The Past

Well hello there and good evening friends.  It has been some time now that I have been asked to blog, not only by people I know but by God.  I have been feeling the need to write on something in particular, but didn't have the words exactly that I was to share.  However, if you have a few minutes, they seem to be flooding my mind and I would love to set them free.

As most of you know I am a firm believer in moving forward.  However, there seems to be some things in life from my past namely that as I am learning love to peak its nastiness into my head.  This particular blog is on the past and what it does to us as people and believers.  You see, for a long time I didn't realize that God really desired a relationship with me, I completely had it all confused.  I thought man, all this "stuff" that I'm supposed to be doing or am not doing right, surely can't be pleasing to God and therefore it felt as if this life we call being Christians was something with my Heavenly Father that was completely unattainable.  With that being said let's go back just for a little bit, into what I call "My Past".

I grew up knowing deep within me, that I was born for greatness and I don't mean being famous or anything, but I knew deep down that God had something amazing planned for me.  However, when I got to some crooked point of being confused about what kind of deal this was with God, somewhere along the path to my greatness I lost my way.  I truly got wayward when I was about 17 and at the ripe age of 18 I decided that full on rebellion was the best way to go.  Seriously most of us see that number as a significant turning point in our lives....true adulthood if you will.  Being that I "knew" everything, this new way of life seemed a lot more fun at the time, than doing what I thought was right and good.  What really could be the consequences of having so much fun, I couldn't seem to find any.  Let's not mention that obviously our brains aren't fully developed at this age, I'm true testimony to that.  I won't go into grave detail about all the heinous and horrible decisions that I made, but let's delve on just one shall we.

Not everybody thinks the same at 18, but a lot of people think that this number signifies independence and entering into adulthood, so now you can do anything you want at this point.  I thought that anyways, so let me tell you what I did that day, I bought a pack of cigarettes and a lottery ticket.  I was big stuff right, well it's obvious now that I was just senseless.  Wasn't long after that I made another decision I thought was the coolest one EVER!  I got a.....yep that's right a tattoo.  Now before I go any further, let me remind you, I was in a sheer state of rebellion and my brain also was not fully developed ok.  You see the original tattoo there was a dolphin and a name of an individual.  I thought yep, this is the life, I will love my new tattoo forever.  Then guess what happened, I didn't love the name anymore so I had to get it covered up.  Seriously, I was covering up a past mistake with another new mistake.  I never thought truly that one day, I would no longer want this ridiculously "cool" artwork on my body anymore.  I also never thought how when my life would turn back around into what it was originally supposed to be like, how this one place of ink would haunt me on a daily basis.  How in the world did all this make sense to me at the time I have no idea now.  I justified my ridiculous decisions to most all, but especially to my parents.

This tattoo was/is on the inside of my ankle and I thought that this was an inconspicuous place to put it originally.  Not a lot of people would see it there you know and I could cover it anytime if I wanted to.  Yet it never failed that almost every single day, somebody or some child asked me what it was.  When did I get it?  Why did I get it?  Do I love dolphins?  Why did I choose that one thing in particular?  Did it hurt?  When I gave my life over to God and I mean really gave it over to him, this piece of ink has taunted me everyday.  I had not liked it anymore, but when things changed for me, this was like I carried around my shame for everybody to see.  There it was right on my leg, I was marked, my rebellion and sin was tagged for people to see and question me on.  Don't get me wrong, people didn't ask me about it because they wanted to throw my past in my face, it was always just innocent conversation or trying to get to know me.  However, there was and has been no escape to it.

So in 2010 after talking to Chad,we discussed it and we decided we had the financial ability to do so, I was going to try the treatments of getting it removed via laser.  This is the process where basically you are burning your skin with anywhere from 2nd to 3rd degree burns.  OUCH!  Turns out there is an amazing couple that comes to Tyler from Dallas Tattoo Removal Clinic and because of grants they are able to offer the treatments at half the normal cost.  So in May of 2010 I began my journey of personally removing my past.  The picture above is before I started my treatments and the picture here is after 3 treatments.  You can really see the difference in how much of the black ink is broken up or is even completely gone in some areas. 
 
This was my answer you see, I was now going to be able to at least rid myself of 1 thing from my past that couldn't taunt me by the sight of it everyday.  What is so amazing is that God completely wiped away my sins and my past, it clearly states this in the following scripture.

Psalm 103:11-12
For as high as the heaves are above the earth, So great is His lovingkindess toward those who fear Him.
As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.

Although, what I know I have struggled with is not that he has forgiven me and it is no more.  My mind tends to want to replay these things over and over and over.  It's like a broken record sometimes, it's almost relentless and ridiculous.  To make matters worse, I have been toting around with me for 13 years now a part of my past that is no more, but I had to look at it and answer questions about it.  It has been as painful as the day the needles originally penetrated my skin.  To this day I have had 13 excruciating treatments.  Can you imagine it equals the same amount of time that I have been carrying it on my leg.  Something else ironic was that it cost me $75.00 to get it and the cost of each treatment.....$75.00.  Geez, really could this whole process be any wilder??!!

Last week was my 13th treatment, Kara and I drove to Dallas this time to get it done by their bad to the bone machine at their office.  Here is the result and what it now looks like with current blisters of course after all the treatments.  I do not know how many more that I will have to get done in order for it to be completely gone, but I will keep trucking through. 

Let me end by sharing something with you that God has taught me through this seemingly endless process. There are lots of choices in life that we make that will create either a good effect or a bad effect.  We can not continue to go on covering up mistakes with more mistakes.  We cannot run from an inevitable outcome whether it be good or bad.  This one choice in particular that I made has created a bad effect.  Not only has it hurt me and others emotionally but to rid myself of past pain, I have to go through more pain to remove it.  If I could sit down with every teenage girl I know and openly share my story and they hear me, I mean actually hear me, I would do it everyday if I could.  If I could save just a few from some of the heartache of choices that can and will come back to taunt them, I would count it as a blessing.  I am utterly humbled that I am going through a mere amount of pain to remove something that God no longer remembers, but so that I can personally feel free of a shame that I have carried for so long.  Yet look at the pain that Jesus Christ endured so that our transgressions would be not remembered.  He teaches us these truths so that we can be set Free.  I could not imagine living a life any longer without the actual deep relationship that I now have with God The Father.  Let us no longer look to the Past, but live in obedience to God in the Present, so that we can eternally live in the Future.