I hear people say it all the time.
“I want to go back to when things were simpler.”
“I wish life could just go back to the way it was.”
“If only I could hit rewind.”
It is a common human instinct—nostalgia wrapped in the comfort of familiar territory. When the wilderness gets tough, human nature hasn’t changed much since Exodus; like the Israelites wandering in the desert, our first impulse when things hurt is often to look back toward the familiar, even if the familiar was a place of bondage.
Whenever I hear that longing to return, I feel an immediate, quiet resistance.
Personally, I don’t want to go back to anything.
Not to old routines, not to past comforts, and certainly not to who I used to be. Nostalgia is an incredible editor. It trims out the uncertainty, softens the bruises, and polishes the ordinary until it shines like gold. When we long for the past, we rarely want the whole truth of that season; we just crave the safety of a script where we already know the ending.
Scripture gives us a sobering warning about looking back. Jesus said in Luke 9:62:
“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Lot’s wife remains an enduring reminder that clinging to what God is calling us out of only petrifies us in place. Going backward means trading divine growth for false certainty. It means returning to a version of your life before God cultivated the endurance, faith, and grace you carry today.
I don’t want the rewind button. I want to keep moving forward in time and purpose.
Yet, there is a sobering, heavy truth to moving forward: sometimes the compass only resets when our world shakes.
It is a deeply sad thing when it takes a tragedy to make you realize your purpose is off track. And that is precisely how I feel today.
It feels unfair that routine and comfortable momentum can lull us to sleep so effectively that only an earthquake can wake us up. C.S. Lewis observed that God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains—using it as a megaphone to rouse a deaf world. A crisis strips away the superficial noise, the worldly distractions, and the hollow busyness we mistook for faithful progress. Suddenly, you find yourself standing among the studs, staring at an undeniable gap between where your feet have been wandering and where the Lord called you to walk.
Carrying that realization is painful. There is real grief for the fracture itself, and there is grief for the time spent drifting off course.
Yet Scripture assures us that “a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise” (Psalm 51:17). Conviction is not condemnation; seeing that you are off track—no matter how bitter the catalyst—is not a defeat. It is an awakening. It is the Shepherd seeking out the wandering sheep to set its feet back on the narrow path.
Moving forward doesn’t mean moving unaffected. Forward doesn’t mean pretending the wound doesn’t ache. It simply means refusing to pitch a tent in the wreckage or run back to an illusion of safety that was never God’s will for your life.
The Apostle Paul knew what it meant to face devastation, redirection, and total upheaval, yet his posture remained resolute in Philippians 3:13–14:
“Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
The past was the foundation. The crisis was the disruption. But God’s sovereign purpose is still out ahead.
Today the realization stings, and the heart aches. But from this ground, every step taken next is surrendered to Him—taken with eyes wide open, guided by grace, and walking forward.
Heavenly Father,
You know how heavy my heart is today, and You know the grief that brought me to this place. Forgive me for the seasons where I drifted, mistaking comfortable momentum for Your divine calling.
Thank You that You love me too much to leave me wandering off course. Even when the wake-up call is painful, thank You for resetting my compass toward You. Strip away any lingering desire to look back or settle for past illusions of safety.
Take the pieces of what feels broken and use them to rebuild my focus. Give me the courage to loosen my grip on what lies behind, the faith to surrender this ache into Your hands, and the clarity to walk forward into Your purpose—one step, one day, and one prayer at a time.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.
Scripture Disclosure:
Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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