Click. Click. Click. Undo! Undo! Undo!

If you’ve spent any time using Microsoft Word or Apple Pages, you’ve also spent some time clicking that “undo” button at the top of the screen.

More than once has that little backwards arrow saved my life. 

You know that feeling of panic when you’re typing along, finally making progress on that 1,000-word essay due at 11:59 p.m., then you look up to see a whole paragraph highlighted right as you hit backspace? 

Eek! Right as the anxiety sets in, you remember that glorious undo function. Your work has been saved!

Wouldn’t it be amazing if we had an undo button for everything—every foolish deed, every unkind word, every sin.

Sadly, we don’t.

We’re forced to suffer the consequences of our mistakes.

And that’s how it’s meant to be, as painful as it may be. 

It’s natural for us to want to undo our sin, forget about it and move on as soon as possible. But that’s not how life works. And that’s not how God intended life to work.

He wants us to learn from our mistakes, including the consequences we may face because of them. 

The possibility of a permanent mistake motivates us to seriously consider the decisions we make—how we act, what we say, how we live.

We want to do right and never sin, but we know that’s impossible as fallen creatures.

But with the strength Christ gives us, we can overcome our sin by faith.

Christ helps us make the right decisions if we only ask. Oftentimes, He grows us the most during the consequence part of the mistake making. 

Life sure would seem easier with an undo function.

But we must accept the responsibility of our sins, repent our wrongdoing and learn from it.

We must ask Christ to grow us in the consequences, to mold us into His image.

More importantly, let’s seriously think about our actions and words before doing or saying something we will later regret.

As Proverbs 24:16 says, “For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.”

Don’t go through this life stumbling over your sins. Reach out and let God’s hands of mercy lift you up again.