Remember this day

One of my favorite movies of all time is Star Trek — The Wrath of Khan. 

In the climatic scene, Spock goes down to the engineering section, and needs to go into a room flooded with radiation to get the engines back on line. 

He knows he’s going to die, but is determined to go anyway, and when one of his friends tries to stop him, he knocks him out. 

But before he goes into the engine room he stops, touches his friend, and says “Remember.” 

We of course (you Trekkies, anyway) find out what that means later, but at the time, it kind of had the feeling of, “Remember me.  Don’t forget who I was.  Don’t forget what I’ve done.”

And that’s kind of what God was telling the Israelites in this chapter:  Remember this day. 

Remember what I’ve done for you. 

Remember how you were slaves in Egypt.

And remember all I did to bring you out of bondage into freedom. 

Remember how I brought you out from death into life.

And God wants the same thing of us.  He wants us to remember the day he brought us out of bondage to sin and death, and into the freedom of the children of God. 

Why?

I suppose it’s because we forget so easily. 

What happens when we forget?

Often times, our love for him starts to wane. 

When we first become Christians, there’s usually a strong love in us out of gratitude for what he’s done for us.  That he died on a cross to take the punishment for our sins, pulling us out of the miry clay of life and setting us on solid rock. 

But when we forget what he’s done, our love wanes and we start taking him and his love for us for granted.

He starts taking a back seat in our lives as we start pursuing money, our careers, or whatever else it might be.

That’s why God said to the Israelites, “When you go to this land of milk and honey, celebrate this ceremony I’ve given to you so that you won’t forget what I’ve done for you. 

“When things are going well, celebrate what I’ve done for you so that you never forget me and my love for you.”

But God doesn’t want us to remember just for our own sakes. 

He told the Israelites,

On that day tell your son, ‘I do this because of what the LORD did for me when I came out of Egypt.’  (Exodus 13:8)

And again in verses 14-16, he said again,

“In days to come, when your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ say to him, ‘With a mighty hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the LORD killed every firstborn in Egypt, both man and animal.

This is why I sacrifice to the LORD the first male offspring of every womb and redeem each of my firstborn sons.’

And it will be like a sign on your hand and a symbol on your forehead that the LORD brought us out of Egypt with his mighty hand.”

God’s desire is not only that we would stay in close relationship with him, but that our children and the generations to come would do so too. 

So let us never forget the cross. 

Let us never forget the sacrifice Jesus made for us. 

And let us pass on to the next generation all he has done for us.

I remember the day I heard you call out my name.
Still remember how you have gently shown me your way.
I will bow down and worship and give all my praise to you.