I recall a story of a conversation between two travelers… In order to determine the right direction of our spiritual journey as children of God, we need to know our destination.

In our Epistle reading for today, the Apostle Paul had a clear goal in God and pressed on toward that divine direction. Paul aimed to gain Jesus, be found in Christ, and become more like Him. Paul’s desire to know Christ went beyond mere head knowledge. He didn’t just comprehend Jesus; he followed Christ with all his heart and even participated in the suffering of the Lord.

I have previously shared the background of today’s passage. Saint Paul, formerly known as Saul of Tarsus, his Jewish name, was called “a Hebrew of Hebrews in regard to the law and a Pharisee” (Philippians 3:4-6). Before his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus, Saul imprisoned and murdered Christians. He persecuted Christ’s followers because, in those days, Jesus was believed to be God’s Messiah among Jewish believers. From his perspective, Paul could not consider Jesus as the Son of God, so he wanted to correct this inaccurate teaching within Judaism. Personally, Paul also desired to become righteous before the Lord. However, he discovered that he could not change even his own heart to the righteousness of God, no matter how hard he tried to keep the Lord’s law. Eventually, Paul cried out to God due to the defeat to the evil spirit in his inner being. After the surprising sacred meeting with the Resurrected Lord, Paul became convinced that “this righteousness [the righteousness of God] is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe… all are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:21-26). Later, God changed Saul’s name to Paul, which means “small” or “humble.” After Paul came to realize God’s righteousness through faith, he wanted to magnify Jesus and longed to be closer to Christ. That was the highest goal he had been pursuing since the new beginning of his spiritual race with Jesus.

In our Epistle, Paul summarized his practical attitudes toward the direction God had given him. “But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14). When we consider Paul’s statement, we observe that the phrase “one thing” in his declaration consists of two parts. As someone has wisely expressed it: “Forgetting is part of pressing forward, and pressing forward is part of forgetting.” One illustration Paul often used to depict our journey of faith is a race. An essential aspect for a runner is to focus on what lies ahead, not what is behind. This insight reflects Paul’s perspective on his divine marathon.

Now, let us explore Paul’s principles in his faith journey in more detail. The first strategy of his sacred race is “forgetting what is behind.” What does this phrase mean for those of us who have embarked on a new godly race in this New Year? The term “forget” here does not imply literally erasing events from the past since God has granted us the ability to remember those moments. Many of us may have numerous wonderful memories we want to continuously cherish. We are proud of some things our loved ones and we have accomplished. At the same time, one challenge we might face is witnessing our loved ones struggling with cognitive impairment. They may find it difficult to recall recent experiences. As we grow older, one thing we may want to work on is maintaining the capacity of our brain to remember.

I believe that there are two critical reasons why, as children of God, we should not entirely forget things that have taken place in the past. The first reason is that God is the real source and strength of the things we have and are enjoying today. If we forget this, we might find ourselves saying, like the people of Israel in the Old Testament, “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me” (Deuteronomy 8:17). We should not forget that God is the One who gives us the ability to produce wealth or any other good fruits.

The second reason why we should not forget is the fact that we can learn valuable lessons from even past painful memories. On a snowy Sunday morning almost seven years ago, I was involved in a single-car accident. As many of you know, Highway 8 or Glenarm Road has many curves. When I approached the last turn to Glenarm Church, suddenly, I felt the vehicle sliding on an icy road. In a state of panic, I immediately pressed the brakes, thinking it was the best way to control the car. Unfortunately, it went off the road, rolled over a couple of times, and ended up in the ditch. I thank God for protecting me in that incident. The most significant lesson I have learned from that accident is, of course, to reduce or slow down my speed when driving in snow, ice, and freezing rain, maintain a safe distance, and brake gradually.

