For years my mom woke early in the morning. Those hours well before daybreak when the night sky still holds back the sunrise. Farm work required it. As she aged and became less involved in the daily chores, her inner clock stayed right on schedule. “But now,” she said, “I wake up early and lying there I just think … the things I remember.”

Remember the days of old; consider the generations past. Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you.
Deuteronomy 32:7

I, too, am an early riser. Although a few years younger than my mom was in her reminiscing days, I also wake well before daylight and remember.

Some call it rehearsing the deeds of the Lord; others refer to it as taking a spiritual inventory. Both involve an intentional act of remembering — the process of recalling the past, especially God’s presence and activity in life.

Remembering Leads to Praise and Rejoicing

No, I do not remember being seven months of age. But this photograph stirs countless memories of the room in which it was taken and of that family rocking chair still found there. Many a birthday and holiday get-togethers, quiet conversations, and a share of gatherings weighed down in sorrow.

I do remember twenty-five years later, however, after this picture was taken. The morning my daddy found me awake and curled up in that chair in the wee hours of May 1st.

“Can’t sleep, uh?” he asked.

“No, I am just lying here thinking,” I replied.

Later that same day he walked me down the church aisle to give me away in marriage to my husband.

Looking back, God’s presence was evident in all things — interwoven throughout the innocent days of childhood, in building faith, and during the routines of family life.

In a one-room school house on cold winter days, twenty-one children warming themselves around a huge, black potbelly stove completing their studies. The outhouse “facilities” and the woodshed from which the older boys carried in logs to feed the potbelly stove. Sunshiny days and “Red Rover, Red Rover” recess games. In end-of-school-year Play Day relays, races and tug-o-war competitions. Ribbons awarded to the winners; participants were, well, participants.  

All through Vacation Bible School stories and songs and art projects. In the red Kool Aid? Hmm, even while “enjoying” those cold, sugary drinks. (Yech!) Through influential, caring teachers — Mr. Groenke, Mrs. Mouser, and Mr. Golz, Confirmation Day preparation, and the Spring storm that took out the electric power the evening of my First Communion.

Everywhere. Seated around the supper table, the evening meal over, my brother, sisters and I reciting our bedtime prayers — “Now I lay me down to sleep …” A child’s voice echoing Grandma Haertling teaching The Lord’s Prayer in German as we cleaned eggs collected earlier from the hen house. Playing Sunday School on the little porch, the window-filled room off the kitchen. My doll students always seemed much better behaved than the rather vocal, spirited teddy bear students.

Cutting My Teeth On Christmas Blog

Every day. While working together tending row upon row of freshly planted potato seedlings, in the beauty of butterflies lighting on a rainbow of Zinnia blooms, and across fields of tasseling corn. And culling chickens under cover of darkness (separating the layers from those hens no longer producing). I still hear my twin sister’s voice, “I don’t know what’s back there breathing in that corner, but it’s no chicken!” If you know her, ask Connie about that one.

Remembering Leads to Repentance and Understanding

The Old Testament book of Deuteronomy is a book all about remembering. “On the first day of the eleventh month” of the last year of their wanderings, Moses urges the Israelites to look back and remember.

Remember how the LORD your God … to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart … that in the end it might go well with you. Deuteronomy 8:2-16

Writing a short time before his own death, Moses recasts God’s law for a new generation poised to enter the land of promise. To reaffirm the covenant God made with them, His children, the people of Israel. The covenant previously established at Mount Sinai, the pledge they broke in distrust and disobedience.

Other nations feared their own gods. The Lord God sought a renewed commitment with His people based not just in rote obedience, but an obedience springing from a relationship with God to His people. A bond based on God’s might and awe and fear. A life together drenched in His own deep, unfailing love.

Remembering Produces Hope

Moses didn’t pull any punches. His speech calls each of the Israelites to remember their stubbornness, painful memories resulting in loss of life and a 40-year long, desert education. And to realize in hope the blessings that accompany obedience.

What do we do in the early morning darkness with memories of our poor choices and irresponsible behavior? A mental notebook filled with what ifs and could haves? Heartaches stemming from impatience and bullheadedness, of harsh words spoken in anger? Of life-altering tragedies? Memories that wiggle their way in with a side of guilt and shame added.

We leave them in repentance where they belong: at the cross of Jesus Christ who took on Himself the payment for sin. And we remember His abundant grace.

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us.
Ephesians 1:7

Remembering God’s work in the past can lead to praise and rejoicing. Remembering can lead to repentance and to understanding. Remembering evokes hope for the future. For remembering the past produces confidence in Whom we believe — Jesus Christ.

I know not why God’s wondrous grace
To me He hath made known,
Nor why, unworthy, Christ in love
Redeemed me for His own.

But “I know Whom I have believed,
And am persuaded that He is able
To keep that which I’ve committed
Unto Him against that day.”
(2 Timothy 1:12, Jude 24)

I Know Whom I Have Believed, Daniel W. Whittle, 1883