Friday, 11 September 2009

• What Do You Remember?

  Today being September 11, many of us REMEMBER back those few years to the attacks in our country by the terrorist suicide-murderers where thousands of people died within a few hours.  Most of us REMEMBER not only the videos of the World Trade Center towers being hit by commercial planes, but we also REMEMBER where we were and what we were doing and with whom.  I was at work, trimming a new house.  We had a TV set on the job that day - very unusual that we would.  I stared in unbelief.  It was all over in a short time.  The towers collapsed and that was the end of many lives.  I REMEMBER, do you?

  Recently, I have been lamenting the short memory of people living today, both in their forgetting of the history of our country and the forgetting of their faith.  History is being rewritten today for the purpose of making us forget our heritage and the men and women who sacrificed their lives for the cause of freedom - the freedom that we take for granted now.  REMEMBER the struggles of the pilgrims as they suffered from cold and starvation and disease trying to adapt to the harsh environment of the new world so that they could worship God without the dictates of a government which was hostile to any believer who dared object to the "state religion."  REMEMBER the brave men who fashioned the Constitution of the United States and dared put their names on it. 

  According to the "historians" of today, these people were not heroes at all but exploiters and pillagers and the Puritans were religious fanatics who did terrible things in the name of God.  -  And, since we have a faulty memory, we aren't sure but what these charges might be true after all.  I'm not suggesting that our forefathers were superhuman or that they were not sinners just as we are.  But by villifying them, we are denying that the cause of freedom was just and right and that many of our founding fathers believed that God was the only Sovereign Lord.

  Because of our "short memory" we are forgetting who we are and where we stand with God also.  So-called theologians and scholars are calling into question all that we ever knew about God and the Scriptures.  Many denominations are veering off course because they also have forgotten their heritage.  The Bible is being relegated to the level of an untrustworthy collection of biases and half-truths so that the "higher critics" can pass judgment on the teachings of the scriptures.  Modern society, popular opinion, and the latest fads carry much more weight in the decision making of many modern churches.  They don't REMEMBER their foundations and the true Head of the Church, Jesus Christ. 

  REMEMBERing is important to God.  I can't tell you how many times God calls us to REMEMBER, but here are a few:

  "...“REMEMBER this day in which you came out from Egypt, out of the house of slavery, for by a strong hand the Lord brought you out from this place. "  Exodus 13:3

  " You shall REMEMBER that you were a slave  in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm'"  Deuteronomy 5:15

  "They REMEMBERed that God was their rock,
  the Most High God their redeemer.  Psalm 78:35 

  "REMEMBER that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.   Ephesians 2:12 

  Why should we forget?  What is wrong with us that we don't REMEMBER?   We were brought out of slavery, out of the world (Egypt) out of the muck and mire of our sin.  We were redeemed by the Most High God who is our ROCK.  Christ shed His blood to redeem us (without the shedding of blood there is NO remission of sin).  How could we fail to REMEMBER something so important as that?   Do you REMEMBER when you first saw your helplessness to save yourself and then saw Christ as your only hope of salvation?  Do you?  How is it then, that after a time we begin to lose our love for our Savior?  How do we begin to value the opinions of lost men and women over the True and Living Word?  How is it that we begin to nitpick the church and badmouth our brothers and sisters in the Lord?  How is it possible that we who once knew that we are without hope in this world apart from Christ now contend that our wisdom is superior to the wisdom of God?  Don't we REMEMBER that we are dust - that our life is just a vapor, here today and gone tomorrow?

  I hear God calling us all to repent of our foolish pride and our "selective" memory.  If we will REMEMBER where we came from, we will (at first) be like the children of Israel:

  "By the waters of Babylon,
  there we sat down and wept,
  when we REMEMBERed Zion."

  ...or like Peter:

  "And immediately the rooster crowed a second time. And Peter  REMEMBERed how Jesus had said to him, “Before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times.” And he broke down and wept."   Mark 14:72

  REMEMBER  the day you first trusted Christ as your savior and return to that place of fellowship you once had by renouncing your sinful ways and acknowledging your need for His grace.  God is calling all men everywhere to repent.  The revival of God's  people is coming - as sure as Christ's return is coming.

  (All emphases in the scripture quotations are mine.)

   

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