Last week, I hired movers to haul a ridiculous number of boxes filled with office supplies and art materials. They unloaded them in Ladoga, Indiana, in the building that was my dad’s studio. Some of you know that he was a professional watercolorist, and he worked out of his old, small-town-downtown storefront from 1990 until this past summer. Losing him was devastating and heartbreaking and all that you would expect it to be.

I’ve had my ups and downs. This past couple weeks has seen more tears than usual, though, because for these past seven months, we’ve been trying hard to do things the way Dad would have—matting and framing his art, putting on a sale of his remaining pieces that he would have been proud of, steadfastly refusing to move a thing on his credenza. It was like if we didn’t disturb his brushes and paints, we could hold on to him a little longer.

But the truth is, we can’t get him back.

Nevertheless, when I hired a guy to repaint the walls (going from Dad’s country blue and tan to my bolder eggplant purple and warm gray), I felt like I was painting over him. Erasing his presence. When I moved his painting stuff out of the way of the painter, I fought tears, because it felt wrong to change things.

And then I came home and cried all night.

Sunday morning, as I stood in the second row of my church, I felt the words of the praise song wash over me. We sang the chorus again and again and I felt a kind of exhilaration rising up within me—hope, God’s promises of renewal. Quietly, I stood there, eyes closed, arms raised, thinking about moving forward. Wanting God to heal me, to make me new and whole again. To help me stop hurting.

We were singing the song “Moving Forward,” and it contains these lines:

I’m not going back, I’m moving ahead
Here to declare to you my past is over in you
All things are made new, surrendered my life to Christ…
Yes, you make all things new and I will follow you forward

I think when people talk about wanting to put their pasts behind them, they’re usually talking about their sins… Mistakes, what we’ve done wrong, destructive behavior. Regrets. We all have plenty of that. But what I realized Sunday morning is this: sometimes the past is behind us even if we don’t want it to be. I’d give anything to go back, for my dad to still be alive. But I can’t make that happen.

And although it’s tempting to try to hold on to that—to create a shrine to my dad, to tiptoe around his studio space and blow the dust off of his things that I’m refusing to move because of the fact that he was the one who put them there—it doesn’t bring him back. It doesn’t make me miss him any less. It doesn’t help me heal.

I feel like God showed me that being there, inhabiting that space in my own way, is part of my healing. That there’s healing in moving forward—in looking towards what God has for me, and not dwelling in the sorrow. It doesn’t mean I’ll stop missing him. It doesn’t mean I’m glad he’s gone.

It just means that God’s not done with me. I’m still here and there’s still hope. There’s still redemption. There’s still growth and joy and happiness. And they don’t only exist behind me, but they’re waiting for me when I take some small steps forward.

Oh, hey, what a moment you have brought me to
Such a freedom I have found in you
You’re the healer who makes all things new…

Lord, let the Holy Spirit wash over those who are reading this, who are listening to this song… soothe the hurts and heal the wounds of those who are missing someone. Who feel lost or alone. Who are sorrowful or paralyzed by their grief. You are with the ones we love. You are closer to them than we are, and we know they’re in good hands. We also know that those very same hands can hold us close and bring us comfort. Lord, hold us tight and don’t let us go, and let us find hope and empowerment and renewal with you. Amen.