Do You Remember?

After placing my order for lunch, I sat back in the chair. The air was stuffy, hazy and warm. Not the ideal setting for a great meal, just a utilitarian lunch.

The food took longer than the expected amount of time to arrive. In the meanwhile, a stallholder walked passed my table and parroted our orders, albeit erroneously.

“Chao Fan hor”, he said in a hurry. (that would be Fried Rice in Chinese)

There I was wondering to myself, “How could Hor Fun suddenly sound like Chao Fan in a matter of 5 minutes?”


After 10 minutes, there was still no sign of the food.


In the meanwhile, I had begun to muse on the issue of memory span.
It occurred to me that people in certain professions require short-term memory spans while others may require much longer.


Using the case of the food hawker above, his memory span begins from the moment you place your order and ends when he brings you your food – about 7 minutes on average.

Now how about a stage actor in a grand musical?
With the mass of lines she has to recite, surfeit of dance steps to remember, and a cascade of melodious notes to sing, I would reckon that her memory span begins from the moment the first practice begins and ends only after the last curtain call – about 1 year at least for perfection.



Closer to home; what about ourselves?
Do you remember what clothes you wore on Monday, 3 days ago?
What was your most recent meal?
How about the color of the drinking glass? Erm, wait, was there a drinking glass?


It is evident that people don’t remember everything.
Or to put it more lucidly, we only choose to remember specific things.
These things are remembered only because we attach a certain value to them.
For other less or even insignificant things, we conveniently filter them out.
Thus unless your most recent meal was cooked by a loved one, you wouldn’t probably choose to remember it.


For us as Christians, I believe there is a greater purpose that can be explored.

Our memory of Christ our God and His saving grace – how much we recall of it says a lot about the significance that we place on His love.


When we were baptized into His death, the host of angels in heaven rejoiced
for His blood washed away our sin stains
and reconciled us to the Father and His Church.
– do we recall the great sacrifice He went through to effect this for us?

When we received the Holy Spirit after praying in earnest at length,
He came to live within us, being our Comforter, Counselor, Guide and so much more.
For those who spent years or decades to pray and finally receiving the Holy Spirit,
do we recall the immense joy that filled our hearts,
the tears of joy that flowed down as we gave utmost Glory to Him?
- do you recall His words to the disciples that “I go so that the Helper will come and dwell amongst you”?



Sadly, we often forget.





Much like the ancient Israelites who forgot countless times, so we do the same today.


When God promised His people that He would guide them into the Promised Land of Canaan, they cheered.
He brought them out of Egypt, parted the Red Sea so they could believe with their infantile eyes.
Despite such a colossal display of God’s power, they feared the Anakim giants of Canaan.

Sentenced to 40 years in the wilderness, God nonetheless gave them Manna for sustenance.

Yet, it didn’t take long before the gripes and murmuring went into overdrive.
“Give us meat to eat!” was their grouse.
“Give us the delicacies of Egypt!” they wailed.



More so during the era of judges was this cyclical malaise played out.
They trusted God, got complacent, sinned, incurred the wrath of God, were punished, repented, and trusted God, but not for long.
In fact, the last verse of the book of Judges aptly sums up the culture of that period.


Despite all the miracles, signs and wonders, they forgot God was their king. So instead of the holy theocracy, they opted for the temporal monarchy.
“Give us a king to rule over us!” they yelled



So sometimes we wonder why the Israelites couldn’t remain faithful to a God who so tangibly demonstrated His greatness before them.

Wouldn’t the stories of the patriarchs have been told to the succeeding generations?
– The stories of God being a Friend to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.





But before we point all 10 fingers at them and snort, let us examine ourselves.


Don’t we often fall into the trap of sin?
We are tempted by our own lusts and desires and choosing to ignore the Spirit’s warning, we take the same step as David did.
Just as he inquired as to whom Bathsheba was, so we are inquisitive about the sensuous pleasures that seem to be luring us.
As David sought his men to bring her to his palace, likewise we enter the door of sin by accepting the temptations.


When we do so, it becomes all too easy to forget and ignore the Holy Spirit’s warning and prompting.
I could go on but it would merely be calling a cup a mug.


The biblical examples and stories were recorded in ink, not pencil, for us to know their endurance and permanence for this life. They are lessons for us to heed.






Coming back to my earlier point on affixing value, it is true that we have the option to choose if we want to place value on certain things.


Take for example the food hawker.
He wouldn’t place much value on our order for it would merely be a matter of $3 to him.
But if his grandchildren come to the store to patronize,
he would rush up to serve them and ensure that their plate is overflowing with food.
Why?
Simply because he values his precious little tots.




Did the Israelites place great value on their status – Sons of God – or was that title merely an excuse to be complacent and arrogant?
Palpably, it can be seen many times that they veered toward the latter.


Samson for all his strength and might often failed to see beyond the lust and violence. He placed his value on hedonistic pleasures and lost his Advocate. It is by God’s grace that he regained his strength for one last time when he remembered God and cried out in regret.




As for us,
How much value do we place on Christ?
And more importantly,
Has the value that we placed on Him initially lessened when it should actually increase?

It is a fact that,
We so easily lose sight of our goal of the prize.
We are so easily shaken by temptations.
Sin and Pride constantly overtake us.

We need to,
Remind ourselves of the value of Christ in our hearts.
Refresh our minds that we can only choose God and not the world.
Recall that Christ placed the greatest value on us – the value of His life.


Believe me when I say that I need this lesson as much as everyone else does, or perhaps even more.



Despite all our flaws, God has remembered us even before we were born.
- Being chosen before time to be His sons (Ephesians 1:4-5), we are consummately precious to Him.
- He is the only One who counts our grief, sorrows, and bottles every drop of tear we cry. (Psalm 56:8)
- He is the only One who remembers our good deeds and His righteous judgment fire will test and proof our favorable works for Him. (1 Corinthians 3:13)
- Being the righteous Judge, He will remember everything, be they good or bad, for which we have to give and account of on the Last day. (Hebrews 4:13)



While human memory is only for a lifetime on earth, God is the Alpha and Omega and in Him we see eternity.



"But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD's love is with those who fear him,and his righteousness with their children's children- with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts. The LORD has established his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over all."
(Psalm 103: 17-19)




My Hor Fun finally arrived after 15 minutes. It was not bad.