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Remember the Words of the Lord

            It was a Tuesday morning. As usual, I was on my computer when my phone rang. My son was calling from his college dorm. “Dad! You better turn on the TV!” September 11th, 2001. We won’t forget. The horrific images have been burned into our memory banks. Where were you when the Twin Towers burned and crashed? Ten years have gone by, but for many it seems like yesterday. We do remember.

            But what if more subtle attacks come our way? What if Satan were scheming in his situation room to launch an attack to get adults to model misplaced priorities so that their kids follow suit with apathy toward Jesus? What if Satan would use the allure of dollars to distract people from the riches of Christ’s mercy or use the drive to build self-worth to keep others from building their house on the rock of Jesus’ words or use the temptation of feeding sexual desires to get people to push away from the banquet of God’s love? Wouldn’t the result of those attacks be even more disastrous than 9/11?

            Today’s first lesson from Deuteronomy chapter 11 takes us back to the dramatic point in Israelite history when the ancient people of Israel were poised and ready to enter the Promised Land. How could they confront the perverted occupants of the land and toss them out, as God ordered them to do, especially when their path over the past 40 years was littered with rebellion against God? Time and again they acted as if they had forgotten “his majesty, his mighty hand, his outstretched arm; the signs he performed…what he did to the Egyptian army…how he overwhelmed them with the waters of the Red Sea.” So, Moses called out to them in his swan-song sermon: Remember the Words of the Lord.

Remember correctly

            Did you ever find yourself remembering bits of trivia while forgetting important information, like remembering the theme song for Gilligan’s Island or Cheers but forgetting an important bill that should have been paid or the password to your online account?

            Moses called on the Israelites to remember something more important than anything else: “Fix these words [of the LORD] in your hearts and minds.” They were to remember God’s promise to deliver them from bondage in Egypt and give them their own land. They were to remember the directives God had given them at Mt. Sinai. Most importantly, they were to remember the promise God had given to their ancestors that the Savior of the world was to come from their nation. All of these words from God, promises of his pardon and guidance for their gratitude, were repeated by Moses in his final sermon and came with the understanding, “Remember the words of God correctly,” because they would be bombarded by plenty of alternate messages both from the people around them and from the sneaky sinful nature still embedded inside them.

            We live in an information age, but there’s plenty of misinformation about what the Lord says. We get bombarded daily by messages in the media and with messages from people around us, at home, at work, and at school that distract our attention from God’s truth. How can we tell what’s right? Moses said, “Fix [these words of the LORD] in your hearts and minds, and you’ll know the difference. You’ll remember the words of the Lord correctly.”

Remember constantly

            Here’s a story I often tell the couples at our annual pre-marriage seminar. At their 50th wedding anniversary celebration, the wife leaned over to her husband and said, “You told me that you loved me on the day we were married but haven’t said that since.” The husband replied, “Nothing has changed since then. If it does, I’ll let you know.” That would be not only ridiculous but sad, wouldn’t you say? Or how about the pastor who told me that his board of elders tried umpteen times to call, e-mail, and text a young member who had not been in worship for two years? Finally and reluctantly, they sent a loving and caring letter. The young man’s parents blew a gasket: “How dare you send that letter to our boy? He went to the Lutheran school here, and our family has been members for four generations!” The elders responded, “What if your son was hospitalized because he went on a hunger strike, had lost half his weight, was skin and bones, and told you, ‘I’m trying to kill myself.’ Would you encourage him to eat? What about his soul? Do you think his soul needs spiritual food?”

            Moses told the Israelites that it would be just as ridiculous to listen to the words of the Lord once and never pay attention to them again. “Tie [these words] as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.”

            How can we get better at remembering the words of the Lord constantly? A classmate of mine had an uncle who lived in L.A. Like everyone else, he had a long commute each day. So, each day he wrote a Bible passage on a card and fastened it to his car’s visor. When the traffic stopped, he read and re-read the passage. When he got to work, and someone asked, “What’s new?” he told them the passage. Everyone knew he was no Bible-thumping fanatic, just a Christian gentleman to whom people could go for an honest answer about spiritual concerns. Have you set aside time to read the Sunday Scripture lessons and psalm during the week? Have you planned on expanding your Sunday schedule to include finding the lower level of the church for Bible study? Have you marked your calendar for a midweek class? How about this? Our adult education team is planning small group Bible studies to be rolled out next January on-site and off, Sundays and midweek. Are you sleepless with excitement? All of those are designed to help you remember God’s words constantly.

            When you watch TV with your kids, do you discuss the values or lack of values a program presents? When the news blares out the viciousness of the world and images of 9/11, do you remind them that heaven is our home thanks to Jesus? When ads entice them to buy gadgets, do you talk with them about the difference between what is wanted and what is needed? When they start pondering career choices, do you help them think through how they will serve the Lord in their vocation or suggest a life of full-time service to God? Moses said, “Teach [these words] to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get upso that your children may remember the words of the LORD constantly.”

Remember the consequences

            “I forgot” may get you off the hook when your mom asks why you didn’t take out the garbage. It may cost you a couple days of steam rising from your spouse’s head if you zoomed through your anniversary and forgot to get a card. But remembering the words of the Lord is essential because the consequences are eternal.

            Moses told the Israelites, “Be careful, or you will be enticed to turn away and worship other gods…Then the LORD’s anger will burn against you, and…you will soon perish.” If they would forget his words, they would lose the means by which God conveys the life he intended them to enjoy.

            A parent sends the kids off to school, “Remember to wear your hoodie at recess.” You’re walking out the door, and your spouse says, “Remember to pick up a gallon of milk on your way home.” It’s near the end of the work day, and your boss calls out, “Remember to put that report on my desk by noon tomorrow.” There are a lot of messages we try to remember each day. We probably forget more things than we remember. Fortunately much of the forgetting we do involves inconsequential things. But disaster can follow when a person forgets something important, like a pilot forgetting to lower the landing gear.

            The truths of God’s love in Jesus and his guidelines for our life tend to dribble out of our ears as though there was a hole in the bucket of our brain. We run out of time and patience because God doesn’t make things go our way, and we begin to wonder whether it’s worth the effort. Worse yet, we lose interest because the earphones of “Have fun!” and “Make money!” and “Please yourself!” muffle out both the thunder of God’s threats, “You’re damned if you disobey me,” and his gentle whisper, “Because Jesus lived for you and bled for you, I still love you.” When we turn a deaf ear to the words of God, both his threats and his promises, then we have been enticed to turn away and are worshiping other gods. And then the Lord has a perfect right to bring consequences, his burning anger.

            Praise God that his Spirit has called us to faith. For most of us that happened through water and the Word at baptism. Then he assures us that God does not forget his mercy or discard his love for us. He always remembers us, forgiving us, all for the sake of Jesus who died to remove our guilt forever. Then to add to our fun, God’s Spirit uses those same words to empower us to will and do what God wants every time we read, ponder, and remember his words.

            Does it bug you when you meet someone and five minutes later forget his or her name? We might forget names, but God hasn’t forgotten your name or mine. He wrote them in his book of life, inscribed with the indelible ink of Jesus’ blood. That’s enough to lead us to do as Moses urges, “Remember the words of the LORD correctly and constantly” so that we can enjoy the consequences—life with God here and hereafter. Amen.

Preached at Grace Lutheran Church, Milwaukee, WI (www.gracedowntown.org) on September 11, 2011.

Services

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Mondays 6:30 pm

Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church | 1209 North Broadway Milwaukee, WI 53202 | (414) 271-3006

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