If remembering is an important aspect of our spiritual journey, why does the Apostle Paul tell us to “forgetting what is behind”? What is the real meaning of his statement? He meant that he would not want to dwell on the past events, whether they were good or bad. Saint Paul is renowned as the greatest theologian and biblical scholar. He was an expert in Holy Scripture, authoring most of the epistles in the New Testament. When I read them, I am always amazed at his profound thoughts, especially in the letter to the Roman believers. As he wrote the epistle for today to the church at Philippi, he was getting older and was in prison. He could have boasted to himself about how much he had already achieved his goal. However, instead of pride, he humbly admitted that he had not reached it yet. He did not want to dwell solely on those glorious memories. At the same time, Paul would have regretted some mistakes and failures he had made over the years. Due to those shortcomings, he might have condemned himself, or he could have been attacked by Satan and his three favorite tools: doubt, despair, and discouragement. Paul was fully aware of the dangers of dwelling on former matters.

That is why God said to the people of Israel in our Old Testament reading: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing!” (Isaiah 43:18-19). The Lord did not want them to be stuck in their past. He wanted His people to know that, even though they were being punished, they were not being forsaken. God had continuously been with them and kept planning good and new things for them. God wanted them to understand that they could still have a fresh start in their faith journey. Some of us may be saying, “Well, it’s easier said than done.” You are right. But, by the grace of God it can be done. How do we do that?

The Prophet Isaiah encourages us to pay attention to what the Lord told the people of Israel about the promise of His total forgiveness: “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more” (Isaiah 43:25). Have we learned how God could forget all their sin? God simply chose to not to remember. Similarly, God has forgotten our sins since they were fully paid for by what Jesus did on the cross. One crucial foundation for forgetting in our spiritual race is the fact that we need to repent of our failures, mistakes, and shortcomings and believe in Jesus’ forgiveness. Forgetting, especially, in previous negative memories, cannot be done by merely trying to forget them. Most of us will not forget them, no matter how hard we try. The best way to approach this is to honestly bring to Jesus the things we have wronged and humbly ask Him for His forgiveness. Then, we need to believe that Jesus no longer remembers them because His precious blood shed on the cross erases all the sins we have repented of and removes them from His recording book. That is why we place our complete trust in God’s merciful and mighty hands and can move forward into His bright paths.

The second strategy of Paul’s spiritual race is “straining toward what is ahead” (Philippians 3:13). What is the certain thing ahead of him? He explains this fully in the next verse. “I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). The main reason why Paul can move in this direction is to attain the prize in heaven that God has prepared for him. Receiving the Heavenly reward is the motivation for Paul to dedicate his one hundred percent to the Lord. That would be the ultimate objective of his spiritual race. Later, Paul said, “Without faith, it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Since Paul had faith in the godly prizes, he did not want to compare himself with any other apostles. Instead, he “worked harder than all of them” (1 Corinthians 15:10).

Even though the Apostle Paul did not compare himself to anyone, there was one exception. He measured himself using the perfect example of Jesus Christ, who is “the pioneer and perfecter of faith” (Hebrews 12:2). That is why Paul desired to “grow to become in every respect the mature body of Him who is the head, that is, Christ” (Ephesians 4:15). Like Paul, our Lord wants us to grow to be mature believers. We often hear that we live not under the law of God but under the grace of God. We need His grace in our lives every day, but because of this, we tend to justify our weaknesses in practicing the law of God. On our own, we cannot be holy and perfect. However, we need to be reminded of what Jesus says to His disciples: “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). As children of God, we are not called to live on the same level as the world. God wants us to run our journey of faith in the light of His absolute standard, even while we are living in a relative world.

Once again, let us listen to what Paul says about his passionate purpose in our Epistle: “What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage that I may gain Christ and be found in him…” (Philippians 3:8-9). This is Paul’s goal in the Lord. If Paul had wanted, he could have placed great confidence in who he was in terms of the race, reputation, and rules. But none of these aspects could compare with knowing Christ and having fellowship with Him. When we hear about Paul counting everything as rubbish, we may ask ourselves whether we have to throw all the things we have into the garbage. Please understand this. What Paul is saying here is that if there is anything that blocks him from coming to Jesus or anything that he relies on rather than on Jesus, he counts that as garbage – as something that he needs to lose. Paul worked as a tentmaker to support himself, even though he was called to be the apostle to the Gentiles. Paul utilized his knowledge and intelligence to write many inspirational epistles to various believers. Paul gave his best to share Jesus Christ with others. Particularly during his last years, he kept fighting the good fight and had finished the race for this heavenly present (2 Timothy 4:7). To know Jesus and become more like Christ each day is the highest value in his life. One more time, this is Paul’s ultimate longing in his entire faith journey.

