Jump Start # 1330

2 Peter 1:9 “For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins.”

  Following a list of virtues that the Christian is to be adding and increasing in his life, Peter gives this solemn statement that is our verse today. Forgetting where we came from, forgetting what has happened, being blind to those things, will lead to serious spiritual consequences. Earlier Peter said that if these qualities are yours and are increasing they will render you neither useless nor unfruitful. However, if the opposite is true, if one forgets where he came from, then he is likely to be barren towards God.

How is it that one can forget? We all have our own unique story. Our story may be long, painful and filled with drama. Others have a rather straight forward and simple story. All of us who are Christians have eventually ended up at the same point. Like a giant funnel that is large at the top, it narrows down to a simple point at the end. All of us ended up being baptized. It may have been after a Sunday morning sermon. It may have been during the week. We may have been baptized in the church building, or in a swimming pool, or some, years ago were baptized in rivers and ponds. My dad remembers cars lining up on a hill with their headlights on, so folks could make their way down to a pond where someone was going to be baptized in the dark. It may have been a preacher baptized you. It may have been your dad that baptized you. But we all come to that central point, purified from our sins by the blood of Jesus. Although the details of our stories are all unique, the conclusions are all the same. We believed. We decided to change. We confessed. We were immersed. The song, “Oh, happy day,” was sung at many of those baptisms. It was a happy day. It was a new day for us. We were given a clean page in our life’s story by God. Our names were added to the book of life. We were off on a journey with Christ.

Do you remember the moment after were baptized? The hugs, the pats on the backs, the “we’re happy for you,” comments. Sometimes, especially on a Sunday morning, there was a long line of people waiting just to hug you. You were standing there with wet hair, a bit scared and nervous, but you felt so good. You know you did right.

The next Sunday, we took the Lord’s Supper for the first time. We’d seen our family and others do it, but now it was our turn. Now it meant something special to us. Jesus had died for us. We were remembering that wonderful event. How special that was.

Time passed. You grew. You became a real student of the Bible. You prayed deeply. You started putting things together in your mind. Things were moving along. But for most the newness settled down into a comfortable routine. You got used to taking the Lord’s Supper. Seeing fellow Christians was nothing new. And for some, we might have lost the specialness of what happened and who we now were. Sin comes back. The lines of distinction between who we were and who we are got merged a bit. Things got taken for granted. Another service. Another Lord’s Supper. Another sermon. We leveled off. We stopped growing. Life and all the activities squeezed out our prayer life and our reading of the Bible. We just drifted along.

For some of us, this is where we are now. Some of us have been here for a long time. We are not spiritually dead, or even lukewarm, it’s just that our spiritual burner is barely on. We tend to be coasting. Things are not bad or even wrong, we are just not as excited as we once were.

Then something happens in our life. It could be a visiting preacher who stirs up something deep in us that we had forgotten about for a long time. His passion, his delivery, his reminders, plug us back in. Everything turns on. We become excited again about the Lord. For others, it’s a journey down some tragic path. A death. A car wreck. A divorce. The bottom seems to drop out. In those quiet moments, a person realizes that something has been missing for a long time. God has not seemed very close. A new interest takes place. A home Bible study. A new try at hospitality. Hope is found. Love lost is renewed in the Lord.

It’s good for us to remember. It’s good for us to take a moment and see where we are and what’s happened on our journey. The church of Ephesus had lost their first love. They weren’t throwing in the towel on Jesus, He just wasn’t first with them any more. The admonition is to remember and do what you did at first. Peter is telling us to remember. Remember your purification from sins.

Do you remember who baptized you and when it was? Do you remember what the day was like? Do you remember the feeling when others found out? Have you ever thanked the Lord for that person in your life? Have you ever given thought to what happened to that person? Have you thought about those people who came and smiled and hugged you? Go down memory lane. Give it some thought. It’s like our spring flowers that are coming up, it brings joy and happiness to remember those precious memories.

Remembering will also stir a passion in you. Remembering will help put God back into the center of things. Remembering will help you grasp your resolve and commitment to the Lord. Remembering will put you back on the path and continue your journey with the Lord.

Don’t forget. Don’t ever forget. Several years ago, I received an email from a young man. He’s now preaching. He was remembering me baptizing him. It was an anniversary of his baptism. He reached out to me. I’d forgotten the details. He never did. It made my day knowing that he never forgot.  You might want to do that with someone in your life. Maybe they didn’t baptize you, but maybe they were your first Bible class teacher. Or, maybe they were a real friend to you when you started out. Or, maybe it was a lesson that really changed your life. Years later, you have never forgotten. That too has happened to me. Years ago, a man in Colorado came to hear me preach one evening. He remembered a sermon I preached when he was in college years ago in another state. He had gotten a cassette tape and literally wore the tape out listening to it over and over. I’d long forgotten that sermon. It was stuffed away in some box somewhere. He hadn’t. It had stayed in his heart all these years later. He remembered. He shared that with me and thanked me. It does a person good to share with others the good that they have done for us.

Remember…I hope this has stirred your mind and heart today. Oh, the names, the places, the people, long ago, who helped us become who we are today. Thank God for them. Thank them if you can. Then, become that kind of person for someone else.

Roger