Sermon for the Sunday After Ascension – May 4, 2008
“… the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service. And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. But these things have I told you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I told you of them. ”
TIE a string around your finger. Write an important date on your wall calendar. Put a sticky note up on the refrigerator door. Put your most colorful paperweight on a table where you'll see it so you can remember. Remember. Remember… what?
My father's career as an actor on General Hospital entailed a lot of memorization, learning his lines for the following day's shooting at night. After dinner many evenings we'd just say goodbye to him as he went to a bedroom to record his cues on tape and then recite his lines in the gaps. He was good at doing this: better than many of the younger actors who never learned how to memorize. For them, the teleprompter was essential: a machine that scrolled the actors' script in view of a struggling character trying in vain to remember what to say. On the set it was funny to look around at what was supposed to be a clean hospital, where penciled lines were scrawled all over desktops and sleeves. “I just don't know, John. I don't think we can go on like this…”
How does memory work? It's a riddle that scientists are having a rough time finding out. We have assumed that all memory resides in the brain, but now with organ transplants some people are beginning to remember things that happened to the donors. And not brain transplants, either. I don't think you can get such a shadow memory from a blood transfusion, but I'm not going to try it.
How do we get a memory and how do we go to retrieve it? Short and long term memory seem to work differently, and in old age some people struggle to remember what just happened, while the past is alive to them, the memories of 60 or 70 years ago alive like they just took place. How does that work? And when something important happens in our lives, how do we keep it in front of us so we do not forget?
God told the Israelites to write down His laws on doors and walls, to bind them on their bodies and recite them to each other and to themselves so that they should remember. Today we recite elements of our faith—Bible verses, the Nicene Creed—to implant them in our minds and not lose them in the course of our lives. That's how liturgy works. The words of the Book of Common Prayer bury themselves deep in memory, so that people who have been a long time away from the 1928 can still call it up. It's right there, just waiting for us to begin it. “ Almighty God, unto Whom all hearts are open…”
God has a memory too. His memory is, of course, perfect and He even knows all things before they happen. When He tells us that He will not remember something terrible that we've done, what He means is that He sets it aside, not to be brought up again to assign guilt to us. When He says that He will remember, it's not that He forgot something and was surprised when it came back to Him. He's not like us in those ways. When God remembers , He puts something in the foreground , lets something take precedence that was waiting for a time to be ready. And sometimes it's about getting us to remember…
It had rained 40 days and nights and drowned all things on the earth, so that Noah and his animal crew on the ark were the only ones alive. When they finally found dry land, God showed Noah a new thing as the sun broke through the eternal clouds: a rainbow. God spoke: “I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.” Gen 9:13-15 In other places, it appears that God remembers the Israelites in Egypt and His covenant with Abraham, remembers Rachel and her desire for a son, and finally remembered the evils of Babylon. But God doesn't forget —He just puts things on hold, then calls them up again at the right time.
But we forget, don't we ? If my father couldn't forget the lines he had remembered for previous shows, his head would have been too full of words to remember what today's show was about. Memory needs to be orderly. Memories that haunt us, that remind us of bad experiences, if they are too present, get us frozen in fear or associate evil with everything in our lives. It's good to forget some things. But it's always good to remember God and what He's done for us, and what He's promised, and Who He is, and where we're going. When we forget God, we get into trouble.
The 4 th Commandment was a memory thing, wasn't it? “ Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” Ex 20:8 Moses admonished a young generation, “ Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: ask thy father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee. When the most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.” Deut 32:7-8 The Psalmists sang, “Remember his marvellous works that he hath done; his wonders, and the judgments of his mouth.” Psalm 105:5-6 “If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy.” Psalm 137:6 “All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.” Psalms 22:27 “ But I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High. I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old. I will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings.” Psalms 77:9-12
Jesus got frustrated with the short memory of His disciples. These men had seen the most wonderful things any man has ever seen. Almost too wonderful, because the lessons they were to draw from what they saw often got lost in the miracles themselves. They were boating on Galilee and He warned them of the leaven of the Pharisees, but they only remembered that they were hungry, and without bread. Jesus cried out, “Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? … When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve. And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they said, Seven. And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand?” Mark 8:15-21 It was numbers and signs to them, but they had forgotten the importance of the sign: just Who Jesus is.
The penitent thief on the cross remembered, and he earnestly asked Jesus, crucified beside him, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:42-43
Perhaps the most horrible thought of all is that God might forget us. Evil people might like that, but they really don't know what they're thinking. Satan would like to be overlooked at the end of all things, but he's kidding himself. People kid themselves when they think God might just forget about them, and they can just die, or go on living as they have. Nnnnno . God forgets nothing. He will remember your evil deeds and you're going to need a Savior at that hour—it's too late to figure that out then.
At His last supper, Jesus surrounded by His favorite people, told them why He had to depart. It was the whole plan of God. He came, was made a man, died for their salvation, and would need to go back to His Father in heaven. But they would not be alone. While He was with them in body, He would only be in one place at a time, in one city, in the presence of a few people, to be the source of all truth for us. We'd have to travel to see and know God. Imagine Jesus visiting America today, being on CNN, thronged by crowds of thousands, unable to be heard above the din. But He was to go away for the very purpose of being closer to us still. “I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.” John 14:16-18 “ When the Comforter is come, even the Spirit of truth, he shall testify of me: And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning. These things have I told you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I told you of them.”
Remember . It's the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus departed, went up into heaven, and sent His Holy Spirit in a new and wonderful way. The Spirit had always been here, and had spoken to the Apostles already, been breathed out over them by Jesus, and had given the prophets their messages. But now the Holy Spirit was to live inside every Christian , the Spirit of God inside our hearts and minds, our souls and spirits, to inform us from inside us what God wants, and to remind us of what we have heard. Remember . The Spirit has been sent to exalt us to the same place our Saviour has gone before us. He is given to sanctify us, purify our thoughts and deeds, bring to memory things we once knew, and make sense of things we never understood before.
Remember . We go to the Altar and break the bread, mingle wine with water, and reenact the last supper once more by word and deed. Then we bow the knee and receive Him in His Body and Blood while worshiping. “Do this in remembrance of Me.” It doesn't mean just thinking about Jesus long ago and far away. Like the Spirit residing in our souls, remembering Jesus in the Eucharist calls Him back, finds Him still seated at the head of the table, handing out the loaves and chalice with His own hands. Remember .
“Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.” The old spiritual song went, “Do Lord, O do Lord, O do remember me, way beyond the blue,” remembering the good thief's last request. It's a good thing, and could be a bad thing too, that God remembers. But if we will only remember Him, it's all good. Remember .
PFH+