it and moving forward, but you're growing as a disciple and you're reaching out to help others. There's no way to explain it, except that God is with you. So, Lord willing, we're going to return to this topic with our four studies. And it will be some heavy discussion, necessary discussion. We're going to talk, especially that third week, as adults and with great... I'm not even sure how much I'll put on the web. I've done that third series, or that third message in other churches, and I've asked them not to put it on the web, but we'll think through that as we approach it here. But let's go for it. The past is such a big issue with all of us. Let's just run hard at this topic. And you know what? God's word is robust enough to sustain this whole discussion and to send us all moving forward from the past.