I will remember the deeds of the LORD;
yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
I will ponder all your work,
and meditate on your mighty deeds.
(Psalm 77:11-12 ESV)
The thesis of this blog is that cultivating a heart of remembrance on the historical acts of God in the Bible is the substance that will fuel our love, worship and faithfulness for the Lord over the next decades. Thus, if we are to remain faithful to the Lord we must study, meditate and talk with Him about His acts throughout history. The negative proposition is that if we do not study these acts then we could “burn out” and lose our faithfulness for the Lord in the following years.
So why study the historical acts of God? It is through the Lord’s acts that we gain an understanding of His love. A friend can tell you “I love you” or “I care for you” many times, but if His actions contradict his statements then his words are meaningless. In the same way, God’s deeds throughout history is what reveals His emotions towards us. In our modern context, which is permeated by ancient Greek philosophy, when we think about the words lovingkindess, goodness, mercy, love or any other words associated with one’s emotions we mostly think of them as some ethereal or abstract concept. But the Hebrews would have had a concrete understanding of what these terms meant. The Lord’s actions proved the statements about his emotions towards His people. Here is one of the many passages where we see the direct relationship between God’s emotions and His actions:
On the glorious splendor of your majesty,
and on your wondrous works, I will meditate.
They shall speak of the might of your awesome deeds,
and I will declare your greatness.
They shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness
and shall sing aloud of your righteousness.
The LORD is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
The LORD is good to all,
and his mercy is over all that he has made.
(Psalm 145:5-9 ESV)
The psalmist’s proclamation and praise about God’s character was founded upon His understanding of God’s deeds. In the same way that we know a friend’s love for us through His actions so also the psalmist knew of the Lord’s affection for His people through His works.
By knowing the emotions behind God’s deeds the saints were sustained to remain faithful to Him throughout the decades of their lives. 1 John 4:19 says that “We love because he first loved us.” Thus if we are to love the Lord and remain faithful to Him we must understand His love for us through His acts in history. Our understanding of the Lord’s love cultivated through meditating on His acts will cause us to remain faithful to Him unto death
The negative side of the coin is that if we do not cultivate a heart of remembrance for the Lord’s acts throughout history then we could end up loosing our faithfulness to Him in the following years. Here are some Scriptures that reveal this principle:
As soon as Gideon died, the people of Israel turned again and whored after the Baals and made Baal-berith their god. And the people of Israel did not remember the LORD their God, who had delivered them from the hand of all their enemies on every side,
(Judges 8:33,34 ESV)
They tested God again and again
and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
They did not remember his power
or the day when he redeemed them from the foe,
when he performed his signs in Egypt
and his marvels in the fields of Zoan.
(Psalm 78:41-43 ESV)
Our fathers, when they were in Egypt,
did not consider your wondrous works;
they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love,
but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea.
(Psalm 106:7 ESV)
The cause of the Israelites unfaithfulness towards the Lord was their ignorance of what He had done for them in Egypt. In other words, it was because they did not remember the Lord’s deeds that resulted in them breaking His covenant. In the Law of Moses their lifestyle was specifically set in a way that the Israelites would always remember what the Lord had done for them. The Lord even commanded that the kings of Israel should read His Law all the days of his life (cf Deuteronomy 17:18-20) since it is through the Law that the historical deeds of God were seen. Why would God do this? The Lord knew that the surrounding nations’ values and doctrine would permeate into their lives and cause them to fall away. It is no different in our day, there are demonic beings that are stirring the hearts of humanity and causing deceptive doctrines to permeate into the world and even into the Church. Thus it is crucial that we have a historical understanding of the Lord through the Bible. But more than knowing His deeds, we must find out “why” He did them, this is the place where we find the heart of God which will sustain our lives. As we have seen in 1 John 4:19 ,we love God because of our understanding of His love for us.
If you could come away with something from this blog my desire is that you would: (1) meditate and commune with the Lord about His acts in history so that you would know His heart in them, (2) make reading the whole Bible a regular part of your lifestyle and (3) regularly sing all of the Psalms. Over time you will see a change in your heart and your view about the Lord, people, creation and your life will change.
These are the main acts of God in history as seen in His Word: Creation, Exodus, the Covenants, Incarnation, Death, Resurrection, Ascension, Outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the Eschatalogical Deliverance of Creation.
Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
but his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.
The wicked are not so,
but are like chaff that the wind drives away.
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;
for the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.
(Psalm 1 ESV)
