Forget Not All His Benefits

by W. Fisher, Bathgate, Scotland | Category: General | Jan 1987

Looking ahead to the year in front of us, we can also look back over the past and seek from the heart to give a fitting word of exhortation:

Bless the LORD, 0 my soul, and forget not all His benefits. (Ps. 103:2).

How forgetful the world is of the benefits received from God. Temporal blessings are accepted and enjoyed as if all had a right to them, forgetting that, but for the cross of Calvary, nothing but judgement would have been meted out to men. We who are saved are liable to fall into the same state of mind, instead of blessing God "who daily loadeth us with benefits" (Ps. 68:19 AV).

The circumstances of the past year have been many and varied yet we can all sing:

With mercy and with judgement

My web of time He wove,

And aye the dews of sorrow

Were lustred with His love.

Some of the clouds have indeed been dark, but how sweet - "a voice was heard out of the cloud". There was a brightness amidst the darkness and a strength to sustain in hearing the voice from on high.

In speaking to Israel of old, who had said, "Jehovah hath forsaken me, and the Lord hath forgotten me", our God, who is love, takes up with Zion the strongest expression of love, that of a woman for her child. "These may forget" God says, "yet will not I forget thee" (Isa. 49:14,15).

"I have graven thee upon the palms of My hands" (v.16); graven - written indelibly, how comforting to the heart in these difficult days, again, ''I will not forget thee". Knowing the tendency of the human heart, God could exhort His redeemed people to take heed lest they should forget Him and all that He had wrought for them. The Psalmist writes, "They soon forgat His works" (106:13). "They forgot God their Saviour" (v.21). They soon found themselves in the hands of the enemy through their departure. These things are written for our learning and profit.

Not only does God not forget us, but how encouraging in His service are the words, "God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love which ye showed toward His name" (Heb. 6:10). What a wonderful place the redeemed have in His heart. Nothing is too trivial for Him to take notice of, even a cup of cold water given in His name will yield its reward in a future day.

The apostle Paul, looking at the opposite side of the picture, says

But one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and

stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:13,14).

The daily benefits that God showers upon us we are not to forget, but the events and experiences of the past are not to have a retarding influence upon us in that which the future has for us down here. There may have been joys and there may have been sorrows in the pathway, much to grieve our heart and cause despondency, but the prize is held forth, therefore let us take heart and, forgetting the things which are behind let us press on. Failure in the past ought to lead us to fresh endeavour to have as our ambition that of which the apostle writes:

Wherefore also we make it our aim, that whether at home or absent, to be well-pleasing unto Him" (2 Cor. 5:9).

W. Fisher, Bathgate, Scotland | Jan 1987
General