This is the sixth of 25 special reflections based on lessons I learned from my mother. These will run from my birthday on October 27 until her birthday on November 20.

Read

Lamentations 3:19-33

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
    his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:22-23

Reflect

Mom didn’t always get everything right. In fact, there was one area where she fell short and had deep, deep regrets. Mom and Dad were married in 1960, but they had some big differences throughout their marriage. In 1973, the differences became too great and they agreed to divorce. It wasn’t a decision she ever regretted, especially because she ended up marrying my stepfather, and the two of them had a storybook marriage and life together. But whenever I talked with Mom about her divorce, she had a definite sadness, perhaps because she knew that divorce is so disappointing to the Lord.

After the divorce, Mom made a pretty big decision that would change her life – and ours, too. She felt that she needed a reset, and so she packed up a station wagon and a U-Haul trailer, and she moved herself, her two boys and her schnauzer to live with her parents in Carthage, Texas. Now that I’m grown, I can see how difficult that had to be for her – to leave her home and friends in Florida to move back to the home she’d lived in when she was a child. Thankfully, my grandparents were willing to open their homes and their lives to us so that she could have a fresh start.

We serve a God of the fresh start. Throughout the Bible, God gives His people a chance to hit the reset button on their lives and to start anew. The biggest example of that is salvation – the chance to hit the reset button on sin and to have a new life in Jesus Christ. If we’re willing to confess our sins to the Lord, he is always faithful to erase them and to allow us to start again with a clean slate. And He commands us to afford the opportunity to others to hit the reset button with us when they’ve offended or sinned against us.

If your life has gone in a direction that’s different than where you thought it would go, don’t be afraid to start over. There’s no shame in having to hit the reset button, even if others might not completely understand what you’re doing. It’s enough to know that the Lord understands. If you trust and seek a clean slate with Him, you can have a new day and a new outlook free from the disappointments of the past.

Reflection copyright © 2025 Doug DeBolt.