Remember Responsibly

With a blog named “Lest I Forget,” it’s safe to assume I believe in the importance of remembering. Indeed, all throughout Scripture, remembering is celebrated and even commanded (Exodus 12:23-27, Deuteronomy 4:9, Joshua 4, Luke 22:14-20).

However, remembering can also stir up destructive patterns of thinking if we’re not careful. So, like any good thing, its use comes with responsibility.

As we look back on the past, it’s important to guard against two things:

• Limiting God based on what He has or hasn’t done (Isaiah 43:15-19)
• Limiting ourselves based on what we have or haven’t done (Philippians 3:13-14)

In Isaiah 43:15-17, God, speaking to His people exiled in Babylon, reminds them who He is and then recounts how He delivered their ancestors out of Egypt.

“I am the Lord, your Holy One, Israel’s Creator, your King. This is what the Lord says – he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters, who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and reinforcements together, and they lay there, never to rise again, extinguished, snuffed out lie a wick:”

Yet, he immediately follows with,

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:18-19)

Here we see God first remind His people of who He is. The Lord. Holy. Creator. King. Miracle worker. Deliverer. Victor. His attributes never change and are always worthy of remembering.

However, God does change how He chooses to display his character and authority. He is infinitely creative in His ways and His provision in one situation doesn’t guarantee the same provision in another. God did in fact deliver His people from Babylon, but he did so in a fresh, new way. Then, on the cross he led another great exodus as He released us from the bondage of sin and death. And one day, He will lead us out of this fallen world into the ultimate Promised Land.

God’s command to forget is meant to guard us from cultivating false expectations and assuming His power and capabilities are limited to only what He’s done in the past. He is in the habit of doing new things in His people and His creation. The same God who turned the sea into dry land can fill dry land with streams. He “is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20) so we must keep our faces forward and eyes open for God’s surprises. Additionally, we must not allow areas where He’s seemed silent in the past to numb us into thinking circumstances can never change.

The other potential pitfall of remembering is limiting ourselves based on our past. We all have a past, a patchwork of beginnings and endings, laughter and tears, successes and failures. If we constantly dwell on “the good old days,” we can end up stuck in the past and when we’re stuck in the past, we miss the new things God is doing in and around us today. Or, if the past hasn’t been kind and we define ourselves by our past failures and hardships, we can become broken and bitter. Now, I’m in no way suggesting we just brush off and deny the difficult experiences of our past. Sometimes it takes time, grieving, wise counsel, and lots of prayer but God can help us move on…stronger, whole, healed…able to embrace the purposes He has for us.

The fact remains, who we were in the past does not define us today nor does it limit God’s ability to use our lives now and in the future. Look at the life of the apostle Paul. He refused to fixate on his past self, from his highest achievements to greatest failures, and instead set his eyes on the future.

“Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward to what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:13-14)

 

With Jesus, the best really is yet to come so let’s remember responsibly and not allow the past to hold us back from pressing into what God has for us ahead.