Do you know that a number of older characters have been used for the kingdom of God in the Bible? The most productive years of people’s lives can be during retirement! Moses was eighty years old when God told him to go get His children out of Egypt. When Abraham was seventy-five years old, he received a call from God to leave his homeland and serve Him in the land of Canaan. During the last thirty years of his life, Joshua was given the charge of leading the people of Israel to conquer the Promised Land. Later, Caleb received permission from Joshua and fought to claim his inheritance at the age of 85.

One day, a little boy was playing with his friends in the yard. His grandmother, in her seventies, watched with great joy… Just like this woman, when we are asked to participate in something, we may excuse ourselves similarly responding: “I’m too old for that.” We may retire from our secular jobs when we reach a certain age. However, our sacred service to God has no age limit. I believe when we decided to follow Christ, we did not dedicate specific amounts of time. We vowed to give all our hearts, souls, minds, and strength to the Lord until we are called to be with Him. We have committed to being used as long as He gives us the strength and has something new for us to do.

Today, the Lord says through the Prophet Isaiah, “See, I am doing a new thing. Now it springs up; do you not perceive it. I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland” (Isaiah 43:18-19). Did we notice the emphasized and repeated word in these sentences? It is the word “I.” God does not say, “It is time for you to do a new thing.” The Lord says, “I am doing a new thing.” He does not say, “It is time for you to build up your strength and make a new resolution for yourself.” The Lord says, “I am making a way and streams in the dessert.” One of the main reasons why many of us may fail in the New Year resolutions is that we try to make these decisions with human willpower alone. I mean that we do not keep putting our faith in God while carrying out the resolutions. So, one of the best promises we can possibly make today is to rely on God’s power completely.

Before I conclude this message, I want to share an article titled “An Old Gentleman’s Goal to Learn Something New.” I have introduced this story before. Let me read it to you again. “During my thirties, forties and fifties, I had enjoyed my job and had worked really hard. Because of my dedication to my duties, my abilities had been recognized, and I had been well-respected during my long career. Receiving plentiful compliments, I proudly retired from my occupation at age of 65. However, thirty years later, on my 95th birthday, I have to admit that I am ashamed of the way I have lived. Today, I regret the fact I wasted my time doing nothing new. It seemed as if I had lived meaninglessly. The last 30 years were one-third of my life, and if I had known that I had many more years to live after I retired, I would never have lived the way I did. I thought I would be too old to start something new. I was totally wrong. Even at 95, my mind is still sharp. From now on, I challenge myself to learn a new language. The only reason why I am doing this is I will not want to regret my life again when I have my 105th birthday, 10 years from today. Now I want to start doing something new.”

What an inspirational story! How about our goals in the next 30 years or the abundant days to come? What are we expecting in our faith journey in this New Year, or do we think that this year is simply going to be the same old, same old? In reality, we tend to look at our outward or obvious situations and expect things based on our circumstances. If our conditions are not good, we may not expect anything good to come for us. But in Christ, we can expect something new even in our challenging environments. Our Lord is the Creator. He can and will make a way in our spiritual desert and streams in our physical wasteland.

Once again, the Apostle Paul says, “I press on toward the goal” (Philippians 3:14). His goal was to continuously know Christ. Like Paul, our God wants us to fix our eyes on Jesus and renew our passion to fully follow Christ. What the most productive experience we will be anticipating if we all repent of our sins, refocus our thoughts on the Word of God, and rely on Him absolutely. Furthermore, God wants us to realize that He is continuously doing new things in our faith journey both today and in the coming days. What a phenomenal year we will have if we offer ourselves as living sacrifices to the living God in our daily lives. Amen!

* In this message, I have been inspired by some thoughts from various sermons based on the following texts, Isaiah 43:14-21; Philippians 3:1-14.