For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more. (Hebrews 8:12, NIV)
After Phil Mickelson grabbed the 54-hole lead at the 2021 PGA Championship last month at Kiawah Island, the pundits on various sports channels began talking about Phil’s mental toughness. A common question they posed was whether there might come a time during Sunday’s round when “the demons of Winged Foot” would emerge to derail him in his quest for his sixth major title.
One of the common prescriptions golf psychologists offer for developing mental toughness on the golf course is the ability to “forget the last bad shot.” They tell us to analyze what happened, and then after we have gleaned any information that might be useful in the future, we are to erase it from our memory banks. In other words, “forget it and flush it.”
Last month I wrote about our sinful nature and the gift of God’s forgiveness that allows us to start every day with a clean slate. Quite often, however, I find myself recalling the pile of sins that have accumulated each day, which then heap on top of one another creating a huge pile that dwarfs Mt. Everest. I am engulfed by a sense of guilt, even though I know I should be joyful because of God’s grace and forgiveness. Like the memories of my bad golf shots that plague me from round to round, I cannot forget my sins and flush them.
But then my inquiring mind asked the question: If God is omniscient, how can he forget my sins?
In today’s Scripture passage, the writer of Hebrews, quoting from Jeremiah 31:34, provides some solace to those of us who still feel guilty about our past sins. Isaiah emphasized a similar theme when he quoted the Lord: “I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake and remembers your sins no more” (Isaiah 43:25). Not only does God forgive, but he also forgets.
But does he forget?
In my initial cursory reading of these passages, I equated “forget” with “remember no more.” But then my inquiring mind asked the question: If God is omniscient, how can he forget my sins? It did not make sense that an all-knowing God could simply forget something as gigantic as my pile of accumulated sins.
But, as I looked closer, I discovered that the phrase “will remember no more” means something slightly different than “forget.” That distinction helped me to understand the conundrum.
The Hebrew word zachar means “to remember.” It includes both bringing a thought to mind and the actions that are a result of remembering. When Scripture says, “I will remember them no more,” it is really saying that God, after forgiving our sins, will not take any further action, such as punishment, against us. Not only will he not take any action against us, he has also dispatched or “sent away” (one of the meanings of the Greek word aphiemi for forgive) those sins. He has sent them “as far as the east is from the west” (Psalm 103:12); he “will…hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19).
It is incredibly liberating to know that God not only forgives our sins, but that he also does not remember them. As a result, we can live in joy as we look to the future and not dwell in the past burdened with fear and guilt.
—
Mark “Ole” Olson
June 30, 2021
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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