REJOICE FOR REMINDERS!

By Dena Ivie

If you are like most people, you need "reminders" on a calendar, sticky notes, or smart phone to help you stay "on track" with what you need to know and do. God, in His great and all-knowing wisdom knew we would need reminders if we were going to truly know Him and obey Him. Therefore, we should never cease to be thankful for and to heed His reminders given to us in His word!

Yes, even those established in the truth need to be reminded.

2 Peter 1:12-15, "For this reason I will not be negligent to remind you always of these things, though you know and are established in the present truth. Yes, I think it is right, as long as I am in this tent, to stir you up by reminding you, knowing that shortly I must put off my tent, just as our Lord Jesus Christ showed me. Moreover I will be careful to ensure that you always have a reminder of these things after my decease."

Peter, by inspiration of God, stated again this need to remind.

2 Peter 3:1-4, "Beloved, I now write to you this second epistle (in both of which I stir up your pure minds by way of reminder), that you may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Savior, knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.'"

Because God created us, He understands we are "a forgetful people."   Again and again in His word, God reminds those who are His exactly what He requires.

The following scriptures are only a few reminders in the Old Testament. There are many, many more scriptures that could be included in this list.

Numbers 15:40-41, "and that you may remember and do all My commandments, and be holy for your God. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am the LORD your God."

Deuteronomy 8:11, "Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments, His judgments, and His statutes which I command you today,"

Psalm 119:16, "I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word."

Proverbs 4:5, "Get wisdom! Get understanding! Do not forget, nor turn away from the words of my mouth."

Also in the New Testament, there are many reminders, lest we forget.

Jesus commanded in Luke17:32, "Remember Lot's wife."

Why do you suppose this command is important? As we think of Lot's wife (Genesis 19:15-26), we are reminded God is serious about obedience to His words!

Jude 5, "But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe."

1 Corinthians 4:17, "For this reason I have sent Timothy to you, who is my beloved and faithful son in the Lord, who will remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach everywhere in every church."

2 Timothy 2:11-14, "This is a faithful saying: For if we died with Him, We shall also live with Him. If we endure, We shall also reign with Him. If we deny Him, He also will deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself. Remind them of these things, charging them before the Lord not to strive about words to no profit, to the ruin of the hearers."

Why is he preaching on that again?" The next time you hear someone make such a statement (or maybe you say it yourself), remember how much we all need to be reminded to do exactly what God says and then rejoice in the reminder!

"But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does"  (James 1:25).
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