The things you do for
me stand a good chance of being forgotten.
I may not appreciate
them the way I should. That Christmas sweater was a little too red and a little
too heavy for me, so I never wore it. The gift card was for a shop I never go
to, and it’s still sitting on my shelf. The DVD was something I already had,
but I didn’t want to mention it.
I didn’t need what you
gave me, so I said a quick thank you and forgot about you.
Sorry.
Thankfully, God is
nothing like me, or like so many others I know. Since he needs nothing, no one gift offered to him is in or of itself better than any other. When he
remembers the things we offer him, it is for reasons other than that they meet
or do not meet perceived needs.
“Your alms have ascended as a memorial before God”.
That’s what the angel
told Cornelius. Later,
retelling the story, Cornelius says, “Your alms have been remembered”.
Either way, that’s a pretty impressive
thought. The fear of God caused Cornelius to give generously to people who needed it. Belief demonstrated itself in works. Ultimately, God arranged it so that
Cornelius and his family and friends could hear the message of salvation through
Jesus Christ from Peter. God didn’t leave Cornelius to appear before him with
only dead works to show but granted him and his household opportunity to
exercise living faith.
“What about those who have never heard?” That’s
one answer, I suppose.
Quantity
of Alms
I don’t think it was the quantity of alms given by Cornelius that got the attention of Heaven. The Lord Jesus sat down opposite the Temple treasury to watch people put money into the offering box. He watched them all, rich
and poor. But he singled out the poorest person among them, a widow, for
approval. The large sums given by the rich were unremarkable to him,
presumably because they did not arise out of the same sort of devotion.
The
Grand Gesture
And it’s not just alms. The Lord Jesus
showed the same concern to acknowledge and mark out the gesture of the woman
who anointed him with expensive perfume at Bethany. He says:
“Wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”
Not only does the Lord remember that one, he
makes sure the rest of us do too.
A
Love for His Name
In fact, the New Testament writers assure
us that God does not forget anything that arises out of a love for his name: work or service to other believers.
To do so, the writer to the Hebrews says,
would be “unjust”. God is not unjust.
When we say that God will “not forget”, we
are not really talking about memory, are we. God never forgets in the way I
forget: a synaptic lapse, an unexpected distraction or a dearth of interest. If
he can be said to “forget” anything at all, it is only those things he has determined he will not take into account or hold against us because of the work
of his Son.
Memory
and Reward
So it’s not about memory, like me and that
thank-you note I never sent. Rather, when the scripture says that “God will not
forget”, the suggestion is that he will not neglect to reward those who act out
of love for him. As Paul told the Galatians:
“Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”
We have a God who remembers and rewards. What
we do out of love will never be forgotten.
Come to think of it, maybe I should try on
that red sweater …
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