Forgetting to Remember

Once upon a time I worked as a drive-in teller for the bank uptown. Trusting your happy hostess with other folks’ money didn’t turn out well. Wait, that doesn’t sound good. I should clarify, quickly. The problem wasn’t my making off with anyone’s funds, it was my tendency to lose track of them and that’s not the sort of thing that will send you up the corporate ladder in the banking industry. Were it not for the graciousness of my boss, I would’ve been fired a long time before I chose early retirement.

Every afternoon, I was supposed to put my coin box in the safe situated right below my station and lock it. I did this without incident, at first. Then the day came that I forgot to lock the heavy steel door. The next morning, I was reprimanded. And that’s when the problem started. A few days later, I forgot again, and I was reprimanded again. I tried harder not to forget, and I forgot. I made myself notes. I tied strings on my fingers, but try as I might I would inevitably forget again, even though it was weighing on me something horrible. I’d actually lie awake at night trying to remember if I had locked that blasted door! It sounds crazy, but the harder I tried to remember to put it in the vault and lock that door, the more I forgot secure it!

This, dear friends, is very much the way it works when we focus on what’s wrong with us instead of what’s right with Jesus! As believers, we need to develop Christ consciousness. When we take our eyes off of Jesus and get suckered into obsessing over our failures, we’re prone to repeating the very behavior we abhor!  Should we confess? Yes, absolutely and immediately! But, afterwards, get your eyes off of yourself and back on your Savior.  Human efforts and determination will fail us, however hard we try to do what’s right. But when we let Jesus reign, we get to rest in His victory!

Hugs,
Shellie