https://odb.org/2024/05/20/longing-for-the-past
Sometimes, we like to reminisce and dwell in our past memories. I think not so much in our past successes but more to the nostalgic era where time was not moving as fast as the present. Times when we were younger and still discovering the world. Our early working days, feeling our way in the world. My chambering days and early practice years after graduating from university. Perhaps God was more real then – as we were relying more on Him? In our innocence, we looked more eagerly to God in prayer, in desperation. We were going through what perhaps our children are going through now.
The Israelites in exile in Babylon also longed for the past. But when they were in Israel before they were captured, they believed in the sweet messages of all the false prophets prophesying good times and prosperity despite their disobedience to God. They just couldn’t see that their lives were incompatible with the message. They ignored Jeremiah, who bore the message of doom and threw him in prison into a pit. Jeremiah suffered greatly to bring God’s true and genuine message to the Israelites.
Whatever may have been in the past, it’s in the past. Those times are long gone. They may not be relived again. We are nearer to the grave than 30 years ago. If we were at the start of our careers then, we are now at the tailend. We should be planning for our retirement. Should we be living in a small apartment in the city or on a piece of modest land in the country? How will we be continuing our service for God? Do we go for mission trips to help out God’s work in other places since we are no longer bound by the constraints of full-time employment? Or should we make our local church our mission field?
I think the message this morning is to look ahead to the new things God is doing in our midst through Christ. We are much older and about to retire. Ask and seek the Lord as to His plans for us for the next 30 years. What does He want us to do? How should we serve Him? Should we be a missionary in a foreign land or to East Malaysia or rural Malaysia? Should we write a book? Should we build a farm to prepare for the Great Tribulation? The answer may not be apparent immediately, but as Jeremiah 29:13 says, “You will seek and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”
Ronnie's Thoughts 