I have always been a fan of scary movies.  I don’t go for the blood and guts genres as much as the drama and suspense. I prefer the Classics like Frankenstein, Dracula, and particularly the not-so-funny spoofs like Young Frankenstein where the monster dons a top hat and sings Puttin’ on the Ritz, ala Broadway.  

I’m amazed with the more modern horror flicks at how many times a monster can be killed off only to be resurrected for a sequel or two or ten. How many ways can Michael Myers be terminated before he stays dead?  Just when you think the boogey man is gone, he re-emerges back into your life unexpectedly to haunt and terrorize you some more. Every time he comes back to life we entertain him some more, almost as if we have been waiting in anticipation for his return.

For many of us our lives resemble a scary movie, haunted by events and decisions in the past that just won’t die. We are constantly haunted by regrets, by failures, by skeletons in our closets that emerge just when we think the coast is clear. For believers in Christ who have been forgiven their sins, the enemy likes to bring them back from the dead into our memory bank like a shadow we can’t lose or the fog we can’t find our way out of. Could we have saved our marriage? Could I have done more to save a business?  Have I really been forgiven of stupid decisions in my past? How can God, who knows everything from the beginning to the end really forget my sins? Instead of living in peace with the assurance of eternal forgiveness we find ourselves like the victim of a scary movie, running for our lives from monsters who just don’t seem to ever die, and we entertain them as if we were expecting them to come back.

The best weapon we have against the haunts of our past is not a wood stake or crucifix or hi-tech ghost zapper. It’s the simple but powerful Word of God and the promises He has given for our assurance.  Consider just a few of these weapons of mass destruction against the enemies of the mind:

2 Corinthians 5:17-If any man be in Christ, he has become a new creature. All things in his past have gone away and everything has become new.

1 John 1:9-when we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all (past and present) unrighteousness. (parentheses mine)

Isaiah 43:25-I am he who blots out your sins for my sake and remembers them no more.

Romans 8:1-There is now no condemnation to those who are now in Christ. 

Psalm 103:12-As far as the East is from the West he has removed our sins from us.

Hebrews 8:12-I will purge them of all evil, and I will not remember their sins again. I will be merciful to their iniquities and their sins I will remember no more.

If we are truly in Christ and beneficiaries of his promises, then there is no reason to give in to the constant reminders by the enemy of where we were and what we did. “I Still Remember What You Did Last Summer” is the name of a fictional scary movie, not the theme of a believer whose sins are covered and buried under grace and forgiveness. It may be impossible for us to completely blot from memory our past, but it is possible through the daily renewing of our minds to change the scary movie channel and find a different station.  Leave the ghost stories for sleepovers and camp fires!