As a friend and I walked a trail, we came across this property that probably has quite a few stories to tell. I have a quote in my phone but don’t remember where I read it or if I wrote it. I searched the internet and couldn’t find it. I like it because it’s a good perspective to have.
Leave yesterday alone – It’s gone.
Live today – Count your blessings.
Don’t worry about tomorrow – It may not come.
If this old house could talk, its walls would probably have heard a lot of conversations to share. Maybe the children are grown and the original owners wanted to downsize. Maybe the children grew up and had happy memories here and kept it in the family. But their lives took a turn in different directions and it was time to move on. Eventually someone found this property to be a treasure worth owning and living in.
Yesterday. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve remembered an item I used to have—a book, a piece of furniture, a decoration—but thought I didn’t need or want any more and either gave it away, sold it, or threw it out, only to later wish I had kept it. Yesterday is like that. I often wish I had yesterday to “do over”. I think there’s always something that comes to mind that could have been done, said, or thought differently. But yesterday is gone, never to return, as much as we would like it to. So leave yesterday alone. Nothing can or will bring it back. It’s gone FOREVER!
Today. We are here in the present, today. We are alive and have much to be thankful for during this upcoming Thanksgiving season. Would you rather recount all the bad things that have happened or all the good things?
The Cambridge Dictionary defines the idiom “count your blessings” as to be grateful for the good things in your life, often to stop yourself from becoming too unhappy about the bad things. That is a good definition and so true. If we count our blessings, we won’t be recounting all the negative things in life.
Tomorrow. How often do you and I say we will do something or go somewhere tomorrow? But we are not promised tomorrow. The Lord may come today and the rest of our tomorrows will be spent in eternity instead of here on earth. We may get sick or be in an accident that ends our lives as we know them, and tomorrow will be a whole lot different than we had in mind.
A song by speaker and songwriter Don Wyrtzen has four verses that so well give depth to the thoughts of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. The story behind this song can be found at: https://thescottspot.wordpress.com/2016/11/06/yesterday-today-and-tomorrow-written-in-1980/
Yesterday He died for me … This is history.
Today He lives for me … This is victory.
Tomorrow He comes for me …This is mystery.
O friend do you know Him? … Jesus Christ the Lord.
History can’t be changed. Oh you can rewrite it like some try to do, but that doesn’t change what happened. History is still the story of yesterday. Jesus died for us in the past so that we can have life in the here and now as well as for eternity. What He has done for us is history and cannot be changed.
Victory is what we can have when we choose to count our blessings instead of our failures and mistakes. Victory can be recorded in history, but it happens in the here and now. Jesus lives in your heart if you are His, and He gives us victory when we let Him have His way in our lives.
Mystery is all about what might happen in the tomorrows of the next day or the next month or the next year. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow. We have plans and hopes and dreams, but as I said above, we are not promised tomorrow. Jesus is coming back for us some day. It could be any time, especially in the light of all the aspects of prophetic happenings becoming reality right before our very eyes. Are you ready should it be tomorrow? Or today even? Or in the next moments?
Jesus is the answer to our past, present, and future. He’s been waiting for us in our past yesterdays, gives us victory in our todays, and coming for us in the tomorrow of our future. If you know Him, you can be assured of tomorrow—oh, not the tomorrow you may dream about, but a secure, pleasant, safe, and loving tomorrow in eternity with Him.
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”
Hebrews 13:8, NLT