Sam Bush, “Don’t Forget You’re Precious”

Sam BuOne of the minor stresses in our modern age is trying to remember all of the different passwords required to access information we need to live our lives. There’s the password to pay your electric bill or to access social media or a streaming service or an app. Maybe you’ve got it all together, but from my experience, it’s impossible to keep them all straight. One of my favorite recent jokes is an online interaction between a person and a computer hacker. The hacker says, “I have all your passwords,” and the person replies, totally relieved, saying “Oh my goodness, thank you, what are they?” 

Especially now that the internet serves as an externalized memory bank, memory has become that much more elusive of a faculty. It’s hard for us to remember our own dreams the moment we wake up. It’s hard to remember people’s names the moment after they tell us. These kinds of mental blunders are often embarrassing and frustrating because they remind us that we are not in control of ourselves. There are countless tips to help maintain an active memory - get more sleep, make checklists, adopt a Mediterranean diet - but nothing’s guaranteed to help. Studies have shown that even offering money to incentivize people to remember something doesn’t make a difference. What we remember and what we forget seems to depend on a power beyond our grasp. 

This is what the Apostle Peter is addressing in his letter which was sent out to churches in Asia Minor. He’s likely writing from prison in Rome as he awaits execution. As he nears his end, what are his final wishes? He says, “I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to refresh your memory…And I will make every effort so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things.” What exactly does he want us to remember? Of all things, he wants us to remember the Transfiguration, this strange event when Jesus took Peter, James and John up to Mount Sinai for a dramatic summit conference with Moses and Elijah. And Jesus is revealed for who he really is. His clothes become dazzling white, Matthew’s account says his face shone like the sun. Clearly, he is not simply a teacher or a prophet, but the Son of God in all his glory. 

Peter says, “We did not follow cleverly devised myths…but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.” In other words, “I was there! Whether you believe it or not does not change

the fact that this actually happened. Take it from me. Christianity is not just a nice idea or a story or an abstract philosophy or wishful thinking, but the truth.” 

Why would Peter insist on this? Why is he afraid that Christians are going to forget about the Transfiguration? Well, when we remember that Jesus is Lord of all, everything else falls into place. When we remember that Jesus is Lord of all, we remember that we are not Lord, that we are not in control, that we need only to trust God who is in control. When Jesus’ holiness is revealed in all its splendor, our sin and undeservedness is revealed in its wretchedness. We simply have no choice but to fall at his feet and receive his mercy. 

In fact, Peter says all human sin is rooted in forgetfulness. Right before this passage he urges Christians to be faithful. He says, “Make every effort to add to your faith goodness; self-control; perseverance and love. Whoever does not have [these things] is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.” Forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins. All your fears, all your sin, everything that is wrong with you comes from forgetting that you have been cleansed from your sins. We need to be reminded. 

Sometimes, you might experience the gospel as forgotten news. One Sunday morning, you hear that Jesus actually loves you and that, through Jesus, you have been cleansed from your sins, that death has been defeated, that there is nothing to fear. You’ve heard it before, but somehow the message gets through to your heart and it brings you peace for, let’s say, four minutes (which is pretty good, these days). But, later that day you get in a fight with your spouse or roommate, or you do the thing you said you weren’t going to do again and it makes you wonder if you can trust that feeling of relief you had just hours before. This happens all the time. It happens to me. We forget we have been cleansed of our sins. 

Do you ever care what people think about you and bend to their whims? God says in Isaiah, “Who do you think you are that you are afraid of mortal men who are but grass and you have forgotten the Lord, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth.” We need to be reminded. 

There’s a British songwriter named Alabaster DePlume who has a song called “Don’t Forget You’re Precious.” He says, “I remember my pin number. I remember my ex’s email address, but I forget that I’m precious. I remember to drink. I remember to check

my Instagram but I forget that I'm precious. I remember my shame, I remember the German word for “calculator” but I forget that I’m precious.” (In case you didn’t know, the German word for calculator is “tachenrechner”). 

The structure of our church service is built upon the act of remembrance because of our tendency to forget. Every week, we take the Body and the Blood of Jesus as the “memorial of our redemption” and we receive the gifts of God in remembrance of him. We do not consume them as a one-time cure-all, but as routine nourishment, a weekly reminder. As we receive it, Jesus charges us to remember: “Don’t forget you’re precious. Don’t forget I love you.” Of course, we will forget - we’ll forget by lunchtime - but rest assured we will be reminded again and again and again until we need not be reminded when we, like Peter on Mount Sinai, will be eyewitnesses to his majesty forever. 

In the meantime, Peter wanted to make sure this was written down. You see, when you write something down it’s there to stay. If you want to make sure something is a done deal, you put it in writing. If it’s just talk it’s subject to change and forgetfulness, but if it’s in writing it’s basically set in stone. That’s what the Bible is: God’s promise put in writing. A promise we can come back to whenever we forget. 

There’s a book called Ministry with the Forgotten written by a Methodist bishop named Kenneth Carder who details his experience caring for his wife for ten years after she was diagnosed with dementia. He notes that, in our society, to lose one’s memory threatens the total loss of one’s identity. “I think, therefore I am,” is our modern maxim, but it, at least on some level, excludes over 6 million Americans living with Alzheimer’s today. He says: 

Modern culture and much of modern Christianity lead us to think that our personhood is constituted by our ability to reason, to act, and to produce. But from the wilderness, we learn that beyond anything we can think, do, or produce, we are known and loved by God. We are held in God’s memory even when our own fails us. 

What does this mean for you? Well, if you happen to have a terrible memory — if you’re constantly saying to people, “I’m so sorry, what is your name again?” or if you have a hard time learning from your mistakes and your own personal history keeps repeating itself because you forget about the inevitable consequnces — this will come as a relief. When memory fails us, God does not. In the words of Karl Barth, our identity is not, “I think therefore I am,” but “I am thought of, therefore I am.” While we are forgetful, God

remembers. He says in Isaiah, “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.” What God has written on His palms, you see, cannot be erased. It’s not written in magic marker, but in blood. And it’s there to stay. 

You see, we, the forgetful, deserve to be forgotten, but, on the Cross, Jesus was forgotten on our behalf. The very words he cried out on the Cross - “Father, why have you forsaken me?” - can be translated, “Father, why have you forgotten me?” You see, because Jesus was forgotten, we will always be remembered. And so the Cross is our souvenir, the word itself derived from the French verb “to remember.” Whenever you look at the Cross, you can hear God saying to you, “Don’t forget you’re precious.” 

As we’re seated, let us pray: Heavenly Father, in you we live and move and have our being: we humbly pray you so to guide and govern us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget you, but may remember that we are ever walking in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.