Yesterday’s Sunday School lesson posed the question “What difference does remembering make in our relationship with God?”
I recalled a minister in my home church years ago speaking of “the remembered goodness of God.” I remembered an old Dotty Rambo song “Remind Me, Dear Lord”: “Roll back the curtain of memory now and then; show me where you brought me from, and where I might have been. Remember I’m human, and humans forget, so remind me, remind me dear Lord.”
I revisited Ellie Holcomb’s delightful children’s book, Don’t Forget to Remember, celebrating creation’s reminders of God’s love, which surrounds us from sunrise to sunset, even on our most forgetful of days.
“Don’t forget to remember you’re never alone
No matter if you are up high or down low
And as sure as the sun will keep rising above,
Don’t forget to remember that you’re dearly loved.”
Remembering the past accurately can help to keep things in perspective. In the wilderness, God had met the people’s basic needs for food and clothing consistently. In the new land, they could trust that God would provide the abundance out of that same grace. They would receive everything they needed for a rich and happy life. Even more, these things would be unearned and undeserved, offered only out of God’s love and care. God, who brought the people out of Egypt, would lead them into a life where they could eat their fill, literally and figuratively. … But Moses foresaw that the people would soon think in terms of “my house” and “my vineyard,” without remembering the One who gave those gifts in the first place. They would come to believe that they had achieved these gifts on their own, and to think of themselves as special because of what they had done.
Avoiding such a dangerous perspective shift is difficult. When we need a “refresher course” to help regain a right perspective, we can follow a few basic steps. By looking back to what God has done, we can remind ourselves of who God is and who we are. Once we claim this, we can receive God’s blessing with humble thankfulness and joy. ( from The Present Word Bible Lesson, Fall 2022)
Let’s not forget to remember the goodness of God- where God has brought us from, and where we might have been!
Elizabeth
Updated: Oct 12, 2022
Yesterday we celebrated the 205th anniversary of the Jackson Springs Presbyterian Church. We gave thanks for the day, for each other, for the joy of gathering together on this holy ground dear to our hearts, and for the memories of people and times past that fill our hearts with love, longing and with gratitude. We remembered with gratitude our history and our hope for our future in this special place.
The words of our Bicentennial Hymn spoke to our hearts as we sang together:
“From highland peaks to Jackson Springs, where healing waters flow; the Scots of old, they made their way, God’s kingdom seeds to sow.
The Word is preached, the table spread; our hearts are open wide; to love our neighbor as ourselves, and serve Christ crucified.
The stained glass windows, all around, the old, old story tell; and chiming hymns throughout the day, remind us all is well.
Through sun and shadow, joy and pain, our losses and our gains; By grace, we make our homeward way, through valleys, hills and plains.
From day to day and year to year, two hundred, come and gone; the faith of generations past, that faith will lead us home.”
For a second time, we heard words from a sermon by a beloved son of this church, the Rev. Leland Richardson, written shortly after 9/11, and delivered at Bensalem Presbyterian at the 50th reunion of the West End High Class of l952. “What can we do when trade towers fall?” was the title of his sermon.
“What can we do? To whom can we turn when Trade Towers tumble and our worlds come crashing in upon us? Who can give hope and comfort when doors close and voices fall painfully silent … Hold on look up! Remember God created you, loves you, and redeems you in Jesus Christ. God is not a fleeting shadow, here today and gone tomorrow. Look up with the eyes of faith and behold Jesus who is the same yesterday, today and forever.”
We were challenged to encourage each other with these words, and we so encouraged one another. We prayed, and heard once again Rev. Richardson’s words,
“We give thanks for this church that has preached and taught the good news through the years. With grateful l hearts, we hear again the voices of those saints who taught us – that you are a God of love, grace and mercy, who came to redeem, not to condemn; to heal, not to hurt; to love, not to despise; to forgive, not to judge.”
As we look to the future, in all the changing seasons of life, from year to year- in the best of times and in the worst of times, may God’s Word would be preached and taught and lived in this special place. May God continue to complete the good work begun over 200 years ago, so that those who come after us “find us faithful.”
Elizabeth
Yesterday was World Communion Day, and Christians around the world gathered to break bread and share the cup in celebration of our oneness in Jesus Christ.
The observance began in a small Presbyterian church in Pennsylvania in 1933. It was the worst year of the great depression; storms swept across the mid-west dustbowl; Hitler was rising to power; Japan and Germany withdrew from the League of Nations; all provoking fear and anxiety.
Wanting to do something real and symbolic to witness to God’s faithfulness in such a time, World Communion Day was planned, and has been celebrated the first Sunday in October ever since.
In many ways, we find ourselves facing such days once again. While the circumstances are not exactly the same, and the players in the drama are different, the events of the days in which we are living all provoke fear and uncertainty. There are times when we feel lost in the midst of life, separated from the “best of times” and left to wander in what feels like the “worst of times.”
In the breaking of bread and sharing of the cup on World Communion Day, we recalled how God loved us so much that he came among us and became one with us, suffered and died for us, so that sin and death no longer have the final word. As he shared in our death, so we will share in his resurrection. God has made us his family, a family that stretches around the world; a family that is called to love as we have been loved; to forgive as we have been forgiven; to give to others what has been given to us.
As we shared our family meal, we gave thanks to God that we are not alone - that we have both each other and the Spirit of Christ among us, and the faithful love of God with us, a love that will never let us go.
Jan Richardson’s Blessing for World Communion Day says it all:
And the table will be wide
And the welcome will be wide
And the arms will open wide to gather us in.
And our hearts will open wide to receive.
And we will come as children who trust there is enough.
And we will taste and know delight.
And we will become bread
For a hungering world.
And we will become drink
for those who thirst.
And the blessed Will become the blessing.
And everywhere
Will be the feast.
Giving thanks for the beautify of World Communion Day, and for those streams of mercy, carrying us through this life to the life that is to come.
Elizabeth