Do You Remember?
Do you have a good memory? I have a good memory for facts, but once in a while I find out that the facts I remembered were wrong. I have a good memory for faces, but not always names. Normally, I have a good memory for appointments and meetings, and when I forget an appointment, as I did about a week ago, I know it’s time to re-examine my priorities and my commitments.
Lots of people have bad memories. For instance, a man with a bad short-term memory went to the doctor because he had two very red ears. The doctor asked him what happened. The man said, “Well, I was ironing a shirt, and the phone rang. Instead of picking up the phone, I accidentally picked up the iron and stuck it to my ear!”
“Oh, my!” said the doctor in disbelief. “But what happened to your other ear?”
“The phone rang again.”
Just to be fair to the men, I need to tell you about a couple of elderly women who were out driving, and both could barely see over the dashboard. As they were cruising along, they came to an intersection. The stoplight was red, but they just went on through. The woman in the passenger seat thought to herself, “I must be losing it, but I could have sworn we just went through a red light.” After a few more minutes they came to another intersection, and the light was red again, and again they sailed right through. This time the passenger was almost sure that the light was red but was really very concerned that she was losing her mind. She was also getting nervous and decided to pay better attention. At the next intersection, sure enough, the light was definitely red, and they did go right through it once again. So, she turned to the other woman and said, “Mildred! Did you know we just ran through three red lights in a row?!? You could have killed us.”
Mildred turned to her and said, “Oh, am I driving?” (parables, 19.8.1)
Forgetting can be hazardous to your health, can’t it?
There are lots of reasons why people forget. They get so focused on one thing, that everything else gets lost in the details, like the man with the red ears. Or, like Mildred, maybe we’re just having a “senior moment”. Perhaps a disease process is taking hold, such as Alzheimer’s. People who are addicts are notorious for having bad memories. So are codependents. It’s a part of the denial system. It’s also true that people sometimes “forget” a painful or abusive experience. For them, the forgetting is a coping mechanism that buffers pain.
Gary Demarest says that “memory is the lens through which we view our world. We relate to the present through our memories of the past. Our present attitudes are shaped by how we remember past events.” It’s easy to see the truth of this. A harsh word, a tragic event, can influence our attitude for a long time. So can a kind word or an act of love. We relate to the present through our memories of the past. I wish I had a nickel for every conversation that Ed and I have that includes this statement: “That’s not the way I remember it.”
How we remember influences not only how we feel about life, but also what we do. In the Bible, the word “remember” refers to more than just a mental exercise, such as “Do you remember who wrote the Declaration of Independence?” The kind of remembering the Bible talks about is more like “Did you remember to take out the garbage?” It’s remembering that relates to what we are doing.
Faith is an act of memory. In the very early days of the Christian church, when people lost their faith or left the church, they were described as having amnesia. They didn’t remember anymore.
Remember Jesus Christ, Paul wrote to his young friend Timothy. Do this in remembrance of me, Jesus said to his disciples.
What does it mean to remember Jesus Christ?
If Demarest is right, that memory is the lens through which we view our world, then what we remember about Jesus will be the lens through which we view the Christian life. And if it’s true that memory is about what we do, not just how we think, then what we remember about Jesus will greatly influence what we do as well.
Remember Jesus Christ, Paul said, raised from the dead, a descendant of David. To remember Jesus is to remember who he is, and what he has done. That’s what this meal called the Lord’s Supper helps us to do.
But remembering Jesus is not just about remembering facts. It’s about remembering who we are in relation to him. That means that we need to remember our commitments to him, and our decision to follow him.
If we remember Jesus Christ, we will remember our promises to him, and if we remember our promises to him, then we will live out those promises. Paul reminds us of what those basic promises are.
What you have heard from me, through many witnesses entrust to faithful people who will be able to teach others as well. Followers of Christ are called to a ministry of multiplication. I’m not talking math, here, but sharing what we’ve been given. Someone has shared with you what the gospel means. And you have received what was given. Now, you’ve entered into the ministry. It’s your job to pass it along.
It’s been said that Christianity is always just one generation away from extinction. People don’t just automatically know that God loves them and that Christ died for them. They don’t just automatically know that they can take advantage of all of Christ’s blessings by simply saying, “yes, I accept.” People don’t just automatically know what it means to be a Christian. Somebody has to tell them. And if you’re a Christian believer, then that somebody may just be you. Each of us, in our own way, has the responsibility of sharing the story, sharing the love, the healing, the forgiveness, the reconciliation that we have received.
We need to remember that we are ministers, not just consumers.
The second thing that Paul wants us to remember is that, like life, ministry is difficult. Share in suffering, Paul says, like a good soldier.
Sometimes the gospel comes to us in such a sugar coated container, that we can get the idea that following Christ will make life easy. Following Christ makes life possible; following Christ makes life joyful, abundant, meaningful, whole, effective, fruitful, etc. But following Christ does not make it easy.
In this church we work hard at communicating the gospel message in a way that is relevant to people in our culture. To work at language that is understandable and to use methods and styles that people can relate to. But what we need to remember is that once we become followers of Jesus, our task is not to make Jesus relevant to our life. Our task is to make our life relevant to the gospel. And that’s not easy. We have to readjust our priorities. We have to be disciplined and we have to persevere.
The illustrations of the soldier, the athlete, and the farmer give us examples of these three qualities. A soldier cannot get entangled in everyday affairs. The soldier has to obey his/her superiors. A follower of Christ has to make some tough lifestyle decisions. And must remember that Jesus is the superior officer. Jesus is the primary one that we need to please.
An athlete competes according to the rules. An athlete exercises discipline. As I’ve been watching the Olympic trials, and the extreme dedication that these athletes have to their sport and to their one opportunity to try for the gold, I have thought, Christians have a lot to learn about discipline. Think about it. If you treated your Christian life and your ministry like an Olympic athlete treats his or her sport, if you really thought it was that important to live your Christian life and do your ministry, what would you do differently? How would your life change?
The farmer who does the work is the one who gets the first share of the crops. I grew up with farming, as you know. The one thing about farming, is that you learn quickly that there’s no such thing as instant potatoes. Growing a crop takes time. And it takes persistence, perseverance. You can’t just give up at the first sign of trouble. The follower of Christ needs to remember that in ministry, as in life, there are no quick fixes.