What’s your favorite family memory? What is your favorite memory of church? Your favorite holiday memory? Recollecting can bring warm feelings toward people and fond memories of places. Nostalgia can stoke gratitude. It appears that God rejoices in godly nostalgia. Take a look at Psalm 78 or Psalm 105 where God takes his people on a tour of their past and we see his faithfulness on display.
Last week we celebrated my son’s 16th birthday. My wife sent a dozen pictures of Soren through the years in our family text strand. My eyes filled with tears and my heart almost burst as I reflected on each of the moments in his life Angel had captured through her photos. My son is such a gift to us: his tender heart, his sense of humor, his perceptiveness. It is a gift to go back and re-live sweet and joy-filled moments that we have shared.
And yet. There is danger in nostalgia.
The Perfect Isn’t Behind Us
Nostalgia can make it seem as though the perfect lies behind us. When we reminisce, there can be a halo effect over times and places in our past that distorts reality. We remember a vacation fondly, thinking that our family was delighted in that season of our lives, only to forget the squabbles on vacation, or the Monopoly game that ended in tears. We recollect a sweet season in a church we used to go to, but forget that the church was pretty insider-focused and had a poor evangelistic outreach. We think fondly of a time when we worked for a company that was making a big difference in its industry, but omit from our memory the overly critical boss.
When we view certain seasons of our lives as rosier than they actually were, it can make things now seem worse than they really are. Our relationships or career or church now seem more lackluster than they really are. Our gratitude with the past might be coupled with ingratitude for the present.
God Purposes Everyone to Grow and Change
Nostalgia can also handicap us from caring well for those God has placed in front of us today. There is a danger in me wanting to have Soren return to his five, eight, eleven, or fourteen-year-old self. God has numbered Soren’s days and has purposed his growth and development. It’s true that it’s easier for me to think of him as an eleven-year-old than a sixteen-year-old. I figured out how to parent him as an eleven-year-old, I still have a lot of work to figure out how to parent him today and six months from today.
God desires that every person and entity grow into maturity. I’m not loving the church well if I try to recreate the days of yesteryear. Those were for then, how is the church going to grow into the community God has called it to be today? I’m not loving the friends in my life today well if I am comparing them to the friends God gifted me with a decade ago in a different setting.
Nostalgia Won’t Fix Your Sorrow
We can be tempted to run to nostalgia when we are down. Dante Alighieri said, “There is no greater sorrow than to recall a happy time when miserable.” If we return to times of joy in order to cultivate praise to God and strengthen our trust in him, then lean into your nostalgia. But if you return to seasons of happiness only to revel in your sorrow, then be wary of where your heart is taking you.
It is no surprise that nostalgia is used by marketing companies the world over to encourage you to purchase their products. From Coke to Pepsi to Ford to Chevy to Nike to Apple, brands know that if they can connect you to the warm glow of your past, they can get you to open your wallet.
The Best is Yet to Come
Let’s not forget, either, that while we are invited to remember God’s faithfulness in our past, he ultimately calls us not backward, but forward, to the new heavens and the new earth. What lies ahead of us is far, far greater than the highest moments in our past.
There are lots of good things about nostalgia, but it isn’t without its dangers. Be wary of ingratitude that can be multiplied with memories of good times. Be wary of self-pity that can be attendant. Be careful not to be manipulated by nostalgia. And do not lose sight of the great future that lies ahead of us in Christ Jesus.
Photo by Girl with red hat on Unsplash