Don't Look Back

This morning, during my early morning walk, I came upon the neighborhood deer herd.  There are a pack of deer that roam through our neighborhood, and typically there are about 5 that are together most of the time, but I have counted 9 at once.  Today, there were 3 that had just crossed the neighborhood street where I was walking.  The youngest one turned toward me, and actually started moving toward me.  Knowing how unpredictable deer can be, I crossed the street to give a wider berth for them.  The younger one took a few steps towards me, so I stopped walking.  All at once, the younger one bounded back across the street and headed for a row of pine trees from the direction they came.  The other two took off in the opposite direction, but kept looking back for their young friend who was no longer with them.

I thought about how we often think going back from where we came is the better idea.  It was comfortable there.  It was known.  It was predictable.  It felt better than forging ahead into what lay ahead.  But then I realized that the poor young deer was now in a much worse predicament.  He was alone, and had no friends.  He now had more territory to cover to catch up to the rest. 

The good thing about deer is they want to stay in their pack, so I am sure that the others waited until young-one could get it together and rejoin them again.

This is not necessarily the case with us.  We stay stuck if we keep looking back, like the Israelites, wishing they had never left the slavery of Egypt because the desert held too many unknowns.  Growth requires forging ahead, even when it looks very scary.  Even the bondage of slavery can look good (or a familiar group of trees) if we don’t trust the One leading us forward.

Lesson of the day:  Look ahead and not back, and remember that the present means knowing where we came from is not as good as where we are going.  Being in the present means that we will trust the one leading us every step of the way, even if the way forward looks too hard.