Journey to the Far East / Journey to the World: August 2015

Well, the house is clean, the garage purged, the tasks completed, the friends visited, the miles traveled. Now it is time to pack up to return to BJ.

Earlier I thought about the many things that we have done this summer. However, after I listed the things we had done, God reminded me that really I am to remember what He has done. Someone once said that the operative word for the Old Testament is REMEMBER – remember God and remember what He has done. God recounts all the things that He did for the Israelites. The Passover was to remind the Israelites of God’s miraculous deliverance from Egypt. The rainbow reminds him of his covenant. Many of the psalms promote a theme of REMEMBER. All those events point to our great, merciful, faithful, and steadfast God. Even God REMEMBERS – He remembers the covenants he made with his people. Sometimes God doesn’t REMEMBER – He doesn’t REMEMBER our sins when we repent and seek his forgiveness. The cross of Jesus reminds us of his sacrifice for our sins. The empty tomb reminds us of his resurrection – his conquering of sin and its consequences. A quick search of the word REMEMBER turns up so many verses. I can’t list all the verses in the Bible that have REMEMBER in them. Almost every book uses the word, either for us to remember what the triune God has done, to remember who He is, or for him not to remember our sins and instead show mercy.

Therefore, instead of remembering what we did this summer, I want to remember Jesus and what he has done.

Hebrews 10 (ESV)

10 For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. ²Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? ³But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. ⁴For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

⁵Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said,

“Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired,
    but a body have you prepared for me;
⁶in burnt offerings and sin offerings
    you have taken no pleasure.
⁷Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will, O God,
    as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.’”

⁸When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), ⁹then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. ¹⁰And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹¹And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹²But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God,¹³waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. ¹⁴For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

¹⁵And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying,

¹⁶“This is the covenant that I will make with them
after those days, declares the Lord:
I will put my laws on their hearts,
and write them on their minds,”

¹⁷then he adds,

“I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”

¹⁸Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.