Remember, Remember….

Did you know that the word “remember” is the opposite of “dismember”? To “dis-member something is to tear it apart… and to “re – member” is to put it back together again.

The people of God, through the ages, have constantly re-membered their journey as a people in order to make sense of the past and to plan for, and make decisions about, the future. They passed on the stories by word of mouth… and later in scripture… so that they and their children’s, children’s children, would remember all that God had done for them.

They did not pass on the stories so much for history, as to record the actions of God who is intimately involved in their lives.

Christians do the same today. Year by year we journey through scripture, re-membering the coming of Christ as savior of all, as foretold long before his birth. We journey with Christ from Bethlehem to Jerusalem re-membering the steps along his journey… and gaining new insights with each retelling, in order to hold onto the reality of the power of God in the lives of everyday humans.

So too, in effect, when we re-member the events of our lives, we are putting them back together again, and, in doing so – with the wisdom and maturity of hindsight – we make sense of the past and learn for the future. As Christians, this remembering is not about holding on to the past… but about looking back in order to see the parts of our lives where the power of God is most evident… a little like that well known story of the footsteps in the sand!

We don’t stop talking about the people we love simply because they have died… we continue to be warmed and reassured of their love and impact on our lives by sharing memories. As children of God, we need to keep re-membering the love, the power, the impact of God on our lives so as to warm us and reassure us in times of difficulty, dryness and sorrow.

Love and Blessings

Rev Shan