"Over half a century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this is happening.' Since then I have spent well-nigh fifty years working on the history of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some sixty million people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat; 'Men have forgotten God; That's why all this happened.'"

History vividly records the destruction and devastation that forgetting God has done. Scripture reveals the plight of those who have forgotten God, as well as warns those who would. Peter calls those who "deliberately forget" God, scoffers, who follow their own evil desires. (2 Peter 3:4-5) But, the danger of forgetting God is not unique to those in the world. It is a very real danger for God's own people. Forgetting God is such a concern that Scripture reminds His people repeatedly not to forget Him. "Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God" or words very similar are spoke over and over (Deuteronomy 6:12; 8:11; 2 Kings 17:38 to name a few). The Psalmist vividly details what happens to those who forget God as a warning. In Psalm 50:22 he calls us to "consider" the plight of the forget-er.

Do not mistake what it means to forget God. There are subtle ways of forgetting God that creep into our lives if we are not careful. We forget God when we live as if He doesn't exist. We claim His Name and do our religious duties, but our daily lives are lived as if He isn't even there. We speak His Name but our worship is not exclusively His, other gods get our attention and worship as well. Gods such as materialism, humanism, work, family, education, self.... Such are our gods of baal that worm their way into our lives if we are not careful. To worship God along with others is to forget Him and not to worship Him at all.

In his book "The Screwtape Letters" C. S. Lewis has Screwtape advising Wormwood that it is all right that "his patient," the person whose spiritual demise Wormwood was responsible, was going to church. In fact he says he is "almost glad." Screwtape goes on to explain that it is good that the patient thinks he is a Christian when indeed he is far from God, for this demise is the most subtle of all. William Willimon, Professor of Preaching at Duke University, said that more often than not Christians are "practicing atheists." Saying there is a God and living like there is a God are two different things. God is more than an "higher power." He is more than "the Man upstairs." He is more than the one who is "watching us, from a distance."

Beloved let us heed the words of the hymn writer William P. Merrill; "Rise up, O men of God! Have done with lesser things. Give heart and soul and mind and strength To serve the King of Kings." Let us be sure that we truly love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength, living lives that reveal we do. This is the remedy for forgetting God. May it never be said about God's people; "They have forgotten God; That's why all this happened."

Keep Close To Jesus
Pastor Gerry