New Every Morning

By Greg Laurie, Op-ed contributor Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Through the Lord's mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.
— Lamentations 3:22-23

Greg Laurie, senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California and Harvest Orange County in Irvine, California, shares the Gospel with a sold-out crowd of 19,000 for Harvest America at the American Airlines Center and Victory Park in Dallas, Texas, Oct. 5, 2014. | (Photo: rever Hoehne for Harvest Ministries)

Sometimes I will run into people I knew years ago, and they will say, "Hey, Greg, we remember the old days back at the tent [at Calvary Chapel]. Those were good days, weren't they?"

"Yeah, those were great days," I will say. "So anyway, where are you going to church now?"

"We don't go to church. We're still living off the tent."

They need to get current. That was then, this is now. For some people, it is all about what God did thirty years ago or twenty years ago. But I am interested in what God is doing today. And I want to see what He will do tomorrow. The past is interesting to me only to the extent that I can learn from it so I don't make mistakes that I have made there. I can also remember some great things that God did and pray that He will do them again.

There's a place for remembering, but let's not be crippled by past victories that stop us from doing what God wants us to do today. The Bible says that His mercies are new every morning (see Lamentations 3:22–23).

That is why Paul could say, "Forgetting those things which are behind . . ." (Philippians 3:13). If anyone could have rested on his laurels, it was Paul. He had a pedigree that didn't stop (see Philippians 3:4). And if anyone could have been crippled by his past, it was Paul. Before he was the great apostle, he was the notorious Saul of Tarsus, the Christian killer. But Paul wouldn't allow himself to be crippled by past sins or to be distracted by past victories. Nor should we.

God wants to do a fresh work in your life today—and He wants to do another one tomorrow.

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