What Will You Remember Today?

We have just passed through the Memorial Day weekend, a time to remember the sacrifices made by the men and women of our nation’s military, specifically those who didn’t come home alive. My dad was a veteran of World War II and as a 19-year-old in the US Army Air Force flew bombing missions over various locations in Germany. He was one of the fortunate ones who came back alive and without any significant physical trauma. As a boy, I remember he rarely talked about it and often avoided direct questions about his experience of the war itself. Though he would sometimes tell fanciful stores that were so outrageous even an 8-year old boy knew there wasn’t much truth in them. But I always knew his experiences had shaped him, even if I didn’t know how exactly. I am grateful for his sacrifice even though I don’t truly understand what it cost. So, with the rest of America, I take time to get reconnected with the truth that is so easily forgotten, our freedoms come with a price, a price that someone else has paid for with their life.

I have other memories of this weekend as well. Barb’s birthday often falls on the Memorial Day weekend and we take time to celebrate another year of God’s faithfulness to her and to us as a family. My dad died on Memorial Day weekend 1994 and so I am often flooded with memories of those final hours. The highlight of his last couple of days on earth was his receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, a true deathbed conversion that took place just hours before he was rendered unconscious by the cancer that had ravaged his body. God’s incredible grace and beauty invading and then overcoming, the ugliness of sin and death.

And maybe most significantly, there was my own encounter with the God of grace Memorial Day weekend 1979. After another weekend of abusing alcohol, my body had finally had enough and it began shutting down. The next day I was hospitalized with acute pancreatitis and would spend the next 8 days fighting for survival and deciding what direction my life was going to take. During my stay in the hospital, I had an encounter with the Lord, received His healing and was set free from the bondage of alcohol and illicit drugs. It was 39 years ago I personally experienced the truth of John 8:36, “If therefore the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed.” When I stop to remember, I live my life knowing that “my life was redeemed from the pit and I was crowned with loving kindness and compassion” (Psalm 103:4). It was a God encounter of Biblical proportions.

You would think given the dramatic nature of God’s intervention in my life that living with a daily awareness of His goodness and an abiding sense of gratitude would be an easy thing to do. Unfortunately, I cannot say that has been the case. As the years have gone by, it has been easy to allow the magnitude of what God did, and the resulting significance of it all, to diminish in my life. It is easy to grumble, be disappointed, frustrated and angry about the insignificant challenges of daily life when the reality is the last 14,235 days have been the result of God giving me a second chance at life! Perhaps you can relate?

I used to beat myself up about it all but have come to understand I am not the only child of God with a poor memory that results in a lack of gratitude and a corrupted perspective on life. I can, and want, to do better but I also understand that God is not surprised at my waywardness and loves me deeply even in those times when I forget His goodness, His love, and His beauty. It truly is amazing grace!

The Scriptures are replete with God’s calls to remember. To remember His works, His faithfulness, His lovingkindness that never ceases. We are called to remember because we are people of poor memory and limited perspective, quickly forgetting God’s many acts of love and kindness. In the book of Exodus God raises up Moses to deliver the people of Israel from their bondage at the hand of the Egyptians. Knowing the tendencies of the human heart the Lord institutes the Passover meal and commands the people through Moses, “remember this day in which you went out from Egypt, from the house of slavery; for by a powerful hand the Lord brought you out from this place (Exodus 13:3). But the people did not remember and entered an oft-repeated cycle of wandering, rebelling, falling into bondage, repenting and being restored. Only to do it again and again.

As Jesus followers living in the new covenant, it is easy to read the historical accounts regarding Israel and wonder at the hardness of their hearts. But are we really so different? We chase after other gods, indulge the old nature and self-determine the course of our life and then are surprised when we find ourselves in bondage to sin and the devil. Out of His great love for us, God is quick to restore when we come to our senses and repent. But there is a better way. If we live with an abiding appreciation for all that God has done in our lives we will not be so prone to wander. Remembering the gift of our salvation, the fact that we have been forgiven of all our sins, past, present and future because Jesus gave His life as payment should be enough. But there also is God’s protection, His faithful provision of all we need, His guidance, His peace, His presence wherever we go and so on. We are hard-wired to experience what we entertain in our minds. Stew over your problems, your dissatisfaction, your hurt and disappointment and you end up with anger, worry and anxiety. In short, you will have a miserable life. Meditate on the goodness of God and all His works in your life and you will have peace, contentment and a positive vision for the future. The choice is ours!

In Joshua chapter 4, the Lord instructed Israel to take up stones out of the Jordan river to memorialize their crossing into the Promised Land. They were to be a visual reminder for future generations of all that God had done in allowing them to “cross the Jordan on dry ground,” “that all the peoples of the earth may know the hand of the Lord is mighty, so that you may fear the Lord your God forever” (Joshua 4:24). We would do well to find contemporary ways to memorialize Gods’ works in our own life. Journals, pictures, paintings, sculptures, poems, songs, celebration events, or any other way to keep them before us will go a long way to keep our hearts focused on Jesus and our attitudes right. Let your imagination go and find a way that works for you. God has called us to remember not because He needs our gratitude but because our remembering serves to keep our hearts rightly aligned with His. What will you remember today?