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Dear fighter,

I had recently gotten a notification that the official start of a bible study that was in, started 2 years ago on August 1st. I had just started to talk to the leader of the study again after a season of great distance. I told him how crazy it was that things always seem to come full circle. I veered away from my friends there and the relationships that I had built, but I came full circle.

Do you sometimes feel like a majority of things, people, and situations, always come back for seconds? I personally noticed this a lot recently. For me, I’ve had a lot of old friends coming back into the loop. People that I thought I had fallen off with for good, are back at full speed and we’ve fallen right back into step like no times has passed.

Safe to say I’ve learned a few things about these little blasts from the past that I’m just going to leave here for you to do with as you please.

#1- The Case Of The Trojan Horse

In most cases, the chance to repair a broken bridge has been a blessing. In the other extremely rare case it’s been… well interesting is a word. Destructive is also… a word.

I’m sure we all have experienced a situation where something that starts off beautiful and promising, can very quickly turn rotten. Sadly, the same can be said about second chances or people that have randomly popped back into your life.

I remember thinking, this is the perfect opportunity for me to repair this relationship, and, this is the moment that I’ve waited so long for. The conversations were great, I was forgiven for my role in in things and it finally felt like things were going to be okay between us. Until they weren’t.

The conversations quickly flipped from encouraging and positive things to me being someone that they would only turn to when they needed to feel less lonely. You know it’s bad when you go form looking forward to every text, to craving the time in between them.

“Guard your heart or everything that you do flows from it.”

-Proverbs 4:23

Because of past experiences, I know that I personally can’t be a savior to them. I’ve also learned the hard way that I can’t stretch myself too thin trying to please them. (I’m going to talk more about this in an upcoming blog because it’s just a lot for right now!)

Point is, sometimes things come back around and while the opportunity may seem amazing, it could not be. It could be super damaging to both parties. I’m still learning to approach these things with discernment because my heart needs to be protected. All of ours do.

#2- Self - Sabotage By Guilt

Going back to my friend from the beginning, we were just 2 of the members that had built a youth group that was completely focused on finding the face of God everywhere that we could. Granted, we were kids that had no idea what we were doing and while we made our fair share of mistakes, we would always bounce back. Despite our few missteps, God was there and it was good.

My friend expressed a level of guilt in regards to our group coming to an end. As he was talking about making a mistake and and feeling guilty about it, I realized that I felt the exact same way about our friendship.

I felt such a heavy guilt because I had distanced myself so far from him and the rest of the group after we had disbanded. I went from doing life with them, to watching their lives through social media. The guilt is real and it can be heavy.

However, I was given another opportunity. But… if I let guilt interfere or get in the way of this undeserved second chance then, it’ll end up exactly where it was before. It would be self-sabotage.

If I were to look at every second chance through the lenses of “I’m undeserving and I’m just going to mess it up again” then we aren’t giving it a fair shot. The same way that holding a grudge against someone else can poison a bond, holding a grudge against yourself can be just as poisonous. We’re messing things up before we can even stop to enjoy and celebrate the reunion.

Looking at it through a bigger picture… mercy and grace are real and they are given to us time and time again by God. Now if we were to go through our daily lives holding a long standing grudge against ourselves when God has already forgiven us, we’re just setting ourselves up for failure.

God granted us mercy and grace, we can’t waste it. What did we learn from the past? How can we move towards the future? Cast your guilt and shame into the light while you step into it. There’s no time to waste!