Every time I read through the Old Testament, I’m surprised all over again by just how ridiculous the Israelites can be. It seems they can’t walk more than thirty feet in the desert without panicking, complaining, or outright turning away from God. Sometimes they even manage to do all three at once. Half the time I want to reach through the pages of my Bible and smack each and everyone of them upside the head and scream “Are you stupid? Don’t you see what God’s doing for you? Don’t you remember what he’s done?”
And then, inevitably, I remember that I’m no better and am in just as much need of a smack upside the head. The only difference between me and the Israelites is that I know their outcome. That’s it. That’s the only thing that separates me. If they had a copy of my story they would probably be thinking the same things of me that I think of them. “What’s wrong with this girl? Why does she keep forgetting what God can do? Can’t she see what he’s doing?”
The plain and simple fact is we humans have shockingly short memories. If we are really good at anything it’s forgetting that God will take care of us. Every instance of human shortcoming in the Bible starts with doubting that God is who he is and will do what he says. Every single one.
Doubt, fear, and forgetfulness are huge, constant struggles in our lives, and certainly aren’t ones we can afford to ignore. As Christians, we have a duty to fight against those things that would keep us distant from God. We have a duty to remember.
The word remember (or some variation of the word) appears hundreds of times across the Bible. God is constantly calling us to remember what he’s done and what he says he will do. It is our single greatest defense against the lies and forgetful misery of our world.
Think about every Bible story where people were freaking out and then think of those few who stayed calm and faithful. They were the ones trying to remind people that God was with them. They were the ones who could rattle off God’s promises without hesitation. They were the ones remembering.
When the Israelites panicked about the opposition facing them entering the promised land, Joshua and Caleb were the ones reminding the others that God said he would fight for them. While I imagine that they still might have felt afraid, it didn’t occur to them for a second to doubt what God would do because they’d immersed themselves so deeply in the knowledge of him. Their work to remember what God had done and what he’d promised to do for them.
Their remembrance built faithfulness.
In our own lives we might not be facing down giant warriors fighting us for our homeland, but there are very real struggles we face that prey on our own forgetfulness. It is our responsibility to entrench ourselves so deeply in what God is telling us that we can’t move a muscle without remembering that he is with us.
Practically, this looks like a lot of the things we already know to do but so readily neglect. It looks like simply reading our Bibles again and again until the words are stamped on our hearts and minds. It looks like talking to fellow believers in our lives and being honest with them about where we struggle, because they can often remind us of God’s promises when we’re losing sight of them ourselves. And it looks like a lot of prayer. Prayer for every little thing and thought. Making God a constant part of your day until you can’t imagine passing time without talking to him.
He is so ready for us to remember him and the goodness he has planned for us. We don’t need to be a people panicking in the desert, but a people who are unflinchingly confident that God will fight through for us. He has, He is, and He will. May we remember that.
Let’s find some joy,
A
Avalon Robinson Author 