Back to the Future

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Where do you live? Many people, especially as they get older, attempt to live in the past—the “good old days,” but is there a better option?

There were a series of movies years ago now titled, “Back to the Future.” They dealt with time travel to change situations that occurred. The main actor would find a situation that needed change, but the only way he could change that was to go back in time. And it was exciting to see how he went back to another time in his life or the life of others to change circumstances. Then, however, he had to return to his own time or he would be stuck in a time before he was born. And that too would alter what was going on now.

Many get stuck in time, though, and never return back to our own time (the future when you are back in time). They get stuck in old ways of doing things—the “same-old, same-old,” the familiar and well-worn paths. But they either ignore or don’t realize that the time they live in is no longer the way it once was. The world around them has changed, yet they have not grown and therefore have remained the same, and they are a person now out of time with outmoded or useless tools to cope, to create, to make their way in the new world. Such does the church and Christians find itself today.

The Israelites found themselves in such a time in Exodus. God sent them Moses to lead them out of slavery into a “land flowing with milk and honey.” But they found that the journey was not easy—the path had many turns—and they found themselves unprepared for this new world they lived in. Despite their instructions to follow Moses and the “cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night,” (God Himself or at least, God’s way of leading), they wanted to go back to Egypt. The known, even if very uncomfortable (we often forget what it was really like “back in the good old days), often becomes preferable to the unknown of what is going on now, since I need new skills to cope with what is from what was. In essence, we need faith, but we’d rather walk by what we can see and touch and do than by trusting the unseen, the untouchable, the heavenly provider. (We like to walk by sight, not by faith.) So we do all we can to go back to Egypt, to live the known, to do it the way we are comfortable with and live in the past. We do not “press on” as Paul mentioned in Philippians 3.

But maybe we need to go back to the future in the skills we have learned to cope, the tools we have been given for the journey, and then use what we have learned to live in the now and the future. Some of our skills are applicable to the present. I am finding now that small group skills I learned at the beginning of my ministry are very beneficial to leading today. I am going back to things I learned but applying them to new ways of doing in the present. That is not getting stuck in the past, but applying things from the past that may work or may aid in ministry now. There is a difference in being stuck in a rut from using what has been learned and then adapting to the now. There is a difference in “there is only one way to do this—the old way—the tried and true way—the way we did it 50 years ago,” to what things from the past are still beneficial today and what things are not. What skills are still necessary and what things or ways of doing need to be put away for the now and the future.

Sometimes today I find myself in a time warp—I live with people who either live just in the past, or live just in anticipation of the future (heaven) yet do not live in the now or for the now. (There is the old say, “There are some people that are so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good”—lots of truth in that about some, even today.) And that is frustrating and not beneficial.

Adaption and change—not fun, but necessary. What have I learned from the past that can be refined, tweaked, adapted, and yet still be relevant and beneficial in the now.

I am returning again to some small group processes I learned many years ago, in ministry among college students, and finding that they are important to this generation and people looking for groups to fit into, friends to do life with, and those longing for relationship. There is a restlessness and need for others that characterizes today, and groups help supply some of that, especially in the context of the church and its ministry. Hence the importance and success of cell groups, small group ministry, groups that meet outside the church and reach those not touched by the church that concentrates within the walls of the building.

We go back for things that still work—things that are adaptable—experiences and learning (skills) that can be used to the glory of God and for His kingdom today. But we do not live in the past, nor just in the future (heaven). We live in the now with what is helpful and we consider other things “garbage” in relation to knowing Christ and living for Him now to affect others for His kingdom. (Matt. 6:33; 28:18-20; 2 Tim. 2:2)

Back to the future!