Our past can be like a ball and chain that attaches itself to us and keeps us from moving forward. Imagine your life as a race. You have trained, and now you are positioned in your lane ready to obtain the prize. Maybe, it is a new promotion, a first job, or a new family. You are in your lane prepared to go. However, when you begin to run, you find you have no momentum.
You don’t comprehend at first why you can’t seem to apprehend the life that you have anticipated. Your momentum halts like a ball and chain wrapped around your ankles.
The ball and chain was a device used in centuries past. It was attached to the ankles of a prisoner and could weigh over eighteen pounds. The weight of the instrument made it difficult for the prisoner to walk, and running was almost an impossibility. Imagine as a runner giving your all while running a race dragging a ball and chain around your ankles. At first, you try to drag yourself to the finish line, but nothing seems work. Unless you are powerful, you will fail either through sheer exhaustion or inability to carry the weight of the device. As you run your race in this life what hinders forward momentum. Often it is our past.
Our past can be like a ball and chain. Imagine running with the weight of your past both good and bad – your past failures, successes, victories, pain, regrets, love, rejection… Anything that does not empower you in your present pursuits could be part of what is weighing you down.
Philippians 3:13 states, “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are
before.” The Greek word for forgetting is a compound word epilanthano. Epi means to turn from one thing to another, while lantrano refers to something obsolete. Epilanthano can loosely translate as “turning from that which is obsolete.” The Greek word opiso is the word translated to behind. The original language implies that its object is something that should be left behind, never revisted.
Now re-imagine your life without the weight of your past. It is time to let go of those old obsolete things that should be left behind never and visited again so that you might run your race and obtain your prize. It is time to run your best race. Runner, take your mark. Get set. Go!!!
Note Greek Translation from: Renner, R. (2016). Sparkling gems II from the Greek: 365 Greek Word Studies for Every Day of the Year to Sharpen your Understanding of God’s word. Tulsa, OK: Teach All Nations