Avoid the Danger of Forgetting God

"You have forgotten God your Savior;
         you have not remembered the Rock, your Fortress."
                                             Isaiah 17:10

It seems this is a common refrain from God's prophets to Israel and Judah. "You have forgotten your God."

It was the cause of many of their issues. The forgot God and began to worship other gods. The result was judgement and destruction.

I think we have the same danger. We are in danger of forgetting God too.

We get caught up in life and we turn from God. Sometimes intentionally. But oftentimes, it's not intentional.

So, what is the solution?

How do we prevent ourselves from forgetting God?

God told Israel how to prevent this. He spelled out for them what it would take for them not to forget God.

Deuteronomy 4:9 says:

"Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen and let them fade from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them."

Did you catch what it says?

The way we prevent ourselves from forgetting God is to share the stories of what He has done. Tell others the stories of God and His work among us and in our lives.

When we share the stories we have a reason to remember. We keep God present in our minds. It prevents us from forgetting God.

We avoid the danger of forgetting God by sharing the testimonies of what He has done with others.

How to Stop the Constant Running

"Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went off to a solitary place, where He prayed." (Mark 1:35)

"When the apostles returned, they reported to Jesus what they had done. Then He took them with Him and they withdrew by themselves to a town called Bethsaida." (Luke 9:10)

These are just two of the many examples we can find of Jesus withdrawing from the busy-ness of ministry to rest and meet with God. It's a model of something very necessary for the life God has called us to live as His followers.

In our society, I believe this is even more important for us to learn. We prize being busy - even in the church. And we feel guilty for taking a break.

Yet, if we were to follow Jesus' example, as recorded in the gospels, we would regularly carve out time away from the busy-ness to be with God. We would make the time away a priority rather than an after-thought.

Because, the truth is that we can't live out what God has for us the best if we're constantly running from one thing to the next. We got too tired.

When we're constantly running, we also risk missing what God is leading us to next. We can get so focused on what we need to do next that we miss out on God trying to move us in a different direction. Or we just get so tired that even the thought of doing something new or different becomes too much for us.

What would it look like for us to regularly take time away for refreshing and the hear from God? What would change if we became intentional about not allowing busy-ness to take over our lives?

It seems I go in seasons with this. Sometimes I do this much better than others. It's easy for my calendar to just get filled up again - especially when it's with good things. But, even those good things may not be the best things.

So, how do we protect ourselves from falling into the trap of prizing our busy-ness? How do we make sure we're not so busy we don't have room for time to hear from God?

There's a few things I've learned that help me to do this better.

1) Be intentional and schedule it.

If I'm not paying attention it can be really easy to overload my calendar. All the empty places in my days get filled. But, if I regularly block off time in my calendar, I'm more likely to leave the space I need in my life. Often I sit down and block out the time on my calendar at the beginning of the month for the entire month - so it's just done and I don't have to try to remember all the time.

2) Lean to say no - even when it's something good.

This has probably been one of the most difficult things for me to learn and I don't do it well all the time. Lots of good opportunities to be involved in something come my way, but, realistically, I can't say yes to them all. Sometimes the way to manage our schedules and not become too busy is to say no to some of the good opportunities that come our way.

I've learned not to say a quick yes or be too hasty in my no. But, instead, to take each good opportunity to prayer and give myself time to look at the impact a yes would have on me, my family, my friends, my other commitments, and, most importantly, my relationship with God. Sometimes it won't fit, sometimes it will, and sometimes I realize it's time for something to change because this needs to fit and something else doesn't anymore.

3) Show grace to yourself.

In many ways, this is the most important one. We don't always do this well. We'll fill our calendars and get so busy we don't have time for what should be most important. When we realize that, it's not time to beat ourselves up. It's time to make the decisions we need to make to get our schedules beack under control and start again.

My Least Favourite Part of Church Services

I've often wondered if I'm the only one who feels this way, or if there's more who feel the same way sitting in church pews each week. I love church. I love my church.

But there's a moment in almost every church service that I don't really look forward to. Some weeks, I would say it's the moment I dread.

What is it?

That moment, usually after the first song, when someone tells you to greet the people around you before you sit down.

Writing it down, it doesn't sound like something that's a big deal. And compared to so many things in life, it probably isn't a big deal at all.

But, it's a moment when I'm often tempted to just slip out of the service just to avoid the awkwardness I feel doing that.

It's not that I don't want to talk to people, or I want to just ignore the people around me. But, I do find it awkward to just shake hand sand say hi to people I may or may not know. I would much rather take a few minutes for a conversation with someone, than say nothing more than hi to a dozen people in the next minute.

I've always been like this. When I arrive at a party and there's a crowd of people there already, I'm not going to be the one who says hi to everybody. I'll find a couple of people to start a conversation with. Over the course of an evening, I'll talk to more people, but large groups of people can be draining for me, so I'll look for the smaller groups within that through-out the time I'm there.

It may only be a minute or two in church, but that time can be draining for someone like me. With ever person I turn to, I'm draining to social energy I have to spend for the evening. And some weeks, I don't have very much to begin with, so it's really tempting to avoid this time of spending what I have to spend that night.

But, I also don't want to come across as rude to anyone around me, so I'll turn and shake hands with people around me. I'll do my best to engage in this part of the church service as well, but more weeks than not, it's a challenging time for me.

I've had this post sitting as a draft for a few months because I've been trying to figure out a way to wrap it up. A way to bring it to some kind of a conclusion. But, that is proving to be elusive. However much I want a tidy ending to this post, I'm beginning to think there isn't one for this post.

It's not something where I can say "this is what we should do about this." It's something where all I can say is we need grace for each other. I know some people who like this part of a church service. And I know I'm not the only one who could do without it.

So, what do we do?