Can I start with a confession? I struggle with slowing down. I’m a big-picture, future-oriented kind of guy, and one of the things I’m working on in my personal life is developing more of an ability to just slow down and enjoy the present. One side-effect of that struggle to live in the present is that I’m not the greatest about celebrations, especially birthdays. For me, my birthday every year is more or less just another day, not markedly different than the other 364. But Kayli is different. For Kayli her birthday isn’t just another day, it’s THE day. It’s circled in red on the calendar every year. Actually, in the time I’ve known her it’s really become more of a birthweek celebration than a birthday celebration; you would be amazed at how long that day can get stretched out!
I bring all this up because FBC just celebrated a significant birthday last month, but in fitting with my usual approach to life it was a date that passed without much celebration or acclaim; actually it almost passed without my even knowing it had happened! Fortunately though a member of the congregation stopped me this past Sunday and kindly informed me that the building we stood there talking in had been open for five years this month. So, happy birthday FBC! To celebrate, I thought I’d take a moment to reflect on the significance of remembering in our day to day walk with God.
If I asked you to make a list of the most important commands of God within Scripture, what would you come up with? I imagine you’d have lots of the usual suspects on your sheet. Maybe love God and love others at the forefront with a whole host of “Thou shalt not’s…” bringing up the rear. I wonder though if you’d include anywhere the command to remember. If you’re at all like me, you probably wouldn’t. After all remembrance, unlike a command like obedience, doesn’t seem inherently holy or productive does it? What’s amazing though is that there are whole sections of Scripture where the command to remember is emphasized as much as, if not more than, the command to obey. The best example of this is in the book of Deuteronomy, where Moses urges the Israelites to remember God, and His work in their lives no fewer than fifteen different times.
Why is that? Why is God so concerned with our memories? Scripture doesn’t answer that question explicitly, but I’d like to suggest at least a few reasons. First, God is concerned with our memories because, as the creator of our minds, He knows just how powerful a gift (or curse) our memories are. Perhaps the better way to put it is to say that God knows how easy it is for our memories to take us farther from, not closer to, Him. Have you ever noticed how quickly your thoughts can become distorted? The story of the Exodus provides a great example of this principle at work. The Israelites lived for hundreds of years as brutally treated slaves within Egypt. Then, after a few short years of wilderness wanderings they complain, “Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full!” (Exodus 16:3). From oppressed slaves to supposed happy servants with full bellies, the power of memory to distort reality is on full display.
The next reason God is concerned with our memory is because, as a good and perfect Father He wants to bless us, and knows that one of the easiest ways to do so is to help us remember rightly. Scripture teaches that “…every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of Lights” (James 1:17). What that means for us as Gods people is that remembering rightly should be a joyful experience as we exult together in all that God has accomplished in our lives. Again the Israelites provide an example for us, of this positive power of memory, when Moses commands them, “You shall not be afraid…but you shall remember what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and all of Egypt.” (Deut. 7:18) The call to remember is a call to worship. We worship, as we remind ourselves of Gods faithfulness and unfailing love. Remembering rightly helps us live joyfully in the present as we reflect gratefully on all God has done for us in the past.
So Faith Baptist let me urge you at the close of our time together to remember. Remember all that God has done. Remember how He brought a church from a crumbling building at a land-locked location that would have made expansion difficult, if not impossible, to a brand new, handicap-accessible building on eight incredible acres of donated property. Remember! The process was imperfect, and the last five years have been difficult, but God has never left us to our own devices. He has been Lord over our church for almost 190 years, and He hasn’t fallen asleep on the job over the last five. We will persevere, we will fight on, and one day the trials of these years will be just another memory.
Remembering With You,
Pastor Grant