Title: Forgetting God
Contents
1. Words that begin
One of the most important things in life is to forget what should be forgotten and not forget what should not be forgotten. However, most people tend to remember things that should be forgotten well and forget things that should be remembered. It is good to forget painful wounds and sorrows, bitter failures and defeats, but not grace and love.
However, if you are indebted to us once or twice, we do not forget and thank you, but if we continue to be indebted to it, we take it for granted, and later we do not even remember, let alone thank us. They are even dissatisfied and resentful about the help. As a result, the will to love will be lowered to the person who helped, and you will lose the love of God yourself.
If you know this fact, you will realize the deep meaning of the words to remember God and His grace throughout the Bible.
2. Forgetting God
There is no limit to the grace and blessings of the God of love. God saved Israel from slavery in Egypt through Moses, who repented and cried out in prayer. To save Israel, he performed ten miraculous powers ten times against all the idols of Egypt and the whole of Egypt, but God's love did not end there. God is a being of eternal love, and Israel's life was not over.
Education and training were needed to form a religious nation that continued to serve God under God's grace and love, and military training was needed to conquer the land of Canaan that God had promised to give. We needed missionary training to proclaim God the Savior.
All of this cannot be accomplished without the love and help of Almighty God. That's why God said in verse 11, "Beware that you do not keep the commandments, decrees, and ordinances of the Lord, which I am giving you today, and forget the Lord your God.
Of course, this word of God is not an expression of the desire to be recognized by the people, nor is it a public act. Please believe that it is an expression of God's love for the people who have been saved and wants His children to live a life full of grace and blessings in spiritual, material, and physical aspects.
There are many obstacles that stand in the way of God's love, and the biggest one is forgetting God. The biggest obstacle to God's grace and blessing is that we are not human, we are not criminals, we are not disobedient, we are not bad circumstances, we are not the devil, we are forgetting the God of love.
Forgetting God does not simply mean the state of the head and heart about the existence of God. Forgetting God means a state of the whole person and the principle of the whole life. In other words, our whole life does not conform to the principles of God's rule. This can be seen from the fact that he did not simply tell us not to forget God, but added the words, “We did not keep God’s commandments, His decrees, and His ordinances.” Specifically, forgetting God means not keeping God's Word.
Everyone, I want you to live a life that does not forget God at all, instead of forgetting God and asking for help only in an emergency.
If you don't forget God even in the midst of a couple fight, you won't be able to pull out your husband's hair or bruise your wife's eyelids.
There are many church members who live according to their own will apart from God's will and word, unaware that they are forgetting God.
Second, to forget God means to be proud of all your achievements. It is not, but people who wish to be good-looking forget about the God who gives nature, gives life, makes possible, and also achieves, and is proud of all achievements as the result of their own abilities and efforts. Isn't pride what God hates? That is why God says, “When you eat and be satisfied, and when you are satisfied and when you build and live in beautiful houses, and when your flocks multiply and your flocks increase, and your silver and gold increase, and all that you possess, become abundant, lest your heart become arrogant and you will forget the Lord your God.” Do you have any more?
God of love is reminding Israel of past events through Moses so that Israel can continue to receive grace and blessings. “The LORD brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, and led you through that vast and dangerous wilderness, a dry land where there are fiery serpents and scorpions and where there is no water; He fed you in the wilderness, so that he might humble you and test you, to finally bless you.”
Moses, knowing that God resists the proud and grants favor to the humble, said, “I fear that you will say in your heart, ‘By my power and by the strength of my hand I have obtained this riches. You have given him the power to do this, so that the covenant that you swore to your ancestors might be fulfilled as it is today.”
It is to throw away the pride that we have achieved through our own abilities, and to remember God and the grace of God who gave us the ability to humble ourselves. Humility and gratitude become possible when we remember only God in relation to some outcome and not ourselves as much as possible.
I don't know who he was, but he said something funny. “President Roosevelt of the United States, we do not remember him as disabled. Inventor Edison, we don't remember him as a graduate of a public school. British Prime Minister Thatcher, we do not remember her as the second daughter of a thrift store. Ordinary person Roh Tae-woo and loyal boss Chun Doo-hwan, we no longer remember them as presidents.”
It would be nice to add the words, "We who believe, we no longer remember ourselves apart from God."
Third, forgetting God means serving other gods. In other words, those who are most proud are forced to worship their idols, and those who are less than that are bound to worship some form of idolatry. Humans who forget the Creator God inevitably have no choice but to worship idols, such as wealth, power, science, ideology, and pleasure.
3. Consequences of Forgetting God
Forgetting the God of love, who is the Creator, Providence, and source of all things, and worshiping idols does not stop at simply not receiving God's grace and blessings. You will surely perish. It is inevitable that they will perish just like the nations that God destroyed before Israel. Even though they could hear and believe God's word through various channels, they did not obey and committed all kinds of idolatry and sins, and they were destroyed. The sad and frustrating thing is that, despite the fact that each of these nations believed in many gods, they were terrified when they saw and heard that they were defeated and destroyed by Israel who believed in God, but they did not repent or believe in God.
Rahab lived as a prostitute, serving her people and many idol gods, but after hearing rumors about God and Israel, she repented and believed in God, and she and her family were saved. Rahab confessed: “As soon as we heard it, our hearts melted, and people lost their minds because of you; for the LORD your God is God above and below” (Joshua 2:11).
The name of the unbeliever or the chosen people Israel, or the name of the new chosen people, church members, has no meaning in terms of salvation and destruction. What is decisive is faith in God. If you believe, you will be saved; if you do not believe, you will be destroyed.
4. Conclusion
The entire universe and everything we own, including our life, is a gift of love from God the Creator. Moreover, we, who were led down the path of destruction as slaves to sin, the trap of the devil, have received forgiveness of sins and eternal life. I sincerely hope that you will never forget the God of love and give thanks, and humbly listen to and obey God's Word, enjoying God's undying grace and blessings forever.
(Poongseong Methodist Church. Book: Complete Commentary on 27 New Testament Books/ Interpretation of Difficult Scriptures I, II/ Salvation Before Jesus Came/Paul’s Understanding of Man/ Prosperity Prayer/ Seasonal Sermonbooks/ Sermonbook 18. -3051)