past on Children's Imagination

Author David Seamands once wrote, “Children are the best recorders but the worst interpreters.” I remember a lot about being a kid. I remember colors and moments, arguments and smells… Though my me...

At some point in childhood we all make the powerful discovery that we can manipulate the truth about ourselves.

Every creator, from a child with Play-Doh to Michelangelo, learns that creation involves a kind of self-limiting. You produce something that did not exist before, yes, but only by ruling out other opt...

The late comedian Sam Levenson enjoyed sharing funny anecdotes about his childhood, especially his early school days. One of his favorite stories was about his first day of school, when his overly pro...

The most exemplary nature is that of the topsoil. It is very Christ-like in its passivity and beneficence, and in the penetrating energy that issues out of its peaceableness. It increases by experienc...

“When it comes to the past, everyone writes fiction.”

In her book, Grace for the Good Girl , Emily P. Freeman charts her early years growing up in the church believing in grace but living according to the rules of perfection. One thing that would, a...

Barbara Brown Taylor recounts her first experience with caving, the exploration of caves that are not prepared or made easily accessible for inexperienced explorers. Her guides gave her a bit of helpf...

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future.

There are two golden days in the week, upon which, and about which, I never worry—two carefree days, kept sacredly free from fear and apprehension. One of these days is Yesterday; Yesterday, with its ...

Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future.

In many parts of the country, leaf clean-up is an annual chore. They fall from the trees, blanket our lawns, and we often bag them up and toss them out (or burn them). There’s a lesson in this… In my...

Intellect is therefore a vital force in history, but it can also be a dissolvent and destructive power. Out of every hundred new ideas ninety-nine or more will probably be inferior to the traditional ...

In a futile attempt to erase our past, we deprive the community of our healing gift. If we conceal our wounds out of fear and shame, our inner darkness can neither be illuminated nor become a light fo...

Maybe the most sacred function of memory is just that: to render the distinction between the past, present, and future ultimately meaningless: to enable us at some level of our being to inhabit that s...

All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story.

When we remember the past, it is not only the past; it breaks into the present and gains a new lease on life.

What I like about experience is that it is such an honest thing. You may take any number of wrong turnings; but keep your eyes open and you will not be allowed to go very far before the warning signs ...

“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”

Too often we are given a choice—emotions or faith and belief. Yet as Dan Allender and Tremper Longman observe,  Emotion links our internal and external worlds. To be aware of what we feel can open ...

In her excellent little book (Mythical Me), Richella Parham describes the importance of looking on the past with grace: Developing a redemptive memory requires recalling not only the pain of the pas...

I was regretting the past and fearing the future. Suddenly God was speaking: "My name is I am." I waited and God continued: "When you live in the past, with its mistakes and regrets, it...

Trust no future, howe’er pleasant!  Let the dead Past bury its dead!  Act,—act in the living present!  Heart within, and God o’erhead!

Holy Spirit, open our minds to the truth that hurts and the truth that heals. Open our hearts to the love that challenges and the love that embraces. Amen.

“Shall we never never get rid of this Past? … It lies upon the Present like a giant’s dead body.”

Remember Miss Haversham in Charles Dickens's Great Expectations? Her entire life was defined by the fact that she was jilted on her wedding day. People can become very attached to their pain and i...

It’s okay to look at the past and the future. Just don’t stare.

The things we say yes to and the things we say no to determine the terrain of our future. My convoluted journey is posted with invitations, and my RSVPs account for the twists and turns. Sometimes, ha...

No matter how much the world shatters us to pieces, we carry inside us a vision of wholeness that we sense is our true home and that beckons us.

What is the shape of your pain? Is your pain a gaping wound? Is it stuffed into the back corner of a closet, or is it neatly categorized and filed away with annotations that no one but you understand?...