Memorial Day

The Scriptural Art of Remembering

There is a counter between my kitchen and living room that collects all my forgetfulness. That coupon I wanted to use for cheese, the DVD that needed to be returned, the letter that needed mailed, they all end up there. It isn’t until I’ve driven all the way into town and go to reach for the coupon or DVD that I remember that I left them on the counter. Researchers in the science of memory, such as Elizabeth Loftus, have shown us how malleable and unreliable memory can be. Each time we seek to recall some event from the past, it’s like putting together the pieces of a puzzle or bits of data scattered over a hard drive. (In fact, many researchers now liken our dream states to the defragmenting of a hard drive, as our brain gathers the bits of loose data and reconfigures them as we sleep.) Over time, and with age, more and more of the pieces go missing, or our brain substitutes pieces from other puzzles to try to make the picture complete. As the Chinese proverb notes, the palest ink is better than the best memory. Surely this inaccurate process of mental recall is not what the scripture writers had in mind when they spoke of God remembering or the call for us to remember.

So much of our faith is rooted in this one word: remember. God calls on his people, again and again, to remember something as part of their journey of faith. “Remember the Sabbath day to set it apart as holy,” “Remember the whole way by which he has brought you these forty years through the desert,” and “Remember the ancient days; bear in mind the years of past generations.” Jesus repeatedly told his followers to “Remember what I told you.” And of course his command to “Do this in remembrance of me.” In scripture, remembering is not merely a mental action – the opposite of forgetting – it is an incarnational moment of making someone or something actively present accompanied by a call to action. When the children of Israel are called to "remember the Sabbath," they are not being told to mentally recall the Sabbath, as if they had forgotten such a thing existed. They are being called to actively keep the Sabbath holy and set apart. When we read of God remembering Noah, or Abraham, or the Israelites in Egypt, he is actively working on their behalf to fulfill a promise made. In fulfillment of his command, when we remember Jesus through the sacrament of communion, we are actively making him present with us through the tangible elements of bread and wine. Augustine’s “invisible grace” is made visible through our active participation of remembering. In this sense, though not entirely etymologically correct, the antonym for remember is not forget but dismember. “Re-membering” brings the “dis-membered” fragments of our memories into a remembered whole – alive and active again through our actions. One of the most important actions of sacramental remembering is prayer. Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, "I do not cease to give thanks for you when I remember you in my prayers." For me, the action of prayer is not based on a certain set of words, it can in fact be wordless. It is the act of remembering someone in the presence of God. I bring the dismembered parts of your broken life into his presence and just hold them there is his healing and restoring light. By remembering you to and with God, there is an active hope they he will act on your behalf and if possible use me to act on your behalf too. And in that place of prayer our lives will be defragmented and brought together in wholeness again. In this sort of remembering, I remember not only the past, but also the present and the future. Lewis Carroll said, “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backward.” I wish I could write more, but I have a DVD that has to go back to BlockBuster.

Prayer:

I will remember God while I groan;
I will think about him while my strength leaves me.
You held my eyelids open; I was troubled and could not speak.
I thought about the days of old, about ancient times.
I said, “During the night I will remember the song I once sang; I will think very carefully.”
I tried to make sense of what was happening.
I asked, “Will the Lord reject me forever? Will he never again show me his favor?
Has his loyal love disappeared forever? Has his promise failed forever?
Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has his anger stifled his compassion?”
Then I said, “I am sickened by the thought that the sovereign One might become inactive.
I will remember the works of the Lord. Yes, I will remember the amazing things you did long ago!
I will think about all you have done; I will reflect upon your deeds!”
O God, your deeds are extraordinary!
What god can compare to our great God?
You are the God who does amazing things; you have revealed your strength among the nations.
– Psalm 77:3-14

Be Blessed...
Dei Gratia,
Stephen