Becoming Virtuous

Do you ever feel trapped and haunted by your past? Like you’ve sought to grow and change, but the people around you can’t seem to let go of the shortcomings of your youth? They are unable (or unwilling) to see the maturation in your life? It feels like you’re trying to “bury the hatchet” (to borrow the colloquialism), but others only buried the hatchet head, and keep pointing to the handle when they want to remind you that you’ve messed up before.

I guess you can tell I’ve felt this way before (), and today I was pondering how I should be handling these feelings. Previously, I’ve gotten discouraged and depressed, feeling like it was hopeless to try to get people to know me for who I truly am now instead of fixating on the past.

But then today I remembered some truths that give me freedom. First, God sees me (Psalm 139). He is intimately aware of my current shortcomings, but He also sees the ways I’ve grown and rejoices over His work in me to that end (Zeph. 3:17). Second, God’s mercies are new every morning (Lam. 3:22, 23). I do still fail and fall short, no doubt about that. But His mercy towards me is infinitely more abundant than any sin I could commit. Thirdly, because of His mercy through Christ’s sacrifice, God sees me as having Christ’s righteousness (Rom. 4:23–25). This means that He doesn’t see my sins when He looks at me, He doesn’t hold them over my head. Finally, people are fickle. And this is one (of many) reasons that God never says to put my hope in other people and their opinion of me (Prov. 29:25). On the contrary, God doesn’t change (Heb. 13:8). So, because God chose me, I can rest in the fact that His love for me never changes. And more importantly, His love for me doesn’t rise and fall with my usefulness (1 John 4:10).