Editor’s note: “The Spoken Word” is shared by Derrick Porter each Sunday during the weekly Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square broadcast. This will be given Sunday, Sept. 27, 2026. This week is No. 5,063 of the broadcast.
Please note: Reservations are needed to attend “Music & the Spoken Word” in the Salt Lake Tabernacle. Find out more about how to make reservations here.
It’s natural, at times, to look back on our lives and wonder, “What might have been?” or to say, “If only …” Along the way we may accumulate regrets and remember missed opportunities, sometimes focusing more on the past than the future.
Remembering such experiences can be constructive, helping us to change and become better. (See John Calvin’s commentary on Philippians 3:13 at Bible Portal, bibleportal.com.) But focusing too much on the past can be like embarking on a countryside drive only to find ourselves circling the same landmark over and over again.
Getting past the past can be difficult. But as we take the necessary steps to pull away from old circular patterns that repeatedly carry us through the valleys of our mistakes, we find joy. We experience the beauty of new beginnings, new frontiers and new challenges. The past, now in the rearview mirror, becomes a teacher rather than a master.
But it’s not enough to simply forget the past. Without resolution, guilt lives on. Doing all we can to correct the past enables us to move forward, unshackled and unencumbered. Eventually — though regret may linger — with God’s help our guilt is swept away.
As Charles Spurgeon once proclaimed, “Repentance is the clearing away of rubbish of the past.” We develop “a tenderness of repentance … and of holy desire for the future.” (See “Christ’s First and Last Subject” and “Their Desired Heaven,” by Charles H. Spurgeon by Christian Classics Ethereal Library, ccel.org.)
Like the apostle Paul, as we repent of past mistakes and focus on the future, we can escape the sting of “those things which are behind and [reach] forward to those things which are ahead” (Philippians 3:13, New King James Version).
Getting past the past requires us to correct what we can. Paying that price — to the very best of our ability — allows the circular road we may have been traveling to straighten its course and, with heaven’s help, lead us toward new horizons. We then recognize it’s time to move forward. “Whatever mistakes we have made, whatever debts we have incurred, whatever duties we have deferred, our only way out is ahead” (see “Rearview Living,” by Richard L. Evans, July 16, 1950, richardlevans.org).
May we focus on the future by first correcting what we can from the past. Then may we move forward with renewed confidence, allowing the past to be our teacher rather than our master.
Tuning in …
The “Music & the Spoken Word” broadcast is available on KSL-TV, KSL News Radio 1160AM/102.7FM, KSL.com, BYUtv, BYUradio, Dish and DirecTV, SiriusXM (Ch. 143), tabernaclechoir.org, youtube.com/TheTabernacleChoir and Amazon Alexa (must enable skill). The program is aired live on Sundays at 9:30 a.m. Mountain Time on these outlets. Look up broadcast information by state and city at musicandthespokenword.com/viewers-listeners/airing-schedules.
