Embrace a Fresh Start: You Are Not Defined by Your Past

You Are Not Your Past 

I saw this quote a few years ago and I saved it because it really spoke to me –

Just because you did something wrong in the past doesn’t mean you can’t advocate against it now. It doesn’t make you a hypocrite. YOU GREW. Don’t let people use your past to invalidate your current mindset.

You might have made some really big mistakes in the past. You could have even gone to jail for some of them. But that doesn’t mean the devil is allowed to hold you captive thinking you can’t talk about the right things now.

A lot of the time we fail to reach our full potential, we fail to help someone going through what we did, we fail to stop someone from going down a broken path because we think we’ll be labeled a “hypocrite.”

Use Your Experiences To Help Others

You went through what you went through and God brought you through to the other side so that you can help other people.

Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

You’ve grown from your past. It’s made you who you are today. And you, like Paul, can gladly talk about your weaknesses because:

1. Your past doesn’t define you.
2. Someone else can overcome this struggle by hearing that you overcame it.

Kristen James

Midday Show Host, STAR 99.1