Last night I watched one of my top ten Christmas movies, George C. Scott's version on A Christmas Carol. During his visit from the ghost of Christmas Past, he is shown all of the things about his past--good and ill, finishing with a disturbing picture of love and life lost to Ebenezer's greed and obsessions. Scrooge demands the ghost depart him, but as it evaporates, the spirit cries out. "Truth will win!" Denial and rationalization does not change the consequences of our past choices. The truth will work through and we will have to live with the truth. We cannot change the past.
But we can change the future!
How so? First, by not holding onto the past but by learning from it. Are there persistent patterns of thought and behavior in your life that consistently fail and rarely satisfy? That might be the first clue as to what you need to face. Does your personal story always begin with the disappointments in your life, is your default mode a victim mentality? You may very well be holding onto the past. The only thing you are learning from the past is how to stay there.
Second, make a relentless moral inventory. What is there about your values and your character that create negative, self-defeating, destructive patterns? Don't trust simply our feelings (your feelings often lie to you). Don't trust your own capacity to see the truth. Find someone you trust and invite them to speak the truth in love to you.
Third, seek the help of God to see what can be changed and to empower you to be changed. Ebeneezer Scrooge wasted a lot of his life, and caused a lot of suffering to others along the way. But because he made those changes, he was honored because "he always kept Christmas in his heart."
"Behold, I am making all things new!" - Jesus
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