Forgotten
It hurts when we’re forgotten. Passed over. Ignored.
Questions run through our minds as our hearts ache from the loss of relationship we thought we had or wanted to have.
What did we do? Why don’t they care?
But Scripture tells us we are often the ones doing the forgetting. And YHWH our God aches with longing for the closeness He wants with us His loved ones.
The Problem
Humans have a tendency to forget. We focus on our wants or needs, what makes us feel good, and forget there is Someone higher to Whom we are responsible.
God used Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, and He spoke to His people through their leader. Before entering the Promised Land, Moses reviewed with the Israelites the history of their long journey, gave them God’s directions and commandments, and highlighted warnings if they chose to ignore God and His directives.
Included in Moses’ words were the following:
“beware, lest you forget the LORD who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage” (Deuteronomy 6:12).
The Hebrew word translated forget is שָׁכַח. According to Strong’s Concordance, that word means, “to mislay, i.e. to be oblivious of, from want of memory or attention.”
How could the Israelites mislay the One Who rescued them from slavery? Why would they be oblivious to YHWH Who fed them, clothed them, and brought them safely to the Land of Promise? Why did they choose to ignore the One Who loved them with an everlasting love?
Can we forget? Would we fail to give attention to the One Who made us? Do we ignore the lover of our souls?
Sadly we can, and we do. When life is sweet, we often quit giving attention to our Creator. Our focus shifts, and He is forgotten.
Pride and Forgetting
John Henry Jewett, a pastor in the early twentieth century, wrote the following about forgetting God.
“Open and deliberate revolt against God shows, at any rate, some respect for His power. And even formal prayer, empty though it be, offers some recognition of God’s existence. But to forget Him, to live and plan and work as though He were not, to dismiss Him as insignificant–this is surely the last expression of a separated life.”*
Isaiah 17:10 says, “you have forgotten the God of your salvation, And have not been mindful of the Rock of your stronghold.”
When our world runs smoothly, we tend to forget the One Who made us and sustains us. We begin to believe we are self-sufficient, in need of nothing except what brings us pleasure.
But this life isn’t always roses and sunshine. Thorns grow and darkness covers.
Sometimes the thorns and darkness over our path are simply the result of living in a fallen world. But sometimes the Father allows them because He knows pain and problems catch our attention far quicker than the pleasures of life. It’s easier for us to remember our Creator when we sense the need for help beyond ourselves.
John Henry Jewett says,
“Pride of strength makes us forget the rock out of which we were hewn.” “Our weakness helps us remember God; our strength is the friend of forgetfulness.” And he goes on to declare “our strength is really our drug. It is an opiate which ministers to spiritual forgetfulness.”*
It’s not that the Father wants us to struggle in life. He loves us and sacrificed Himself for us. He pulled us out of the miry clay of sin through the shed blood of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. But it cost Him everything to make a way for us to have a relationship with our Maker. Why would He willingly stand by and let us forget Him and the life He has prepared for us?
Remember
Before the children of Israel crossed into the Promised Land, YHWH told Moses what was going to happen in the future. Moses would “rest” with the fathers, the people would go into the Promised Land which God prepared for them, and they would forsake God and break the covenant He made with them.
Knowing this was coming, and knowing the discipline that would come because of the Israelites’ sin, YHWH told Moses to teach the people a song to remind them of God when they forgot Him.
“Now therefore, write down this song for yourselves, and teach it to the children of Israel; put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for Me against the children of Israel. When I have brought them to the land flowing with milk and honey, of which I swore to their fathers, and they have eaten and filled themselves and grown fat, then they will turn to other gods and serve them; and they will provoke Me and break My covenant. Then it shall be, when many evils and troubles have come upon them, that this song will testify against them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten in the mouths of their descendants, for I know the inclination of their behavior today, even before I have brought them to the land of which I swore to give them” Deuteronomy 31:19-21.
God knew the inclination of their hearts and still chose to make a covenant with this people.
God knew the inclination of our hearts, and still chose to send His Son to die for us.
Just as YHWH told Moses to teach the people a song of remembrance, we have the word of God and hymns and spiritual songs we are able to hide in our hearts to help us remember.
Conclusion
God is our Strength and our Shield. He is our Source. When we forget Him and begin to think we are strong in and of ourselves, we forget He is our Source. And when we become oblivious to His role in our lives, and His rule over all, the enemy begins to win the battle raging against us.
YHWH our God is not to be forgotten. He never forgets us. We cannot afford to forget Him. He is our Maker, our Redeemer, and our Reminder. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
My prayer for us all is for us to never forget. God bless you as you remember Him.
NOTE: Related posts you might enjoy: Remember; Additional Scriptures on forgetting God: Deuteronomy 32:18, Isaiah 51:12-13, Jeremiah 18:15, Ezekiel 23:35.
*Quotes are from the article “Forgetting God,” Decision Magazine, December 2024, adapted from Things That Matter Most: Devotional Papers by John Henry Jowett, Public Domain.)
(Scripture: New King James Version; Photo: Taken by Carolyn Thigpen, Tribble Mill Park, July, 2025)
