Burn The Bridge

We've all heard the saying "burn that bridge". And we all pretty much know what that means. It's a metaphorical phrase that means to make it impossible to go back to where you once were. To completely obliterate any means of crossing back over to from where you just came.

I think that burning a bridge is necessary in our lives and even biblical. I'll show you the scriptures for it in a minute.

I was thinking of something that reared its ugly head in my life last week or tried to until the Holy Spirit showed me what to do about it.

There are so many times in life when we make a decision to go forward and improve our lives, be it by serving God or taking a new job or even walking away from the people we used to hang with because we no longer walk the same path. After that decision is made, I can guarantee you that at some point you will question it as to whether it was the right one or wrong one. There will even be times when you want to turn back and go back to what's familiar because of battles. But I will tell you what God says about it all.

I had a job once that I liked, not my favorite, but not the worst either. I worked it for a while until a better one came along. And what I mean by better is the new job had all the benefits I was looking for as far as insurance, vacation, etc. The travel time was longer, the job itself was harder, and the hours were longer, but I made the decision to give my notice at my other job and two weeks later, I began my new journey.

On the fourth day, I questioned myself as to why I had taken it. I found the training to be frustrating, the job itself was VERY hard and on top of that, I didn't know anyone there. So I felt lost, to say the least. I was irritated and sad. My first thought was, "call your old boss and see if you can go back". I wanted to run from the new place. I wanted to return to a job in which my hours had been cut to only 25 a week, I had no benefits because I was a temp and there was no hope of ever getting a raise, much less anything else.

Why did it enter my mind to go back when this new job had everything I had been looking for?

Because, as humans, we tend to gravitate toward the familiar. We want to be in the comfort zone of life. We don't want things to be difficult, even if it's for our own good in the future.

No, we want to be comfortable and "safe". Even if it means going back to where we came from.

I didn't call my old boss, I hung in there with the new job. I stuck it out and went through the training and worked there for quite a while. The only reason I left was that I was presented with the opportunity of a lifetime and I couldn't stay. But I found that after I stuck it out during the hard times, I was able to find my place there and flourish. I could work all the overtime I wanted and choose my hours during that overtime. I ended up with a good size 401K that I was able to cash out when I left and other very good benefits.

I think about if I'd left that job when it was hard, how bad things would have been for me. How I would never have met some that are still dear to me and how I wouldn't have some of the things I have now because that job afforded me the opportunities it did. I"m so glad that I stuck it out and didn't go back to the former one.

I was thinking about something that happened with my son once a few years ago. He went on vacation with someone in his family. The trip was about nine hours to that particular beach and so he got comfortable and tried to sleep. He told me that one of the people that had gone with them had never been to the ocean before and she was scared right off the bat. He said that she had nothing but negative things to say about the drive and pretty much complained the whole way because it rained during the trip. They were about twenty miles from their destination when a bad storm had caused a couple of trees to fall and slowed down traffic. My son said the woman began to fall apart and wanted to turn back and go home. She was screaming, "it's an omen that we aren't supposed to go", lol. She was begging her companion to turn around and drive nine hours back to where they came from instead of going the twenty minutes on to where they were to spend the next week relaxing and having fun.

Needless to say, the companion knew it was a dumb idea to turn back and so he kept going and less than a minute later they were past the downed tree and on their way to paradise for a week.

Why are those two examples so true to how we are as people? Because the old, familiar place is less scary than the path we are walking at the moment toward a brighter future. If my son's family member had turned around and driven the nine hours to get back, they would have lost all the money for the condo, the gas money they'd spent and they wouldn't have gotten to relax on a sunny beach for the next week.

But she was afraid of the unknown. She knew what she'd left, but she had no clue of what was in front of her.

Just like with me and the job. I knew at least what I'd left but I had no clue during that tough transition of what was on the other side waiting for me.

That's where I always go back to the children of Israel in my studies. They knew what they'd been told by Moses about what God was going to do for them. Yet, when times got tough, they wanted to run back to the familiar.

Why?

Because it's comfortable and it doesn't require the ONE thing that God asks of us. TRUST.

The Israelites said, "hey, we might have been in slavery, but at least we had food and a place to sleep." They were actually craving Egypt and all the mess they were in. How sad. The enemy had caused them to forget how they longed to be free of all that and he tried to paint them a picture of how good it was by having them remember the one thing they were in need of: food and shelter.

The enemy will take that one area of your life where you are in "lack" and he will use that to try to divert your focus from God and what He has in store for you. He will offer you solutions as to how you can get out of that place you're in, even if it means going back to the place you came out of.

If you are in "lack" financially, the enemy will present opportunities in your life where you can see an increase, but there is a price to pay spiritually for it if you choose his way. If you are in "lack" emotionally, the enemy will send someone your way to offer you the "love" you've always craved so desperately. Even though it's not the right decision to make, so many times we reach out and take hold of it because it's the one area where we are starving.

But God doesn't want that for us. He doesn't want us to live that way.

God wants us to trust Him to take us where we need to be. He can get us from bondage (sin), just like the Israelites and take us to the promised land (Heaven) if we just TRUST Him to do so.

On my new journey with God, I have found times when the enemy will try to show me the old things where I used to live or walk if you will. He tries to paint a pretty picture of what I had at one time. He makes it look so good in that one second flash in my mind that if I sat and entertained it, I'd be in a mess spiritually before long. But what I have to do is: number one, take every thought captive unto the obedience of Christ. I must make the choice to bind those thoughts, put them out and get my mind in the place where I only look to Jesus and what He did for me. And number two, see it for what it really was.

I have found when we (people) are in a place that things aren't going as planned or it's slow moving toward where you think God has called you, the enemy tend paints a picture of how things used to be. When looking back, we don't want to see the bad times in a situation, but only the good times. We want to romanticize the place we were when in reality it was awful and that's why we wanted out to begin with like the Israelites did with Egypt.

If my job had been so great, then I would have ever searched for another one? So, when I looked back at it, I had to see it for what it was. A mess of a place where I had no future.

God wants us to forget the former things and look toward the future He has planned for us. He doesn't want us turning back to slavery or the bondage of sin. He wants us to keep our eyes on Him, trust Him and walk by faith to the place He's promised us.

It's time to burn the bridge between you and yesterday. Move forward with God and watch amazing things happen in your life.

Much love,

Christy

Helpful Verses:

Isaiah 43: 18-20; Philippians 3:13: 2 Corinthians 5:17; Luke 9:62; Ephesians 4:22:24