I can honestly say I’m happy to be at the end of my posts about man’s forgetfulness, but it just shows how important my word of the year is: REMEMBER. Still, we must finish our glimpse into Scripture to see why remember is used so often in God’s Word. We forget. We have a history of forgetting. We forget God, what he’s done for us in the past, and even the fact that he remembers us. In my goal to remember God, his Word, and his works, I must acknowledge I’ve been forgetful. Today’s passages are evenly distributed between the Old and New Testaments, and I pray they will motivate you to be faithful in remembering and memorizing God’s Word.
Israel is our model in forgetfulness.
We can learn so much from the people of Israel in Scripture, and this lesson in forgetfulness is just one of many. The seventeenth chapter of 2 Kings has a section entitled “Why Israel Fell.” It’s a great summary of why God’s chosen people faced trials and invasions, a broken kingdom, and ultimately exile. As their nation would be invaded by foreign peoples, God still tried to stress the importance of remembering.
You are to be careful always to observe the statutes, the ordinances, the law, and the commandments he wrote for you; do not fear other gods. Do not forget the covenant that I have made with you. Do not fear other gods, but fear the Lord your God, and he will rescue you from all your enemies.” However, these nations would not listen but continued observing their former practices. They feared the Lord but also served their idols. Still today, their children and grandchildren continue doing as their ancestors did. (2 Kings 17:37-41 CSB, emphasis added)
Though he specifically warned them not to forget the words of his covenant, they would. They tried living on the fence, fearing God while also serving idols. We know that doesn’t work. It didn’t work then, nor will it today. They forget the first, most important commandment: “Do not have other gods besides me” (Exodus 20:3).
As a result of their forgetfulness, they would pay a great cost in exile.
Forgetting leads to waywardness.
Just as Israel’s forgetting of God’s covenant led to idol worship and wayward living, the writer of Proverbs paints a picture of that waywardness. Invoking the image of a forbidden woman, Solomon describes what has led her to such a life of debauchery and deceit.
It will rescue you from a forbidden woman, from a wayward woman with her flattering talk, who abandons the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God; for her house sinks down to death and her ways to the land of the departed spirits. (Proverbs 2:16-18, emphasis added)
She could have been a woman of standing among her people, but because she has forgotten the covenant of God, she’s fallen off the path of righteousness, abandoning her husband and choosing to seduce others with her flattering talk. All she does will lead to death and destruction. There is no blessing for the one who forgets God’s Word.
I’ve strayed on the path before, forgetting God’s Word and allowing my selfish desires grab hold. I’ve watched others as well, and it’s not a pretty picture. Nothing good comes from the wayward life. We must remember God’s Word to stay on the path to blessing and hope.
Just as the wayward woman served as an example in Proverbs, God asked a prophet to marry such a woman. Gomer would be the real, fleshly example of his own people, Israel. Her waywardness would be lived out in this real-time drama, and Hosea would play the part of the God who seeks and longs for his people to return. What was the reason for Israel’s horrible ways? They forgot the law of their God.
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will reject you from serving as my priest. Since you have forgotten the law of your God, I will also forget your sons. (Hosea 4:6, emphasis added)
When we forget God’s law, neglect to live in accordance to his rule, we face destruction. A life lived in ignorance to God’s Word is a sad life, a doomed life.
We forget the meaning of the word pictures God uses to teach us.
I have been leaning into the concept of how God uses drama or word pictures to teach us. The Passover feast and our Lord’s Supper are both visuals of God’s teaching in action. After feeding the crowd, Jesus used a word picture to help the disciples understand the importance of being discerning in what they hear and are taught by the religious leaders. But they missed the point.
The disciples reached the other shore, and they had forgotten to take bread. Then Jesus told them, “Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”
They were discussing among themselves, “We didn’t bring any bread.”
Aware of this, Jesus said, “You of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves that you do not have bread? Don’t you understand yet? Don’t you remember the five loaves for the five thousand and how many baskets you collected? Or the seven loaves for the four thousand and how many large baskets you collected? Why is it you don’t understand that when I told you, ‘Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees,’ it wasn’t about bread?” Then they understood that he had not told them to beware of the leaven in bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees. (Matthew 16:5-12, emphasis added)
So often, God gives us lessons through what’s right in front of us, but we miss the point. The disciples should have remembered that leaven is a sign for sin. Afterall, at Passover, they must sweep the house for all signs of leaven. But they couldn’t make the connection when Jesus spoke of the leaven of the religious leaders. Oh, how quickly we forget.
We forget that God treats us as his children.
Our forgetfulness has consequences. It did for Israel, it did for first-century Christians, and it does for us today. When we neglect God’s Word and forget his teachings, God disciplines us as his children, wanting us to be restored to right relationship with him. Look at what the writer of Hebrews said.
For consider him who endured such hostility from sinners against himself, so that you won’t grow weary and give up. In struggling against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons:
My son, do not take the Lord’s discipline lightly or lose heart when you are reproved by him, for the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he receives.
Endure suffering as discipline: God is dealing with you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline? (Hebrews 12:3-7)
We are encouraged to remember this wisdom, again from Proverbs, that the Lord disciplines those he loves. We will fail to remember—it’s a given in our fallible, human nature, but God will lovingly discipline us with the rod of the Good Shepherd and help us return to the path of righteousness for his Name sake.
Grace and Peace
If you missed the last Friday Focus post, click HERE, or start from the Beginning.