Note: I do apologize, reader friends, for the lack of a post last week and the lateness of this post today. I seem to have been a bit off-kilter of late, plus I’ve been sick, but I expect to be back on my normal Wednesday posting schedule next week. Also watch for a special Writing Process Blog Tour post on Monday! And as always, thanks for reading and sharing—you are a blessing. 🙂
A barren, elderly couple are given a child. A churning sea is parted for a bunch of escaped slaves. A prostitute in a godless city—and her family—are spared because she has the audacity to believe there’s something to these ragtag Israelites and their God—and to act on it. A shepherd boy defeats a champion warrior with a sling and a stone in the name of the Lord his God.
These scenes stand more vivid in my mind of late, since I’ve been streaming The Bible series on Netflix. While the inaccuracies bother me at times (and I’d add a definite caution for the violence), still it touches something deep in my soul to actually see these stories I’ve heard and read all my life. To be reminded that they really happened, to real people, through the power and mercy of our real God.
It helps me remember.
Sometimes it’s hard to remember, when we can’t see the way forward. We so easily forget what God has done in the past when the present seems all that we can see. It’s then I think it helps to intentionally remember.
David did. When he wrote:
…my spirit is overwhelmed within me;
My heart is appalled within me.
He transitioned to:
I remember the days of old;
I meditate on all Your doings;
I muse on the work of Your hands.~Psalm 143:4-5
He must have remembered some of those same scenes, those same stories—God calling Abraham, keeping His promise to bless him with a son, testing him and showing His faithfulness yet again on Mount Moriah. Saving the Israelites from famine through Joseph, then delivering them from slavery in Egypt. Leading them through the Red Sea and into the Promised Land. Choosing him, David, a shepherd boy runt, to lead God’s people as king. A story pockmarked with human sinfulness and failure, yet woven together and pressed forward by the powerful thrust of God’s sovereignty and grace.
And that story continues today.
It must have helped David to remember, when hiding out in the wilderness, relentlessly pursued by Saul, or having his kingdom and even life threatened by his own son Absalom.
It helps me to remember, too, even through blog posts I’ve done in the past recounting His faithfulness. Because otherwise, I so easily forget.
What helps you to remember? Please comment and share!