Good Deeds Forgotten

 

Genesis 40: 1-23

Some time later, the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt offended their master, the king of Egypt. Pharaoh was angry with his two officials, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, and put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the same prison where Joseph was confined.

The captain of the guard assigned them to Joseph, and he attended them. After they had been in custody for some time, each of the two men—the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were being held in prison—had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of its own.

When Joseph came to them the next morning, he saw that they were dejected. So he asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why are your faces so sad today?”

We both had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

So the chief cupbearer told Joseph his dream. He said to him, “In my dream I saw a vine in front of me, and on the vine were three branches. As soon as it budded, it blossomed, and its clusters ripened into grapes. Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup and put the cup in his hand.”

“This is what it means,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three days. Within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your position, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you used to do when you were his cupbearer. But when all goes well with you, remember me and show me kindness; mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this prison. For I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing to deserve being put in a dungeon.”

When the chief baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said to Joseph, “I too had a dream: On my head were three baskets of bread. In the top basket were all kinds of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating them out of the basket on my head.”

This is what it means,” Joseph said. “The three baskets are three days. Within three days Pharaoh will lift off your head and hang you on a tree.  And the birds will eat away your flesh.”

Now the third day was Pharaoh’s birthday, and he gave a feast for all his officials. He lifted up the heads of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker in the presence of his officials: He restored the chief cupbearer to his position, so that he once again put the cup into Pharaoh’s hand, but he hanged the chief baker, just as Joseph had said to them in his interpretation.

The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him. – Genesis 40:1-23

Why do we have a hard time forgetting bad things that happen to us?  Researchers believe that the amygdala’s emotional response heightens your sensory awareness, which means you input and encode more effectively.  It is for this reason that traumatic memories are so hard to forget.  Research has discovered that good and bad memories are actually rooted in different parts of the amygdala in separate groups of neurons.  This proves that your mind physically reconstructs good and bad memories differently.

We all forget things sometimes.  It’s also normal to experience some memory loss as we get older.  But if you’re having serious memory issues, it’s important to see a doctor.

What are some examples of serious memory issues?

1. Getting lost in familiar places

2. Forgetting how to say common words

3. Repeatedly asking questions

4. Taking longer to do familiar activities

5. Forgetting names of friends and family

How is forgiveness related to forgetting?  Forgiving is learning to stop being angry and harboring resentment towards someone who has wronged us.  Forgetting, on the other hand, is when we determine to repress what happened and move on.  This highlights that forgiving is the better option in comparison to forgetting as it allows the wronged person to heal completely.

But what about God?  Does He forgive and forget?  How can God forget if He is God?

The LORD is compassionate and gracious,

slow to anger, abounding in love.

He will not always accuse,

nor will He harbor His anger forever;

He does not treat us as our sins deserve

or repay us according to our iniquities.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,

so great is His love for those who fear Him;

as far as the east is from the west,

so far has He removed our transgressions from us. – Psalm 103:8-12

“This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel

after that time,” declares the LORD.

“I will put My law in their minds

and write it on their hearts.

I will be their God,

and they will be My people.

No longer will a man teach his neighbor,

or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’

because they will all know Me,

from the least of them to the greatest,”

declares the LORD.

“For I will forgive their wickedness

and will remember their sins no more.” – Jeremiah 31:33-34

Choosing not to remember is not the same as forgetting.

So I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have. I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body, because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things. – 2 Peter 1:12-15

The following is taken from an audio transcript of an interview with John Piper:

Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. – Philippians 3:13-14

So Paul says, “I forget.  I am not paralyzed by the horrible memories of the fact that I was killing Christians.  I was throwing them in prison.  I was shaking my fist in the face of God.  I am forgetting all of that, and I am pressing on.”

However, Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:11-12:

Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” (that done in the body by the hands of men)—remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. – Ephesians 2:11-12

Well which is it?  Are we supposed to remember what it was like before we were saved?  Are we supposed to remember how horrible that was and what horrible things we did? 

I think what Paul would say is we forget them and we remember them according to what is good for us.  When he says remember them, it is for your humbling, not for your paralysis.  Remember them for your deeper enjoyment of grace, not because of your destruction.

I think it is the same way with God.  God remembers and doesn’t remember.  That is He calls to mind and applies, or He doesn’t call to mind, according to what is good for us and what is good for His glory.

So God is God.  He is omniscient.  He knows everything past, present, and future.  But the “not remembering” is a not calling to mind for our destruction and not calling to mind for anything except what would work for our good or the future good of someone else.

Surely when we are dealing with unbelievers who are engulfed in the same sins that we were before we were saved, we must call to mind our past in order to have compassion on their present bondage of sin, a bondage that was broken for us when we first repented and believed in Christ death on the cross as payment for our sins.

So how does this forgetting and remembering relate to the story of Joseph?  As we read and heard at the beginning of today’s message, Joseph had interpreted two dreams for two of his fellow prisoners.  After the first interpretation he said:

But when all goes well with you, remember me and show me kindness; mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this prison.” – Genesis 40:14 

All went well with the chief cupbearer: The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.  

However, God did not forget Joseph or his condition.  We will see next week how this all worked together for Joseph’s good and the good of his family.

Let’s pray.