Devotionals from my Bible app: Never Forget (Psalm 103:2)

Bless the Lord, O my soul,
And forget not all His benefits:
Psalm 103:2, NKJV

Never Forget


Humans are forgetful…


We forget what God has said.
We forget what God has done.
We forget what He’s called us to do.
We forget who He’s called us to be.


The word “forget” can mean two things: to not remember (sometimes by accident) or to ignore (sometimes on purpose). To “forget” is to fail to hold something in our minds.


When faced with hard things, we might beg for miracles or plead for provision, but when we get the thing we asked for, we can still tend to forget what God has already done for us. We’re not alone in this—the Bible is full of stories about people forgetting God … But that doesn’t have to be us. That doesn’t have to be you.


We’ve stepped into an ongoing story that’s been playing out since the beginning of time. With zero help from us, God has hand-crafted this breathtaking world and chosen the unique times and spaces in which we show up. And even though the world seems to get crazier and scarier by the minute, God is always at work in the mess.


We need to remember God’s faithfulness in our collective history. We need to remember God’s goodness in our personal lives.


We can fight against forgetfulness today—right now—by remembering that it was God who created this world and filled it with good things—including us! It was God who offered us mercy when we didn’t deserve it. It was God who gave us real purpose: to love Him and love others; to know Him and make Him known.


And when we pause to remember God’s gifts, God’s provision, and God’s faithfulness, it triggers a powerful response: worship.


“Let all that I am praise the Lord …”


Both God the Father and Jesus explain how to love Him with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength (Deuteronomy 6:5; Matthew 22:37; Luke 10:27). Your thoughts and feelings, your passions and desires, your talents and personality, both the physical and spiritual … if it’s a part of you, it was meant to praise God!


So how have you seen God show up in a way that you never want to forget? Thank Him for what He’s done, and worship Him for who He is.




https://bible.com/bible/114/psa.103.2.NKJV



Note after sharing the devotional: in my short list of Bible passages to memorize / pray / recite, the below is one of my go-tos:

Bless the Lord, O my soul;

And all that is within me, bless His holy name!

Bless the Lord, O my soul,

And forget not all His benefits:

Who forgives all your iniquities,

Who heals all your diseases,

Who redeems your life from destruction,

Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,

Who satisfies your mouth with good things,

So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Psalm 103:1-5, NKJV

It is so easy to forget God - I have been guilty of that countless times. It’s a big reason why I spent so many years complaining about things. Reciting God’s Word, doing it often, and meaning it when I do - it has cut down the complaining I’ve been doing in more recent months.


In 2019, once I knew (and started experiencing) God’s forgiveness, I swore I would never again forget, having now understand that this simple task was the difference between life and death, between abundance and poverty. I even put up this verse on a piece of paper and taped it to my desk hutch (so I would see it every time I was at my computer)

And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15, NKJV

But I did not anticipate that, despite knowing how simple it now was, I would still forget yet again. But I did. Awareness is a good and great thing, but unless I put action to my awareness, it is useless. As such, here are a few other guidelines I’ve needed to include and learn how to apply to the other core Biblical principles that God has put on my heart:

• “practice what you preach”
• “feet to your faith”
• “to the cognition of the brain must be added the experience of the soul” (from this post)

In addition to my search for what the Bible says about maturity, I have also embarked on a search to restructure what I learned in therapy so that it doesn’t fail this time like it had over the last five years.

[After enduring what I endured in my previous living situation, I felt like I lost much of what I had learned in therapy, some of which was simply the destructive nature of the living arrangements (specifically, the people), and some of which was the fact that, after my counseling center changed hands halfway during my time there, several of the changes they made unfortunately meant losing the spirit of what had made this counseling center's former era so great. A lot of the models were the same - although some had changed (and in some cases, radically changed) - but something shifted spiritually that I bet almost no one noticed, myself included, until I had had that return to faith in 2019/2020.]

Thing is, as fallible people, we will forget when we rely on our own strength. But God is faithful to remind all who stay close to Him. God wants us to remember who He is, and also for us to remember Whose we are. And when we spend time in His Word and mark certain things that He highlights for us to notice and apply, then we will be amazed and full of joy when we do see Him come through. He wants us to know that He makes and keeps His promises, as part of this love-relationship that He wants with each of us.

Prayer: God, thank You for showing me Your mercy and faithfulness. You are my healer, restorer, rescuer, conqueror, and provider. You give me Your strength, joy, peace, and love. No one compares to You. You are my God, and You are worthy of all my praise! In Jesus's name, Amen.